AW: RE: [ RadSafe ] Enriched uranium incident a.. Uranium in India

[parthasarathy k s]

Friends,

In India, we had a few newsstories related to uranium, some of them led to serious dicussion in the media.All except two cases finally turned out to be depleted uranium in the form of shielding from old medical equipment such as linear accelerators and cobalt-60 machines;later the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board initiated a procedure to keep track of such material.

In one instance, a hospital in Mumbai imported used medical accelerators (available cheap in som countries). They decided  not to install them possibly because of stringent regulatory requirements. They did not know that their equipment contained DU. ( Some models of accelerators contain about 125 kg of DU). They sold it as scrap. The buyers were impressed by the weight of a few pieces on which there were clear inscriptions stating that they are made up of DU. The problem started when they tried to sell it clandestinely Police who shadowed them arrested them.

To many, any material ending with "ium" is radioactive and dangerous!. Police got the material analyzed. The story got more coverage in the media as the" thieves" were arrested near  Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC), the premier nuclear reearch labs in India.Press went to town with the idea that the uranium must have come from BARC. Police hoped to get some mileage; but were disheartened when the mateial turned out to be after all not that harmful!

A local TV channel aired the story several times, I  was interviewed on two occasions. The reporter was very unhappy when her story turned out to be  less spicy!

On another occasion, a person was arrested for trying to sell some metallic powder which contained some traces of uranium. The amount was too trivial but the fact that the sample containd a few ppm of uranium gave the story some news value. Again the police was not amused when they were told that any material may contain some uranium!

Stories on illicit trafficking of radioactive material/uranium have very interesting possibilities!

Regards

  K.S.Parthasarathy Ph.D
  (Formerly, Secretary, Atomic Energy Regulatory Board, India)
Raja Ramanna Fellow
  Strategic Planning Group
  Board of Research in Nuclear Sciences
  Department of Atomic Energy
  GN 18, Vikram Sarabhai Bhavan
  Mumbai 400094, INDIA
   
  91+22 25555327 (O)
  91+22 2 5486081(O)
  91+22 2 7706048(R)
  9869016206 ( Mobile)
   
  



Franz Schönhofer <franz.schoenhofer at chello.at> wrote: Dear Dan,

Thank you for your well founded message on this topic! You remind me that I
had intended to contact you for a long time, especially because of your
"leoben" e-mail address which was surprising. I may ask you to forgive me
for not having done it until now, but my excuses are: I have been last year
away from Vienna for more than half of the year, mostly in Poland, but as
well in Lithuania, in Oxford, at NPL in London, Bratislava and most recently
in Lund, Sweden. Another excuse is that just before the turn of the year my
computer refused to follow my commands and a very large number of data,
including RADSAFE-messages was lost. 

Believe me, I burst into laughter, when I read that you did not consult
"Kronen-Zeitung"! This is a proof of your knowledge about Austria! I have
not time enough to follow the most "important" newspapers, but I sometimes
question the scientific credibility of both "Presse" and "Standard", because
they usually simply reprint what has come in from press agencies. 

Regarding the probability of the story being correct: Maybe the attempt of
somebody to sell "nuclear grade uranium" has a 5% of being correct. The
probability that those 100 g or whatsoever were really nuclear grade, not to
talk about the chemical form, because metallic uranium is pyrophore and will
incinerate on contact with air have to be questioned!!!!! The story is
getting into more and more unbelievable speculations and therefore it should
be regarded more than 90% as unconfirmed speculations.

On a personal question I will contact you separately.

Best wishes,

Franz  

Franz Schoenhofer, PhD
MinRat i.R.
Habicherg. 31/7
A-1160 Wien/Vienna
AUSTRIA


-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: Dan W McCarn [mailto:hotgreenchile at gmail.com] 
Gesendet: Samstag, 27. Jänner 2007 19:51
An: 'Franz Schönhofer'
Cc: radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: [Norton AntiSpam] RE: [ RadSafe ] Enriched uranium incident a ploy
-news article

Lieber Franz, Stewart, RADSAFErs:

OK! Here's the skeptic in me!  I once tracked these types of stories in
detail, and found that the media almost always had it wrong.  There was an
article some years back about an Indian smuggling operation of so called
"weapons grade" material that was being hidden in "Yellow Cakes" to cross
the border.  I laughed so hard that I cried!

In the event that there are a couple of you on the list that doesn't know
what "yellowcake" is, then perhaps you should find another occupation.

For a period of one year while in Leoben (that's in Austria, by the way), I
followed in detail all environmental and nuclear stories in 6 newspapers in
Europe including: Deutche Zeitung, Die Presse, Der Standard, Süddeutche
Zeitung, Neue Zürcher Zeitung, and the Herald Tribune. (Note to Franz: I did
not include the Kronen Zeitung!) Only the Zürcher had systematically
accurate initial reports, and their retractions of incorrect stories were
easy to find.  I cannot say that for any of the other papers who were
clearly driving an editorial agenda and bias.

I'm not saying that the report from Georgia is wrong, but I have no way to
"verify" the report.  From past experience, I'd give it a 5% chance or less
of being materially correct.  Unfortunately, that 5% could potentially kill.

Dan ii

Dan W McCarn, Geologist
Houston & Albuquerque 
(Formerly Vienna and Leoben)

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On Behalf
Of Franz Schönhofer
Sent: Saturday, January 27, 2007 11:51
To: 'stewart farber'; radsafe at radlab.nl
Subject: AW: [ RadSafe ] Enriched uranium incident a ploy -news article

Stewart, RADSAFErs,

There was a message one or a few days ago, which cited a story published at
"The Independent". Unfortunately I have already deleted this message. What I
remember is, that the headline spoke about a sale of weapons grade uranium,
suitable to build a few nuclear bombs. Further down in the article there
were 100 gramm (?, anyway metric!!!!!!!!!!) mentioned and the claim of the
"seller", that this was only a sample and that he had some kilos (?, again
metric) more in his flat. Nothing was mentioned about whether police found
anything in his flat, so I suppose there was nothing else there. From all my
knowledge (!), you cannot build several nuclear bombs from 100 g of weapons
grade uranium, whatever this might be. Even the sample was not sold and the
prospective seller obviously arrested. 

I do not know about the reputaton of "The Independent", but this message is
in line with all the incredible nonsense and speculations about Litwinenkows
dead in Austrian newspapers - no real information, speculations which could
be a source for a Hollywood Spy Movie. 

I would not be surprised if these news-releases were deliberately
manipulated like so much in this field. 

Official information about seizing of nuclear material can be found at the
IAEA web-site. 

Best regards,

Franz 

Franz Schoenhofer, PhD
MinRat i.R.
Habicherg. 31/7
A-1160 Wien/Vienna
AUSTRIA


-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----
Von: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] Im Auftrag
von stewart farber
Gesendet: Samstag, 27. Jänner 2007 17:26
An: radsafe at radlab.nl
Betreff: [ RadSafe ] Enriched uranium incident a ploy -news article

See:
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/asection/la-fg-sting27jan27,1,62434
93.story?coll=la-news-a_section

Interesting story from LA Times about the alleged Georgian middleman
involved in offering a few ounces of highly enriched U to agents for
security agencies in a sting operation.

NPR ran a sensationalistic story yesterday afternoon about this incident
--never stating that the amount in this former sausage broker's possession
was far below the amount of 5 pounds to 20 pounds of enriched U that would
be necessary for some group of terrorists to fabricate a nuclear weapon.

Stewart Farber, MS Public Health
Consulting Scientist
Farber Technical Services
1285 Wood Ave.
Bridgeport, CT 06604
[203] 444-8433 [office]
[203] 522-2817 [cell]
email: radproject at sbcglobal.net
          


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