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Thieves Who Stole Cobalt-60 Will Soon Be Dead
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "The Washington Post reports that the carjackers who set off international alarm bells by absconding with a truckload of highly radioactive cobalt-60, used in hospital radiotherapy machines, most likely had no idea what they were stealing and will die soon from exposure. The robbery occurred as the cobalt-60 was being driven from a public hospital in the border town of Tijuana to a storage facility in central Mexico. While waiting for daybreak at a gas station in the state of Hidalgo the drivers were jumped by two gunmen who beat them and stole the truck. "I believe, definitely, that the thieves did not know what they had; they were interested in the crane, in the vehicle," says Mardonio Jimenez, a physicist with Mexico's nuclear safety commission. The prospect that material that could be used in a radioactive dirty bomb had gone missing sparked an urgent two-day hunt that concluded when the material, cobalt-60, used in hospital radiotherapy machines, was found along with the stolen Volkswagen truck. The cobalt-60 was found, removed from its casing, in a rural area near the town of Hueypoxtla about 25 miles from where the truck was stolen. Jimenez suspects that curiosity got the better of the thieves and they opened the box. So far the carjackers have not been arrested, but authorities expect they will not live long. "The people who handled it will have severe problems with radiation. They will, without a doubt, die.""
or gain superpowers.
Instant Karma is gonna get ya...
On my lunch bag when I put it in the fridge at work I put
"Strontium-90 - RADIOACTIVE" on one side
The other I put
"LIVE SPECIMEN - BIOHAZZARD"
I nominate these guys for the Darwin award!
You've been watching too much tv
By any chance was it a 1964 Chevy Malibu?
You will be a hit with the TSA.
Geiger-Mueller detectors work on the photoelectric effect. Point source radiation is an inverse square law. You wouldn't detect this stuff even a few miles away. Reactors hardly release any isotopes. It's the thermals that show up on satellites
Here you go: The Goiânia accident.
It wasn't an X-ray machine though, but a device for radiotherapy.
Fortunately, X-ray machines are harmless when powered down.
It's too bad they found that cobalt. If not, they would have lived forever!
Tic-Tac-Toe, Global Thermonuclear War, and relationships all have the same winning move.
ISO 21482 is pretty universal. Doesn't solve any of the nastier issues of cross-cultural-communication-without-shared-assumptions; but either that symbol, the old trefoil, or both, are about as iconic as warning labels get.
Now, as for this 'cobalt 60 in those drug shipments' concept, it might expose the mules (who tend to be low level and treated as expendable anyway) to enough radiation to kill them, slowly; but the major effect would be on the customers: ie. the coke-snorting Americans whining about them. You wouldn't be the first to suggest this... particular approach, the winning the war on drugs; but I bet you'd learn some interesting things about who does drugs once the casualties start to pile up.
They probably don't. They felt nausea after first handling it, then after that passed they felt fine. They will continue to feel fine for maybe one to three days during what is called the "walking ghost" phase, after which their bodies will start shutting down and they die a very messy and painful death.
I bet you'd learn some interesting things about who does drugs once the casualties start to pile up.
Indeed, there have been cops, judges, and prosecuters in the news in Illinois in the last year who were busted for cocaine. There are the mayor of that Canadian city and the ex-mayor of DC. Look at Rush Limbaugh.
I look at "war on drugs" politicians like I look at right wing politicians who constantly decry homosexuality, how many of them have been kicked out of the closet?
I don't know if the GP is an idiot, a troll, or a government shill. He advocates a painful death for drug users? I smoke pot and advocate HIS death. Alcohol, tobacco, and coffee are all addictive drugs. Marijuana is not.
All of society's problems that are attributed to drugs are really problems that stem from the laws against them.
Free Martian Whores!
they have guns right? It's up to them how painful and horrible it is.
it can be quick and painless if they like.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
Shhhhh, here have a bowl.
They will, without a doubt, die...
Or at least 93% of us, since 7% of all humans who have ever existed are alive today.
If the loot starts to glow, just say "No"
In this particular case, and especially given the amount of crime in Mexico, it does not surprise me that the truck would be unmarked. And it doesn't really matter if the cargo is marked: carjackers aren't going to rob you at gunpoint and beat you up then take the time to look at the cargo and see if it is worth stealing. They are just going to drive off. I am surprised that the hospital didn't at least hire a security service to escort the shipment; I would assume even(maybe even especially) in Mexico contractable security services are common. Maybe they just aren't trustworthy or capabale enough?
The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
They stole a truck with no idea of the cargo's value or importance, and probably didn't even care if someone else could die if they stole it. It might have been medical supplies, vaccines, food rations, anything. And if they'd gotten involved in a high speed pursuit they could have killed someone just running away. Not to mention their willingness to threaten deadly force in the act, which would have given the driver grounds to use the same in self defense, even without the cargo being lethal.
Which would itself only increase any self defense fatality in being justified if the thieves had gotten shot.
They jacked a rig, had no concern for the value of human life, and it bit them in the ass. To be blunt, they had it coming.
The fact that the authorities aren't even going to be responsible for punishing them means they have nobody to blame but themselves.
doesnt the danger remain? The total rads you get is not as important is not as important as how you get those rads. If you inhale a particle, your body cannot dispel it and it will mutate your genes and kill you with cancer. Even minimal radiation, if constantly directed at you by an internalized particle will still kill you.
Goiana was Cesium-137.
There have been several incidents with Cobalt-60 sources, including one in 2010 in Dehli, India, and another in 2000, in Thailand. And in some cases, the radioactive material has ended up being recycled into new products; for example - incidents which actually happened: water-dishes for pets, and belt-buckles sold from discount websites. In these cases, the radioactivity was detected by random spot-checks. There are probably products out there that have incorporated recycled radioactive substances, which made it through spot-checks and are sitting in people's homes, making them sick - and there is no way for us to know.
With regard to the cobalt 60 source: Wikipedia says it was 111 Tbq.
"Example: a 60Co source with an activity of 2.8 GBq, which is equivalent to 60 g of pure 60Co, generates a dose of 1 mSv at one meter distance within one hour."
A 1 Sv dose in 1 hour, is lethal.
Extrapolating 111 TBq to 2.8 GBq; (111,000/2.8 = 39,642 ...); so multiply 1 mSv by that, and you get 39.6 Sv per hour.
If they took it out of it's casing, they'd receive a lethal dose of radiation in less than 2 minutes. (depending on how close they stayed, and how long they stayed near it). Staying at least 400 cm away, would mitigate much of the beta particles, but not the gamma rays. Gamma rays are attenuated by the inverse square law, like any radiant energy. So distance is also your friend, but better still, an inch or so of lead.
They would not start feeling symptoms, until an hour or two later. Dizzyness, headache, nausea, vomiting. Later - worse symptoms appear. It will probably take a few days for them to die, and they may seek medical treatment, which may save them, depending on how long they were in close proximity to the unshielded source.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
> better still, an inch or so of lead.
depends. An old friend worked with medical radio-iodine, which emits high energy gammas. Part of her job was introducing new medical staff to the procedures. She would bring in the standard lead drapes and a Geiger counter and ask them all if they understood radiation precautions. They would of course say yes; she was just a little old lady (her own description), after all, and they were Doctors and Nurses.
She'd hold up the Geiger counter near the patient who had taken the radio-iodine dose, and the Geiger counter would click away steadily.
Then she'd put the lead drape in between patient and Geiger counter -- and the counter would roar.
Then she'd smile and say:
"... I know you all understand secondary radiation, and how gamma rays mostly go straight through tissue like you and me without interacting, but if they hit a really dense material like these lead drapes, they knock off a huge number of electrons that become charged particles that will interact far more readily with tissue, that's one of the reasons we call it ionizing radiation.
"So who wants a drape?"