Radiation Cloud

Thanks Mike for doing what our goverment didn't do, give us real time reading and not a bunch of BS.

Nothing (yet) here in Italy, at least not in beta and gamma (i don't have a working alpha detector, at the moment), but you can never say ..... radiations cannot just be "washed away" (nor "dissipated", as some idiotic CNN speaker said ) ..... and metereology is anything, except an exact science, in matter of long-time previsions .....

Hey Mike..
Thanks for giving us some of your results..
I'd like to take some readings up here...
Did you take your readings outside or inside??

Jerry

RA_pierce said:

@benm
However, It would be nice to see some facts to back up the "Don't worry," since there is a possibility of real danger should the situation get worse.

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As far as i've seen, the information we get is all they can feasible know at the moment. There is just no way to see what is going on inside the core of a damaged reactor, you only see temperature and pressure readings.

The 'real' danger is also impossible to predict, since it will be something between 'nothing to worry about' and 'complete meltdown'. In the latter scenario there will be release of radioactive materials into the environment, but nothing like the chernobyl disaster.

The current situation is that the main nuclear reaction that normally provides power has been stopped (it was stopped before the tsunami). The current activity is due to remaining fission products in the fuel bundle, not from the actual fission of uranium. Depending on the age of the fuel elements this still produces quite a lot of heat, and that is the problem: Cooling is required to prevent the fuel bundle from melting due to its own activity.

Without, the fuel rods will melt, pool up on the bottom of the inner vessel, and possible melt through. Theoretically this melt can continue though the secondary container and the concrete floor. After that, it will end up in the ground, polluting ground water, releasing radioactive vapours - the china syndrome (or in japan, it would be whatever is on the other sde of the planet from their perspective).

There are plenty of data and local readings here: Timeline of the Fukushima nuclear accidents - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Here is a live webcam of a geiger counter in Tokyo: 放射線測定　æ�±äº¬ãƒ»ç‹›æ±Ÿ on USTREAM: æ�±äº¬éƒ½ç‹›æ±Ÿå¸‚ã�®æ”¾å°„線測定をライブé…�ä¿¡ã�—ã�¾ã�™ã€‚測定器ã�¯RadexRD1503。å*´æ‰€ã�¯æœ¨é€*家屋内。測定上é™�ã�Œ9.99μSv/hã�¨ä½Žã�„ã�®ã�§ã�”注æ„�ã��ã�*ã�•ã�„。. ...
(In case it's offline, it read 0,17 microsieverts/hr when I posted)

Hemlock_Mike said:

If 4 PicoCuries of Radon is dangerous

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The potassium that is naturally regulated by your body is over a hundred times that.

"A radiation dose equivalent of 100 μSv (10 mrem, or 1,000 BED) increases an average adult human's risk of death by about one micromort – the same risk as eating 40 tablespoons of peanut butter, or of smoking 1.4 cigarettes."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_equivalent_dose#cite_note-6

wow Mike, good job on providing this information. It is always nice to hear reliable information outside of the news. I understand there is no reason to panic but it seems to me that Japanese officials are trying to downplay the seriousness of the reactor problems. The news in the past month has been 10x more exciting.

On that geiger counter: Its currenlty reading 0.14 uSv/hr, which is normal background really, it amounts to less than 2 mSv/year which is the normal average dose.

I've heard in the news that right next to the reactor measurements up to 400 mSv/hr have been taken, which is problematic since even a radiological worker would only be allowed to work for 3 minutes to collect the annual safe dose of 20 mSv.

I think the japanese are handling things extremely well considering the extreme disaster that hit the country. Lets just hope they will be able to keep some level of cooling going in reactors 1 to 3. The good thing is that the fuel in the core will become less radioactive quite quickly, since the fastest splitting isotopes provide most of the heat.

They will probably have to keep cooling the destroyed reactors for years, at an ever decreasing level... after that they can be decommisioned. As they were fairly old reactors, i suspect this was already planned somewhere in the next decade.

Readings for 3/19/11:
I use a geiger counter pointed toward the sky at about the same time every night. I take a 10 minute reading, wait 20 minutes and repeat the test.

Tonight I got 11.3 and 11.9 C/M over the 10 minute runs. Same as last night.

I'm hoping there are a few with geiger counters who can contribute data for their area. The world is a BIG place.

HMike

I have been interested with radiation for quite a while and I was wondering what the best decent priced geiger counter is? also how sensative are they?

I ask Because I have a couple pieces of uranium ore I would like to test as well as ~25 lbs of thorium doped tungsten I would also like to test.

More on topic, Ive lived through chernobyl (in Canada) as well when I was a kid had agent orange run down my back many times. If I'm not dead yet I am not at all worried even if it goes into full meltdown (for my safety). I cant speak for all the people near by though. For them I really do hope they sort this out quickly.

Also I forgot to mention, A guy on another forum I frequent knows some guys over there monitoring and here's a quote from him "Also, US Military personal I know working there monitoring radiation themselves and at the plant site itself, the highest readings are right in line with what the Tokyo Power Company is reporting."

lpstealth said:

I have been interested with radiation for quite a while and I was wondering what the best decent priced geiger counter is? also how sensative are they?

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They aren't that expensive, probably in the $100 to $200 range for a basic model. Usually they can only detect beta and gamma radiation, but some models can also detect alpha particles.

Sensitivity varies with the size of the detector tube (and for gamma, the density of the gas in it). I don't think there are very big differences between models, and they are pretty sensitive: If you have a jar of potassium chloride you can easily count its activity.

I have 2 counters but the one I use here is an old Heathkit unit. The GM tube does seem to "see" alpha radiation from Am241 chips.

Anyhow --- 3/20/11
12.7 and 14.1 Counts per minute. A wide spread but that's science for you. This is a bit higher than the last two nights and unexpected because of rain last night and misting conditions today.

HMike

You may be seeing secondary effects of the alpha radiation though - alpha particles hitting matter, even the enclosure of the meter, often produce gamma and or beta radiation that is readable with such counters.

Thanks for the update Mike! Edit: don't know what the situation at the reactors is a the moment, due to conflicting news reports.

Mike, if there is some radiation in Air you can only hope it does not start raining. The rain will "wash" the air but now you have that crap on the ground. And once there it stays for long time. Pray for a wind not for rain.
Be sure. Until the japanese gouverment says yes it happend some bad things but we can handle it, you can be sure the problem is ten times bigger.
I hope your Geiger counter becomes not more busy.
Do you know what is going on in Hawaii ? Do they have biger problems with radiation?