[ RadSafe ] Chernobyl haunts the Norwegian uplands

Mon Oct 30 22:33:00 CST 2006

The booklet titled " Wholebody counters(1964) in "The understanding the atom series" of the USAEC contains interesting details of the measurement of Cs-137 content in Swedes and Norwegians caaried out by Dr Liden at the University of Lund. Cs-137 originated from fallout from atmospheric weapon testing. C E Millier and Marinelli identified Cs-137 in human body for the first time in 1955.

It is worthwhile to collect data from the Chernobyl fallout; the way nuclear reactors are designed now with admirable safety features, there may never be another Chernobyl!!

Regards
K.S.Parthasarathy

----- Original Message ----
From: Dan W McCarn <hotgreenchile at gmail.com>
To: Raymond A Hoover <ray2hoover at yahoo.com>; edmond0033 <edmond0033 at comcast.net>; ROY HERREN <royherren2005 at yahoo.com>; radsafe at radlab.nl
Sent: Tuesday, 31 October, 2006 7:21:06 AM
Subject: RE: [ RadSafe ] Chernobyl haunts the Norwegian uplands

That's my recollection as well (Chernobyl-related).  I think it was the
Finns or Norwegians who discovered the cloud of high-level of radioactive
material 3 days or so after Chernobyl.  This was while I was at the IAEA and
it caused quite a stir among my Soviet colleagues. 

Dan ii

Dan W McCarn, Geologist
Houston & Albuquerque 

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On Behalf
Of Raymond A Hoover
Sent: Monday, October 30, 2006 16:28
To: edmond0033; ROY HERREN; radsafe at radlab.nl
Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] Chernobyl haunts the Norwegian uplands

Most of those area were in the path of the cloud that originated from
Chernobyl.  For a while the Finns were thinking of banning the eating of
caribou (raindeer??) due to the high levels of Cs-137 in the meat.

  Back at that time the approximate concentration of Cs-137 in undisturbed
soil due to fallout was less than about 1 pCi/g, assuming I remember
correctly of course.  That low a concentration would have been overwhelmed
by the Chernobyl fallout in those regions.

  The average resident of Kiev had a body burden of roughly 2200 Bq around
1999 (this from Dr. Perevashnikov of the Ukrain Institue of Radiation Safety
who was doing the measurements).

edmond0033 <edmond0033 at comcast.net> wrote:
  I seem to recall that most of the Cesium-137 in the northern areas of
Europe 
(Laplands) (including Alaska and Northern Canada) was from the above ground 
weapons testing performed by the Soviet Union and the United States in the 
late 50's and early 60's. One can still find Stronium-90 and Cesium-137 in 
'bones' of cattle and tree ash. A litle more than one half life has pasted 
since then, so that they will be still in the soil and ground covering 
vegetation. It will take several more half-lives before meat from these 
animals will be safe. Has anyone thought of 'whole body counting' the 
inhabitants to see what their uptake is especially the younger ones?

Just a thought!!

Ed Baratta
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "ROY HERREN" 
To: 
Sent: Sunday, October 29, 2006 4:13 PM
Subject: [ RadSafe ] Chernobyl haunts the Norwegian uplands

>
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn10393-chernobyl-haunts-the-norwegian-u
plands.html
>
> Chernobyl haunts the Norwegian uplands
> 12:00 28 October 2006
> From New Scientist Print Edition.
> Tougher controls on the slaughter of sheep have been imposed in Norway 
> after they were found to be contaminated with unusually high levels of 
> radioactivity from the Chernobyl disaster in 1986.
> The Norwegian Radiation Protection Authority (NRPA) says the problem has 
> arisen because the sheep have feasted on an unusually large crop of 
> mushrooms, which were more plentiful than usual because of wet weather. 
> Previous research has shown that fungi take up more radioactivity from the

> soil than grasses or other plants.
> There are 36 areas of upland Norway where Chernobyl contamination still 
> requires controls on sheep. According to the NRPA, levels of caesium-137 
> from the Chernobyl disaster reached 7000 becquerels per kilogram in sheep 
> this year, more than twice maximum levels in previous years.
> Farmers can reduce the level of radioactivity in sheep by giving them 
> non-contaminated food for a month before slaughter. For some farmers, this

> period will now have to be doubled to reduce caesium-137 levels to below 
> Norway's safety limit of 600 bq/kg.
> Per Strand, the NRPA's head of environmental radioactivity, stresses that 
> the precautions mean that lamb on the market is safe to eat. He says, 
> though, that the discovery of such high levels of radioactivity so long 
> after the Chernobyl accident came as a surprise.
> "No one at the time expected contamination to be so high more than 20 
> years after the event," he says.
>
>
> Roy Herren
>
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