Los Alamos FedEx delivery

OMG, how ******g stupid are these people!

They shipped a radioactive package using FedEx and it leaked radioactive americium-241 over 4 States?

I hope this person goes to prison for stupidity.

Error at lab spreads nuclear material
Contamination from Los Alamos found in 4 states
Keay Davidson, Chronicle Science Writer

Tuesday, August 9, 2005

The apparent mishandling of a potentially hazardous radioactive substance by an employee of the University of California-run Los Alamos National Laboratory has resulted in contamination of sites in four states, according to a report released Monday.

Traces of the substance have been found in homes in Colorado and Kansas that the Los Alamos employee visited, his own home in New Mexico, and also at the Pennsylvania laboratory where the employee apparently shipped a contaminated package via FedEx.

sfgate.com.../c/a/2005/08/09/MNGRTE50121.DTL

Its great to know my Tax dollars are going toward paying whoever was responsible for this.

So I guess that UPS gets all new contracts.

First the lab loses a key, now this. Makes me wonder how some of this stuff happens in a lab full of some of the worlds brightest physists.

Could this have been a bit more than meets the eye? Some kind of test, perhaps? Or maybe they're all on crack?

They havn't exactly been known lately as being worthy of their clearances.

Thats kind of an oops. A big oops.

I wonder how much of this kind of stuff goes unreported?

I have done some very stupid stuff at work, mostly hangover related, but never have I imagined such ineptitude. How can you be smart enough to land a job with a top secret lab and work with nuke material all day but not know that shipping said material FedEx is a bad idea? Had this person never seen the way FedEx people handle packages on the truck? Did they atleast put the stuff in foam packing peanuts? Was it insured or just standard delivery?

And what about the poor FedEx driver, he's gonna have to seriously ask, and with a straight face, "is this package radioactive" when picking stuff up at the lab there in Los Alamos 'cause you know FedEx probably has a policy about that, you'd think the lab would too.

Sending this stuff FedEx is retarded. This person should be forced to wear a bright red warning label on their forehead so the rest of us can avoid them with greater ease.

I used to just worry about a mis-labled envelope full of anthrax being in my mailbox, now I gotta wonder if the FedEx guy is bringing exotic radioative material along with mom's christmas cookies. Damn it. If my cookies come glowing or tasting funny I'm gonna be so mad.

I could run better logistical and inventory systems, and my experience stems from working in an ice cream shop and several pizza chains. In fact, I know several delivery drivers which could have made a better decision than this.