[ RadSafe ] Radioactive Cargo Is Lost, Then Found in Boston

[Jose Julio Rozental]

Colleagues also can find at the following site

Shipment of radioactive equipment brings rebuke for nuclear agency
By Charlie Savage and Shelley Murphy, Globe Staff  |  February 11, 2005

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/02/11/shipment_
of_radioactive_equipment_brings_rebuke_for_nuclear_agency/

Jose Julio Rozental
joseroze at netvision.net.il
Israel
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----- Original Message -----
From: "Gerry Blackwood" <gpblackwood at sbcglobal.net>
To: "Rad Safe" <radsafe at radlab.nl>
Sent: Friday, February 11, 2005 10:46 PM
Subject: [ RadSafe ] Radioactive Cargo Is Lost, Then Found in Boston


> THE WORLD
> Radioactive Cargo Is Lost, Then Found in Boston
> >From Associated Press
>
> February 11, 2005
>
> WASHINGTON - A Halliburton Co. shipment of radioactive material that
> arrived in New York in October was lost en route to Texas and was not
found
> until Wednesday, when it turned up in Boston.
>
> The material - two sources of the element americium, used in oil well
> exploration - was found intact at a freight facility after a search by
> federal authorities.
>
> The Nuclear Regulatory Commission said it had not been informed of the
> missing shipment until Tuesday. Depending on the material, government
> rules require notification either immediately or within 30 days.
>
> NRC and Halliburton officials said Thursday that the public was never
> in danger.
>
> The americium was being shipped from Russia to Houston, Halliburton
> said in a report filed with the NRC.
>
> On Thursday, the company blamed the shipper - Greeneville, Tenn.-based
> Forward Air - for losing track of the material and failing to tell
Halliburton.
>
> A spokesman for Forward Air did not return calls.
>
> "The focus through today was on trying to find the material," NRC
> spokesman Neil Sheehan said. "We're going to be pressing them on why the
> notification was not more timely."
>
> Halliburton spokeswoman Wendy Hall said the shipping company improperly
> labeled the material and sent it to the wrong location. She said
> Halliburton contacted the shipper "multiple times" about the package and
was told
> repeatedly that it was en route to Houston.
>
> Hall said the shipping company acknowledged Tuesday that it could not
> find the shipment. Halliburton immediately notified the NRC, she said, and
a
> review of surveillance tapes enabled authorities to locate the shipment
> in Boston.
>
> Hall said the material was encased in a double-walled stainless steel
> cylinder that was locked in a steel container.
>
> "All of this was found intact, and we have no information that leads us
> to believe that the public or environment were in danger," Hall said.
>
>
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-halliburton11feb11,1,297
> 0258,print.story?coll=la-headlines-world
>
>
>
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