[JustSurrounded]

Well, if I read the chart right, 500 millisieverts an hour is not exactly trivial. Looks like 50 mSv is the maximum yearly dose permitted for US radiation workers. So, what, the equivalent of 6-minute cleanup shift? Do I have that right?

[GonzoGOP]

Japan upped the maximum dose for employees from 100 mSv to 250 mSv per year for the duration of the emergency. And you don't show any symptoms until 1000 mSv per year. So you could be in 500 mSv for 30 minutes before you would be maxed out for the year. And you would still be only at a quarter of the dose where you would show symptoms. And they have already announced that they have sent some employees away when they hit their limit so it is being monitored.

Of course the 500 mSv is immediately adjacent to the reactor and that isn't where you would send a person. I mean lets give the guys some commons sense here if their counter spikes that high they are going to fall back to a safer area. They aren't going to stand there for two hours until they start puking their guts out. It makes the cleanup a lot harder, since they have to use trucks with long booms to put the water in, but they are still getting the water in.

Even at the lower doses they are getting based on the front gate numbers published this morning they are going to time out after around two weeks (depending on how many hours per week they work). As I said earlier they are going to need to rotate their crews often and that will complicate things. It takes a couple of days to get a guy up to speed on a construction site, and then after a few more days they are going to lose him for the rest of the year.

[HangnJudge]

500 millisieverts = 5 rads

lowest 1 year dose
associated with carcinogenesis = 10 rads

1 sievert = 100 rads

The units are hard to follow without a program...

[GOPJ]

LOL-Loved the graphic - up until the end:

"I'm sure I've added in lots of mistakes; it's for general education only. If you're basing radiation safety procedures on an internet PRG image and things go wrong, you have no one to blame but yourself."