Pingie: HTTP:: Soviet Radioactive Cobalt Retrieved from Lebanese Laboratory

HTTP:: Soviet Radioactive Cobalt Retrieved from Lebanese Laboratory
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Experts from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) recently managed to retrieve dozens of radioactive sources from a Lebanese research facility, where they had been left to decay for the better part of the last ten years. The active cobalt, which has now been repatriated, was a potential source of material for a “dirty bomb,” if it were to fall in the hands of terrorists. The action was part of a wider IAEA initiative meant to secure such sources, Nature News reports. The material was first identified in 2006, in an agricultural research institute in Lebanon. Originally used in a pest-control study, the dangerous cobalt-60 irradiator had been untouched since 1996. It was, fortunately, stored in a sealed unit, which contained about 36 sources of radiation. With a combined power of 3,500 Curies, this was by far the most radioactive source in the entire country. In the wrong hands, it would have made for a powerful component in a dirty bomb. “We were worried !
about the risk of theft, either for the value of the irradiator or particularly for malicious purposes,” IAEA radioactive source specialist Robin Heard, who has been in charge of overseeing the new recovery mission, said. While the cobalt was found in a sealed unit, there existed a danger of someone accid...
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http://news.softpedia.com/news/Soviet-Radioactive-Cobalt-Retrieved-from-Lebanese-Laboratory-121542.shtml
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