“You mean like the last time Tepco intentionally released much stronger radiation and they failed to tell any of the workers besides the handful that manipulated the valve open ?”
Well, yes. Apparently some or all of those workers not informed of the venting of radioactive fumes were not wearing dosimeters.
From what I’ve read TEPCO is having problems with getting enough dosimeters due to losses from the tsunami. From my limited experience film badges are cheap, but pose the problem of time to develop the film and transmit the information contained. But they were light, low-profile and permanent.
In my era “pencil dosimeters” were the standard for high-rad areas as they provided the user ability to read total dose/exposure at will. But I’ll also note they had drawbacks, too. They were bulky/heavy and location-sensitive. Wearing them where they did the most good, (i.e. gave the best readings of exposure) meant they were vulnerable to being bumped or snagged as workers performed physical tasks. “Bumping” was particularly troublesome as they were static charged and a good “bump” would reset them or knock them off calibration. Hence workers (myself included), were prone to taping them to their backs, or into pockets which pretty much degraded the information they recorded. Wlhen working on a complex assembly the loss of a dosimeter among those performing the work pretty much meant dissassembly and inspection which increased the “dose” for everyone.....Not to mention the reports/interviews/”splanations” it entailed...... >PS