Busby C (2012) Health consequences of exposures of British personnel to radioactivity whilst serving...

7/28/2019 Busby C (2012) Health consequences of exposures of British personnel to radioactivity whilst serving in areas where atomic bomb tests were conducted. Res

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Health consequences of exposures of British personnel to radioactivity whilst serving in

areas where atomic bomb tests were conducted

Response to:K. Johnston: Exposure to Ionising Radiation

at Christmas Island: A review

Chris Busby PhD

Castle Cottage, Sea View Place

Aberystwyth, SY23 1DZ UK Feb 5th 2012


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1. Scope

In this report I address the document: Exposure to ionizing radiation at Christmas Island: a review (K. Johnston, Nov 2011) which advances arguments and analyses for the defence in the issue of the veterans tribunals cases. Johnstons report itself (KJ)

examines the earlier reports by written by me and by Prof Regan, and presents anumber of arguments and calculations. In addition, because I have results from newevidence which has recently become available, I will also present some analyses of

photographs of the Grapple Y test which seems to me to be relevant to thediscussions.

2. Natural Background radiation doses on Christmas Island (CI) and the UK.

KJ returns to an issue which was raised in my earlier reports where I took issue withthe defence assertion that the background radiation on CI was much lower than in theUK. I argued that the report by Clare et al 1987 was demonstrable false in tabulatingthe background on CI as 600 Sv compared with 2300 Sv in the UK because Clarehad not included exposures to Uranium, Thorium, Radium and Radon gas, whichcarry a high weighting factor of 20 because they are alpha emitters. Most of the UK dose was from Radon gas and its daughters. KJ argues that I was in error in this in thatClare et al 1989 did in fact include internal exposures from Radon and other alphaemitters. KJ calls this a key issue and states that it renders my subsequent argumentsto be without foundation .

The key reference is supplied by KJ and is Clare et als Reference 13 which isappended to the KJ report. This reference 13 is: Supplementary Statement No 1 Issue

No 3 of 21 st August 1989: Exposure to Background Ionising Radiation on Christmas

Island 1956-1964 MoD (PE) AWE (Aldermaston) ( henceforth SS1).SS1 Para 2 includes the key statement:The average background of the island of 580uSv per annum is lower than in theUnited Kingdom and refers this statement to two reports of the National RadiologicalProtection Board which give values for the UK, not Christmas Island. It continues:This is due to a number of factors. . .l. First the cosmic radiation is lower near the equator. .2. . . . and last, and most importantly, the dose from alpha particle radiations fromthe gases radon (222Rn) and Thoron (220Rn) and their radioactive decay products isvery low, less than 1% of the average in the United Kingdom, due to the coral composition and isolated position of this small island in the middle of the Pacific

Ocean

The first point is true, that the cosmic radiation is lower at the equator, but not by anamount that would justify the argument made in SS1. Table 1 of UNSCEAR 2000gives the cosmic ray dose rate at Lat 0-10 degrees as 30nSv/h compared with Lat 50-60 as 32nSv/h. This would be annual doses of 280 Sv Cosmic Ray dose on ChristmasIsland and about 263 Sv/h in the UK a difference of 7%. So we can discard this

point.The second point above is more interesting and is also demonstrable false, as I

wrote. SSI does not present any results of measurements for its statement that thealpha particle Radon etc doses are 1% of those in the UK, but bases its assertion onthe vague and unscientific idea that because this is a coral island in the Pacific , itcannot have any Uranium or Uranium decay products in the soil. In addition, to


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support this, it in turn cites two references, one of which is a personal communication(which I have no way of investigating), the other a report by the New Zealand

National Radiological Protection Board (McEwan et al 1981, hereafter ME1981). Sowe are now two stages away from KJ and I will turn to ME1981.

3. The McEwan et al 1981 New Zealand Department of Health Survey

ME1981 is the report of a radiological survey of CI carried out in 1981 by a teamfrom New Zealand. But this report gives no measurements of Radon or Thoron levelsin the air. It gives an outline of external dose rates at various parts of the island andmeasures Cs-137, Sr-90 and Pu-239 in soil samples. It does however make someinteresting statements:

1. (p3) it was not considered necessary to make separate measurements for betaradiation ( because the beta gamma ratio is constant for long lived materials )

2. (p8) although naturally occurring radionuclides viz. K-40, Ra-226 and U isotopes were detected in many samples , their concentrations are not tabulated or generally discussed in this report.

3. (p7) At site 41 which was on the shores of the enclosed salty lagoon the doserate was about 45nGy/h at a distance of 40m from the waters edge. . . a soil

sample demonstrated that the slight elevation in dose rate was due to Radium salts: the Ra226 concentration in surface soil at site 41 was 230Bq/kg. At adistance of 100m from the waters edge it had decreased to 100Bq/kg.

CI is a coral island and is composed of Calcium Carbonate. It is made up of theskeletons of marine creatures built from calcium present in the sea. Also found in seawater are other elements including the alpha emitters Uranium and Radium, the originof Radon and since these are both chemically similar to Calcium and in the sameChemical Group these will be laid down and incorporated into the Calcium Carbonatein concentration ratios which will largely be the same as in the sea water. We cancheck this. Other deposits of calcium carbonate from earlier sea creatures include thelimestone deposits and derived soils all over the world. The concentration of Uraniumand Radium in these limestone deposits is well documented. Table 6.6 in Eisenbudand Gesell 1997, the standard work on environmental radioactivity, give a mean U-238 activity of 16Bq/kg in limestone rocks and the mean Ra-226 activity is the sameat 15Bq/kg as it is a series descendant. This compares with 48Bq/kg in igneous rocksin the same table.

However, although no results for U-238 are given in ME1981, we see that soil upto 100m from the edge of the lagoon has between 100 and 238Bq/kg of Ra-226. Thisis an unusually high activity of Radium and will give rise to significant Radon decays.

No mention is made in the report of this finding, nor of the Radon concentrationsanywhere on the island. I conclude two things:

1. No account was taken of internal exposures from Radon, as I argued in myinitial report. The Radon concentrations in air from soil contaminated by 100-238Bq/kg of Ra-226 are considerable and can be calculated on the basis of Radium-226/ Radon flux equations developed and reported in UNSCEAR 2000. If we assume that the whole island was contaminated by Radium at the

lowest level reported, 100Bq/kg then the Radon doses would have inflated thenatural background at CI to a level which is at least twice that for the UK


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(assuming a mean Ra226 concentration in the UK of 20Bq/kg this would potentially deliver four times the annual UK dose) and maybe higher depending on the nature of the accommodation and where the veterans weresleeping in relation to the ground. Radon level in drinking water (in which it isquite soluble) will also have been a significant unmeasured and overlooked

dose source. But I do not call this natural background Radium as it is morelikely a Nuclear Test Uranium contamination byproduct; it is nevertheless a

background radiation and this falsifies the argument made by KJ and earlier papers on this issue.

2. The Radium levels mentioned in passing draw attention to seriouscontamination of the island by Radium, and therefore probably Uranium,which could not be explained from consideration of the natural backgroundconcentrations in Calcium Carbonate rocks and results were dismissed asnatural and mostly not reported by ME1981. This raises the question of theorigin of the Radium and the failure of MC1981 to follow up this finding.

It follows from all this that KJ is wrong and that my statement that the comparison of doses at CI and the UK are demonstrably false, stands. Radon exposure was notmeasured but it was assumed that there was no Radium on the island because it wasan isolated coral island in the Pacific. The measurements of Radium on the island bythe NZ team seem to have been overlooked. The same is true for Thoron. The parentnuclide, natural Thorium-232 was reported in ME1981(p7) but no reporting of Thorium occurred apart from one site where it was stated to be the cause of elevatedgamma readings.

The reliance of ME1981 on the gamma dose rate measurements alone if unsafe. U-238 contamination will produce hardly any gamma radiation.

We should also ask why (point 1 above) the NZ team made a point of notmeasuring the beta dose rate because as they stated: the beta gamma ratio was known .In fact, the beta gamma ratio was anomalously high, much higher than they wouldhave expected, as I showed from Oldburys paper and also in my 2 nd supplementaryreport where I check the beta gamma ratio on the material on the aircraft. It isimpossible that the NZ team did not also find this, and I find it rather suspicious thatthey omitted reporting it.

This analysis therefore largely withdraws KJs platform regarding the dosecomparison between CI and the UK.

4. Uranium series decays: U-234

Some explanations may be of value here. Table 1 shows the decay series nuclides U-238 and U-235 series together with their half lives. It should be recalled that the

bombs were made of U-238 and U-235. In addition, and rarely mentioned is U-234.When U-235 is separated from natural Uranium, the methods depend on the slightdifference in atomic mass. Thus the lighter isotope U-235 is removed from the heavier isotope U-238. But it is clear that the natural Uranium will have also U-234 as astowaway which is also an alpha emitter. Since it is the daughter of U-238 and has amuch shorter half life, this isotope will be present in secular equilibrium, which iswhat is found when measurements are made of natural Uranium. The activity of U-234 will thus be the activity of the parent U-238, generally 1:1 though in disturbed

soils and waters this can vary slightly from about 0.9 to 1.2. Since the activity ratio of U-235 to U-238 in natural Uranium is about 23.6 (that is just the function of the


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normal isotope atom ratio, the atomic ratio of U-235 in natural Uranium, 137.88),there will be 23.6 decays of U-234 (and also U-238) to each decay of U-235. Itfollows that if U-234, being lighter even than U-235, is separated from the naturalUranium in the enrichment process, the so-called enriched Uranium (used in the

bombs) will be enriched also in U-234. But the activity of the U-234 will be 23.6

times greater than the U-235. Thus if there were total enrichment, to give 100% U-235, the Uranium activity would be 80MBq/kg from the U-235 but also 23.6 *80MBq = 1888MBq/kg (1.9GBq/kg) from the stowaway U-234. Thus it followsthat U-234 is a serious component of the Uranium contamination in fallout andrainout. Indeed, Karl Z Morgan, the head of internal radiation and health effectsCommittee 2 of the USA NCRP and in charge of much of the US tests radiationhealth effects team came to Aldermaston in 1952 and told the UK teams this, that theyshould be very careful about Uranium contamination at the test sites, particularly U-234. I saw a memo where this was reported in the files I examined. I will ask Rosenblatts to look it out. The reason I mention it here is that it is clear from Table 1that Radium-226 is one of the later decay products of U-234, and that the unusuallyhigh levels of Ra-226 found in the ME1981 survey may signal the presence of evenhigher levels of U-234 and the other U nuclides. It is a great pity that ME1981 did notreport the Uranium results they had and wrote them off as natural Uranium. In

passing, should not the AWE memo in 1989 have questioned their own analysis aboutRadon and alpha emitters on the basis of the presence of Uranium and Radium on CI,rather than falsely cherry-picking from ME1981 that which supported their desire toshow that the radiation doses were lower than in the UK? But as with many of thereports from AWE we see the questionable behaviour I have come to expect from theMoD.

Table 1 . Uranium Series. Only the earlier series nuclides are listed. (from Eisenbudand Gesell 1997 Tables 6.2 and 6.4).

Nuclide Name Half life radiations Specific activityU-238 Series

U-238 Uranium 4.47 x 10 9y 12.4MBq/kg U-238Th-234 Thorium 24.1d , 12.4MBq/kg U 238Pa-234m Protoactinium 1.17m 12.4MBq/kg U-238Pa-234 Protoactinium 21.8y , 12.4MBq/kg U-238U-234 Uranium 244,500y 12MBq/kg U-238;

230 x 10 9 Bq/kg U-234

Th-230 Thorium 7.7 x 10 4y Ra-226 Radium 1600y Rn-222 Radon 3.8d Po-218 Polonium 3.05mMore RadonDaughters

U-235, Actinium seriesU-235 Uranium 7.038 x 10 8y , 80MBq/kg

Th-231 Thorium 25.5h , Pa-231 Protoactinium 2.27 x 10 4y ,


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More nuclides

5. KJs arguments relating to the external exposures as defined by the stickypapers; decay rates

In KJ Section 6.2 there are a number of points raised. These mainly refer to myearliest attempts to try and make sense of the cumulative doses received by veteransliving on the island for periods of time. These calculations have been overtaken bynew data, and I will return to this. KJ makes a number of points:

1. I ignored readings from sticky papers which showed no gamma activity andchose only those which did.

2. I added these dose rates to make a cumulative dose which did not take intoconsideration the rapid decay of the hot nuclides on the sticky papers.

3. I failed to convert the contamination ( Ci/m 2) into dose rate4. Drew misleading comparisons with Chernobyl: short lived vs longer lived

nuclides5. I alleged biased reporting

I will briefly deal with the main points.First, KJ is correct that I was wrong to add the cumulative fallout deposition based onthe measurements reported for the sticky filters in terms of the gamma defined surfacecontamination. KJs version of my Fig 3.3 which is given in KJ Appendix 2 would beaccurate in terms of gamma emitters in fresh fallout. So that early analysis wasincorrect in terms of fresh gamma emitters. However, in so far as the sticky papersactually reflect the fallout and rainout on the island (and we see from the evidence in

my supplementary report and below that they do not), there will be a much larger component of unreported and unmeasured alpha and beta emitting long lived nuclides present in the mix. We know this from the measurements made on freshly dispersedmaterial from the USA bombs where the beta gamma ratio is as high as 100 and isgenerally (see my 2 nd supplementary report) of the order of 50. Since the expectedvalue is about 1.5, we can see (and I have argued) that the missing beta emitters arethe two Uranium daughters, Th-234 and Pa-234m (see Table 1). There will also be theU-235 daughter Th-231. There are thus 48.5 betas for every gamma measured byAWE in the sticky filters (assuming with KJ no fractionation of alphas, betas andgammas). If we ignore the U-235 there will be about 24 alpha decays from parent U-238 for every gamma decay in the sticky papers. Thus the cumulative contamination

as defined by my Fig 3.3 will actually be 24 times what I calculated for the gammaemitters. Over the period of the 1957-58 covered by my Fig 3.3 (in KJs appendix 2)there will have been a cumulative deposition of 0.23 x 24 Ci/m 2. This is 888kBq/m 2 of long lived alpha emitting U-238, and since the Chernobyl exclusion zone wasdefined as 555kBq/m 2 this may be accurately compared with Chernobyl and giveslevels greater than the exclusion zone limit.

But there is also the question of whether the sticky papers accurately recordedthe fallout and rainout. It has emerged since my first report that they do not and I

point this out in my 2 nd supplement report Section 6 where I discuss one interestingdocument released under the FoI. This draws attention to the way in whichmeasurements of fallout were made (I subsume rainout under this heading of fallout).A memo by Maj.WG McDougall written from AWRE Aldermaston 14 Feb 1948outlines required operation of fallout collection on Christmas Island (Veterans July


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2008157654) is titled Air Water and Sticky Paper samplings . It states: Sticky paper isadversely affected by rain and should be taken in under cover when rain is falling .We assume that either this was carried out or wasnt. If it was, then no radionuclidesin the rain will have been collected on the filters. If it was not, then the filters willhave had the fallout washed off them. Since the MoD depend to a great extent on the

sticky filter data to argue their position that there was no fallout in areas where theveterans were stationed, this paper largely withdraws that evidence as unsafe.Therefore the real situation must be worse than that I have deduced above.

6. KJs approach to internal dose

In my 2 nd Supplement report I have already employed the KJ gisted data to assess thelevels of likely contamination from Uranium U-238. I have also employed theOperation DOMINIC US aircraft surface contamination beta gamma ratios from theOldbury 1962 report to show, as I do above, that the likely contamination was fromUranium, and this supports my very earliest attempt to do this using the Oldbury 1963report of the beta gamma ratios on the airport washdown pad and other locations.

KJ employs the gisted data to deduce maximum levels of plutoniumcontamination. As KJ points out, my own concern is with Uranium. This is, as I arguein my 2 nd supplement report, because Uranium has singular and anomalously highgenotoxicity which is arguable from scientific principles (binds to DNA, acts as a

photoelectron amplifier of natural gamma radiation) and also from epidemiology (IraqFallujah papers, Gulf War syndrome etc).

KJ makes two statements which are relevant here and which I will take issuewith. The first in 7.3 states: There are no credible mechanisms for separate dispersal of Uranium Dust or Unexploded Uranium particles and in 7.5 so long as the fallout composition is not severely fractionated, this (his result) is also the fraction of theresidual fissile material present. It is quite easy to show that there are suchmechanisms and that different fallout components behave differently with regard todispersion and transport. First, Uranium and Plutonium are quite differentlydistributed in the areas contaminated by Chernobyl. The Caesiums and Strontiums,

being soluble in water, and of low boiling point, are dispersed as vapour and remainas gases at low temperatures. The boiling points of Cs, Sr, Ba, Pu and U are given inTable 2.

Table 2 Melting points and solubility in water of Cs, Sr, Ba, Pu and U (CRC1981)

Element, isotope MP BP Solubility waterCaesium-137, 134 28 678 Highly soluble/ reactiveStrontium-89, 90 769 1384 Highly soluble/ reactiveBarium-140 725 1640 Soluble/ reactiveUranium-238, 235,234 1132 3818 Insoluble/ unreactive (oxide)Plutonium-239, 240, 241 641 3232 Insoluble (oxide particles)

In the enormous temperatures generated by fission and fusion reactions the ion plasmacontaining these substances will condense as it cools with the formation of Pu and Usub micron particles quite close to the centre of the reaction fireball. The lighter elements will remain as vapours and will condense at lower temperatures muchfurther away from the centre of the reaction. This is rather like fractional distillation


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which relies on separating substances on the basis of their boiling points. It istherefore the credible mechanism that KJ argues does not exist, and indeed only a

physicist could ask such a question. That such mechanisms exist is clear from maps of Caesium, Strontium and Plutonium contamination in the areas affected by theChernobyl accident, also as we now know from the Xenon isotope ratios measured

nearby, a nuclear explosion. It is clear that Caesium contamination occurred far awayfrom the reactor whereas The Strontium contamination was located nearer and the

plutonium contaminations was the closest to the reactor. I show two Chernobylcontamination maps, one for Cs-137 and one for Pu-239 (see e.g. Mould RF 1990) inFigs 1 and 2. A similar situation exists in the Fukushima contaminated territories of

N Japan as I have personally determined by measurements of car air filters. It is also possible to draw attention to the measured contamination of upland parts of the UK,some 2000 miles from Chernobyl, with Cs-137 but virtually no contamination fromPu-239 or indeed Sr-90.

Fig 1 Caesium contamination near Chernobyl (RF Mould)

Fig 2 Plutonium contamination near Chernobyl

I conclude that this fractionation argument goes against KJ. Indeed, at ChristmasIsland, it is my belief that the Uranium and Plutonium sub-micron particles will haveformed condensation centres for water vapour and been rained out from the cloudquite early. Eisenbud and Gesell state that the particles formed in the fireball are 0.3micrometers dameter. Heavy rain on CI and indeed in the camp areas after tests wasreported by many veterans and by the observer aircraft. In one anecdotal report, therain contained fish. I will discuss the origin of this rain below.

7. KJs argument about basing my analyses in the Oldbury OperationDOMINIC reports

KJ 8.2 makes an issue of the fact that I have employed the Oldbury OperationDOMINIC measurements, which were mostly of US test fallout to draw conclusions

about the UK tests. KJ argues that the USA data is irrelevant and that therefore myargument is invalid. My response is that I was interested mainly in showing that innuclear test fallout and rainout, the fractions of the radioactive material that end up onthe ground are dominated by Uranium isotopes and in terms of mass, principally U-238. This must be true of the USA tests as well as the UK tests since these bombs areall based on the same principle, the fissioning of U235 with massive reflectioncomponents to contain the bombs made of U-238. Therefore I use the DOMINICdata: I would certainly have preferred to use the UK data but it has been kept secretand so I cannot.

8 Carter et als exposure dose calculations: KJ Section 9.8; calculating a dose.


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I do not accept the accuracy of the figures for external dose given in the table inCarter et al 2006. The results in the tables given by Carter et al are incorrect. They arelow by a factor of approximately 2. I use the UK Handbook of RadiologicalProtection HMSO 1971 to show this assuming a mean energy of 0.7MeV per photon.This is not so important to my arguments and I will not pursue it or lay out the

calculations but is just one more piece of evidence of bias.Since KJ (Section 11.4) has complained that I have not estimated any doses

from the contamination, I will make a quick calculation of the annual ICRP dose fromUranium-238 and Uranium 234 at a contamination level of 100Bq/kg which is basedon the Radium-226 reading reported by ME1981. This translates into a surfacecontamination of 7.5kBq/m 2 if we take the contamination to be to a depth of 5cm andthe density of the soil to be 1.5. Using a resuspension factor of 1 x 10 -5 this gives anair concentration of 0.075Bq/m 3. At an inhalation rate of 23m 3 a day (ICRP 23Reference Man, 1975) this gives an annual internal inhalation exposure of 629Bq.Using the ICRP72 effective inhalation dose coefficients of 8 x10 -6 and 9.4 x 10 -6 Sv/Bq for U-238 and U-234 only (no daughters) this gives annual inhalation doses of 5.0 and 5.9mSv, a total Uranium inhalation dose of 10.9mSv. If I add in the Uraniumdaughters this goes up by a factor of 2 to about 20mSv ICRP.

9. New Evidence: Seawater source of rainfall after Grapple Y

In my 2 nd Supplementary report, Jan 2012, I employed a report released under theFreedom of Information requests to re-analyse the fallout and rainout from theGrapple Y test which was carried out over the sea in the SW corner of the island. Iargued that heavy rain occurred after this test and assumed that this rain resulted fromthe drawing into the mushroom cloud the moist tropical air from sea level. However new information has come available since then which throws new light on the issue.

Stephen Evans of Rosenblatt Solicitors obtained some photographs taken bythe Canberra photographic aircraft of the development of the mushroom cloud. Iappend the photograph and a cropped section in Figs 3 and 4. Close examination of the cloud development shows a large mass (or more than one) being drawn up fromthe surface into the fireball. As this mass enters the fireball, a skirt of what seems to

be water vapour is thrown down from the mushroom, and this is followed by a secondskirt in the last frame. Thus we are left with what looks like two petticoats of vapour below the mushroom head, with a gap between them. This seems to be a

property of air bursts over the sea. In Fig 5 I show a photo of a USA air burst Truckee (210kT) over the sea near Christmas Island (Light 2007). The petticoats are clearly

apparent. These are not seen in any photos of air burst devices over the land (in 100 photographs of atomic explosions I have examined (Light 2007).I have used a laboratory travelling microscope to determine the dimensions of

the labeled object seen flying upwards into the Grapple Y mushroom. If we take theMushroom head diameter to be 8 miles diameter (13km) which is conservative and

based on the Sniff measurements and speeds (given in my 2 nd Supplement) then thedimension of this object modeled as a cylinder are L = 1.77km; D = 0.59km. Thevolume of this is thus 484 million cubic metres and if sea water this is about half a

billion tons of sea water splashed up and drawn into the fireball. I believe this iscaused by the blast driving a hemispherical depression in the sea and the filling of thedepression and recovery from hydrostatic pressure resulting in the explosive meeting

in the centre of the water rushing in to replace the displaced water. Anyone who hasdropped a large rock in a pond knows that a vertical mass of water is ejected


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conceivable way over some two years, they ultimately are, for some reason, still asecret after 60 or more years?

KJs approach is to try and create them by some simplistic theoreticalcalculations based on a theoretical bomb. I am always very suspicious about this kindof modeling and prefer semi-quantitative arguments based upon real measurements.

The main problem with the theoretical approach of KJ is it assumes that nofractionation of nuclides can occur, that there are no mechanisms for this. This showsa fundamental lack of knowledge of physical chemistry and a lack of knowledge alsoof the different dispersions of nuclides after the Chernobyl and Fukushimacatastrophes. Happily there are some real measurements, those of AE Oldbury, madefor a quite different purpose, but applicable, despite being of USA fallout, to the UK

bombs. These show that the beta gamma ratios (which KJ dismisses without anexplanation based in data) are highly anomalous and can only be explained by thequite reasonable assumption (given that the bombs are actually made of Uranium) thatthey are due the presence of very large amounts of Uranium-238. And my ownversion of KJs approach using the gisted tables supports this belief, as do the remarksmade by the New Zealand 1981 surveyors about Uranium measured on CI and thereported measurements of the Uranium 234 daughter, Ra-226.

These measurements also show KJ to be wrong about the relative annual dosesat CI compared with the UK. As I pointed out in my first report (and Prof Regan also

pointed out) the CI doses do not contain components from Radon or internalexposures to alpha emitters and are not strictly comparable with the UK annual doses,Unless the author of KJ can bring new evidence on this point, his argument is withoutsubstance in fact. Arm-waving references to low activity calcium carbonate andisolated Pacific islands are not evidence. And the KJ arguments about Uranium andthe possible doses from the Uranium are based on the ICRP risk model, which I havediscounted. The evidence from many sources shows that inhaled Uranium particlesare extremely hazardous and cannot be modeled using the methodology of the ICRP.

But even if we employ the ICRP model and assume a surface contamination of U238 and U234 of 100Bq/kg (the Radium level reported by ME1981 23 years after the tests) and we only model inhalation exposure the result is

Finally, there are two critically important developments. The first is thediscovery of the photographs showing that huge quantities of seawater were drawninto the developing mushroom cloud which were arguably the source of thecontaminated rainout containing the fractionated Uranium and Plutonium. The secondis the discovery that the sticky filters were useless in rain which destroyed their abilityto trap fallout. These taken together provide a mechanism for the alpha emitting

particulate contamination of CI and the lack of evidence for this in contemporarymeasurements.

C BusbyFeb 6 th 2012


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