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Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

nytimes.com

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Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#281

Post by ferrumfist »

triggercut wrote: post #274
BetterGeiger wrote: post #167

Radiation detection is my specialty. This source is Cs-137, few hundred mCi. It's easy to detect within a few seconds at distances of a few tens of meters or more with professional detection equipment if there is direct line of sight. If it was knocked off the road, though, the question will be if it fell into a crack or other such place because then the radiation is somewhat shielded and it would take much more meas…

That's good to know, some useful context: tldr: It's going to take a while The search area is immense. People (even locals) fail to understand the incredibly vast distances. Sure, you can think up a comparison from your own context of a few hundred kms... but does your example have nothing, and I mean, literally nothing manmade but the road infrastructure itself in the proximity of the horizon for sometimes hundreds…

> US or the poorer parts of Europe

Sorry to nitpick, but I've driven across the USA many times and I've never had much to complain about with regards to our roads (outside of Ohio, fuck that state). Doubly so when comparing our road infrastructure to poorer countries.

Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#282

Post by giardini »

Animats wrote: post #135

Here's what gauge sources like this look like.[1] Here are some packed for shipping. bolted to a crate, as described in the NY Times article.[2] The locks are $8 Master Lock combination padlocks, probably just to keep people from opening the things by accident. The lock looks optional on the model in [2]. The lock is on the shutter end, anyway. The cover plate that gives access to the source for replacement is secure…

After seeing this I judge the probability of theft or human error in packaging to be higher than the probability of loss along the route. They should pursue further questioning of all parties involved who were near the items of interest before/during/after transport.

Sometimes extracting this information is not easy b/c jobs/careers depend on it. E.g., did the fellow who packaged the capsule possibly drop it down a toilet accidentally and try to cover up the loss, did the truck veer off course at any time? Did a driver take any unreported stops or side trips (food, whorehouse, supplies, pick up a six-pack, etc.)?

Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#283

Post by Perenti »

bendews wrote: post #248
LatteLazy wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks. I was confused why the NYT didn't include a picture of it for public safety if for no other reason...

NYT does not have any reach in Australia, and especially so with the population that lives around where the capsule was misplaced.

Probably better to say "and no-one lives around where the capsule was misplaced". It _could_ of been lost in a "built up area" (more than 0.1 ppl/sq km) but statistically it's probably where no-one ever goes except wildlife. It's a HUGE area with very very few people in it.

Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#284

Post by giardini »

morpheuskafka wrote: post #243
eternityforest wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't imagine those things are available anywhere for that cheap. Why not require 4g tracking on them all if they're already $1000 items?

The source fell out of the equipment, which somehow broke apart in transit. A detector on the equipment wouldn't help and you can't put a detector on the source itself, it's just a capsule that needs to go inside a certain place in the device.

>...which somehow broke apart in transit...

This is IMO the real puzzle.

Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#285

Post by Perenti »

anakaine wrote: post #89
AlbertCory wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Best reply on this thread. Everything in Australia kills you or at least causes horrible pain. Even that cute platypus or that harmless-looking shell on the beach. And now this.

No moose, bears, wolves, cougars, or other alpha predators in Australia though. About the worst are wild dogs / dingos, though they typically won't be a problem unless they're in a pack. I'll take Australian dangers over North American every day of the week.

Australian who has lived in US here. I met a wild mountain lion once, and it was quite scary, less than 3m away, and fortunately as scared of me as I was of it.

Conversely, I've been bitten by red-back spiders, by a bat, many large lizards and goannas, a 4m python, by a wobbygong shark and by a red-bellied black snake. I encounter many more dangerous critters here in Oz than I did in California. I do kind of bring it on myself though, 'cos of my penchant for picking up snakes and spiders.

And don't forget the Cassowary, a confirmed vegan bird that if startled can disembowel you in one strike. Not only apex predators can kill humans. I wasn't aware moose was an apex predator by the way, although they are plainly dangerous.

Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#287

Post by plugin-baby »

ferrumfist wrote: post #281
triggercut wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's good to know, some useful context: tldr: It's going to take a while The search area is immense. People (even locals) fail to understand the incredibly vast distances. Sure, you can think up a comparison from your own context of a few hundred kms... but does your example have nothing, and I mean, literally nothing manmade but the road infrastructure itself in the proximity of the horizon for sometimes hundreds…

> US or the poorer parts of Europe Sorry to nitpick, but I've driven across the USA many times and I've never had much to complain about with regards to our roads (outside of Ohio, fuck that state). Doubly so when comparing our road infrastructure to poorer countries.

Around San Francisco they’re noticeably worse than the well maintained parts of Europe.

Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#288

Post by LarryMullins »

paranoidrobot wrote: post #265
leaving wrote: post #56

This is mostly a data analysis job. If the capsule is on or very near the road, a single trip from start to finish with a NaI(Tl) or CsI scintillation counter will find it. Every CBRN team in the world has these, so they have obviously completed the first run at this without finding it. The capsule is not on or near the road. Australia is famous for road trains on the Great Northen Highway. They travel fast and heavy…

I know this is just a list of theories. > or because there was a dead kangaroo on the road or something There's few situations where someone might stop for a dead kangaroo, or really any other wildlife. Either because they see it's still alive, or because they're checking to see if it might be a female with live young. If it's clear that it's dead, nobody is going to stop. On a road, in WA, in summer -- yeah you're g…

Do people ever eat roadkill kangaroos? I know it's fairly common for people to eat roadkill deer in America, if they know the kill is fresh.

Re: Australians scour desert for dangerous radioactive capsule smaller than a penny

#290

Post by el_benhameen »

wkat4242 wrote: post #254
el_benhameen wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found a polonium-loaded anti-static brush for photography in a box from my parents’ attic. Scared the shit out of me at first. Called the hazardous waste folks and had a fun chat with a perplexed employee. We finally decided that, as it was from the 70’s, it had long since decayed into harmlessness and was fine to throw away.

Uhhh be careful with that reasoning. Some radioactive isotopes don't decay into stable isotopes but into other radioactive, sometimes more dangerous ones. It can be a whole chain until it reaches a stable element. Not sure about this particular polonium isotope. But don't expect something to be harmless after 10x the half-life per se.

This is a good point and a fair concern. The brushes contain polonium-210, which we confirmed decays to lead-206. So not very good to eat, but not especially scary.
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