Missing radioactive capsule found in WA outback after frantic search

This company seems reckless. A few years ago they also damaged a 50,000 year-old structure used by Indigenous Peoples.

“Literally” has been abused for emphasis for centuries, apparently:

… yet the wretch, absorbed in his victuals, and naturally of an unutterable dullness, did not make a single remark during dinner, whereas I literally blazed with wit. - William Makepeace Thackeray, Punch, 30 Oct. 1847

- "lead to the opposite effect in such a case, namely hiding the fact that they lost the capsule."

If you think about it, the impact's more pervasive and serious than that. Even simply saying, "hey, isn't there a potential issue with this bolt" shifts the appearance of blame on the person who's asking. When something does go wrong, the lawyer-attitude types can point to your words, and say "look: they were aware of possibility X at time Y, and they failed to stop it. They were negligent". "If you raised issue A, why then did you fail to take actions B, C, and D, and document them appropriately? You were negligent". To discuss Issue A is high-friction and risky -- for all values of A.

That's at the core of legal culture: "don't put it in writing"; "don't talk to the opposing counsel"; "don't make public statements unless we vetted them (to be as vague as possible)". Opacity. What aspect of human nature underlies this? It's this: blame is nebulous, and it attaches to whatever's most visible. Guileless honesty is a *hazard* in a culture of suspicion.

Obviously that's the exact opposite of what you want from an engineering culture! You want anyone to be able to raise issues freely, fearlessly.

That's the true cost of a blaming-people culture. You're not merely disincentivizing communication at the very final stage ("cover up the disaster"); you disincentivize all communication about risk, at any time. Anything that places you visibly closer to responsibility is a peril.

I assume the capsule was in some large equipment in a chamber, and the chamber wasn't closed properly, and it rattled its way out, bumped off the truck onto the road, and was kicked to the side either by that truck or some other vehicle.

It may have come accross as I was belittling the seriousness or danger that the capsule poses to those who come into contact with it. That was not my intention.

The capsule is incredibly dangerous to anyones health.

My point was simply that, from my vantage point, the media coverage and attention that this incident has received is out of proportion to the likely impact that it will have (i.e the danger it poses to people on the world stage, or even on the national stage in Australia).

As an example, and again only from my vantage point, the situation with the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power station received less direct news coverage focusing on the dangers it would have posed to the whole European continent than it seems this single capsule is receiving.

Again, not saying the capsule is not a danger to people. Just agreeing that the attention is out of proportions.