Re: Lapel air sampling - Honest opinion

[Doug Turner <turners@earthlink.net>]

At TMI-2 on the refueling platform we had air concentrations vary by 10 +3
four feet away!  Lapel samplers were the only method of obtaining a
representative sample. Workers are usually not stationary and move in and
out of air currents, go get parts and tools, stand up, sit down etc. which
can only be sampled representaively with a lapel sampler.

Many grab samplers act like vacuum cleaners because of the high flow rate to
reduce sampling time, especially if the sampler is placed on the floor. The
nonrepresentative flow rate and stationary placement are trade offs for
speed and convience.

I am not aware of a tritium lapel sampler, and lapel samplers aren't hooked
up to counters and alarms to turn them into CAM's yet either, so you need a
mixture of sampling as the conditions warrant.

Doug Turner <turners@earthlink.net>

   At 07:44 AM 2/24/97 -0600, you wrote:
>Rad Safe List,
>I would like to here from those of you who work in environments
>requiring air sampling which may result in assigning DAC hours to
>individuals.  
>Do you feel that lapel air sampling provides an adequate sample of
>breathing zone air or is grab sampling better ?  
>
>Phillip Llewellyn
>plllewellyn@tva.gov
>
>