Radiation leak in Mayapuri, Delhi??

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What was being called a radiation leak by the media and a possible chemical leak by the authorities, yesterday, is now being reported on news channels as a mild radition leak.

Radiation leak in Delhi scrap shop, 5 people ill

news.outlookindia.com | Mild Radiation Leak in West Delhi: Four Hurt

Radiation leak: BARC rushes team to Delhi: Rediff.com India News

The Telegraph - Calcutta (Kolkata) | Nation | Radiation leak in capital scalds 4

Reports are still very sketchy as of now and the police have cordoned off the area.

It was reported that one of the workers who came in contact with the material started losing hair, fingernails broke/came off and hands turned black, lost conciousness, ...

As of now, it is reported that 5 people who came in contact with the hazardous material are being treated at AIIMS.
 
Thats the problem with our country. People don't care about jack. How the heck did they just throw away radioactive waste at the hospital in just a careless manner.
 
It came from a medical device -- highly probable that it was some diagnostic imaging radioactive material.
 
I really want to kill these people....why dont people follow any rules in India...because we are so corrupt that we know we can get out of anything.

1 Billion people.....and no value for life.
 
mav2000 said:
I really want to kill these people....why dont people follow any rules in India...because we are so corrupt that we know we can get out of anything.

1 Billion people.....and no value for life.
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The problem is no proper disposal strategy

Docter knows instrument contains radioactive stuff but donot know or donot want to take the expense on head...Pass it on to scrap dealers..

They think we will get minute particles of gold in the instrument so without caring what the stuff is just take it at scrap value..

the same also happens at alang gujrat where radioactive ships do come for dismantling which even their own country is not ready to take
 
mild radiation and hands turn black! wow!!

@Magnet, instead of blaming doctor's you should blame the hospital management. Doctor's should stick to treating patients and not waste time disposing medical waste imo. besides I believe they hardly have any free time on their hands.

And the ship industry in Gujarat is a victim of the greedy people there. If the companies there are not greedy to make quick money at expense of worker class, the people working there won't suffer. But that's just wishful thinking.
 
Magnet does have a point. We really don't have poor recycling infrastructure.there is no awareness on disposal of 'special' waste. so people dump these any way they wish. there are no recycling points where we can go and handover this waste legally.
 
^^

But it is not the professional doctors who are to blame for this. Most medical facilities have a separate a radiology department. It is them along with administration which takes care of disposable material, and prevention of radiation. Though just wondering, most of the radiological materials which are used in medical equipment (invasive/non invasive) have low half lives. How did this survive so long. Was it some chemical compound (toxic) which caused this. The immediate blackening of the hands suggest this. For example the radionuclides used in a PET hardly have a half life beyond 2 hours. Weird..! What was this substance..?
 
It is highly unlikely that this radiation could be due to a medical diagnostic radio active compound. As rightly quoted by Asingh, they are highly unstable and may not survive the time to reach scrap yard and do damage to handlers.

And as per the rules laid down by Supereme Court, the disposable or medical waste is now done under supervision of Pollution Control Board of respective states and its highly costly and regulated affair.

It is very unlikely that such dangerous equipment may have passed unregulated.

It could be the company who may have bought back the device against condition of supplying the new machine which may cause the damage.

But as per my knowledge there is no such device in medical field which natively carries the radioactivity, it has to be powered to produce the radioactivity, which is not likely in scrapyard.

It has to be a very toxic chemical byproduct of some industry which is dumped and now its created havoc.

but still I will not create a point of opinion based on sketchy information, will wait for the complete information to arrive.
 
^^
If this is really the Co isotope, it is hazardous. It has a half life of approximate ~5 years. As per wikipedia...

Cobalt from radiotherapy machines has been a serious hazard when not disposed of properly, and one of the worst radiation contamination accidents in North America occurred in 1984, after a discarded cobalt-60 containing radiotherapy unit was mistakenly disassembled in a junkyard in Juarez, Mexico.
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Same thing happened at Mayapuri. That junk-yard is huge. Many car spare parts are available there...akin to Jama Masjid. Bad case of selling scrap material, without professional expertise.
 
^^ Or rather a bad case of the hospital not following the proper procedures in disposing the radio active waste. Things like those are not meant to be disposed in such an offhand manner along with the regular waste.
 
From the ET link:
The experts, who first collected and isolated the mysterious shining object from the scrap shop in Mayapuri Industrial area in a sophisticated lid, had sent it for further investigations.
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another name for a lead box perhaps?
 
AFAIK, any radioactive substance (source) can be brought only after permission from BARC, atleast for industries...they have proper procedures for monitoring...
wouldnt it be the same for hospitals?
 
i think its the scrappers/recyclers who are to be blamed...they bid cheaply to gain the tender and then dont implement adequate safety measures to save their employees from any hazardous situation...also we have been getting scrap from abroad which generally is not checked for any dangerous substances there have been instances in ship scrapyards where workers have been exposed to asbestos and other toxic materials...
 
^^ No, its the hospitals fault. They shouldn't be disposing radioactive material in that fashion. You can't expect your local scrap wala to be well versed in radio activity no matter what you expect them to be. Its the responsibility of the hospital to ensure disposal of such materials as strict guidelines.
 
^

Absolutely correct. Expecting local scrap dealers to know about radioactive and/or carcinogens is really far fetched. Heck, even the common man is not aware. Radioactive material cannot be disposed of in a 'normal' manner. Period. It has to be kept in special containment facilities, transported under strictly controlled conditions, and disposed off -- where other garbage 'is not present'. Accessibility to the same should be logged and monitored. This stuff is no joke. No ways.
 
I think these radioactive substances should be stored in concrete buildings or some other kind containment facilities untill they become non radioactive.They dont belong in the city scrap yards.
 
Even till now the country does not know how this Cobalt - 60 made it to the hands of the scrap dealers. Only that it was procured from Faridabad. The material has been deported to the Nuclear Facility in Narora, Bulandhsher.
 
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