Report: Nearly 150 plant workers tested positive for drugs (at nuclear power plants)

Times Leader (Wilkes-Barre, PA) ^ | 11/14/2003

[dakine]

Wonder what test they used?

[stuartcr]

Would that mean then, that many people can use drugs...and still perform normally at their jobs?

[friendly]

Homer was found with massive blood levels of illicit donut dough.

[OXENinFLA]

[ClintonBeGone]

Boot 'em. This is too serious an area to be breaking the rules (and the law).

[snopercod]

Suppose a person consumed two glasses of wine with supper. What level percentage of alcohol would be present in the blood 8 hours later?

[Wonder Warthog]

"Wonder what test they used?"

Probably GC-MS (gas-chromatography coupled to a mass spectrometer). Wet-chemical tests can be used for coarse screening, but any positives that show up are typically re-tested by GC-MS to eliminate "false positives".

[snopercod]

As a former nuclear power plant worker, I want everybody here to understand that these tests are used for punishment.

If the boss doesn't like you, you will have to pee in a bottle or have your blood drawn every week. Word will get around that you are a "suspected drug user" and the management is watching you.

If you are a good little syncophant, you will only have to take the test once a year or so.

[friendly]

DOH!

[dakine]

Thanks, I've searching for good oral-tests that are better then the 85% accuracy now available, the need for immediate test results is huge in industry now a days....

[snopercod]

So then one would have to be drinking (or using cough syrup) on the job to produce a .04 level?

[glock rocks]

or had a whole bottle of whiskey for dinner.

[Vaduz]

NONE

[snopercod]

From Fast Eddie's 8/10 Method of Hand Calculating Blood Alcohol Concentration

Widmark called the hourly decrease in BAC his Widmark ß (beta) Factor. It's widely agreed now that normal humans metabolize, or burn off, EtOH at a rate of 0.010% to 0.024% per hour, with an average ß factor of 0.017% per hour.

[ClintonBeGone]

Suppose a person consumed two glasses of wine with supper. What level percentage of alcohol would be present in the blood 8 hours later?

I'm not an expert, but I would guess probably none. Why?

[tbpiper]

Would that mean then, that many people can use drugs...and still perform normally at their jobs?

Performing normally is not the key issue, it's how they would perform under adverse circumstances,i.e., emergencies. 'Dooood! whazzt ringin' noise?', is not want to here when the reactor farts. Many people can drive drunk as long as they are not required to react precisely.

[stuartcr]

It seems though, that if the only way to tell if someone is using drugs is after the fact via a urine test, that there are/were a lot of people in both everyday, and emergency situations, that were using drugs. It would seem that the 'dood...' analogy isn't really valid.

[New Horizon]

Let me interject and assume that snopercod may actually consume two glasses of wine with supper.