Mexican Radioactive Material Theft

[tw]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

A half life of 5.27 years is quite enough to make clean up very difficult.

Difficult is a 'dirty' bomb with plutonium that has a half life of thousands of years and other complicating problems.

[xoxoxoBruce]

When a cloud of the shit spreads across a city, then everyone has to get out while everything is cleaned. Rooves, facades, interiors (where it's been tracked in or the windows were open), storm drains, sewers, utility tunnels, vehicles, garbage cans, everything. That takes time, costs are astronomical, society/business totally disrupted... that's a disaster.

[tw]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

That takes time, costs are astronomical, society/business totally disrupted... that's a disaster.

Cobalt is relatively easy to collect by various methods that include halogens and bacteria. However this particular form is no longer used in most medical facilities due to a few safety problems. The most difficult being that this radioactive material can create a dust cloud. The theft created a new problem: people exposed to a radioactive material without knowing it.

Its been sitting for a week in a field where it was discovered. No rush since the threat does not easily spread. Cobalt 60 is mostly a danger to people adjacent to it. A path is being constructed for a robot to recover it.

Cobalt is not nearly the danger created by three exploding nuclear power plants or what is really a concern - a plutonium 'dirty' bomb. Since plutonium does create a serious dust cloud, is not easily recovered, and has a half life of thousands of year.

Fears of plutonium are why nuclear fuels are only reprocessed in few locations and not in the US. Radioactive cobalt does not create same extreme fears, is not an 11 September disaster, but must be respected. It would create a small contaminated area - not an 11 September disaster. Now that its location is known, a major threat (people not knowing it is there) has been eliminated.