Radioactive waste found in a scrapyard that caused the death of one person and left several others seriously ill from exposure has been traced to a laboratory at Delhi University, news reports said Thursday.
The toxic cobalt-60 came from a gamma irradiator machine bought from Canada in 1970, the Hindustan Times newspaper reported, quoting police.
The machine had been sitting unused in the university’s chemistry department laboratory from 1985 to this February when the university sold it to scrap dealers in Delhi’s Mayapuri area.
The scrap dealers dismantled the machine and in the process peeled off a lead covering exposing the radioactive cobalt-60, Deputy Commissioner of Police Sharad Aggarwal was quoted as saying.
Eight people including dealers from the scrap market were admitted to hospital in mid-April suffering from radiation exposure.
A 35-year-old radiation victim died at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences on Monday. Another person is critical, one has been released, while the others are stable, doctors said.
– from earthtimes.org
This is a small amount radio active waste. What about the tons of waste sitting idle in the nuclear power plants?
Save earth from nuclear power.