LV team searches for radioactivity

Friday, Sept. 9, 2005 | 11:12 a.m.

A Beechcraft 200 airplane based in Las Vegas spent all day Thursday flying over flooded New Orleans searching for radioactive sources to ensure they remained in place and intact, a National Nuclear Security Administration spokesman said.

The aircraft with its specialized crew left Nellis Air Force Base on Wednesday and will continue to fly over the Gulf Coast into next week, said Darwin Morgan, a National Nuclear Security Administration spokesman.

Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco requested that the crew, including three Bechtel Nevada scientists and an Energy Department radiation expert, fly over the flood zone.

The team is checking on radioactive materials from X-ray machines in hospitals, doctors' and dentist offices and radioactive sources used in university research or in construction work, Morgan said.

The team sent from Nevada can detect any radioactive source, he said. As of Thursday, he said, no errant radioactive material has been detected.

"We're seeing the sources where they should be seen," Morgan said.

X-ray machines give off gamma particles that can penetrate any substance except a lead shield. Other sources such as medical tracers are less penetrating than X-ray machines.

Retired health physicist Bill Phillips said the National Nuclear Security Administration is performing an important service by checking on radioactive sources.

"They're lethal," Phillips said of radioactive sources that are normally closed inside sealed containers. "They could kill a child if one is picked up."

Radioactive sources used in medicine, construction or making measurements while drill wells are only dangerous if they are found on unprotected ground and if their containers are breeched, Phillips said. Under water or buried underground they are safe.

"Radioactivity is used every day," Phillips said. "They are safe."

In Las Vegas alone, the Nevada State Radiological Division licenses over 200 sources, he said.

Phillips called the request to search for radiation routine, noting it is done after disasters such as floods. The state's governor must make the request, he said.

The radiation security experts have played major roles in monitoring radioactivity from the days of nuclear experiments conducted from 1951 to 1992 at the Nevada Test Site.

Then known as the Nuclear Emergency Search Team, the team was on call to respond to any nuclear emergency in the world, from falling Russian satellites containing nuclear sources to monitoring for radiation after a plane crash.