Talk:Goiânia accident

Questions about aftermath

Not that the facts listed here disagree with those at List of nuclear accidents. --Andrew 20:41, May 5, 2004 (UTC)

Andrew: I suppose you are referring to the numbers of victims: Well the 244 / 400 is descipancy, I might look into that when I have the time. Concerning the deathtoll, it's in the nature of such accidents that counts disagree: Radiation poisoning can be rather clearly diagnized but what about cancer? Sanders muc 22:33, 5 May 2004 (UTC)

That's what I was referring to; it might be worth putting something in the article to indicate that estimates differ. As you say, it's alarming whatever way you look at it. Do you know what was done to the sites? (The house whose floor got covered in dust, for example) Are they abandoned, with warning signs? Were they cleaned up? Are they in use without cleanup? I sort of fear the last, since they're inhabited by dirt-poor people. For the purposes of studying radiological weapons it'd be good to know too. --Andrew 01:30, May 6, 2004 (UTC)

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After reading this source, I suspect that this article might be better named 'Goiânia Radiation Incident' with a redirect from 'Goiânia accident'. That is, unless it is universally known as the 'Goiânia accident'. -- Solipsist 15:30, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Maybe you are right. Simon A. 16:26, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Name of wife

Is there any better way to refer to the wife of the junkyard owner, other than 'the wife'? Is her name known, or is that confidencial? -- Solipsist 15:45, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Don't know. Just wrote the article from Web search results. So, if you find her name, add it. ;-) Simon A. 16:26, 28 Sep 2004 (UTC)

Not "waste"

The Cs-137 source that was opened and caused the contamination was not radioactive waste. It was a sealed source in an irradiator that was illegally abandoned in the hospital. All sealed sources like this are required to be under control and inventoried and reported if missing. All these controls failed in this case, but the source was not in fact radioactive waste. -- User:24.151.184.155 05:12, 13 September 2005

Thanks for the clarification - I've removed the mention of waste from the article. Be bold: if you see any other mistakes feel free to edit the page directly. -- Solipsist 07:02, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

"Goiânia incident"

This was an incident not an accident. Immaterial to most I guess. --Wetman 07:57, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

Agreed, see comment 28 Sep 04 above. No one seems to object, so it is probably time to move. -- Solipsist 16:17, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

I believe the "accident" terminology is correct. Under the International Atomic Energy Agency's scale of nuclear events (the INES) Goiânia is clearly not an incident but an accident (a major accident in fact). See [1]. Mucky Duck 18:13, 13 September 2005 (UTC)

I agree that it is an accident, but not a "Major Accident" -- that is only for the highest level of the scale, for accidents like Chernobl (sp?). Since the exposure was to less than 100 Terabecquerels, the case could be made that it wasn't even a "Serious Accident". Regardless, it is an accident, so I created the "Goiânia incident" page as a redirect to this one. If the discussion goes the other way, it shouldn't be a problem to reverse my work. Mdotley 16:57, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Similar incident

I saw a documentary about an incident in which radioactive rods from a dumped Mexican X-ray machine came loose, which was only discovered when a lost lorry driver ended up triggering a radiation alarm at Los Alamos. Was this the same incident, and if so, should there be mention of the lorry driver? smurrayinchester^{(User), (Talk)} 11:02, 14 November 2005 (UTC)

Different incident. This one's in Brazil. --Carnildo 06:14, 15 November 2005 (UTC)

thanks

cool this helped me on my debate!!! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.211.92.161 (talk) 22:38, 22 March 2006 (UTC)

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The article only says the radiation was 817 TBq, without comparing it to anything. This don't make any sense to most people, who have no idea about how much 1 Bq is.

I have added details of the average smoke detector source as this is likely to be the only radioactive source that the average person will buy in their lives (as part of a smoke alarm).Cadmium —Preceding undated comment added 10:47, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Furthermore, the article says that Devair Alves Ferreira received a dosage of "7.0 Gy, not fatal." How could 7 grays not be fatal? According to Radiation poisoning, a dosage of 6-10 sieverts (which are equivalent to grays) has a 100% fatality rate. Am I misunderstanding the scale of radiation poisoning, or was Devair Alves Ferreira the only person to survive such a dosage? -Etoile 20:54, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

About the superhuman feat of living despite a 7 Gy dose, the human body (and other living things) has a self repair mechanism. If the dose is given quickly to the subject in one batch then the self repair mechanism has no time to work. But if the dose rate is lower, or the dose is given in small installments then the biological system can endure a much larger dose. I will alter the article to explain this.Cadmium —Preceding undated comment added 10:24, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

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Can someone convert the microcuries into TBqs? We are mxing SI and "standard" units here. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Wachholder0 (talk • contribs) 11:00, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

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The article mixes Greys (a unit of absorbed dose) and Sieverts (a unit of equivalent dose). In the context of a gamma or beta emitter, these units mean the same thing, but most people reading the article won't know that. I think this should be corrected or at least noted somewhere. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.211.202.84 (talk) 06:18, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Data

I'm sorry about my English, so i am not going to change anything in the main text; but i have something interesting about this incident (or accident), maybe someone can change the text:

• When the accident happened, there was moral panic in all Brazil; the people of Goiânia began to be prejudiced about that;
• There was found nothing cominated in 2001 but a guava tree, that was cut down [2]
• Most people who were contaminated didn't know nothing about the accident (some even played with the substance); a lot of kids born after have some health problems (not like Talidomida, but blood, breathing, etc. problems) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.11.150.193 (talk) 22:21, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

Waste disposal incidents

I think that the edit to change a cat. to Waste disposal incidents was in part right and in part wrong. I think it was right becuase the accident involved an object which had become waste by virtue of the fact that it was abandoned so it counts as a Waste disposal incident. But it is also about the recycle process as a group of scrap metal workers tried to return the metal into use through their scarp metal yard. I have added a discussion of radioactivity in scrap metal (which I think is best placed in this article) which includes some other examples of related events. Overall I think that the article should stay in both "cats".Cadmium 12:31, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Scrap metal contamination

The information on scrap metal contamination and dose vs. time health hazards looks excellent (especially the charts), but does it really belong in this article? This would seem to apply equally to many other accident entries, especially the metals section. 142.161.176.232 06:00, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

I agree. One-third of the article is taken up with diagrams detailing the waste outcomes for radioactive contaminants in a scrap metal furnace, which is irrelevant to this particular incident. Suggest this section is split to its own article, "Accidental furnace contamination with radioactive metals". Cheers Clappingsimon talk 08:29, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

It was to make that same comment that I came to the Talk page. I think the proposed title from simon, there, is too cumbersome, but I agree with the concept. Mdotley 16:06, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

I am the person who added the details of how radioactive materials behave if they are added to scrap metal. I think that a page on the subject of radioactivity in the scarp metal trade would be a good idea. I think that as wikipedia gets bigger and more mature that this sort of thing will fork off into its own page. I have just parking the stuff in the best current place, if any of you want to help out then I would be glad to start work on a new page (I have just made it at Radioactive scrap metal).Cadmium 11:20, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

I am going to be bold and remove from THIS article the information that Cadmium has so graciously provided, and helpfully split off into its own article. Feel free to revert if I have overstepped the consensus. Mdotley 17:30, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

Dear Mdotley, I have no problem with what you have done. I think that a series of smaller articles is oftein better than one long one (as long as the fragmentation does not make it unreadable).Cadmium —Preceding undated comment added 07:18, 19 September 2006 (UTC)

Comparision with other related events

That part of the article mentions related events, including one in Mexico, but gives neither introduction nor link? MadMaxDog 14:36, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

I think becuase the mexico Co-60 event occured so long ago that no IAEA report can be obtained from their web site on it. I have added three on-line references to the Tammiku (Estonia) event where people broke into a radioactive waste store to steal scrap metal (stupid crime). I think that the Tammiku (Estonia) event is well documented and is a very good example of a sealed source event where the source stayed sealed (no contamination occured), the mexico event is mentioned in many journals and has now become part of the common knowlege of many scientists.Cadmium 11:24, 17 September 2006 (UTC)

"Popular culture" moved into leaf article

I'd moved the list of movies, songs, etc into the leaf article Goiânia accident in popular culture. This became common practice (see e.g. Gorilla or Tachyon) to keep the main article better focused (and smaller, in this case). Pavel Vozenilek 21:16, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

The "popular culture" article is quite small. If it is going to grow much larger, it might be best to keep it separate, but if it doesn't get any longer, paste it back into this article.

Mfgreen 00:20, 7 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Mfgreen. It is very small. The Pt version didn't split and it's still good. Khullah 18:30, 4 July 2007 (UTC)

Reorganization

I have been bold and reorganized much information. The data on contaminated scrap metal, that Cadmium duplicated in a more specialized article has been removed from this article. Also, the data on cell reaction to fractionated doses of radiation (rather than one long exposure) has been split off into a stub. All the information is still available, but it is not in the way of those who do not want all the technical details.

I think the Categories need to be examined, now. Some of those probably applied mainly to the info that has been split off, and should be removed from this article. Would anyone care to take that on, and then include the "split off" articles in the appropriate categories? Thanks! Mdotley 18:52, 18 September 2006 (UTC)

I took care of the categories a while back, and now feel that I have done all I can to contribute to this article. I am removing it from my watchlist, but feel free to reach me via my talk page if I can be of assistance. ~ MD Otley (talk) 21:06, 4 January 2009 (UTC)

Error in comparison table?

The comparison table states that a smoke detector contains 37 KBq, and the device when stolen contained 50,900,000 KBq. 50,900,000 KBq == 50.9 GBq, not 50.9 TBq as stated in the article text. I believe that the first three rows of the table require an additional three zeros. Agree? --Jered 204.246.225.2 18:57, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Agreed and changed: 1TBq = 10^9 KBq. Dylan Thurston 20:04, 6 March 2007 (UTC)

Strange data

Hi I know that this is not the space for this kind of question, but I hope I can clear it before trying any editing. I'm confused about an aspect on the article. Why the Junkyard workers died, if their radiation doses where only 4.5 and 5.3 Gy? Devair Alves Ferreira got 7.0 Gy,and Maria Gabriela Ferreira got 5.7 Gy. None of them died. Thank you larotta 21:28, 8 April 2007 (UTC)

Please read the article Dose fractionation. The basic idea is that one can survive a higher dose if it's spread out over a longer period of time, b/c one's body has a chance to repair the early damage before the later fractions of the dose. Mdotley 01:20, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

And actually, the wife did die. Mdotley 01:25, 6 July 2007 (UTC)

the animation

The source's animation seems broken. I see something rotating inside a circle but it looks crappy. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.50.43.90 (talk) 07:54, 10 September 2008 (UTC)

It also needs to be explained better. It shows nothing happening except a thin beam when the inner window matches the outer window. But when they are at opposite positions (blocked with an interior casing) the graphic suggests that the capsule is then emitting massive amounts of radiation in all directions. Either this issue is not explained well or the animation is misleading. I have replaced the graphic with an earlier version. -Rolypolyman (talk) 16:28, 15 September 2009 (UTC)

Hospital

Does anyone know why the hospital was abandoned? Drutt (talk) 15:27, 20 September 2008 (UTC)

• The IAEA report says "It is now known that at about the end of 1985 a private radiotherapy institute, the Institute Goiano de Radioterapia in Goiania, Brazil, moved to new premises, taking with it a cobalt-60 teletherapy unit and leaving m place a caesium-137 tele- therapy unit without notifying the licensing authority as required under the terms of the institute's licence. The former premises were subsequently partly demolished. As a result, the caesium-137 teletherapy unit became totally insecure." --KFP (talk | contribs) 13:35, 28 November 2009 (UTC)

Health outcomes and names

The article refers to a Maria Ferreira in several places. Is this the same person as Gabriela Maria Ferreira. If so can that be made clear. This use of middle names as given name may be common in Brazil, but it’s not English standard. Also, who are Leide das Neves Ferreira and Ivo Alves Ferreira? The article says that latter is the father of the former, and then only describes the former as the daughter of the latter. It doesn’t actually tell us anything about who they are. I assume they are relatives of Devair Ferreira. 138.77.2.133 (talk) 04:12, 23 March 2010 (UTC)

Factual errors in "Legal matters" section

The section "Legal matters" says that "[...] the three doctors who had owned and run IGR were charged with criminal negligence" and later that "[...] the court could not declare the owners of IGR liable". This is not true (maybe it's confusing the civil charges with the criminal negligence charges?). The truth is that the doctors (and one physicist specialist in medicine) were convicted and sentenced to three years and two months of jail.

I found a few online sources using Google, the best ones seem to be:

Reflections on Liability and Radiological or Nuclear Accidents: The Accidents at Goiania, Forbach, Three Mile Island and Chernobyl, by M-C. Boehler [3] (pages 15-16 of the PDF)

Sentença na ação civil pública no caso do acidente radioativo com césio 137 em Goiânia, by Juliano Taveira Bernardes [4]

Also, the web pages for sources 6 and 7 (referenced in the section Events, subsection Hospital abandonment) don't exist anymore, and I couldn't find any other sources that claim that the owners of IGR warned anyone about the danger of the abandoned equipment. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.233.48.22 (talk) 02:15, 23 April 2011 (UTC)

Iridium windows don't exist?

I was attempting to find more information about the design and construction of the source holder described in this article, and guess what: when you filter out the search results for Brazil and for Goiânia all you get is web pages that mention iridium window tinting for sunglasses and car windows. There is not a patent anywhere, there is not a book nor academic article describing one, in short outside of this single nuclear incident, "iridium windows" as a device for directing radiation appear to be nonexistent. Really, they just don't exist.

How is this possible? How can something that, in terms of this article, seems like it should be a standard component of a teletherapy device, not exist outside of this one device in Brazil? How can no one have a patent on one? Even in the Wikipedia article on iridium, its only use in conjunction with anything medical is as a source itself of gamma radiation when used for brachytherapy, and not a word anywhere about its use as any kind of "window" for any other radiation source in any other kind of therapy.

I have reviewed in detail the original patent for the international standard source holder used in teletherapy. Here is the source: http://www.patsnap.com/patents/view/US3588031.html. If you look at the patent drawings, you can see that there is no "iridium window" illustrated or mentioned anywhere; neither does any subsequent patent ever filed in the United States or elsewhere ever mention such a window in conjunction with this device or any radiation therapy device.

What I am saying is, I don't know how this is possible. I challenge anyone to demonstrate otherwise, but as far as I can tell, "iridium windows" simply do not exist, anywhere. Period. That one is still mentioned so many times in the course of a nuclear accident like this one just makes no sense. KDS4444^Talk 11:39, 1 March 2012 (UTC)

I think that you are correct. I looked through the IAEA document which is cited as describing the "iridium window" and -- as far as I can work out -- there is no such reference. I am removing the "iridium window" in the article and replacing it with "aperture" which I think adequately describes this part of the equipment for the purposes of this article.Jimjamjak (talk) 15:54, 10 May 2012 (UTC)

Nice choice, and well done. Someday I'd still like to understand how the concept of an iridium window for a radiation source came to exist, but for now "aperture" will certainly be sufficient description and at least won't be inaccurate. Thank you. KDS4444^Talk 10:57, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

Responsibility

I don't like the way some of the things are worded here, mainly that the article tends to demonize the doctors/owners of the hospital when they were not allowed to remove the radiation source and even went as far as to report it to various agencies and governmental officials. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 96.42.21.232 (talk) 07:08, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

I agree with you, why were the doctors charged? The ones that constantly warned them about the radioactive material but they weren't allowed to remove it... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.54.140.226 (talk) 21:56, 7 May 2012 (UTC)

While I think the article makes clear that the doctors did attempt to warn the relevant officials about the dangers of an unmonitored radiation capsule at the facility, it also makes clear that afterwards these same doctors were somehow held accountable for the disaster. That is not a characterization done by Wikipedia, it is a contradictory social & historic fact. We cannot change the fact that these doctors were pointed to as the guilty party, even if that fact seems grossly unfair (which it does, I agree). KDS4444^Talk 11:03, 11 May 2012 (UTC)

"On September 13, 1987, the guard in charge of daytime security, Voudireinão da Silva, did not show up to work, using a sick day to attend a cinema screening of Herbie Goes Bananas with his family." - Because of this, 4 people died. 203.9.151.254 (talk) 22:45, 13 September 2012 (UTC)

The thieves

I've been wondering this for a while, and can't find it in the article - what happened to the two thieves who stole the radiotherapy device? Were they ever persecuted for their part in the disaster? Are they even still alive? Thanks! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.57.185.218 (talk) 19:18, 16 September 2012 (UTC)

Thank you for referring to them as thieves, because they were. I think many attempts have been made by a wikipedia contributor or contributors to whitewash the events by calling those ultimately responsible as "scavengers" which then paints them as victims. "Oh, I wasn't stealing your car, I was scavenging it." "Oh, I'm not a murderer, I'm a ghost creator." There was even supposed to be a guard to protect the property from "scavenging." They took things that did not belong to them. That is theft. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.96.26.57 (talk) 22:16, 3 November 2012 (UTC)

I believe the article refers to them as "scavengers" to let the reader know what their occupation was. Had they been guards working for the hospital the article would say "hospital guards" instead. Not to mention that calling them thieves implies that they occupied their time with taking items belonging to other people. Besides, "scavenger" already implies something negative. DukeTwicep (talk) 16:37, 26 January 2013 (UTC)

That's fine and all, but I think the article should have something about the thieves' fate, as I cannot find anything mentioning if they were criminally charged, or died in the hospital, or were let off with a warning, etc. etc.

SI units

Shouldn't the measurements be in sievert(Sv) rather than gray(Gy)? I believe that sieverts is used for radiation absorbed by biological tissue and gray being independent of material. Unless the sources use gray I believe that you only need to replace the instances of Gy and gray with Sv and sieverts when talking about radiation absorbed by people and other animals. DukeTwicep (talk) 16:45, 26 January 2013 (UTC)