RADIATION LEVELS specific readings thread

Concerning Japan's Fukushima and the other nuclear reactor leaks there, it's been really difficult to get specific information on radiation levels. What most of us would like to see, I assume, is a map of the radiation cloud, types of radiactive chemicals involved, and the precise levels of radiation - with enough information we should be able to build that ourselves. This thread is dedicated to that specific purpose; a catch all for specific radiation placement and readings.

For example:
MSNBC reports radiation dose is same as one month's radiation exposure

The aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan was about 100 miles offshore when its instruments detected the radiation. The fleet said the dose of radiation was about the same as one month's normal exposure to natural background radiation in the environment.

Please provide a specific reading or scenario and the related link.

Nuclear Regulatory Commision Press Release

In response to nuclear emergencies, the NRC works with other U.S. agencies to monitor radioactive releases and predict their path. All the available information indicates weather conditions have taken the small releases from the Fukushima reactors out to sea away from the population. Given the thousands of miles between the two countries, Hawaii, Alaska, the U.S. Territories and the U.S. West Coast are not expected to experience any harmful levels of radioactivity.

(emphasis added)

I agree this is sort of worthless concerning specific radiation levels but still good to have the statements in one place. The NRC says radiation will be less than damaging, which is sort of a "specific".

Thank you for this thread, I will add information as I find it to here specifically.

P.S: Everything was fine, until they named it USS Ronald Raegan - now I *really* can't trust it's findings.

Asahi.com (in Japanese)

According to TEPCO, near Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant Unit 1, 12 3:00 pm 29 minutes, microsievert 1015 / hour, 31 minutes 3:00 pm microsievert 569 / confirmed at a high level of radiation dose . 東京電力は同３時３６分ごろ、１号機付近で大きな揺れと爆発音があったとしている。 TEPCO said about three minutes at 36, has been shaking and there was a large explosion near the first unit.

HOLY uh... weasel! this is CRAZY!

according to wikipedia (referenced to a Radiation Biology journal):
The millisievert* is commonly used to measure the effective dose in diagnostic medical procedures (e.g., X-rays, nuclear medicine, positron emission tomography, and computed tomography). The natural background effective dose rate varies considerably from place to place, but typically is around 2.4 mSv/year [2] (pdf).

For acute (that is, received in a relatively short time, up to about one hour) full body equivalent dose, 1 Sv causes nausea, 2-5 Sv causes epilation or hair loss, hemorrhage and will cause death in many cases. More than 3 Sv will lead to LD 50/30 or death in 50% of cases within 30 days, and over 6 Sv survival is unlikely. (For more details, see radiation poisoning.)

* recognize the above stated info is in MILLI (1/100th) and the article refers to MICRO (1/1000th).

****

SO after adjustment we see that during the explosion 100 microsieverts/HOUR was let out and the normal we take in PER YEAR is only 2.4 microsieverts! Whoa.
In case you're counting that's 350,000 times more radiation than is normal!

Thank you - that is exactly what I would like to see.

And while there may not be "harmful" levels, that doesn't mean that the levels may not be significant enough for some impact on human health.

It also doesn't necessarily take into account lifetime levels of less than "harmful" amount.

What if you've been exposed to multiple fall-out sessions of 'non-harmful' varieties? What if you've had more than the normal number of x-rays, MRIs etc?

The "non-harmful" levels is not USEFUL information without CONTEXT.

Flagged and subscribed.

You all know the questions that make you ponder .. "Will I grow a third eye or not" .. "Will I get spider senses or will I not" ... "Can I cut my energy bill due to an omnipotent glow-in-the-dark effect or can I not"

Ponder no longer, the Specific Radiation Levels Thread - or S.R.L.T. - is here.

I contribute the following:

A radiation map with live readings for the USA

www.radiationnetwork.com...

And the well known geiger counter stream from ustream:

www.ustream.tv...

As well as a live feed from the ESA Satellite "Newton", it has a radiation measuring array inside.

xmm.vilspa.esa.es...

The last one did show a significant increase on the 13th of March.

And for reference and comparison, the fallout map from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster:

www.faculty.virginia.edu...

The distance with elevated radiation readings is about 2500 kilometers, that's roughly 1555 miles .. so just you get an idea of what to expect. Be advised that wind and precipitation parameters can vastly influence these levels.

Getting the a month's worth of radiation exposure in 1 hour = major radiation cloud.

Keep in mind, they are on a war ship which can not only move out of the way, but has measures of protecting their crew from further exposure.

If we here in North America received only 10% of that level of exposure in the air, people would start getting sick in a manner of weeks. I'm watching this and plan on erring on the side of caution.

Originally posted by harrytuttle
Getting the a month's worth of radiation exposure in 1 hour = major radiation cloud.

Keep in mind, they are on a war ship which can not only move out of the way, but has measures of protecting their crew from further exposure.

If we here in North America received only 10% of that level of exposure in the air, people would start getting sick in a manner of weeks. I'm watching this and plan on erring on the side of caution.

Your post lacks of anything to back up what you claim. How did you calculate the "10%" or is that just a well educated guess ? Do you even know how high the monthly exposure through background radiation is in average ? Do you have any idea what unit you measure such things, and how much you get for example when you have a CT done ?

With all due respect, but I bet you don't have the smallest of all clues at your disposal or you wouldn't make claims as you did.

Just to give you an idea: The radiation dosage you receive when a CT is done from your abdomen is in the range from 10-30 mSv, so when assuming a normal background radiation ( both from natural as well as human sources ) is around 4-10 mSv/a you see that you can accumulate the dosage worth of years within a couple of seconds without taking harm.

reply to post by H1ght3chHippie


Thanks man! Great info!

I love this one:

Real-time radiation map of the U.S.

here's a sample:

"Depending on your location within the US, your elevation or altitude, and your model of Geiger counter, this background radiation level might average anywhere from 5 to 60 CPM, and while background radiation levels are random, it would be unusual for those levels to exceed 130 CPM. Thus, the "Alert Level" for the National Radiation Map is 130 CPM"

Wikipedia info on CPM (for radiation level reading)

been keeping a casual eye on the Radiation network, and for the SF Bay Area (California) it's been floating between 20 and 37 CPM. (just added for comparison for later.

so... here's levels for 3 pm Pacific Time 14Mar11:
Vancouver - 12
Seattle - 40
San Francisco - 24
Phoenix - 21
Denver - 20

For all you who dont have geiger counters .... a natural plant who detect radiation

There is experimental evidence from an antinuclear group in Japan that a certain species of Spiderwort plant shows effects of radiation exposure when the radiation is not detectable by any instruments. This indicates that biologically sensitive is much greater than currently assumed or else that some types of radiation which are capable of biological effects exist which cannot be detected by electronic means and are not allowed for conventional theory.

The stamens of the Spiderwort flower are usually blue or blue-purple. In the presence of radiation, however, the stamens turn pink Common Spiderwort (Tradescantia bracteata) Found throughout all but the extreme northern counties of North Dakota, common Spiderwort is a striking plant. Elsewhere, the species ranges from Montana to Kansas eastward to Michigan and Indiana.

www.gdr.org...

HONOLULU — The state Department of Health says it hasn't detected any elevated radiation readings in Hawaii after a nuclear reactor facility damaged by an earthquake and tsunamis released radiation in Japan.

wait just one minute.... isn't that the same group looking for Obama's longform?

The Republic - source Associated Press

Associated Press! Isn't that the people who said Obama is legal!! (sorry I couldn't resist!)

Found this on physorg.com about west coast being frontline to nuclear cloud.
www.physorg.com...

The Denver reading is up to 51 !! For that Radionetwork site they don't make an alert until 130, but other sites say to worry at 60, and it appears Denver is flirting dangerously close to 60? I wonder what is going on there? A local source, or something in the atmosphere?

I will keep watdhing it I suppose.

reply to post by kdog1982


good info. Lots of opinions there.

I sorta like how
"Right now the government as a whole has people looking at the situation and asking these questions. We don't have the answers yet. We don't have anything that we can say publicly right now."
But CNN has already given the all clear! The US media is broken...

reply to post by getreadyalready


Doesn't Denver already have a lot of background radiation or something?

it doesn't make sense this would be from japan if everywhere else's levels are the same as they have been (or dropping in vancouver's case) for a couple days now

Originally posted by getreadyalready
The Denver reading is up to 51 !! For that Radionetwork site they don't make an alert until 130, but other sites say to worry at 60, and it appears Denver is flirting dangerously close to 60? I wonder what is going on there? A local source, or something in the atmosphere?

I will keep watdhing it I suppose.

I tried searching for better sites like USGS,NOAA and so,but nothing.
Is there ANYTHING other than someone sitting outside with his geiger counter and a cup of coffee??
Is this our great advanced society??

reply to post by onyx718


I would expect Denver to have a lot of background radiation, but I watched it all day, and it bounced between 22 and 30. The 51 I saw just now is much higher than the rest of the day, and it should be lower, since we are not receiving radiation from the sun at the moment (night time).

It might be nothing, I just started watching the site today, but that is the largest number I have seen all day.

ETA: Back down to 38 now. Must have just been some terrorist driving his van by the station.

Originally posted by Thermo Klein
reply to post by kdog1982

 

good info. Lots of opinions there.

I sorta like how
"Right now the government as a whole has people looking at the situation and asking these questions. We don't have the answers yet. We don't have anything that we can say publicly right now."
But CNN has already given the all clear! The US media is broken...

I know,it's like,don't give out to much info,less we panic the people.
Japan has nothing the US has nothing.
So that is how it's going to be.
It's remain calm everyone,nothing to see here,move along.

reply to post by getreadyalready


maybe malfunctions of some kind in the readings? i dunno, but again i hardly think it would be anythign to do with the situation unless the radiation hopped over the entire coast and decided denver was good enough