Cobalt-60 Rods: Totally Silent. Totally Deadly.

[@IntotheShadows]

Video Sponsored by Ridge. Check them out here: ridge.com/shadows and use the code "SHADOWS" to get 10% OFF!

[@The210491]

wow, all the links and sponsoring and then you forget to link the "amazing" book of this video´s author....you always suck with linking mentioned stuff like other vids and such, but this time is even special for your standards 🤣👍

[@AaronJLong]

Yep, seems like this happens a lot on KZbin. It's a surprise when something other than a sponsor that is mentioned to be linked is actually in the description. I checked audible, but it didn't show up, but on Amazon it did have a link to get it on Audible after all. I spent a credit on it and now it's in the backlog.

[@muzzer5327]

Where's the link for the book? I wanna buy it

[@GMT439]

New Clear Power comes form the Movement of Water. The Radiation Symbol is an image of THE WATER TURBINE obviously. That why the power stations are all by the sea or on Tidal rivers. Cooling water obviously has no need to be tidal.. & Cooling Water = CW = 33.

[@TKUA11]

Are they made from cobalt 60?

[@rossmcd3703]

I drove a dilapidated blue Chevy Cobalt in college. My friends called it "Cobalt-59" because that was it's apparent top speed due to tire imbalance.

[@kaibotski4939]

Did it make the owners lose hair and fatigue?

[@jblyon2]

@@kaibotski4939 That comes standard on a Chevy. Eventually you lose enough hair and get fatigued enough to buy a Corvette.

[@alm5992]

Friends: "NEEEEEERRRRD!"

[@1Guason3]

​@@jblyon2and for some reason, the urge to place your feet inside of shoes with New Balance branding.

[@jimmio3727]

Your friends should be my friends, just sayin'. That's friggin' hilarious.

[@missanthropy28]

"The Cobalt 60 was at this point 19 years old. The majority of it had already decayed" ...I feel you Cobalt 60, I feel you

[@mood7244]

😂

[@Puddingskin01]

Never thought I could look at a terribly deadly substance and say "Yeah, mood."

[@kiriuxeosa8716]

Dude imagine being older and feelings even more worthless Shout out to all my working adults out there, our time was short

[@eamonia]

Shit... Based on that fact I'll be dead next year. 38, here I come!

[@maccabeus-everydaysurvival5828]

Hahahaha

[@TheAndroidNextDoor]

I've worked with Cobalt 60 and Cobalt 57 as well as a number of other radioactive isotopes and that shit is some of the scariest stuff on the planet. It was a pain to have to keep the tiny, microscopic samples we used inside of heavy lead pill boxes that were further stored inside lead boxes that weighed at least a few hundred pounds but honestly it's far better to be too safe than not safe enough.

[@fett713akamandodragon5]

What is the friggin range on that stuff? Seems like hundreds of meters? Damned scary.

[@TKUA11]

Can you make ridge rings from it tho?

[@igorbednarski8048]

​@@fett713akamandodragon5gamma rays have an infinite range, it all depends on the size of the source. If it's a handful of atoms you can swallow them and nothing's going to happen, if it's an exploding star everything within light-years is toast.

[@MrGrandure]

Right. Don't need another Daglian

[@thehangmansdaughter1120]

Dear god, what do you do for a living?

[@mtheoryx83]

"Taking a piece of steel wool and scraping the enamel off your teeth" Sir, I did not need that string of words in that order today. Well done.

[@jonnylawless6797]

I don’t even have real teeth anymore but that sentence made me cringe

[@seymourpro6097]

There was an incident in Japan. Some Cobalt60 "went missing" and was determined to have been used to make high strength re-bar for some steel used to make a housing tower block. On the basis that the Co60 was "diluted" in the steel and encased in concrete the block was allowed to stand and be occupied, every resident had regular health checks. The residents had LONGER than normal lifespans! Which was put down to regular health checks catching every other disease before that killed people. This has it's own Wiki page but it's drowned out with nuclear power station pages.

[@brobasticbroham446]

Almost like our global approach to healthcare needs a rework.

[@ranger178]

people who work at nuclear plants have longer than average life spans probably due to better healthcare than average population.

[@kiriuxeosa8716]

When finish the comment in your head only to finish reading it and end up with a feeling of deja vu Its like the old saying "Great minds stole it from someone else they just don't know it yet" 😂

[@kaden-sd6vb]

​@@ex-navyspookthat's terrifying.

[@shadowmystery5613]

In the Soviet Union a capsule of Cesium-137 went missing and became embedded inside the concrete wall of an apartment building... Took them 9 years and seeral dead people before they managed to figure out why the residents of that apartment died of leukemia 😆 This incident is known as Kramatorsk radiological accident.

[@competitionglen]

Earlier this year a Caesium 137 capsule was lost in Western Australia on a 1400km highway. From a mining company, not a medical device. It fell off a truck. Talk about trying to find a needle in a haystack. A small capsule along a 1400km highway. They actually managed to locate it within 3 or 4 days, bloody miracle.

[@greenaum]

Depends how radioactive it is, you can just drive around with a Geiger counter til it starts clicking. And Australian highways are very straight, they don't branch off anywhere cos there's nowhere to go to. What did they use it for, "X-raying" rock in the ground, to image it?

[@Dutch3DMaster]

@@greenaum If I recall correctly it was used for blasting materials with it like in spectrogram-readings (that's at least what the newspaper article here mentioned about it, but well, they've gotten some things wrong in the past :P )

[@91Vault]

to be fair I think there was like a 12m radius with a Geiger counter? still hilarious in a horrifying way tho (oh well I guess everyone forgot about Rio blowing up the caves for a little while)

[@dielaughing73]

​@@greenaumyeah that's what they did and they found it on the road. But the thing was only about the size of a pea, so it could quite easily have been picked up in someone's tyre treads or otherwise moved off the road. Luckily, it wasn't. But the whole thing boggles my mind. I have handled radiation sources on a minesite in the same region, and the precautions and paperwork were extensive. This one was in a poorly-sealed container on the back of an open trailer, and simply fell out through a hole. In the end, no charges were laid and I have to think the Govt didn't want too much attention on the issue (perhaps because industry practices were substandard across the board). I sincerely hope they're applying serious pressure behind the scenes though, to make sure proper standards are followed in future. Oh and the most common use is for gauges that can detect flow of material through steel pipes or chutes.

[@mississaugaicedogs]

reminds me of that Jackie Chan movie (not rush hour, Who Am I?) that had a very reactive element go missing in South Africa.

[@willmcgo8288]

For anyone working as a scrap collector having a Geiger counter would be a good device to have around for detecting if items are radioactive.

[@claudiuspulcher2440]

yeah I have the feeling that the kind of people who go around 'finding' scrap that they try and crack open with a chisel (despite having no clue what it is) aren't thinking that hard.

[@talkingmudcrab718]

I actually frequent a rare and antique electronic components shop and the owner keeps a Geiger counter handy for just this reason. He had an occasion where someone brought a similar piece of medical equipment from this story into his shop that set off his detector. It wasn't emitting at an immediately dangerous level but enough to warrant informing the proper authorities to dispose of it properly. I bought a Geiger counter off of him a few years ago as a novelty item but with the way things are going today it might just end up coming in handy...

[@metalmike570]

Right, in Bangcock.

[@billyhomeyer7414]

@@talkingmudcrab718there are old smoke detectors that contain americium and disposal is regulated by one of the nuclear agencies. These aren’t the smoke detectors in you house. If I remember correctly they run off 250V dc.

[@phillip_mcguinness7025]

They usually do, as well as a dangerous gas meter.

[@KENPlotbot]

Fun fact: there are lots of abandoned machines from hospital use decaying around. In Brazil, in here and everywhere. Radioactivity means responsibility

[@anyathepanther7977]

Mr. Ballen has made an Episode about such a Situation in his Medical Mysterie Podcast. The shit that happend there was Gutt twisting 🤢

[@emilyofjane]

That is scarily true. Orphaned sources are no joke.

[@18Hongo]

I'm surprised that Brazil still lets that happen, after the Goiania Incident. At the very least, you'd hope that they were maybe taking slightly more stringent security measures for abandoned radiological disasters in the making.

[@addiemunson2119]

Check out Plainly Difficult. Lots of great stories about tossed radioactive materials 🎉

[@HmmmmmLemmeThinkNo]

That should be a damn slogan -- "Radioactivity means responsibility" aka "if you have something radioactive you're damn well responsible for it. You, your company, your landowner, and your government"

[@wirebrushofenlightenment1545]

When they were designing the radiation hazard symbol back in the '40s, one proposed was a skull emanating wavy lines. It was rejected as 'Too frightening'.

[@khallrik]

oh the irony...

[@JackFrost008]

death by radiation has got to be one of the nastiest ways to go 😕

[@Aryasvitkona]

​@@JackFrost008Oh absolutely. In terms of ways to die I think I'd say it's probably the worst. Definitely one of the most prolonged. Absolutely horrific. No symbol in the world can properly convey the appropriate fear people should have of the materials. When everything is fine, it's golden, but humans are so stupid

[@ryansterling1910]

It should be frightening!! It’s a terrible way to go

[@JackFrost008]

​@@Aryasvitkona that it is... no symbol would show how bad it is... still no way to get rid of radiation :/

[@ostrodmit]

I'm impressed by how neatly the response team dealt with the situation, given the limited tools they had.

[@johndododoe1411]

Tools for recovering radioactive sources will be destroyed in the process and are thus appropriate to be made from lightweight low cost materials such as bamboo . I know a research institution that protected its most radioactive experiments by a wall of loosely stacked lead bricks .

[@Aryasvitkona]

​@@johndododoe1411i think he meant more the usage of the lead shield to help get workers closer and stuff which came across as an "oh shit we need a plan" arrangement as opposed to normal procedure

[@robbie_]

I imagine they don't have an experience with this kind of thing either.

[@Aryasvitkona]

@@robbie_ It was their job, though they likely weren't used to it in such an... uncomfortable place. Like collecting and making safe orphaned radioactive sources is a part of their job. But in a field of scrap and no one knows where it is is just a worst case scenario, they were legit needle in a haystacking

[@A-Milkdromeda-Laniakea-Hominid]

Why impressed? Thailand is a developed nation. The scrap metal yard didn't even have a geiger counter handy as employees were losing their hair. And even after the gov atomic regulatory agency got involved the best they had was dental aprons and a lead shield. It was definitely an "oh shit we need a plan" scenario- they have laws in place to prevent this, yet no one bothers to figure one out for when the law is broken?

[@joebob7730]

Fun Fact: Cobalt 60 has so many calories that if you eat a pea sized bit of it you’ll never have to eat again for the rest of your life!

[@ThereWasNoFreeName]

Because your life will be very short after you eat it.

[@greenaum]

Yeah it's probably better measured in joules.

[@XtreeM_FaiL]

You could eat, but it doesn't do much because your digestive system has died and you starve.

[@sauce4137]

Calories is not really correct, its the equivalent amount of energy not literal calories

[@godtremble95]

@@sauce4137 Calories is correct, calorie is just a measure of energy whether it be food or explosives or a radioactive source

[@drew6524]

When I was a kid playing on the playground at school during recess we found a neat looking slab of what looked like fibrous graphite. Being kids we made up some story and used this weird material. Then a teacher came up and told us to drop it and took out gloves away from us. Turns out me and my friend were playing with a giant piece of hard asbestos, with fibres dropping off left and right. I vaguely understood at the time. I don’t think they told our parents. I’ve been fine no lung issues ever and as far as I know my friend is fine too. BUT it gave me just a tiny microscopic whiff of how EASY it is to find something neat and treat it like anything else then………. Suddenly it’s I just risked my life and could die from it. Remember people replacing a sheet of asbestos like the one we were playing with wear full haz mat suits with battery powered super-hepa filters and are showered before carefully getting out of the suit then shower again. Oh well! It could have ended with two kids getting lung cancer or fibrosis etc- I was lucky. But the line between lucky and dead is as thin as [insert symbol for unknown here] so be careful. Any metal rods of a non construction size or shape and any ball bearings lying around- just don’t. Play with sticks or an AI just don’t trust “mystery metal” because my trust of “mystery construction material looking 100% harmless” could have killed us.

[@justicedemocrat9357]

Uhh...it takes decades to develop asbestosis you're probably gonna die in 10 years bro.

[@denisdubovik228]

It takes 10 to 40 years to develop asbestosis after the exposure.

[@chaoticsilver8442]

What was a chunk of asbestos doing in a school playground in the first place?

[@cattail64]

@@justicedemocrat9357 do we know how old they are now or when they were a child? if their over 40 now then they probably are in the clear. But, yeah, if they are only in their 20s then good chance it just hasn't developed yet

[@hippiebits2071]

Asbestos occurs naturally in the environment. It’s all over the place in some cities in the Southwest.

[@jeffystevens]

Wearing a lead apron while within meters of a rod of cobalt 60 is like jumping into a volcano while wearing an oven mitt

[@speedy01247]

more like being blasted by fire while wearing a firefighters jacket. (and only the jacket)

[@trevorduniho9448]

Is that fucking challenge?

[@ripstephenhawking8787]

It's like slowly lowering your balls into a pot of candle wax at 100°C While wearing sunglasses to prevent eye injury due to possible splattering of wax. There is no challenge only stupidity.

[@mickkelly6389]

Hold my beer

[@attackoramic8361]

Or protecting yourself from a barret 50 cal with a piece of toilet paper

[@denisthemenace8032]

Back in 2005, I used to work as a certified exposure device operator out in the oil patch using iridium 192 taking industrial xrays. It was amazing how many rig workers would ignore the half dozen giant radioactive signs and walk right into my zone. Sometimes they'd even move a sign out of their way so they could enter. Some people just have no clue as to how dangerous thier ignorance is.

[@GRIM_MOD]

Meh could be but most likely nothing will happen to them unless it’s every day exposure for years did they do it everyday??

[@kirtil5177]

​@@GRIM_MOD even if it might not straight up kill, its probably not wise to take the gamble and win either the cancer or impotency roulette

[@18Hongo]

Unrelated field, but related experience: I sometimes have to do chainsaw work near pedestrian-accessible areas. We always put up signs warning people not to walk through, and yet, someone always does. They always seem surprised that there actually IS dangerous work taking place, despite the signs and the sound of machinery. Our safety measures include checking around us, especially within our danger zones, before we start a fell, or make a felling cut, or even start our machines, since more than once curious members of the public have decided to wander through an area of freshly cut brash so that they can walk right up to someone holding a RUNNING CHAINSAW and ask us what we're doing . TLDR: Nobody pays attention to warning signs, and some people seem to have such terrible self-preservation instincts that they would probably try to fistfight an angry hippo, even if you told them it was a bad idea.

[@andiward7068]

​@@GRIM_MODthe longterm results from radiation exposure show that less is best. Our environments are already full of carcinogens, toxins and microplastics. Avoiding radiation should be a no-brainer for everyone.

[@GRIM_MOD]

@@andiward7068 Yes long term that is 100 percent true, but the human body is very resilient to it still. obviously not saying go get an x ray every week lol but once every few years "if needed" isnt going to raise your risk by much considering what you stated other things that are much worse in our every day life i agree with you.

[@WindTurbineSyndrome]

There was a container came in to port from UAE to Italy a few years ago. The port guy went by with Geiger counter it went off so hot he thought it was malfunctioning. He got another radiation detector. The readings were red. He called authorities. The owner if container was never identified. The scrap in container had cobalt 60 in it from a medical equipment and it took a year for the authorities to find a robot to cut a hole in container and remove the radioactive piece and put in lead and ship to a German company that handled nuclear waste. At huge cost. So it happens.

[@DrDeuteron]

Yeah, they don’t malfunction high. 🤦‍♂️

[@hunternovak4187]

Why do they always think the Geiger counter is broken in these situations

[@mjfan653]

Im not sure, but I would quess most cases are just malfunctions. The cases when real radioactive material is found is super rare, most people dont encounter a true emergency of this sort through their entire lives. Meanwhile geiger counters having broken parts or low batteriers or something falsifying reading could be much more common. Just a guess tho.

[@Vok250]

​@@hunternovak4187most people are not prepared to face their own mortality. They don't think anything could happen to them

[@Aryasvitkona]

​@@hunternovak4187because it's the only explanation that doesn't involve them about to die. That and just the sheer unlikeliness of an orphaned radiation source, it's reasonable imo to assume it's impossible. The moment the second geiger counter confirms similar readings, evacuate everyone in the immediate vicinity and call the appropriate people. Any hesitation at that point is negligence

[@Danelhi]

A similar incident happened in Mexico in 1983, in Ciudad Juárez, a radiotherapy machine was sold illegally to a hospital, with no people qualified for its use it was abandoned on the basement until one day someone told a maintenance worker to take it to the scraps, he and another maintenance worker destroyed the machine, loaded it into a truck and sold it, it was recicle into beams that where distributed all through Mexico, a trailer full of these beams got lost in USA and past nearby a laboratory in Los Alamos and that’s how the disaster was discovered…

[@UnknownUser-fe5zu]

Hundreds of People from Juarez come to El Paso every day to dig into our dumpsters and collect trash to bring back. Idiots.

[@MuhmmedNadeem-cy2tj]

Los Alamos was where the Manhattan Project to develop the Atom Bomb was based at. The irony.

[@nooboftheyear7170]

The sensors would have picked it up.

[@ShannonDove-sy7ye]

That one wasn't cobalt 60 , I think it was cesium something, and it was a powder instead of a metal rod (cesium chloride). And it had a half life of 30 years, compared to cobalt 60 at 5 years

[@AG3n3ricHuman]

@@MuhmmedNadeem-cy2tj That's actually why they had a radiation detector in the road. They didn't want nuclear material leaving the lab without their knowledge.

[@TheRealWindlePoons]

I once saw a cobalt radiation source when visiting a commercial irradiation cell. It was immersed in the safety "pond", so there was 18 feet of water between me and the cobalt. The rods reminded me of an electric fire. An electric fire glows orange, though and the glow from the cobalt (or the water immediately surrounding it) was blue. A memorable experience and not one I am in any hurry to repeat...

[@khallrik]

sounds like Cherenkov radiation

[@Aryasvitkona]

I'd love to repeat that experience. Being able to observe phenomena that are fundamentally lethal to our ability to live would be wonderful... Provided it was in such a way that I would not be irradiated. Observing Co60 in a safety pond would do it.

[@Nasticator]

​@@Aryasvitkona this is my favourite part of my job. Going into the cell to do maintenance work while the source rack is at the bottom of the pool. it's a strange blue glow that seems unreal but it's rather comforting.

[@albinklein7680]

I would have the constant urge to jump in. Just like the urge to touch a running fan...

[@khallrik]

@@albinklein7680 so pretty much moth -> flame?

[@LikeTheBuffalo]

That was a harrowing tale that I expected to end much worse than it did, a lot of credit needs to be extended to the workers who located the cobalt in the scrap pile. Absolutely mindboggling.

[@PlasmaOne]

I find that the seeming absence of any intelligence here by those involved more mindboggling.

[@ex-navyspook]

Look up Kyle Hill, and his "Half-life History" series, or Plainly Difficult's "Sources In the Wild" series; the latter one talks about a similar episode in Cuidad Juarez that affected people on both sides of the Mexican-US border.

[@tubensalat1453]

@@PlasmaOne You can only apply intelligence to things you know. If you don't have the privilege of having much of an education there's going to be a lot that you are not aware of.

[@MaoRatto]

Notice this was in a poor country and clear wanting of money as a byproduct.

[@Takyodor2]

@@PlasmaOne It's not lack of intelligence, it's lack of education about radiation. If you had never been taught about radiotherapy machines, or seen a ☢, are you sure you would do better? I agree with OP, the people who located the Cobalt60 rod deserve serious praise. Not registering the radiotherapy machine with the authorities though, that's a major fuckup.

[@erroneous6947]

I’m an environmental geologist, used to work chemical spills and train derailments. This is a good “what not to do” story. Damn. Reminds me of the story about the pest control guy who washed his work clothes with his families clothes. And the pesticides killed an infant.

[@markae0]

I never thought of that. I use a laundrymat that anyone can use, and someone before me could put pesticides dirty cloths in the wash there.

[@Cbd_7ohm]

That must be a garbage washing machine and dryer lol.

[@mickh8231]

Used to get wives who did husbands washing would get asbestos off the clothes in their lungs

[@cyberwarlord7363]

It gets in the build up on the washer.

[@borisborcic]

Pests have mothers too.

[@kery1334]

Remember the radio gold that made it's way into jewelry and rings (fingers fell off)in the early 80's. Jewelry dealers had geiger counters on hand to reassure customers that their jewelry was safe.

[@pnoel82]

Ive worked with cobalt 60 doing industrial radiography. We use it to shoot through large bore piping. It has to be stored in a 500lb camera to be able to transport it safely. I can tell you first hand, its some serious stuff. Pro tip: the best ways to reduce radiation exposure are time, distance, and shielding.

[@MrSplic3r]

Industrial radiography is heavy, dangerous, and idiots will absolutely cut across the yellow and magenta ropes to get to their lunchbox faster...

[@firstjohn3123]

​@@MrSplic3r😂 The irresistible force of stupid...

[@slackocaster]

Alara

[@BluesBoy-ij2rb]

I worked as a radiographer as well , but with Iridium 192 ......cobalt 60 ...???....probably turn an exposure time of a couple of minutes into a couple of milli seconds !???....lol.........Erik☢️

[@pnoel82]

@@BluesBoy-ij2rb I've worked mostly with ir-192 as well. The good ol delta 880 cameras are my favorite lol.

[@AlexanderWright1]

Having been treated in a radiotherapy machine, my discharge letter stated I'd been dosed with 35 greys. The difference being that this was focused very precisely on my former tumour. Modern machines generate their radiation using synchrotrons, and hence are much safer.

[@ratmilk9260]

"former" tumor... woo-hoo!

[@djtrac3r935]

Ayyyy cancer free! Congrats!

[@therobloxpro8262]

guessing it didnt stand a chance

[@mikefm4]

The mention that his hands began to itch upon handling the lead shell is terrifying because that itch is literally his hands cells being ripped apart.

[@captainstabbin1230]

The nerve cells, yeah.

[@mikefm4]

@@captainstabbin1230 the yeah cells, nerve.

[@HeyItsJonny]

​@@captainstabbin1230cell, the yeah nerve

[@seany8787]

@@captainstabbin1230cells yeah nerve, the

[@Peradime]

​@@captainstabbin1230the nerve, yeah cells

[@dannyd.9932]

I love the optimism of “drop and run” since if you can read the label it’s way too late

[@AccidentallyOnPurpose]

Actually, not always, depending on the element and how far it's decayed. If all the people involved in this incident had dropped it and ran and reported it, they more than likely would have all survived with very little damage.

[@johnwagg1538]

I was wondering how effective that “warning” actually was

[@Tea_laBlue]

Has a similar vibe as those videos about how to survive a nuclear blast

[@andiward7068]

"Lay down and die" doesn't mesh well our survival instincts. I don't need cognitive dissonance along with my radiation poisoning.

[@AccidentallyOnPurpose]

@@Tea_laBlue A nuclear blast can be very survivable though on a number of factors

[@adamcavanaugh4940]

Finding an orphan source is terrifying. And the lack of awareness only makes it worse. I began working in a hospital after a background in military and Hazmat. When walking to my place of work in the hospital I thought I saw a pig (heavy lead container shielded for holding a radioactive source) sitting on top of an ATM by the entrance. I checked it for labeling, but it was peeled off. I called security and initiated a "code orange" (hazmat emergency) and blocked off the area. Security acted like I was an idiot claiming there was no chance I could be right. When they finally summoned the health physicist he asked how the fuck that got there. Thankfully it was only Iodine 131, and not a danger to the passersby. But the unwillingness to believe an insistent employee, or take efforts to isolate the area was concerning. People don't want to believe that these things can get out, or how dangerous an orphan source can be. Security footage found the person who left it. A woman thought the container was cool, put it in her purse. She denied peeling the label. Took it out to withdraw cash, and forgot to pick it back up.

[@elliotnolte8298]

... So a random person was able to shoplift radioactive material from a hospital? I am very curious about that place's security protocols or lack thereof.

[@Pushing_Pixels]

@@elliotnolte8298 If you are looking for nuclear material, for whatever reason, a hospital is the best and easiest place to find it.

[@dielaughing73]

​@@elliotnolte8298have you walked around hospitals much? Usually no-one stops you

[@washingmachine4993]

​@@dielaughing73well that's fucking concerning isn't it. this is how you get disasters like that. we should name and shame when it comes to neglectful hospitals, our health can be in danger.

[@Takyodor2]

Thank you for insisting to get that situation sorted out. The world needs more people with your mind set!

[@Bradyboy3211]

Gotta say, as a Canadian I never actually knew we're the biggest supplier of Colbolt-60. Learned something new today, and I gotta thank Simon for that.

[@GertrudeFilthbasket]

as a Canadian i gotta say, i'm pretty disappointed in NORDION for refusing to remove the old hazard. guess they already had their hands full with all that cash.

[@csabahollo6922]

@@GertrudeFilthbasketthey may not have been allowed to due to regulatory rules. Sometimes the culprits are the regulators, which, in this case, was one of the root causes.

[@FSAPOJake]

Canada also puts out a lot of car engines, and has some of the finest engineers and builders working on that stuff. The legendary Hellcat engine comes out of Canada, and despite putting out over 700 horsepower, has never been known to have any problems whatsoever. It's one of Chrysler's best engines. Meanwhile, their 5.7L Hemi V8, a regular naturally aspirated V8 engine, HAS had problems in the past and that one was built in Mexico.

[@jpslaym0936]

Its because you need a nuclear reactor to make Co-60 by absorbing neutrons. In the US, we tend to use any extra nuclear reactor output for the manufacture of weapons grade Plutonium through enrichment

[@yourswordsir2537]

But no thanks to the guy who actually researched and wrote the episode? Great.

[@fencserx9423]

Moral of the story seems to actually be that radioactive material is ridiculously safe when properly handled. And like any toxic chemical, is ridiculously dangerous when it isn’t

[@getsideways7257]

And that hazardous biology can be much deadlier in that case, since it's basically "grey goo lite"

[@shagrat47]

The "moral" of the story is: slapping warning signs on something, does not mean it's safe! You need to prevent illiterates, idiots, or just hungry, desperate people that look for something valuable to sell, from accessing it, for as long as it is potentially dangerous. Give or take a couple hundred years...🤯

[@Munenushi]

damn just like relationships

[@nosidenoside2458]

It's like the risk is squared. Exponentially more dangerous if mistreated, and exponentially safe if treated properly

[@offshoretomorrow3346]

Hmmm, reminds me of 'Communism isn't bad - it just hasn't been done right yet'.

[@doink3259]

Doctor: English V-Sauce isn't real, he can't hurt you. English V-Sauce:

[@stacykrett]

Haha...I first clicked on one of these vids because he looked a lot like Michael Stevens.

[@hollowkos]

WAIT! He isn't the V sauce guy? XD HAHAHAH I had no idea XD I don't watch it often so I got bamboozled XD

[@user-lk2qf4rt3m]

effin hell I just realised they are different people. You're right

[@TailOfThePup]

Vsauce also played Magnus Carlsen at the chess olympiads recently!

[@aderitodealmeida5644]

A few years earlier (1987) a quite similar accident (nearly identical, actually) happened in Brazil: the so-called "Goiânia Accident". But instead of cobalt-60, the culprit was a rod of caesium-137...

[@ruddyxmax]

Cs-137 is more dangerous since decay with beta particles, meaning contamination risk, and also the decay lifespan is higher than of Co-60

[@hdfwk4wjj69wjvi8]

I thought I was going crazy knowing that this happened in Brazil

[@W0lfenstrike]

It is eerily identical and just as tragic, they uncovered the radioactive material that was reminiscent of "blue glowing powder" and the brother of the junkyard owner even allowed his own 6 year old daughter to play with it, she smeared the stuff all over her body. It did not end well for her.

[@NuclearMango.]

That was the incident that I thought he would be discussing in this video. I've seen several biopics about the Brazilian accident. It was so durned tragic. I seem to remember that some the "blue glowing stuff" got on the guys sandwich but he ate it anyway. Also, the toddler that played with it. It was horrible. I had never even heard of the Bangkok incident. Eerily similar and just as tragic.

[@catey62]

@@W0lfenstrike That is the incident I saw a video of here on KZbin as well. so tragic and sad. that's why you need to have strict rules for anything that contains radioactive material.

[@spaceismetal6762]

7:30 A stable cobalt atom begins with 32 neutrons, not 27. Twenty-seven is the number of PROTONS it begins with, as Cobalt's atomic number is 27. Mass number = neutrons + protons, so 27 protons and 32 neutrons makes Cobalt-59 or stable Cobalt. Neutron activation adds a single neutron to the Co-59 atoms, hence Cobalt-60.

[@BrothersCinco]

I don't know man. judging by this guy's highly affected upper class British accent, he must know everything.

[@shuzhan9684]

⁠@@BrothersCinco@spaceismetal6762 is right, atomic number of cobalt is 27, so it means numbers of protons in nucleus.

[@BrothersCinco]

WOW nothing gets past you huh?

[@leewightman8619]

I'm not intelligent enough to understand that

[@spaceismetal6762]

@@leewightman8619 It's not so hard, it's literally just reading numbers off an internationally accepted table.

[@janet6421]

US mom here. I showed both symbols to my kids. 7yo didn't know it and 10 yo said first symbol is "nuclear." I showed them the second symbol and both recognized that as something to get away from.

[@lifespanwellnessbeauty-60i64]

Excellent!👍

[@VVayVVard]

Moral of the story: always carry a Geiger counter.

[@edi9892]

It doesn't detect all the threats. Most can't detect alpha radiation and neutrons.

[@VVayVVard]

​@@edi9892 Many instruments do detect alpha rays. Alpha rays are unable to penetrate the skin (or clothes), so they mainly become a threat when a source is ingested or placed next to/inside an open wound. Neutron sources tend to release gamma rays and can thereby be indirectly detected by Geiger counters.

[@edi9892]

@@VVayVVard I looked for detectors to buy and struggled to get one that detects alpha radiation. Food is exactly why I wanted this feature.

[@VVayVVard]

​@@edi9892 GQ GMC600 and DT-9501 are claimed to be able to detect alpha radiation. The latter seems to be equivalent to the "PCE-RAM 10" offered by PCE Instruments.

[@Aliyah_666]

Man that thing would be going off all the time. Radiation literally bombards us every day.

[@vic5015]

Eerily, that latency period im the cass of severe exposure is also known as "the walking ghost phase". You have gotten past the immediate symptoms but your fate is already sealed.

[@JoshSweetvale]

To be blunt: You've stopped getting microwaved but your DNA is pulverized, and your cells will die. Except your neurons. Those don't die. Ever.

[@MysteriousFuture]

At that point, enjoy the latent stage as much as one can and get one’s affairs in order before the end. When the second stage begins, best to end it sooner than later in a painless way

[@prof.scheere6933]

The walking goat phase sounds scary

[@STScott-qo4pw]

Like the poor firefighters at Chernobyl.

[@Aryasvitkona]

​@@prof.scheere6933it should. It's accurate.

[@Lauren_C]

Hisashi Ouchi is absolutely a topic worthy of Into the Shadows. The guy was kept alive for over 80 days, despite a radiation incident that had destroyed most, if not all, traces of the man’s DNA throughout his body. Pretty gruesome…

[@arami187]

As I recall, the medical staff who handled him were pretty traumatized from that whole ordeal, based on the written statements from them.

[@CaesarSaladin7]

Wendigoon’s video on this is heart wrenching.

[@GENXJOPLIN]

​@@CaesarSaladin7 and all you need to watch on the subject. Why the fuck do people want to hear different people regurgitate the same story?

[@oiltycoonbillionaire]

​@@GENXJOPLINautism

[@crteaser9726]

Im pretty sure they already did one on him on one of his channels

[@Wile-.E.-Coyote]

I work with this professionally. The briefing before we work with this when harvesting is 2,500,000 rem/hr at working distance. That's if we lose shielding, which is to be avoided, of course. For reference, the legal limit for nuclear energy workers is 5 rem/year. That means you would get 138 times your limit from one second of exposure. Which is a lethal dose.

[@larsrons7937]

When the russians last year captured the Chernobyl power plant, one russian serviceman was seen running off with a bar of "something" in his bare hands, that the story claimed turned out to be Cobalt-60. What would the consequences be for such an action?

[@jenniferanderson7304]

​@@larsrons7937Dude got Super Cancer

[@larsrons7937]

@@jenniferanderson7304 I'm quite sure it was super stupid - and jubilant optimistic.

[@SevenSixTwo2012]

@@larsrons7937 He's Russian and Russian DNA consists of nuclear energy, communism and vodka. He will be fine. 😁

[@berryscott3590]

Notions of 'survival of the fittest' pre-date Darwin... People who believe in Neo- 'Darwinian' evolution, underpinned by random mutation, are none too bright themselves... @@HadenBlake

[@AG3n3ricHuman]

"DANGER! RADIATION! DROP AND RUN!" Thai guy: "ฉันสงสัยว่ามันหมายถึงอะไร"

[@Umbrella_Aerospace_Corporation]

😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@chrisrobinson9899]

Except 10 years of English studies is mandatory in Thailand since 96... But I get the joke. Poor Grandpa I guess.

[@Relou4e]

Once my father had to change an old Cobalt-60 piece like this one when the new one got stuck during the transfer from the transportcontainer to the machine. They tried for more than a day to get it loose. They were minutes before calling for an emergency team from Germany when my father fortunately found a solution. Siemens was happy and my father was a hero! 🙂 PS: My father was very happy until he saw the first patient: a seven year old girl with little chance of surviving. That touched him deeply!

[@GT-dh5nk]

This after its potency was reduced by 92%... It's almost darkly comical to hear Simon's narration of what this thing did after losing 92% of its true effectiveness, and just laying around. No joke.

[@lirrobinson8377]

I feel Simon used the wrong word. It's activity was reduced by 92%. 1 Curie of Co60 will still have the same energy level of 100 Curies. 100 Curies will just kill you a lot faster.

[@Aryasvitkona]

Also it was 19 years old. They're meant to be replaced every 5. In a situation where the hospital wasn't skimping on replacing them, it would have been literally 4 times as bad. We'd probably be looking at hundreds dead or nearly dead.

[@expertoflizardcorrugation3967]

​@Aryasvitkona maybe I'm being dumb, but wouldn't it be 8x as bad due to the 5 year halflife of cobalt?

[@WhiteWolf-lm7gj]

​@@expertoflizardcorrugation3967I think it would actually be 16/32x as bad, since it's divided by two every 5 years

[@willb5278]

Yep, that's the true danger of radiation. It can be incredibly concentrated, but unlike heat concentrated to a couple thousand degrees, it doesnt glow, hiss, or burn you on contact. We don't have the senses to feel it, only feel as our body falls apart when it's influence is strong enough to outpace our healing. It's completely invisible to our built-in senses, and needs tools to track down. To someone without those tools, who's not expecting it? OOF.

[@MrTylerStricker]

"Drop & run"? More like "I'm terribly sorry if you can read this"

[@scoliosys8311]

You just say “if you can read this, you’re dead. Sorry.”

[@MrTylerStricker]

@@scoliosys8311 "If you can read this: Sit down where you are & give up."

[@chrisb9143]

The good thing about gamma radiation is that there is an extremely small chance that it will deposit any energy inside of your body. The problem with gamma radiation is that when it start losing energy inside you, the damages are terrible. A single photon can destroy multiple cells, and then organels and DNA as it loses energy and bouces around inside your body.

[@Queldonus]

If you ever think you’ve come into contact with an orphaned radioactive source, remember the 3 rules: Time, distance, and shielding. Spend as little time near it as possible, stay as far away as possible, and keep dense objects between you and it for shielding. (Rock, concrete, lead, etc). The more of any of these, the better. You’ll notice that anyone hurt in these tragic stories didn’t know to do this. And if you ever find something that worries you, contact the appropriate local authorities. Tragedies have been prevented by some lucky people that were appropriately cautious.

[@zwenkwiel816]

Orphaned? What happened to his parents?

[@killerqueenbiteszadusto1771]

@@zwenkwiel816decaying as we speak 😞

[@sprolyborn2554]

And depending on how hot it is, it may not matter. You're dead before you can get away.

[@Michael-sb8jf]

You be surprised at how little material you need to shield from ionizing radiation. Probably the only reason the junk yard owner lived to see the next month.

[@MyStickyUkulele]

I live in BC Canada and the amount of older Indian or Mandarin or Cantonese Grandma's and Grandpa's who don't speak or read English is actually pretty big. Most of them came with their kids and never had a need to learn as the province has a very multicultural population with lots of established communities. If one of those grandparents found one of those canisters they may not know what they were holding till they got home and someone in their family told them. Seems like it might be a good idea to just cover it in warning silhouettes of humans throwing up and skulls in a circles with a line through it and some sorta hand that's shown being injured similar to hazardous products on a construction site

[@BaronVonQuiply]

Somewhere along the line when I was in this topic, I found someone make the point that while a skull is associated with death to us and currently, people in an unforeseeable future time and culture may associate the human skull with life, health, or something else positive. It's a recognized problem for long term nuclear waste storage as we can't reliably say that what warns us will still be seen as hostile in 50,000 years.

[@instanoodles]

@@BaronVonQuiply Nuclear waste is not cobalt 60 though and is only unsafe for 300 years. The longer something decays for the safer it is, an isotope that needs 50,000 years to decay is no more harmful that many places on earth that have a high background radiation like Guarapari, Brazil.

[@BaronVonQuiply]

@@instanoodles You may want to double check some of that. Particularly look up high and low level waste.

[@VentandInvent]

Seems like a good idea to learn the language in the country you’re moving to with your entire family

[@S3lkie-Gutz]

I'm a first generation child of Polish immigrants on my mom's side so I understand, language barriers definitely pose a challenge and I think signs that people universally understand as "danger! Bad!" Regardless of the language you speak would definitely help in some degree, if not at least a good bit

[@MichaelEilers]

This very tragic situation was also repeated in Mexico, Brazil, and Ireland with a very similar set of circumstances, old medical equipment that was not disposed of properly that fell into the hands of poor and poorly educated scrap merchants.

[@jacekatalakis8316]

I knew about Mexico and Brazil. But Ireland? Gonna have to read up on this

[@brodriguez11000]

One would think lead containers would be a warning sign. A reason also to embed the radiation symbol in everything.

[@zephiask1758]

Wasnt this the incident where they found a "funny blue glowing powder" (being Caesium) sharing it with friends, childrend and neighbours, putting it on their body just before dying or suffering horrible injuries and death?

[@AcidHotpocket]

​@zephiask1758 yes, that's the one that happened in Goiania, Brazil

[@TheTomBevis]

There have been cases of radiation poisoning from abandoned radio-thermal power supplies, also. Mostly in former soviet union areas? Most people seem to be more fearful of radiation than is warranted, but these cases are defiantly a run for your life situation.

[@elroyfudbucker6806]

The longer Simon went on describing the way the cobalt rod ended up at a scrap metal yard & then the steadily worsening symptoms of the casualties, the more nauseous I started to feel. This reminds me of an incident at a minesite processing plant in Western Australia where three old industrial radioactive sources (still in their lead shielded enclosures) were put into a scrap metal bin & subsequently melted down. They were used to measure the level of ore in a tall bin, so I'm guessing that they were cobalt 60, too, considering the width of the bin & the high density of the ore. Luckily, the sources were only the size of a match head. Still, not good. There was another incident involving a radioactive source, again in Western Australia whereby a source was being transported in a truck from a minesite to Perth, over 1,600 km. The source somehow managed to escape from its enclosure (not an easy thing to do), fall out of the wooden box & out of the truck. Fortunately, it was found a few kilometres from the mine.

[@DanaWebb2017]

My grandfather had lung cancer, and they hit him in a spot on his chest with cobalt 60; you could see a dent on his chest where they shot into his lung-pretty wicked stuff.

[@rebelroar78]

I had a brain tumor and they used cyberknife with Cobalt 60. The source was moved in a way where only the tumor got a major dose of radiation. Everything else didn’t get hit hard. Pretty ingenious how they do it.

[@Eliastion]

This is absolutely horrifying - not because of what happened (as horrible as it was) but because of how easy it is to potentially replicate. It means that every major hospital basically houses a small weapon of mass destruction. Imagine terrorists seizing a relatively new machine, with fully charged rod - ten times the power of the one in the story. And just placing it in some heavily urbanized residential area. Or bringing it to a mass event where tens of thousands of people would spend several hours within a hundred meters from it, shielded by nothing but other attendees.

[@poonoi1968]

...adds to the horror of hospitals currently being bombed in one of the most populated places on earth. Very bad

[@Eliastion]

@@poonoi1968 Not sure if these ones are actually a threat - Israel has pretty strict control over what can and can't get imported into Gaza... Hamas digs out water pipes to make rockets out of them - I imagine Israeli officials wouldn't be eager to see how long a cobalt-60 rod remains used strictly for medical purposes if allowed to enter the strip.

[@brylozketrzyn]

And this is relatively small container, but instead public was scared with the image of nuclear cask being stolen. You know, casually drive your jeep to NPP, avoid security with rifles and load that 100 ton cask onto it. Nuts

[@kathi9026]

Though they'd need a way to safely remove the material and store it, which Sounds Like an increadible hussle even for experts.

[@Holtijaar]

@@kathi9026 Safely? What for? Terrorists have thousands of indoctrinated people willing to sacrifice their lives for their cause. They wouldn't be bothered with safety.

[@blackhawks81H]

The skull and crossbones to this day, always reminds me of that Futurama episode where Fry finds a pirate flag and Zoidberg goes "Careful Fry! I think that flag might be poisonous!" 😂

[@ranger178]

the weird thing is they stopped using skull and crossbones as a symbol of poisonous food or medicines because kids would associate the symbol with pirates not poisonous things and eat the medicine thinking it was pirate food.

[@ripdangerdolanunsubbedbutn8902]

​@@ranger178ahaa no way

[@ultimaxkom8728]

@@ranger178 I request further elaborations. Thank you in advance.

[@DrDeuteron]

Jolly Roger 🏴‍☠️

[@ranger178]

things that were poisonous used to have skull and crossbones but they stopped using it as a symbol for poison because kids would see pirate movies like peter pan and think it was for pirates @@ultimaxkom8728

[@MR-vi9lm]

Our local scrap yard has 2 pillars you have to drive through. They detect radiation. A loud siren will sound if it does. I had gotten one of those medical tests that they inject radioactive fluid into your bloodstream. Then take a picture of your heart and vessels afterwards. I helped my Dad take stuff to the junk yard like 5 hrs later. The horn went off when we drove through. The junkyard attendant didn't believe me until I walked through by myself, and my Dad drove the truck through. The only time it went off was when I walked through the sensor. In Kansas, USA. They are crazy sensitive.

[@thenthson]

They probably had a the hell moment when it first went off.

[@sabrinadandrimont6752]

That's good they have detectors. I've known scrappers who don't care. They bust apart anythg & everythg just for a little money. Crazy 😮

[@TheAnnoyingBoss]

I think tjey fucked you up tbh bro i wouldnt want a blood stream radiation injection? You sure you werent just tuskegee style expiramented on bro? Unit 731 style?

[@mzjalic324]

There is a series on KZbin called Half-Life Histories by Kyle Hill that covers topics like this, from well known nuclear disasters to smaller scale orphan source disasters like this one and is really worth checking out to learn more about how these things happen and what can be done about them

[@ZijnShayatanica]

Kyle & Plainly Difficult both produce amazing informative content that absolutely scares me, lmaoooo

[@washingmachine4993]

I find him weird because he is so pro nuclear power despite these incidents

[@mzjalic324]

@@washingmachine4993 The way I think he sees it is that pretty much all of those incidents are preventable with proper management and education regarding radioactive material, and so by educating people, he is directly helping prevent future incidents. It's also really worth remembering that far, far more incidents happen because of other forms of power generation, mostly fossil fuel ones like coal than happen with nuclear material, so even though it seems scarier, it is just less dangerous anyway

[@augiegirl1]

Here’s the link to the Half-Life Histories playlist: kzbin.info/aero/PLNg1m3Od-GgNmXngCCJaJBqqm-7wQqGAW&si=86eNdwZAFzfzoWT0

[@batzzz2044]

Kyle is trash

[@rashkavar]

The story of just how ramshackle that source isolation procedure was, compared to the trained and rehearsed exercises you see in some other stories, just goes to show you just how simple and effective the core rules of handling radiation sources is: minimize time, maximize distance, maximize shielding. That 16 foot rod with an electromagnet on the end is definitely not what any radiological expert would keep in their toolkit, but keeping people a solid 5 meters back from the source would've played a huge role in the success of that operation.

[@kevinfreeman3098]

Not in the US, any LEGAL scrap yard has radiation detectors EVERY load in or out drives through, most don't even realize it as they are typically integrated with the scale set-up, I once had a load trip the alarm, told me to take it back through slower, told them "I'm not getting back in the truck, I just shut down your entire yard, you can call the fire department to come scan it, if you don't I'm required to call in a nuclear hazmat situation and you'll really see shit hit the fan, your choice but I'm not getting back in that semi until it's been cleared", turns out it was literally just a box, case size of old smoke detectors... They don't FAFO with radiation in the US scrap industry.

[@elivcdxv1852]

I'd be sweating bullets

[@BrianG61UK]

I remember hearing, sometime in the 80s I think, about a similar incident involving a radio therapy machine of some kind in a scrapyard being dismantled to reveal pellets which, so the story went, had a mysterious blue glow. The scrapyard owners then invited many neighbours and friends to view the mysterious blue glow. As in the story in the video, many of them were burnt and/or died from the radiation.

[@18Hongo]

Possibly the Goiania Incident. That was a radiotherapy machine, but one that used caesium chloride, not cobalt 60. The whole story contains a spectacularly lax response from the Brazilian courts, a heist straight out of a Buster Keaton film, and a cascade of stupidity and poor decisions so monumental it's a wonder we didn't name the whole affair "The week the species got stronger".

[@zoutewand]

Yup, the Goiânia accident

[@BrianG61UK]

@@zoutewand Ah, thanks.

[@zoutewand]

@@BrianG61UK the youtuber wendigoon has a video on that incident that is really good :)

[@Xnoob545]

​@@zoutewandKyle Hill too

[@bpdmf2798]

I never really considered that the radiation symbol doesn't show the danger very clearly until star trek TNG has that episode where Data lost his memory and was carrying a case with radioactive material.

[@alexanderrichards7465]

I work with Cobalt-60 all the time as an NDI radiography testing technician. We use it to take exposure X-ray shots of aircraft part with a portable X-ray camera.

[@tylerfb1]

x-rays? I don't think Cobalt 60 emits x-rays. It emits beta particles and gamma rays.

[@Cysubtor_8vb]

Wonder if an episode of House was based on this as it had a patient they eventually discovered got terminally ill from radiation from, what was to him, a random metal object his father had given him that was found working in a junkyard (or as a garbage man). Was one of the few cases where the patient still dies despite the mystery being solved, which is why I still remember it.

[@BaronVonQuiply]

Oddly enough, I can't remember the one episode where it actually was Lupus.

[@dandycat2204]

House was a great programme. Loved every episode and watch re-runs whenever I can.

[@TorchVX]

Probably so. The dad owned a junkyard and gave his son a plumb-bob not knowing it had been used in radioactive wells and was highly contaminated. The moment when House and one of the fellows scan the dresser with a geiger counter and it goes wild, House tells the fellow to leave immediately and call hazmat -- that was a terrifying moment.

[@Joneender]

Video starts 1:23

[@daikansanchez7674]

Another incident that is perhaps worse than this one, also involving Cobalt-60, happened in Ciudad Juarez; Chihuahua, in México in 1981. The incident also involved a machine from a hospital (an x-ray machine), institutional corruption, negligence, and a couple of scrap collectors to produce the worst accident involving ionizing radiation in Mexican history. It's a true horror story even worse than the one portrayed in the video and yet, aside from some Mexican youtubers, no other science channel has ever mentioned it. I'm serious, the reach this incident had is still felt today because of how badly it was handled.

[@FlyingZeroAGL]

Yes, true story. I believe an entire family (3 generations) tragically died in that incident.

[@axelcosgirl]

Idk if he’d be considered a science channel, but Plainly Difficult has a video on the incident: kzbin.info/www/bejne/np_SYmuVq6d0mKMsi=FzNhsI3P1hLra6Wa

[@X-raySpecs]

An x-ray machine does not contain a radioactive isotope. More over modern radiotherapy machines don't either- they use a linear accelerator to momentarily create concentrated radiation. I have read in to the case you mentioned though and it seems that this was an old radiotherapy unit just like the one discussed in the video.

[@uwotmate4734]

We also have a similar accident in the city of Goiás - Brazil, around 1987, where scrap collectors dismantled a radiotherapy machine that contained cesium 137, that managed to contaminate hundreds of people

[@UnknownUser-fe5zu]

I thought Kyle hill covered it…I may be wrong.

[@donreid6399]

An appropriate video to be released so close to Halloween. No matter what kind of legendary stuff we humans can come up with (witches, vampires, werewolves, etc.), it's the REAL horrors that are scarier than our imaginations can conjure!

[@TUDORMARCU16]

I think the scariest part is that it's completely silent. When you do notice something is wrong, it's already too late.

[@khallrik]

those imaginary horrors probably had some basis in real life horror, like fear of the unknown.

[@sketchesofpayne]

For other stories like this I recommend the channel "Plainly Difficult" where he covers various rail, industrial, and nuclear processing disasters.

[@apeacebone6499]

+1 to that, and adding: Well There's Your Problem as well as Kyle Hill's Half-Life Histories series.

[@Dutch3DMaster]

@@apeacebone6499 "Bullocks!" "Sounds like we need to suit up again huh?" "Why is it always us?" I love the small British jokes in Plainly Difficult's drawn people :P .

[@18Hongo]

I'd add the "Citation Needed" podcast, which is largely about reading a Wikipedia article and making jokes about it, but generally covers topics of major disasters that involve incredible cases of human stupidity (it turns out that's pretty much every single one). They actually covered the Goiania Incident, a similar occurrence in Brazil, where a radioactive source from a radiotherapy unit was stolen, and four people died of radiation poisoning.

[@czechgop7631]

@@Dutch3DMasterBalls

[@rhuarkk2138]

So far I’m just thankful that they didn’t dump the Co60 in the river

[@KittenyKat]

That was an amazingly well told and equally horrifying story. Bravo.

[@ilionreactor1079]

The machines were set outside in hopes they would be stolen, saving the owners any disposal costs.

[@christopherleubner6633]

Yup this happens a lot unfortunately 😢

[@ivancorey7389]

So unfortunate for those thieves. Real bummer.

[@--enyo--]

@@ivancorey7389And for the scrapyard workers, the neighbourhood around the scrapyard, and the kids who were playing in the car park.

[@ZijnShayatanica]

​@@ivancorey7389It's not about the thieve's misfortune... It's about neglecting to protect hundreds & thousands of people who could be exposed to the stolen property. Refusing to pay disposal costs that will save lives.

[@ActionScripter]

@@ZijnShayatanica Absolutely. Not to mention, death by radiation poisoning is not a proportional punishment for theft. There's always some jackwagon in the comments who considers any shred of lawbreaking to be a forfeit of the right to live. I don't know how someone gets so calloused.

[@muhammadabdullahwaseem3040]

that my friends is why you dont mess with suspiciously well sealed pieces of metal that are in multiple layers of other metals

[@frankreads8618]

None of this would have happened if Siemens had taken the machine back. They should have been required to by law.

[@timogeerties3487]

Well, if they stopped working with Cobalt60, I'd figure any forms to allow it's usage no longer need upkeep. Did they still have the permission to even work with it?

[@shareeclifton2265]

Radiation is truly amazing. Terrifying but amazing.

[@williebeamish5879]

And our cells emit it. Nice.

[@pantherdddjvdgx]

And so is corporate stupidity

[@swervsplatt9672]

Mr Galen Windsor says otherwise, chief....

[@ScienceDiscoverer]

It is pure Chaos. The destroyer of Order of Life.

[@swervsplatt9672]

@@ScienceDiscoverer No, lobbied pseudo science and corporate owned media are the destroyers of the order of life.....

[@daviddelgado6090]

Working in forestry research we used a nuclear moisture probe for soil/ water table. We had the radioactivity badges. Teammate dropped hers and didn't recover it for 3 weeks. When she turned it in she got called to the lab . The sun exposure of the badge exceeded the radiation allowance.

[@gregorywillson7730]

The exposure it took was more than what the control badge had by a significantly large amount. She by no means took that much from the sun.

[@calebshaw5647]

Yeah, they don’t work like that. Lol

[@leftyeh6495]

Hay bales will set off radiation monitors at border control, because they're loaded with gamma radiation! 😂

[@DrDeuteron]

That doesn’t make sense. It would a huge headache to have false positives from the sun….when you work outdoors.

[@nathanmoon5891]

@@DrDeuteron They likely had very strict radiation limits in place. The nuclear power plants I work in issue OLSDs, (Optically Stimulated Luminescent Dosimetry), for exposure calculations and they are quite particular about what you do with them. They always reiterate one of the do nots of storing them is leaving it hung on your rear view mirror in your vehicle while not at work. Exposure to sunlight is an issue when it comes to these types of devices.

[@unicorn.mushroom]

My cobalt 'ills all the boys in the yard And they're like, it's sieverts are ouch, Damn right, it's sieverts are ouch. I can save you, but you must drop and run

[@Dan.R.A]

I never knew of this horrifying incident in Bangkok. Reminds me of the Cesium-137 one in Goiânia, Brazil, in 1986. Incredibly similar story.

[@JohnDoe-on6ru]

**reads warning label** Wow if I keep this rod I'll grow better skull bones and be able to run faster!

[@brodriguez11000]

If only it worked like in fiction. e.g. Fallout series.

[@lokelaufeyson9931]

or develop super powers like in marvel universe, maybe you will turn into the hulk?

[@taylorsin9452]

I thought it was "if out during the weird tri-moon, be prepared to run from pirates"

[@johndododoe1411]

There's an entire video about the problem of finding a way to label radioactive stuff for the extreme far future .

[@lokelaufeyson9931]

@@johndododoe1411 people will do dumb stuff even in the future.. nothing is idiot proof and i mean it literately

[@BaronVonQuiply]

At a flea market one summer, I saw an elderly couple offering a Kobold statue for sale. It was stolen over the night, and in the morning the woman said _"They got the Cobalt"_ Half Point for being accidentally historically tangent, as Kobolds were named as (supernatural gremlin) problems in metallurgy actually caused by cobalt contamination.

[@RiehlScience]

No, it’s the other way around. Cobalt was named after Kobolds.

[@Fqubed]

Very interesting story, gave me constant flashbacks to Goiânia accident that was quite similar just a different continent.

[@Lux_Lethal]

Same for me. I was listening thinking I had misremembered where that incident occurred. It's remarkable how similarly they both begin. How sad that there have been two of these types of tragedies... that we know of.

[@heffatheanimal2200]

Yeah, disturbingly similar, and I would'nt be at all surprised if there is more. The monitoring and regulation adherence around medical tech has been pretty terrible. I knew a bit about the Samut Prakan incident from studies, but only found out about the Goiânia incident from listening to the Well Theres Your Problem podcast. They did an early episode about it

[@danhammond8406]

​@@Lux_Lethalboth were caused by thives. Just desserts for them.

[@TomKappeln]

And there it was Caesium 137 powder ,not Cobald 60 rods ... Much more dangerous ....

[@UncleSamsBoot]

Fun fact! The Soviet’s thought it was a good idea to use radioactive materials similar to this in power sources for remote unmanned lighthouses and radio beacons. It’s had similar results to this since the fall of the USSR. Lia, Georgia 2001

[@leechowning2712]

More entertaining news... they have resumed production of the RTGs, as their not very wealthy nation still has a lot of these nearly inaccessable points that need just a little electricity.

[@Bu-Aljoory]

I remember in 1996 when i was in high school a Janitor held a piece of radioactive mineral (i can't remember the name) in his bare hand and said in a sarcastic tone "is this really as lethal as they say?" In less than a year his arm was amputated because of bone cancer which spread almost to his shoulder.

[@johnblood10]

I feel like I need a fully fleshed-out telling of this one, because that’s wild as hell if he really did that shit right there a public school lol. What kind of radioactive material was it & where in the shit did a school janitor manage to obtain it? At any rate that’s a remarkable Darwin Award win right there.

[@Bu-Aljoory]

@@johnblood10 it was the 90's and he was cleaning while we were in science class and the teacher was telling us about minerals that are somewhat radioactive but as long as you don't touch it with your bare skin you are alright and it was in a closed case but the Janitor heard the teacher say that and mocked the teacher and open the case and held it in his hand nonchalantly. He didn't die fortunately but lost an arm in the process. As i grew up and think about it now how the hell was thoes minerals in a school with little to none supervision at times.

[@cc_snipergirl]

​@@Bu-AljooryEspecially around high school kids. I'm surprised it was the janitor that did that and not some high schooler trying to be cool or pull a dumb joke

[@MyLibertyTV]

Any material that radioactive would cause damage to you even without skin contact. Unless the container in question was solid lead the entire room would be dosed.

[@bdunderscore]

@@MyLibertyTVAlpha and beta sources can be stopped with relatively little shielding. A strong beta source might fit the story - however I’m a bit skeptical that such a dangerous thing would be kept at a school…

[@redsquirrelftw]

It's scary how dangerous something that small can be, all while being silent, just sitting there. Radiation is a pretty wild thing.

[@expertoflizardcorrugation3967]

unfortunately, living things aren't equipped to detect radiation.

[@sayori3939]

​@@expertoflizardcorrugation3967 yeah it's weird because we are looking at particles smaller than atoms, so I don't think there's any nerve capable of processing that, even though there are fungi that uses radiation to grow

[@18Hongo]

Humans 10,000 years ago: "Guys, if we chip down the flint just right, it cuts more efficiently!" Humans 80 years ago: "So it turns out if you shoot invisible shit at a lump of poisonous metal, it could end the world!"

[@belisarian6429]

@@sayori3939 Technically our eyes could be altered to see it as it is "just" another wavelength of light (as whole "visible light" terms just point to wavelengths our limited eyes can see), however considering how rare radiation danger was in past and even how it still is, developing something like that naturally is unlikely. For me radiation is scary, but not much considering how rare its sources are (thanks to our regulations and policies and how hard its to make), things like poisons, viruses, bacteria, asbestos etc. are much more common and some of them dont decay over time so will be as deadly in million years as they are now.

[@embersaffron5522]

Oh we can sometimes... it's just at that point you've just been blasted with tens of siverts in a second and well. Your dead​@@expertoflizardcorrugation3967

[@thescholarsjourney661]

The absolute FAILURE to properly compensate for the volume of radiation from the case is astonishing. It's nothing short of a miracle that none of the response workers died.

[@HyperactiveNeuron]

If you think this is bad, look up the Union Carbide incident. They nearly killed an entire city with toxic chemicals.

[@gregorywillson7730]

They're trained and liscensed for source retrievals. If any of them got close to death they failed miserably at their jobs. I've been a part of two Ir-192 retrievals. Far less dangerous, but if you follow the procedures you share the dose and stop if you get close to dangerous amounts

[@N7-WAR-HOUND]

Being Trained and licensed is one thing. Being Equipped is quite another

[@jimbo9305]

@@N7-WAR-HOUND Being untrained, unlicensed, unequipped, and unaware is much worse though. If you know you're dealing with highly radioactive elements you'll at least know to limit your exposure.

[@ScienceDiscoverer]

They could at least used some robot??

[@AmericanDad420]

6:45 Nice choice putting Siemens and Bangkok in the same sentence 🤣

[@BullsMahunny]

There are very few things in life that scare me on a primal level - a raw fear that no matter what you do you can't get rid of because the threat is guaranteed to be harmful. Radiation is one of those things.

[@Aryasvitkona]

The other big things? It's completely invisible, and there's absolutely nothing you can do. Being hit with a lethal dose of radiation has to be such a surreal experience, assuming you understand what's in store. You're dead. You know you're dead. As dead as if someone put a gun to your head. And yet you'll live for a few more weeks. And there is nothing you can do. No treatment you can receive. You just are dead.

[@wolfiemuse]

Small correction 9:50 ish - Lead doesn’t stop *all* radiation in its tracks. Like, an 1/8th inch thick sheet of lead would do nothing to gamma particles. Lead is great, but it still has a harder time with gamma particles than alpha or beta, and gamma can punch through about an inch of lead or just shy of it. That’s why the containers used an inch of lead (and in many places, more than that if I recall correctly) plus steel casing; the more that’s in between the source and the receiver of the radiation, the better. Nowadays I believe we use lead that has been coated with something? Neutrons? Don’t remember. That parts been a while. But yeah lead doesn’t just stop all radiation, needs to be X amount thick per whatever kind of particles you’re working with.

[@Roxor128]

Interestingly, uranium is often used in radiation shielding. Even though it's radioactive itself (though not by much, given its 4.5 billion-year half-life), its high density makes it better than lead at stopping radiation.

[@fatpad00]

Yeah, there's a lot that goes into how much shielding is necessary, mainly though is the source (aka the type and strength of radiation) and what type of shielding. Water, for example, is stellar at shielding from neutron radiation, but isn't great at shielding from gammas, where as lead is a great at shielding against gammas, but terrible at shielding neutrons. Each type of interaction has a value known as a tenth-thickness: the thickness of the material needed to reduce the radiation to 1/10th.

[@madsfiedler3884]

recalling from highschool, but isnt that also why places that hold high radiation have the rly thick concrete walls? because sometimes only the distance allows fhe particles to be dispersed. (i am proposing and asking for confirmation, not asserting! i study neandertals, not neon-)

[@kstricl]

@@Roxor128 Makes sense. -IIRC- Uranium is primarily an -beta- Alpha emitter, and an extremely low level one at that in its most stable form. Since -Beta- Alpha radiation is a lot easier to shield against, it's a pretty good trade off.

[@SocialDownclimber]

@@madsfiedler3884 Thick concrete is the cheapest effective shield for all types of radiation. The goal is to have the radiation to deposit its energy in the concrete, where it is converted to heat through many interactions.

[@fricki1997]

If you want to see more videos about these "orphan sources", I can wholly recommend those by Kyle Hill. They're very well-made and moody.

[@femain1788]

I was just mentioning the Gioânia incident in my comment. That one was the one that broke me the most. The number of effected people was horrific and is probably the scariest thing I’ve heard when related to radiation and orphan sources.

[@dark2023-1lovesoni]

​@@femain1788It really disturbes me just how similar the circumstances between both incidents are too. I hadn't heard of the one in this video before, while I'm very familiar with the Brazilian one.

[@Jolis_Parsec]

Kyle Hill’s a pompous asshole though, quite unlike Simon here especially on his Brain Blaze channel! 🤣

[@pfadiva]

Plainly Difficult has quite a few orphaned source videos. They are pretty good.

[@trishapellis]

@@dark2023-1lovesoni That's what I was planning to comment myself, as well. These radiotherapy machines should really be followed up on better. Like a clearer danger symbol is good and all, but there should be more effort involved in making sure they aren't needed, too.

[@emstudies8791]

thank you, Simon, for reminding me of all the horrors of life once more 😭😂

[@geraldfields6276]

Very informative and correct on all counts. I worked for a company that encapsulated Cobalt 60 and Iridium 192 for industrial radiography.

[@femain1788]

This reminds me of gioânia incident which Kyle hill did on his half-life history sub series. Both were caused by the same thing. Mishandling of defunct medical equipment with horrific consequences. Definitely worth a watch.

[@JoshSweetvale]

"Well There's Your Problem" also did an episode om Goiana. The stupidity of all parties involved was colossal, but not morally equivalent to the death sentence and crippling the cesium dust caused. Can't put 'drop & run' on Cesium dust

[@AltonV]

@@JoshSweetvale the dust was in a capsule, you could put a warning on that

[@NJbldragon]

@@JoshSweetvale Ah yes, a podcast with slides

[@fhuber7507]

We did a calculation based on a Cobalt 60 radiography (x-ray of heavy gauge steel pipe) source getting out of its shield. If you are within 10 ft, you can't run fast enough to live. These medical x-ray sources are very mild by comparison.

[@Mathignihilcehk]

What’s the warning sign on that say? “If broken, you’re 100% dead”?

[@cumcumcum148]

@@Mathignihilcehk "this is a great time to start believing in god"

[@Aryasvitkona]

​@@Mathignihilcehki much more prefer the vibes of "if you can read this message, you are already dead. It's just a matter of how quickly your body catches up"

[@othrwrldlysystm]

0:21 do the rings come in cobalt-60?

[@JaxxGaming7997]

LMAO

[@WormholeJim]

I actually caught myself expecting a reveal of how Vault-Tec was behind it all, several times throughout watching this. "The Cobald-50 rod was left in a pile of scrap in the open air blasting out radiation into the surrounding neighbourhood" That's the most FallOut thing I ever heard outside FallOut!

[@EDCandLace]

Ol cobald.... Simon's Cobald.

[@DrDeuteron]

Cobalt 50 has a half life of 44 ms, so a rod of that size would obliterate the junk yard and surround areas I 1/20 second.

[@C.I...]

"Wow, people dying in a most gruesome way is just like one of my vibeo ganes!!11!"

[@WormholeJim]

@@C.I... In lieu of a simple facepalm emoticon I'll just have to voice my complete bafflement of just how nitwitted people supposedly in possession of a brain allow theselves to act sitting there in solitude in front of their computerscreens and pretending to engage with the world socially: "Whaaaat?"

[@TomFromYoutube]

Holy shit dude. Now I understand why they check for that when selling scrap now. I always thought that was weird but I get it.

[@kdrapertrucker]

Yes, when I was a trucker every steel mill I ever entered had radiation detection equipment at the truck gate.

[@hollieBlu303]

I would HIGHLY RECOMMEND Plainly Difficult as a channel to check out about orphan sources (aka. discarded/stolen nuclear material). This guy knows his shit. Man's a LEGEND 💪

[@KimberCopeland]

The old people dancing while they list the side-effects: The side-effects: 8:37

[@xyz7572]

There were several people in this story who absolutely knew better but didn’t care because they knew whatever happened would affect _others_ and not themselves. That they didn’t have to spend a single day in prison is a travesty.

[@AifDaimon]

Such SELFISH NARCISSISTS

[@user-ug8wx5er1w]

Different cultures are interesting… and deadly!

[@BaronVonQuiply]

The series of 3 pictures inside a triangle in the thumbnail actually does a better job of saying Drop And Run than those exact words do, as if I found the text on an item I'd respond "Wait, what?" and verify the very unexpected situation. The pictures though would send me running without contemplation.

[@JohnHPixelMD]

So if you found a random metallic object with a radiation symbol and writing on it that states "DANGER RADIATION DROP & RUN Co 60 3540 CURIES 7-1-63" you would say "Wait, what?" and try to verify it first?! I give the survival instincts of humanity far too much credit I see.

[@BaronVonQuiply]

@@JohnHPixelMD Or you're an ass.

[@marciaoh7056]

@@JohnHPixelMD You assume everyone reads English. Pictographs are used because they can be understood by nearly everyone.

[@tylerweatherby7131]

​@@JohnHPixelMDnot just that but simple symbols are near instantaneous to comprehend while sentences might take 30 seconds, that's 30 seconds you don't want to be near radioactivity

[@canaanval]

The majority of the world's cobalt-60 is made at the Bruce Nuclear PP in Inverhuron, Ontario....it was a great place to grow up in! lol

[@badgames5025]

I work in walkerton, a town less than 40min from the plant, it's keeps our local economy strong!

[@MistressGlowWorm]

I love the Cobalt blue colored light in the background. Adds a nice touch! I do have a bit of Cobalt Blue glass (don't worry, its harmless but pretty). Great video! Loved it!

[@eiko1490]

This episode hits way too close to home. Just last year we had a big explosion from leaking chemical in a factory not so far from my family friends’ home in Samut Prakan(east of Bangkok). Another chemical leaked from a factory far in the north of the province of Nakhon Pathom(west of Bangkok) but the chemical stinks way far south that we were protesting the college to cancel the school until the matter has settled. At least the situation was resolved fairly quickly and we(college students)were able to go back to business after half a day. The water supply that was stained with chemicals was cleared after a week.

[@cc_snipergirl]

I just looked up the explosion you're talking about. Styrene monomer is a carcinogen. So if it really did leak into the surrounding area, the long term effects might not have even started yet. Really hope that isn't the case. But it doesn't hang around long

[@JonnyMack33]

Smashed it out of the park with this one! Writing and narration are fantastic 👌I've watched a lot of videos on radioactive accidents but you expertly paint a vision of an absolutely horrific situation here.

[@claywest9528]

Actually, there is one notice worse than '"Drop and Run" and it's: "If you are reading this then you are just one dead bastard!" Yep, that's the worst one...

[@spinestealer8129]

The “drop & run” warning is nice, but if you’re within a meter near it and you don’t actually know it’s there, you’re kinda screwed

[@jamesb.9155]

Well said Simon. It never hurts to be reminded about the dangers from exposure to nuclear materials.

[@georgemetcalf8763]

And winner of Springfield Nuclear's Employee of the month and savior of a space shuttle. God bless you, inanimate rod!

[@spugintrntl]

Except that was a carbon rod.

[@georgemetcalf8763]

@@spugintrntl good point. I'd like to think a cobalt rod would work, too.

[@danoliver7044]

In rod we trust!

[@greenaum]

Simon did actually say "carbon rod" at one point, mistakenly.

[@daehr9399]

Due to above ground nuclear testing in the 1960s, my father was exposed to radioactive fallout. He grew up on a dairy farm - when he drank milk, it was usually unpasteurized and fresh. Because the fallout landed on the pastures, and the cows grazed on the pastures, the milk they produced was radioactive. This resulted in thyroid cancer at age 28. And this is in the United States - the was in Iowa. Uncle Sam gave my dad cancer. Think about that.

[@DJ-Brownie-UK]

United States Government believe United States citizens make great cannon fodder, think about that.

[@karlbush1678]

Fallout in Iowa? How could that have come from testing nukes? Iowa is half the nation away.

[@chellefell1331]

And then uncle Sam doesn't take care of them.

[@chellefell1331]

​@karlbush1678 look up Ames project

[@msiankid]

@@karlbush1678look for the Sedan nuclear test and fallout, I suppose that since a lot of material was blasted up into the atmosphere a bunch of fallout was carried far from the source