Re: No response: sweaty surveys

["Michael S Ford" <MFORD@pantex.com>]

Tom, 

What's up with this guy?  Couldn't he find anything else to worry about?  Doesn't he know that in the NM desert your sweat normally evaporates before it has a chance to pool?  :-)

Seriously, though.... I have never seen this asked in an audit, but my useless guess would be as follows:  If you noticed that the person you're surveying is sweating enough to interfere with alpha detection (judgement call), I would grab whatever absorbent material you have that would be suitable for putting on the person and gently apply (don't wipe) that to the area you're surveying.  Once you've soaked up the excess salt water, set your now-suspect absorbent material down in a location appropriate for such items and perform your survey.

If you don't find anything, the person was either clean or you just deconned them with the material that you used.  You can determine which was the case by allowing the material to dry and perform an alpha count on that.

It's a pretty crappy answer, but I had a spare moment to help(??).
:-)
Have a Great Day!
v/r
Michael

P.S. You might also try just spraying them with a fire hose. That gets rid of the whole "sweat" problem...  :-)))


>>> gofft%wipp.carlsbad.nm.us wrote on 19 Jul 00 9:22:15 AM >>>
Help!!!!!

There was only one response to my question on doing personnel alpha surveys
when the person being surveyed is sweating.  

Has anyone ever encountered this during an audit?????  

You can respond directly to me at the below e-mail.

Thanks


Tom Goff
WIPP Radiological Engineering
(505) 234-8861
(fax)  234-6027
e-mail  GoffT@WIPP.Carlsbad.NM.US 
page (505) 234-8850  (pager 479)
P.O. Box 2078
Carlsbad, NM 88221
Radiological Engineering:  Anticipating Radiological Problems
             Developing Techniques to Deal with Them


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