RE: A surprising finding of NORM

[nick.tsurikov@ILUKA.COM]

Thanks, Mark



Very interesting...  Another place where you can find heavy mineral sands is

the medium-size sticky tape holders on, probably, everybody's desk.  When

you roll the tape off the rim the holder should be either firmly attached to

the desk (haven't seen that) or balance-filled with... of course - heavy

mineral sand...



Cheers

Nick

http://www.eneabba.net/ <http://www.eneabba.net/>  



		-----Original Message-----

		From:	Sonter Mark [mailto:sonterm@EPA.NSW.GOV.AU]

		Sent:	Thursday, 1 November 2001 08:00

		To:	radsafe@list.vanderbilt.edu

		Subject:	RE: A surprising finding of NORM







			Hello, all out there in Radsafe-land!!



			I have just returned from a large metal recycling

facility where the

		truck portal radiation detector was set off by a top-loading

automatic

		domestic washing machine....



			It turns out that the washing machine has a hollow

plastic

		ballasting and balancing ring fixed (as part of the original

design) around

		the top of the bowl, and the weighting material in the

balancing ring is

		---(wait for it) ---- heavy mineral sands --- containing (as

one would

		expect) thorium and its decay chain daughters...



			Has anybody else seen this??



			What other circumstances exist where mineral sands

get used as

		ballast and thus introduce a radioactive component where one

might not

		otherwise expect it??



			Mark Sonter

	

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