Nuke agency reports unusual radiation in Europe

Nuke agency reports unusual radiation in Europe

news.yahoo.com

VIENNA (AP) — The U.N. nuclear agency is reporting "very low" — but higher than usual — levels of radiation in the Czech Republic and elsewhere in Europe.

The International Atomic Energy Agency says the "very low levels of iodine-131 have been measured in the atmosphere over the Czech Republic" and elsewhere on the continent.

(visit the link for the full news article)

The article goes on to say that the IAEA doesn’t think its from Japan and that seems reasonable considering this is a new development and any contamination from Fukushima would have made it to Europe months ago. How widespread, the article doesn’t say.

Any ideas where it could be from? Natural variations … or something else?


news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

I131 is not a nturally occurring isotope:

Iodine-131 ( 131 I), also called radioiodine (though many other radioactive isotopes of this element are known), is an important radioisotope of iodine. It has a radioactive decay half-life of about eight days. Its uses are mostly medical and pharmaceutical. It also plays a major role as a radioactive isotope present in nuclear fission products, and was a significant contributor to the health hazards from open-air atomic bomb testing in the 1950s, and from the Chernobyl disaster, as well as being a large fraction of the contamination hazard in the first weeks in the Japanese nuclear crisis. This is because I-131 is a major uranium, plutonium fission product, comprising nearly 3% of the total products of fission (by weight). See fission product yield for a comparison with other radioactive fission products. I-131 is also a major fission product of uranium-233, produced from thorium.

wiki

With such a short half life, there are not very many places it could be coming from. The article is very sparse on detail and until more is known, not much can be said.

Thats a bit on the strange side.. I would have to wonder if it something from the cold war** coming back to bite us on the arse or if this is something new.. worrying indeed.

**as in old containers breaking down etc.

reply to post by thoughtsfull


My first thought was some old radioactive waste from the cold war too.

This is an interesting development. I will certainly be keeping an eye on this one.

Originally posted by thoughtsfull
Thats a bit on the strange side.. I would have to wonder if it something from the cold war** coming back to bite us on the arse or if this is something new.. worrying indeed.

**as in old containers breaking down etc.

This is Iodine 131 it was created from fission with in the last 80 days most likely less this is a leak of a nuclear facility and needs to be found very soon.

reply to post by Corruption Exposed


God only knows what nasties where created then hidden away and now forgotten about during that period of history..

Originally posted by BriGuyTM90

Originally posted by thoughtsfull
Thats a bit on the strange side.. I would have to wonder if it something from the cold war** coming back to bite us on the arse or if this is something new.. worrying indeed.

**as in old containers breaking down etc.

This is Iodine 131 it was created from fission with in the last 80 days most likely less this is a leak of a nuclear facility and needs to be found very soon.

Shows my chemistry skills are next to zero thanks for the clarification..
that is even more worrisome then.

reply to post by SirMike

Natural variations? Iodine-131 is a nuclear fission product from uranium/plutonium, other countrys have detected them same as the Czech Republic but the IAEA are not letting on where.

The IAEA said it did not know the source of the iodine-131 and would give more details when available. It did not give details of the other locations in Europe where levels had been detected.

IAEA

Could be just someone walking around with a Dirty Bomb nothing to worry about.

reply to post by BriGuyTM90


While I131 is a fission byproduct, it is also used in medical procedures, so there is as possibility that it is a leak from a medical source. Due to the sparsness of information in the article, there is not much to go on at the point.

Iodine-131 can be "seen" by nuclear medicine imaging techniques (i.e., gamma cameras) whenever it is given for therapeutic use, since about 10% of its energy and radiation dose is via gamma radiation. However, since the other 90% of radiation (beta radiation) causes tissue damage without contributing to any ability to see or "image" the isotope, other less-damaging radioisotopes of iodine are preferred in situations when only nuclear imaging is required. The isotope I-131 is still occasionally used for purely diagnostic (i.e., imaging) work, due to its low expense compared to other iodine radioisotopes.

Wiki

reply to post by jadedANDcynical


The amounts used in medical uses are minuscule if this is being detected in multiple Eruopen countries than its most likely from a nuclear processing facility or a nuclear reactor site. If it was detected in a certain city or a building maybe medical source.

Before I even clicked this thread open, I thought "Baxter". Austrian. Medical. Careless, sloppy. Unethical. I'd put my money on that one.

My first thought was to when some Al-Queda affiliate said that they planted nukes all around Europe in populated civilian areas to use incase of Osama's death, but nothing came of that, and I doubt anything will come from that now. Maybe Russia and/or China is working on something new that had unexpected reactions? Who knows? Definitely not me, lol.

More sources are picking up the story, but there is still a scarcity of information:

Text he Czech nuclear security authority said it had been detecting radioactive iodine-131 at a number of monitoring stations since late October and had informed the IAEA to see if it could identify the source, Reuters reports.

Czech nuclear safety chief Dana Drabova said the iodine could have leaked during production of radiopharmaceuticals.

It was certainly not from a nuclear power plant, she said, adding that they were almost certain that the source was abroad.

In the days and weeks after the Japan's accident, minuscule amounts of iodine-131 believed to have come from Fukushima were detected as far away as Iceland and other parts of Europe, as well as in the US.

BBC article

I love how they say in one breath that they don't know what the source us an yet they are certain it's not from a reactor...

Most of the other articles are very similar. Looks like we will need to keep an eye open.

Europe isn´t some little village it´s a big place so to state the radiation levels in europe are high is daft, they have to be more specific.

Is there MORE solar energy accessing that area thru what can be considered a hole in upper atmosphere? Or is something leaking into the atmosphere from space?

As Baba Vanga wrote:

2011: As a result of the war, radioactive showers will destroy almost all life in the Northern Hemisphere. The remaining Europeans will face an even further threat from the Muslims who will use chemical weapons to finish them off.

I love the way they always say it has a half life of 8 days. However, if you actually come into contact with it and it enters your body, e.g. through respiration, then that time increases significantly

In the body, iodine has a biological half-life of about 100 days for the body as a whole. It has different biological half-lives for various organs: thyroid - 100 days, bone - 14 days, and kidney, spleen, and reproductive organs - 7 days.

and, once there, it does nasty things

Long-term (chronic) exposure to radioactive iodine can cause nodules, or cancer of the thyroid.
Low doses can reduce activity of the thyroid gland, lowering hormone production in the gland

We've also had 2 radiation detections this year in Slovaki (next door to Czech).
Strange that no one is asking the French just how well their little nuclear accident is going...

reply to post by Ophiuchus 13


Now there I believe you're on to something.
We've just had months of endless blue sky and bright, bright sun. Today was blindingly bright but cold and everyone has a headache (mine feels like it's been microwaved).
W were told earlier this year that the ozone layer had gone over Scandinavia and Eastern Europe and I have a feeling that many of these 'nuclear accidnts' may in fact just be covering up for the fact that we're getting fried from space and no one can do anything about it.
I think this may also be the reason for the chemtrailing - they're trying to plug the hole.

I love the way they always say it has a half life of 8 days. However, if you actually come into contact with it and it enters your body, e.g. through respiration, then that time increases significantly

It appears you do not know what a radiological half-life is versus a biological half-life.

Iodine-131 has a radiological half-life of 8 days whether it is inside the body or outside the body. It is a constant. It does not change. If you have 1 gram of Iodine-131, after 8 days you will have 0.5 grams.

The biological half-life is the time is takes for half of the substance to be removed from the body. Note that the values specified are not for Iodine-131, they are for Iodine.

In the body, iodine has a biological half-life of about 100 days for the body as a whole. It has different biological half-lives for various organs: thyroid - 100 days, bone - 14 days, and kidney, spleen, and reproductive organs - 7 days.

Therefore, the actual total amount of Iodine-131 in someones body is determined by the amount absorbed and both the biological half-life and the radiological half-life. So for the thyroid the equation would be:

(Amount Absorbed)*(1/2)^(t/8+t/100), which can be simplified to:

(Amount Absorbed)*(1/2)^(27/200*t)

Or in other words the half life, both factors considered, for Iodine-131 in the Thyroid is more like 7.4 days.

Were there not rumours of detonations of small nuclear bombs in DUMBS? Could it be from any of these? Just speculating here