Sonic booms, nuclear event, and earthquake outside Chicago, U.S.
Nuclear reactor near Chicago, Illinois, vented steam with radioactive Tritium on Monday, Jan 30, 2012.
A nuclear reactor at a northern Illinois plant, about 95 miles (152 km) northwest of Chicago, shut down at 10:18 am, local time (16:18 UTC), after losing power. Steam was being vented to reduce pressure, according to officials from Exelon Nuclear and federal regulators. The steam contains low levels of tritium, a radioactive form of hydrogen, but federal and plant officials insisted the levels were safe for workers and the public.
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About Tritium
As with all ionizing radiation, exposure to tritium increases the risk of developing cancer. However, because it emits very low energy radiation and leaves the body relatively quickly, for a given amount of activity ingested, tritium is one of the least dangerous radionuclides. Since tritium is almost always found as water, it goes directly into soft tissues and organs. The associated dose to these tissues are generally uniform and dependent on the tissues’ water content.Everyone is exposed to tiny amounts of tritium, much of it produced naturally. If you live near, or work at, a nuclear research facility, a commercial reactor, or a government weapons facility, you should be aware that your tritium exposure may be elevated. Also, be careful not to break open an exit sign, or other device that may contain tritium as an illuminating agent.
It is produced naturally in the upper atmosphere when cosmic rays strike nitrogen molecules in the air. Tritium is also produced during nuclear weapons explosions, as a byproduct in reactors producing electricity, and in special production reactors, where the isotope lithium-6 is bombarded to produce tritium.
Its most significant use is as a component in the triggering mechanism in thermonuclear (fusion) weapons. Very large quantities of tritium are required for the maintenance of our nation’s nuclear weapons capabilities. It is also produced commercially in reactors and in various self-luminescen
Tritium is also used in life science research, and in studies investigating the metabolism of potential new drugs.
Today, sources of tritium include commercial nuclear reactors and research reactors, and government weapons production plants. Tritium may be released as steam from these facilities or may leak into the underlying soil and ground water. However, such releases are usually small and are required not to exceed federal environmental limits.
A recently documented source of tritium in the environment is tritium exit signs that have been illegally disposed of in municipal landfills. Water, which seeps through the landfill, is contaminated with tritium from broken signs and can pass into water ways, carrying the tritium with it.
Tritium is essential to the construction of boosted-fission nuclear weapons. A boosted weapon contains a mixture of deuterium and tritium, the gases being heated and compressed by the detonation of a plutonium or uranium device. The D-T mixture is heated to a temperature and pressure such that thermonuclear fusion occurs. This process releases a flood of 14 MeV neutrons which cause additional fissions in the device, greatly increasing its efficiency.
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December 27, 2011 – KENTUCKY – There’s a bizarre scene in Montgomery County where dozens of birds are dead. More than 30 birds are lying dead on Indian Mound Drive at the intersection of Grassy Lick Road in Mt. Sterling. All the birds appear to be the same species, and seem to have died and landed at this spot all at once. No word yet about what caused their death. The strange sight was first spotted on Christmas morning by people who live nearby. “Yesterday morning around 9:30 am when I pulled out on to the bypass, and there was a whole slew of birds,” explains local resident Karen Williams. “I didn’t know where they came from. I didn’t know. I thought if someone shot them there was an awful lot of shooting going on but I don’t know,’ said Williams. –
December 15, 2011 – BLOOMFIELD, N.M. — A strange sight in Bloomfield where 40 to 50 dead birds were reportedly found along U.S. 64 last week. Some of the black and speckled birds were lying on their backs with their small feet sticking up in the air, and at least one was missing its head. The Daily-Times reports about 30 dead birds were north of the highway and about 20 additional piles of flattened feathers were on the highway. Wildlife biologist John Kendall with the Bureau of Land Management investigated the cluster. He thinks they likely roosted in shrubs north of the highway Wednesday night and died when they flew into the side of a large truck driving the highway late Wednesday or early Thursday. It’s also unlikely the birds died from environmental causes because they were so close together when they died. –
December 14, 2011 – UTAH – Thousands of migratory birds died on impact after apparently mistaking a Wal-Mart parking lot and other areas of southern Utah for bodies of water and plummeting to the ground in what one wildlife expert called the worst downing she’s ever seen. Crews went to work cleaning up the dead birds and rescuing the survivors after the creatures crash-landed in the St. George area Monday night. By Tuesday evening, volunteers had rescued more than 2,000 birds, releasing them into nearby bodies of water. “They’re just everywhere,” said Teresa Griffin, wildlife program manager for the Utah Department of Wildlife Resource’s southern region. “It’s been nonstop. All our employees are driving around picking them up, and we’ve got so many people coming to our office and dropping them off.” Officials say stormy conditions probably confused the flock of grebes, a duck-like aquatic bird likely making its way to Mexico for the winter. The birds tried to land in a Cedar City Wal-Mart parking lot and elsewhere. “The storm clouds over the top of the city lights made it look like a nice, flat body of water. All the conditions were right,” Griffin told The Spectrum newspaper in St. George. “So the birds landed to rest, but ended up slamming into the pavement. No human injuries or property damage have been reported. Griffin noted most downings are localized “but this was very widespread. I’ve been here 15 years and this was the worst downing I’ve seen,” she told the newspaper. Officials said they were continuing the rescue effort that started Tuesday afternoon and included an enthusiastic group of volunteers. The surviving grebes were released into bodies of water in southern Utah’s Washington County, including a pond near Hurricane. –
December 29, 2011 – ALASKA - Scientists in Alaska are investigating whether local seals are being sickened by radiation from Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. Biologists at first thought the seals were suffering from a virus, but they have so far been unable to identify one, and tests are now underway to find out if radiation is a factor. Scores or multiples of twenty, ring seals have washed up on Alaska’s Arctic coastline since July. Their symptoms include: bleeding lesions on the hind flippers, irritated skin around the nose and eyes, and patchy hair loss on the animals’ fur coats. John Kelley, Professor Emeritus at the Institute of Marine Science at the University of Alaska Fairbanks said, “We recently received samples of seal tissue from diseased animals captured near St Lawrence Island with a request to examine the material for radioactivity. There is concern expressed by some members of the local communities that there may be some relationship to the Fukushima nuclear reactor’s damage.” Test results would not be available for several weeks. –