Thursday, February 10, 2005

Misplacing Americium

No, it's not a typo. Americium is a synthetic radioactive element. Now why is this blog-worthy you may ask. Well, your favorite war-profiteering company lost some. But don't panic, they found it - in Boston.

Lost Halliburton Nuclear Material Found

WASHINGTON - A Halliburton Co. shipment of radioactive material went missing in October but the company didn't alert government authorities until this week, Nuclear Regulatory Commission officials said Thursday.

Let's see, it went missing in October but wasn't reported until this week. Isn't that kind of a long time for radioactive stuff to be bouncing around unattended?

NRC spokesman Neil Sheehan said Halliburton did not notify the agency about the missing material until Tuesday. Depending on the material, government rules require notification either immediately or within 30 days.

I think they're slightly outside the mandatory "Hey, we've got nuclear/radioactive shit missing" timeframe. Not to worry, everything turned out ok. Move on.

I'd probably not be bugged too awfully much by it - except for all the hoopla last month in Boston about a "dirty bomb", which turned out to be a hoax. Naw, there wouldn't be a bogus tip to enable a real search, would there?

Anyway, we can be sure that Halliburton has learned it's lesson and will make sure that all future radioactive materials are secured, safely shipped, and arrive at their intended destinations on time. Can't we?