Posted on 02/01/2002 10:50:47 AM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
Edited on 04/14/2004 10:04:59 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
An international team of experts has flown to the former Soviet republic of Georgia to try to recover two highly radioactive objects that were found near a mountainous region controlled by Muslim rebels, officials said Thursday.
The objects, cylinders not much larger than a can of string beans, caught the attention of three woodsmen because the snow nearby was melting. The men lugged the surprisingly heavy objects to their campsite for warmth and soon became dizzy and nauseated. A week later, they had radiation burns. All three men are now in a hospital in Tbilisi, Georgia, and one is fighting for his life.
(Excerpt) Read more at ocregister.com ...
I saw a Snap-7 with a charge of Sr90 and its shielding was pretty big, the whole thing was like a fireplug. It put out about 2KW of electricity. I think the shielding was U238.
If the dose rate was hundreds of REM/hr (seems likely from the facts in the story) the stuff probably was not Pu. We played around with thulium RTGs for a while, they'd be hot.
Another possibility is that the cans were Ir192 field radiography sources, removed from their shielding for theft. Half life is only 70 days.
Sometimes Cs137 was used in RTGs, and sometimes used in radiography. Pretty penetrating stuff, between Co and Ir in photon energy, and the halflife is 33 years.
I doubt we will know what the capsules are until they are found. Should be pretty easy if they are that hot!
I assume "somebody" used an aerial radiation survey ... but no details other than that they recovered the reactor.
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