Re: " Congo Nurses an Old Nuclear Reactor "

["Franz Schoenhofer" <franz.schoenhofer@CHELLO.AT>]

-----Ursprüngliche Nachricht-----

Von: Franta, Jaroslav <frantaj@AECL.CA>

An: Radsafe (E-mail) <radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu>

Datum: Freitag, 27. Juli 2001 17:09

Betreff: " Congo Nurses an Old Nuclear Reactor "





>http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20010726/wl/nuclear_congo_1.html

>

>Thursday July 26 2:57 PM ET

>Congo Nurses an Old Nuclear Reactor

>By TIM SULLIVAN, Associated Press Writer

>

>KINSHASA, Congo (AP) - A hand-held Geiger counter tapped out a steady beat

>as Patrick Kanyinda - looking decidedly uneasy about having a visitor in

his

>small, windowless workroom - stood at the edge of a circular pool and

>pointed into the water.

----------------------------------------------------------



I am far from being an expert on nuclear reactors, I have worked for many

years at the Atominstitute of the Austrian Universities, doing

radiochemistry research and also using activation of nuclides as a method to

obtain tracers for my research. The reactor was and still is a TRIGA Mark

II. This research reactor is inherently safe and one of the highlights were

the "shots", when the central control rod was pushed out by pressurized air

deliberately to create a very short pulse of reactivity and a high (and

short) neutron flux for special research projects. I have watched a few of

them, admiring the beautiful Cerenkov radiation following such an excursion.



This comment only refers to the safety of the research reactor and that it

cannot explode and by any means spawn radioactivity by any possible

mismanagement. My comments do not imply, that everyhing else around the

drift of a TRIGA Mark II is not subject to a certain risk of contaminating

the surrounding environment.



Franz







************************************************************************

You are currently subscribed to the Radsafe mailing list. To unsubscribe,

send an e-mail to Majordomo@list.vanderbilt.edu  Put the text "unsubscribe

radsafe" (no quote marks) in the body of the e-mail, with no subject line.