Re: Plutonium spontaneously combusting???

[Les Fraley <les@lamar.ColoState.EDU>]

On Tue, 17 Dec 1996, Johannes Strydom wrote:

> > There are more immediate dangers. The element is so dangerous that
> > plutonium shavings have been known to spontaneously burst into flame.
> 
> I have never heard of plutonium spontaneously combusting in air.  Is
> this possible or is it just another one of the incredible misconceptions
> about plutonium and radiation (I tend to believe this one).  Maybe they
> mean spontaneous fission.
> 
> Fritz Strydom
> Health Physicist
> Georgia Tech
> 
Pu is a known pyrophoric material.  That is why, when it was machined at 
Rocky Flats and other places, the machining took place in an inert 
atmosphere, not in air.
Les Fraley
Colorado State University
les@lamar.colostate.edu