More Delhi Radioactivity

May 15, 2010 - Rashme Sehgal |

New Delhi

Greenpeace radiation experts have identified eight hotspots in New Delhi’s Mayapuri locality which have 5,000 times the natural background radiation defined as “safe” by the department of atomic energy.

A team of Greenpeace nuclear energy campaigners led by radiation expert Jan Vande Putte visited the Mayapuri scrapyard, including Shop 32, from where exposure to Cobalt 60 claimed one life and caused injuries to 11 others.
Armed with digital gam-ma spectrometers, gamma dosimeters and dose rate measurement instruments on Friday morning, the team was able to detect eight hotspots in a 200-500-metre radius of Shop 32. “We immediately marked the areas with tape and white cement, and informed the local SHO (police station chief) and experts of the Atomic Energy Regul-atory Board,” said Green-peace’s Karuna Raina.
“The particles emitting the gamma rays are so tiny that they are invisible to the eye, but that does not make it any less dangerous,” said Mr Putte.
The activists accused the AERB and National Disa-ster Management Authority of negligence, saying they should have done a much more thorough job as those living and working here were exposed to high radiation levels. Greenpeace noted that the steps mandated by the AERB require radiation experts to scoop out the soil containing radioactive material and get it disposed of safely.

Post new comment

<form action="/comment/reply/13156" accept-charset="UTF-8" method="post" id="comment-form"> <div><div class="form-item" id="edit-name-wrapper"> <label for="edit-name">Your name: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="60" name="name" id="edit-name" size="30" value="Reader" class="form-text required" /> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-mail-wrapper"> <label for="edit-mail">E-Mail Address: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <input type="text" maxlength="64" name="mail" id="edit-mail" size="30" value="" class="form-text required" /> <div class="description">The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.</div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-comment-wrapper"> <label for="edit-comment">Comment: <span class="form-required" title="This field is required.">*</span></label> <textarea cols="60" rows="15" name="comment" id="edit-comment" class="form-textarea resizable required"></textarea> </div> <fieldset class=" collapsible collapsed"><legend>Input format</legend><div class="form-item" id="edit-format-1-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-1"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-1" name="format" value="1" class="form-radio" /> Filtered HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd></li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> <div class="form-item" id="edit-format-2-wrapper"> <label class="option" for="edit-format-2"><input type="radio" id="edit-format-2" name="format" value="2" checked="checked" class="form-radio" /> Full HTML</label> <div class="description"><ul class="tips"><li>Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.</li><li>Lines and paragraphs break automatically.</li></ul></div> </div> </fieldset> <input type="hidden" name="form_build_id" id="form-ba0bcc96152a4250c846e6f4841e2a02" value="form-ba0bcc96152a4250c846e6f4841e2a02" /> <input type="hidden" name="form_id" id="edit-comment-form" value="comment_form" /> <fieldset class="captcha"><legend>CAPTCHA</legend><div class="description">This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.</div><input type="hidden" name="captcha_sid" id="edit-captcha-sid" value="85649192" /> <input type="hidden" name="captcha_response" id="edit-captcha-response" value="NLPCaptcha" /> <div class="form-item"> <div id="nlpcaptcha_ajax_api_container"><script type="text/javascript"> var NLPOptions = {key:'c4823cf77a2526b0fba265e2af75c1b5'};</script><script type="text/javascript" src="http://call.nlpcaptcha.in/js/captcha.js" ></script></div> </div> </fieldset> <span class="btn-left"><span class="btn-right"><input type="submit" name="op" id="edit-submit" value="Save" class="form-submit" /></span></span> </div></form>