[ARC5] Radium Paint Remediation

[David Stinson]

I worked around this problem for many years.

First- Unless you're scraping the paint off and eating it
or breathing loose dust, you're not in any real danger.
If you were to strap the radio to your forehead 24-7
and walk around with it that way for several days,
you might have a problem.  The intensity of the ionizing
field falls very rapidly with distance (is it cube-law, guys?
I don't remember at the moment).  Even a couple of feet
and you're pretty much safe.  With radiation, it's "time and
distance" that determine exposure levels.  The very hottest
radio thing I've ever seen was 4mR/h at direct contact.
If you put this in direct contact with your skin, it would take
over 10 days to deliver 1 REM to the spot, and it takes
a lot more than that to do noticeable damage.
At about two feet, the sample was nearly undetectable.

Do NOT try to remove the paint.  You will have a nasty,
radioactive mess and you will get contaminated, as will your
work area, your clothes, your home, etc.
Just don't do it.

We handled the problem with "fixatives:" basicly paint that
fixed the contamination to one place so you didn't have to
worry about carrying it home or breathing it.
Worked fine.  

Go to the hobby shop and buy a little bottle 
of Clear Gloss Enamel.  
Not the water-based stuff and not satin or flat-
 it must be Clear Gloss Enamel because it will last
and the others won't.
Have a few "wet wipes" handy.
Wear some cheap rubber gloves.
If you're worried about the radium paint being flaky 
and that you might breath some, get a disposeable 
paper painter's mask.
Get some of those Testors hobby paint brushes that
don't shed bristles.  If you use the cheap Walmart
brushes and they shed bristles into the paint, shame
on you because you'll have to leave them there.
Also have a paper grocery bag next to your
work area to receive the used material.

Paint over all the exposed radium.
Make sure everything gets a good coat.
Do NOT clean the brushes. 
The paint and brushes will have picked-up
some radium and will be active.
Put the used brushes and the paint in the bag.
Wipe down your work area with the wet wipes 
and put them in the bag.  
Take off your face mask by pinching the nose part-
do NOT run your gloved hand over your head to 
remove it.  Put it in the bag.
Remove your gloves by gripping "rubber on rubber"
to get the first one off, then use the inside surface
of the now removed glove to grip and remove the other.
Put them in the bag.
Close the bag.
GO WASH YOUR HANDS.

Now... you have a much safer radio.
You also have a paper bag with very low-level 
radioactive waste in it.  Just exactly the kind of thing
Uncle Stupid would spend $300,000 of your tax money
to bury in Nevada.  

Now, I certainly would never tell you *not* to take it 
to the Fire Department guys, who will ask you where you got it,
then have a wonderful time raiding your garage and taking
all your harmless radio stuff (plus probably your work bench,
tools and even the wall board around the gear)
so they can spend lots of tax dollars to bury them in Nevada.
Then they'll send you a bill for all this fun they're having
and make your day even better by putting you on some "list."
Uncle Stupid is your friend..... ohhhhh yeah.......

I would never advise you to put the paper bag in the trash
and forget about it.  Never.  Not me....

73 DE Dave AB5S