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INL specialists left plutonium in their car. In the morning, it was gone
www.idahostatesman.com ^ | July 16, 2018 | By Patrick Malone And R. Jeffrey Smith

Posted on 07/16/2018 1:21:39 PM PDT by Red Badger

Two security experts from the Department of Energy’s Idaho National Laboratory drove to San Antonio, Texas, in March 2017 with a sensitive mission: to retrieve dangerous nuclear materials from a nonprofit research lab there.

Their task was to ensure that the radioactive materials did not fall into the wrong hands on the way back to Idaho, where the government maintains a stockpile of nuclear explosive materials for the military and others.

To ensure they got the right items, the specialists from Idaho brought radiation detectors and small samples of dangerous materials to calibrate them: specifically, a plastic-covered disk of plutonium, a material that can be used to fuel nuclear weapons, and another of cesium, a highly radioactive isotope that could potentially be used in a so-called “dirty” radioactive bomb.

But when they stopped at a Marriott hotel just off Highway 410, in a high-crime neighborhood filled with temp agencies and ranch homes, they left those sensors on the back seat of their rented Ford Expedition. When they awoke the next morning, the window had been smashed and the special valises holding these sensors and nuclear materials had vanished.

More than a year later, state and federal officials don’t know where the plutonium — one of the most valuable and dangerous substances on earth — is. Nor has the cesium been recovered.

(Excerpt) Read more at idahostatesman.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; Government; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: 201703; calibrationsamples; cesium; isolatedincidents; oops; plutonium
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1 posted on 07/16/2018 1:21:39 PM PDT by Red Badger
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To: Red Badger

(Facepalm)...You had ONE job....


2 posted on 07/16/2018 1:26:01 PM PDT by ripnbang ("An armed man is a citizen, an unarmed man, a subject.")
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To: Red Badger

Misleading. Had to read deep down to find out they only lost their source check samples.


3 posted on 07/16/2018 1:27:23 PM PDT by TexasGator (Z1)
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To: Red Badger

They will find it when the perps are found fried. I can hope, can’t I?

This probably is not a big danger since these calibrating samples were probably emitters of very low levels of radiation. It would appear to me that you would want to be able to pick up the slightest of radioactive particulars so there would be no need for more powerful emitters.

Of course my Nuclear Engineering license was revoked last year.


4 posted on 07/16/2018 1:27:30 PM PDT by arrogantsob (See "Chaos and Mayhem" at Amazon.com)
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To: TexasGator

Nothing gets past the Freepiest of the Freepers.


5 posted on 07/16/2018 1:28:35 PM PDT by arrogantsob (See "Chaos and Mayhem" at Amazon.com)
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To: Red Badger

The next day a flashy silver car going just over 80 mph on the local interstate, up and disappeared.

All that was found was a California license plate still spinning...


6 posted on 07/16/2018 1:28:41 PM PDT by DoughtyOne (Take a look out there folks. Can you see evidence of a Left Wing Hate Group, perhaps fascist too?)
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To: Red Badger
Minuscule amounts.

Plutonium used to be regularly used in certain consumer and medical products back in the 60s and 70s.

7 posted on 07/16/2018 1:29:26 PM PDT by Fido969 (In!)
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To: Red Badger

Reminds me of the time I left a doomsday device in the back of my pickup.

Never did find out where that went.


8 posted on 07/16/2018 1:31:44 PM PDT by DannyTN
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To: Red Badger

There are laws and regulations that subjects must follow for the safe handling of radioactive materials. Seems tha they don’t apply to apparatchiks.


9 posted on 07/16/2018 1:32:22 PM PDT by fella ("As it was before Noah so shall it be again,")
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To: DannyTN

This guy has it?................

10 posted on 07/16/2018 1:34:52 PM PDT by Red Badger (July 2018 - the month the world discovered the TRUTH......Q Anon)
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To: Red Badger

Real genius. High crime area, so they leave valises, clearly visible, in the back seat of the car, overnight. Heaven forbid they exert themselves and carry them inside the hotel. Brilliant. I’ll bet they were shocked to find the car had been broken into. Probably got a promotion.


11 posted on 07/16/2018 1:35:54 PM PDT by Hoffer Rand (God be greater than the worries in my life, be stronger than the weakness in my mind, be magnified.)
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To: TexasGator

Hopefully they misspelled PU and meant polonium.


12 posted on 07/16/2018 1:36:45 PM PDT by Mouton (The media is the enemy of the people.)
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To: TexasGator

My old Geiger counters had a check sample taped to the side!.............


13 posted on 07/16/2018 1:36:59 PM PDT by Red Badger (July 2018 - the month the world discovered the TRUTH......Q Anon)
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To: Red Badger
I had to have it to build the flux capacitor.


14 posted on 07/16/2018 1:37:15 PM PDT by DeFault User
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To: Red Badger

The “security experts” don’t deserve the title.


15 posted on 07/16/2018 1:41:46 PM PDT by I want the USA back (*slam is a political movement that hides behind the illusion of religion.)
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To: DeFault User

Were the irresponsible bum federal “workers” fired? Probably, they got some sort of bonus.


16 posted on 07/16/2018 1:42:53 PM PDT by hal ogen (First Amendment or Reeducation Camp?)
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To: I want the USA back

Well, they learned a lot about security that night...................


17 posted on 07/16/2018 1:44:15 PM PDT by Red Badger (July 2018 - the month the world discovered the TRUTH......Q Anon)
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To: arrogantsob

Radioactive or not, plutonium is also a deadly poison.


18 posted on 07/16/2018 1:49:58 PM PDT by Little Ray (Freedom Before Security!)
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To: Red Badger

Well, they didn’t profile the neighborhood where they stayed.


19 posted on 07/16/2018 1:50:03 PM PDT by alternatives? (Why have an army if there are no borders?)
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To: alternatives?

They didn’t stay in a Holiday Inn Express, either..............


20 posted on 07/16/2018 1:51:46 PM PDT by Red Badger (July 2018 - the month the world discovered the TRUTH......Q Anon)
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