[ RadSafe ] School Becquerel kits

Wed Apr 23 12:16:30 CDT 2008

Dan - 

Thanks for sharing your story - Your early exposure to the School
Becquerel Kits certainly was a great stimulus, but I imagine someone
with the curiosity, tenacity, and ingenuity you describe would have been
inspired by almost anything.

Qualities you come by honestly, not every Mom would be comfortable
transporting liquid nitrogen!

Life is short - Break the rules!  Forgive quickly!  Kiss slowly!  Love
truly! Laugh uncontrollably!... And never regret anything that made you
smile.

 <file:///C:\helen's%20documents\Signature%20graphics\hel-2.JPG>
<file:///C:\Program%20Files\Common%20Files\Microsoft%20Shared\Stationery
\fieruled.gif> 

helen Bailly

Radiation Dosimetry Records Unit

CFA-690                  

Mail Stop 4147

(208) 526-5261

 P please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to.

This message and any attachments are covered by the Electronic
Communications Privacy Act, 18 U.S.C.  2510-2521, and are solely
intended for the specified recipient and may contain confidential or
privileged information.  This information is confidential.  If you are
not the intended authorized recipient of this information, you are
hereby notified that you have received this document in error and that
any review, dissemination, copying, or the taking of any action based
on the contents of this information is strictly prohibited.  If you have
received this communication in error, please notify the sender
immediately by e-mail, and permanently delete the original message.

<file:///C:\helen's%20documents\DOSIMETRY\confidential%20mood%20stamp.jp
g> 

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl [mailto:radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl] On
Behalf Of Dan W McCarn
Sent: Wednesday, April 23, 2008 9:22 AM
To: 'Min Sook Kim'
Cc: 'Clayton J Bradt'; radsafe at radlab.nl
Subject: RE: [ RadSafe ] School Becquerel kits

Dear Min-Sook:

Thanks, in part, to those kits, I developed a strong interest in the

measurement of radiation and had built several cloud chambers by the
time I

was 12 or 13 (62 & 63) which provided me many hours of fascinating

observation.  By 16, I was quite adapt at high-vacuum techniques and
built a

Van de Graff type linear accelerator (I was only allowed aluminum
targets)

as well as a couple of gas lasers by 16 or 17. A radiologist friend kept
me

safe!  I even spent a summer in a cyclotron lab in 1966 at Howard
College.

So I was quite adapt at technical glass blowing for building gas lasers.
My

mom would occasionally drive me across town to obtain liquid nitrogen
(for

cold traps) at the steel mills in Birmingham since I was only allowed to
use

silicone-oil type diffusion pumps (rather than mercury) and had to trap
the

oil vapor or my lasers would sputter.

One thing led to another, and I spent 5 years exploring for uranium in
the

western USA. By 1980, I was the youngest technical Officer at the IAEA
in

the Division of Nuclear Fuel Cycle where I spent 8 years.  While in
Vienna,

by pure chance, I once bumped into Burney Hannah (Physics professor at
the

erstwhile Howard College - Samford University cyclotron lab and then
working

in radiation safety for the State of Alabama) and invited him to visit
the

Nuclear Safety Section at the IAEA with me the following day.  We had
quite

a time reminiscing about that 15 year old kid who would reek havoc in
his

lab 20 years earlier.

I've since worked 14 years overseas on various nuclear projects
including

two years on a restoration project on Chernobyl, mine sites in Brazil,

China, Czech Republic and Kazakhstan, and nuclear waste sites in Mexico
and

Slovakia as well as the USA.

But of all the things I've seen, I think it was my home-built cloud
chambers

that captured my curiosity and imagination as a kid and formed a basis
to

de-mythify "radiation".  I'd spend hours tinkering when them, playing
with

magnetic fields, and comparing sources until the dry ice evaporated.
That's

a great way to spend a summer's day as a kid in Alabama - reading every

issue of Scientific American since the 40s and building so many of C.L.

Strong's "The Amateur Scientist" contraptions, and avidly reading Martin

Gardner's "Mathematical Games".  The first laser light that I ever saw
came

from a gas laser of my own making at age 16.

I feel sorry for kids now because we have institutionalized "fear of

radiation" in them from an early age, and they no longer seem to have a

wandering curiosity about a simple home-built cloud chamber let alone
having

a couple of sources to play with.

Now we seem to be coming to the day that only the State is allowed to

measure radiation, and I run the risk having my scintillation counters &

gamma spectrometer taken from me if I operate them in New York.

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 Min Sook Kim

Sent: Wednesday, April 23, 2008 6:54 AM

To: radsafe at radlab.nl; radsafe-bounces at radlab.nl

Subject: RE: [ RadSafe ] School Becquerel kits

Would anyone kindly explain why these chemicals were widely distributed
to

middle schools and high schools: why those schools bought radioactive

chemicals anyhow (assume that's how they got those chemicals): why they

needed them before but don't need them any longer so they need to
dispose

them now. Thanks.

Min-Sook Kim, Ph.D.

New York State Department of Health

E-Mail : msk02 at health.state.ny.us

TEL: (518) 402-7650

_______________________________________________

You are currently subscribed to the RadSafe mailing list

Before posting a message to RadSafe be sure to have read and understood
the RadSafe rules. These can be found at:
http://radlab.nl/radsafe/radsaferules.html

For information on how to subscribe or unsubscribe and other settings
visit: http://radlab.nl/radsafe/