747 plane crash DU "hazards could prove fatal" - Hooper

["Franta, Jaroslav" <frantaj@aecl.ca>]

posted at
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_593000/593649.stm

BBC News, Thursday, 6 January, 2000, 20:09 GMT 
Uranium on jet 'not a risk' 
Emergency services have insisted there was no public danger from depleted
uranium on a Korean Air Boeing 747 cargo plane which crashed near Stansted
Airport. 
It has emerged that the plane, which crashed in Essex last month, contained
several hundred kilograms of depleted uranium. 
But Sergeant Deborah Duce from Essex police said: "The presence of depleted
uranium was known about at the time of the crash. 
"The authorities said it did not pose a danger to the emergency services.
There is no danger to surrounding residents." 
The revelation comes as an Air Accident Investigation Board (AAIB) report
into the crash highlights defects in the flight captain's altitude director
indicator - which gives the crew of an aircraft an indication of whether
their aircraft is level, climbing or descending. 
Depleted uranium (DU) is a heavy substance, 1.7 times as dense as lead, and
used in armour-piercing munitions. Many Gulf War veterans believe it is
implicated in a range of medical problems they are suffering from, known
collectively as Gulf War Syndrome. 
DU has been used in aircraft to make counterweights in the tailplane. 
A Boeing spokesman told BBC News Online: "The company began using DU in the
early 1960s. Boeing replaced it with tungsten in the early 1980s, on grounds
of cost and availability. 
"The Korean 747 was delivered to the airline in June 1980. We think it
contained about 300 kg of DU. 
"But it would need to have been exposed to a fire of 800 degrees Celsius for
more than four hours before it emitted uranium oxide. And even then, if it
was breathed in it would be only 40% of the amount deemed harmful." 
DU is known to vaporise into a spray of burning dust on striking a hard
object, and some studies suggest that it can form uranium oxides at lower
temperatures. 
A report in 1985 from the Battelle Pacific Northwest Laboratory said that
after only two hours' exposure to a fire of 700 degress Celsius, 22% of a DU
munition appeared to have burnt off. 
The Korean plane crashed in flames. Malcolm Hooper, professor emeritus of
medicinal chemistry at the University of Sunderland told BBC News Online:
"If no precautions were taken at the crash scene, people will have been
exposed to hazards that could prove fatal. 
"Those who were handling the wreckage should have been advised of the risk.
I can't see any way you could have a significant fire in a crash like this
without producing the conditions that would allow a potentially hazardous
release of DU." 

Dutch crash 

On 4 October 1992 an El Al cargo 747 crashed into a block of flats in an
Amsterdam suburb. It had been carrying 282 kg of DU counterweights. 
Only 130 kg were recovered in the clear-up after the crash, and the Dutch
commission of inquiry concluded that some of the rest had been released as
particles, which would have been inhaled by rescue workers and local people.

The plane was also carrying chemicals used to manufacture the nerve gas
sarin, which local people blamed for ensuing health problems. 
More than 800 residents and rescue workers were reported after the crash to
be complaining of a range of problems, including fatigue, skin complaints,
joint and bone pains, kidney ailments and respiratory problems. 
The commission of inquiry did not conclude that these problems had been
caused by the DU lost in the crash. 



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