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Grand Canyon Visitors May Have Been Exposed To Radiation For Years (azcentral.com)
joeflies writes: Park safety manager Elston Stephenson provides details about buckets of uranium that exposed visitors to radiation, and the subsequent cover up. The radiation was detected by a teenager that brought a Geiger counter to the building, and was subsequently "cleaned" up by employees equipped with dish washing gloves and a broken mop handle. "If you were in the Museum Collections Building (2C) between the year 2000 and June 18, 2018, you were 'exposed' to uranium by OSHA's definition," Stephenson wrote. "The radiation readings, at first blush, exceeds (sic) the Nuclear Regulatory Commission's safe limits. [...] Identifying who was exposed, and your exposure level, gets tricky and is our next important task." Stephenson said he had repeatedly asked National Park executives to inform the public, but never got a response.
"According to Stephenson, the uranium specimens had been in a basement at park headquarters for decades and were moved to the museum building when it opened, around 2000," reports AZCentral. "One of the buckets was so full that its lid would not close. Stephenson said the containers were stored next to a taxidermy exhibit, where children on tours sometimes stopped for presentations, sitting next to uranium for 30 minutes or more. By his calculation, those children could have received radiation dosages in excess of federal safety standards within three seconds, and adults could have suffered dangerous exposure in less than a half-minute."
"According to Stephenson, the uranium specimens had been in a basement at park headquarters for decades and were moved to the museum building when it opened, around 2000," reports AZCentral. "One of the buckets was so full that its lid would not close. Stephenson said the containers were stored next to a taxidermy exhibit, where children on tours sometimes stopped for presentations, sitting next to uranium for 30 minutes or more. By his calculation, those children could have received radiation dosages in excess of federal safety standards within three seconds, and adults could have suffered dangerous exposure in less than a half-minute."
Unfortunately, there is enough radiation risk ignorance that some people might actually stay away and miss the experience. The headline itself is a great example... here's more news.. WE"VE ALL BEEN EXPOSED TO RADIATION FOR YEARS!
NRC 'limits' are so conservatively low you can get many times that exposure with no real world risk.
"a trend of citizen radiation hunters:" - God no. The last thing we need is morons wandering around with geiger counters clicking away with zero idea of the concepts of Alpha, Beta, Gamma, dosage, background radiation etc.
Anyway what kind of teen walks around with a Geiger counter ? When I was a teen the only thing I walked around with was a semi-permanent erection...
Trans-Uranic elements from U decay actually emit alpha, beta and gamma. You know nothing about this. An unsealed container was accessible by anyone for over 20 years, and one microgram in your lungs is deadly potentially.
You're a moron. Not potentially, you're a moron.
There are actually very few gamma emitters in general. Almost all radioactive decay is alpha and beta. And there are no gamma emitters in U-238 or U-235's decay chains. There are however different isotopes of Uranium that do emit gamma radiation but those usually have to be made in a reactor and can't be made from natural Uranium ore (no matter how much reprocessing you do to it). And Uranium's real hazard is that its poisonous, as in like Arsenic and unlike Thorium which is inert. The radioactivity is just window dressing here. The GP is right, alpha radiation isn't really a hazard as its blocked by clothes and is in sunlight. You can't even write one accurate sentence about this topic, maybe you should stop posting about it and clearly you shouldn't be throwing insults at others when its you are the uninformed and ignorant person here.
"Those that start by burning books, will end by burning men."