Marines inside tunnels facing radiation risk

Daily Sentinal (Grand Junction, CO) ^ | 4-11-03 | GARY HARMON

[Prince Charles]

04.11.03

Marines inside tunnels facing radiation risk

By GARY HARMON, The Daily Sentinel

 U.S. Marines searching through a labyrinthine underground nuclear facility in Iraq face dangers similar, though more extreme, to those that claimed the lives of many American uranium miners.

 Much as miners 40 years ago dug unventilated "dogholes" into the reddish sandstones of the West, soldiers now are picking their way through underground tunnels below Tuwaitha complex of the Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission south of Baghdad.

 Officials on Thursday were investigating the discovery of laboratories and warehouses below the complex and there were reports that weapons-grade plutonium might have been stored there.

 Some tests revealed deadly radioactive residue in the tunnels, posing the possibility that nuclear materials might have been left as a booby trap to harm advancing American troops.

 Today's soldiers, however, have the advantage of protections never envisioned by the miners.

 The chemical suits they carry could provide substantial protection from even weapons-grade plutonium by preventing direct contact with radioactive material, as well as providing protection against breathing in oxidized metals, said Dr. Terry Coons, senior scientist at the Saccomanno Research Institute.

 Plutonium outside the body poses little threat, Coons said, but once inhaled is "significantly more dangerous."

 That doesn't necessarily mean that exposure would kill immediately. In fact, the more likely scenario is that people exposed to weapons-grade plutonium would be markedly more likely to develop lung cancer or other diseases related to radiation exposure, said Dr. Craig Little, an environmental-science consultant from Grand Junction.

 Reports of the discovery of many drums of highly radioactive material are almost certainly not of weapons-grade plutonium, however. Plutonium is an alpha-ray emitter, while uranium is a gamma-ray emitter. Both pose threats to unprotected people in closed spaces.

 The drums of radioactive material also could be perfectly legitimate under U.N. constraints against chemical, biological and nuclear weapons.

 Weapons-grade plutonium is a metal that has to be kept in a controlled environment, Little said. "It oxidizes at room temperature. if you were to lay it down on a desk top, it would burn," filling the area with dangerous particles.

 While there would be no immediate health effect, he said, the psychological effect could be serious.

 The fear of radiation in such exposure could well result in more immediate harm than actual immediate effects of radiation exposure.

 It was only late in the United States' development of radioactive weapons programs that Congress recognized a connection between afflictions such as lung cancer and radiation exposure and offered compassionate payments to workers who labored without warning.

[jimtorr]

While there would be no immediate health effect, he said, the psychological effect could be serious.

Sheesh, another hand-wringing worrier.

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[HiTech RedNeck]

Plutonium is just about the most toxic thing in the world.

[Wonder Warthog]

"Plutonium is just about the most toxic thing in the world."

NOT! Many chemicals and biologicals are far more toxic. The ONLY siginificant "health effect" that plutonium has is that if you manage to get a properly sized particle inhaled into your lung(s), the high specific dose to the lung tissue is extremely likely to cause lung cancer. As a chemical, plutonium is not that different from uranium and other heavy metals.

The "most toxic material on the planet" C**P is right out of the anti-nuclear left's propaganda mill. Why are you helping spread their propaganda??

[Lessismore]

Little said. "It oxidizes at room temperature. if you were to lay it down on a desk top, it would burn," filling the area with dangerous particles.

BS

"Large pieces of plutonium metal react slowly with the oxygen in air at room temperature to form plutonium oxides."

http://tis.eh.doe.gov/techstds/standard/hdbk1081/hbk1081d.html#ZZ25

[HiTech RedNeck]

Well of course the problem is not its chemical properties, but its radiological properties. Plutonium would make one very scary dirty bomb.

[Windcatcher]

For making a dirty bomb, there are other materials that (I think) have far higher Curie levels. Polonium and Americinium (sp?) immeidately come to mind. Of course, half-life might be an issue, since one that's too short would render the material useless rather quickly. (I worked as a TA in the radioactives lab in grad school, but we never messed with anything hotter than Co-60 and Cs-137, which are on the order of microcuries).

The only reason to acquire *weapons-grade* Pu, IMHO, is to make a fission bomb. You need far less Pu than U-235/238 (in terms of mass). Fox reported that one needed about a half-pound of Pu vs. 22kg of U.

From what I remember, it should be child's play to tell whether a sample is Pu vs. something else. A mass-density check and a gamma count should be all that's required. Gamma-counds are pretty well-defined for most radioactive materials, and checking its density should be the clincher.

[Wonder Warthog]

"For making a dirty bomb, there are other materials that (I think) have far higher Curie levels. Polonium and Americinium (sp?) immeidately come to mind."

Cobalt-60 (or other high intensity gamma emitter)would worry me far more than Plutonium, Polonium and Americium (all alpha emitters). A Plutonium dirty bomb's radiological effects would be minimal (the fraction of mass converted into the respirable particle size range likely to cause lung cancer would be tiny), and the alpha radiation easily shielded during cleanup. The only REAL bad effect from use of plutonium would be psychological, due to the fear factor enhanced by the propaganda about plutonium spread by the anti-nukes.

[BillM]

That would be Alpha particles, not rays. The author is not familiar with the subject.