Los Angeles Rad Rain results found to be 42.4% above normal
Hi BRAWM team,
I suspect that your air in the Berkeley/San Francisco area is a lot, lot 'cleaner' than in Los Angeles. You mention that you now barely find any radioactive concentrations in your air samples. I know the following is comparing apples to oranges, but the live EnrivReporter.com in the Los Angeles basin area on May 9th, 2011 reported:
New Los Angeles Rad Rain results found to be 42.4% above normal radiation level readings.
Care to comment?
Negative rain radiation finding for Los Angeles, May 17th
Unconventional measurements, or not, the EnviroReporter website on May 17th reported negative radiation findings for its rain sample testing on Tuesday, the 17th of May.
Some peace of mind for those of us in Los Angeles, and some fresh air.
It is again raining.
Keep testing BRAWM. Keep testing away.
A month of negative radiation rain findings, and I will breath a sigh of relief!
Additionally, EPA gross beta
Additionally, EPA gross beta radnet monitor findings for Los Angeles appear to substantiate the EnviroReporter website's findings of no radioactivity for rain precipitation for May 17th.
P.S.: Thanks for your
P.S.: Thanks for your follow up! Cheers!
for the first time tonight...
I saw the EnviroReporter counter hit 80+. Radiation Network has San Francisco at 50, at least for a bit, as was one of the ones in S. CA.
I've never seen those three that high. They weren't sustained values, though the values in all three areas appear to be running overall higher than they have been in the last couple of months.
We've been having rain and
We've been having rain and the CTBTO graph shows a small rise in Cesium over the last few days.
http://www.bfs.de/de/ion/imis/ctbto_aktivitaetskonzentrationen_caesium.gif
The graph shows Cs-137 at 1E-8 Bq/L on US west coast
That's converted from 0.00001 Bq/M^3 (1E-8 Bq/L). Which is the same
as what the BRAWM team reported for their 5/5-5/6 air sample. And SF
has not seen any increase in background levels. And the CTBTO graph
actually shows that the Cs-137 levels were the lowest they've been
at the time of the EnrivReporter.com rain sample (5/9).
Except that the CTBTO
Except that the CTBTO monitoring station is in Sacramento, not LA.
Huge difference that the CTBTO monitoring station is not in L.A.
No, the CTBTO is not in Los Angeles. And, it is important to note that there have been any number of days that the Fukushima radionuclide jet stream plumes appeared to hit Los Angeles harder than San Francisco (a big surprise to me). Guess that's just how the wind blows. And, now we can no longer track the Japanese plumes flow pattern/arrival times, as major reporting agencies (NILU included) have ceased forecasting radioactive plume movement. So, yes it is important that the CTBTO, while near Berkeley/San Francisco, is not weather-wise close to Los Angeles. Point in fact, there are any number of days it will rain in San Francisco, but not in Los Angeles. Well, guess what? Radiation via the Fukushima express is no exception.
I'll take your word for it :-)
The graph only says USA Westkuste and USA Ostkuste. Which I assume
is west and east coast. Which, if it's in Sacramento, puts it right
in the middle.
Middle? Sacramento is an
Middle?
Sacramento is an hour and a half Northeast of Berkeley/SF.
Maybe you're thinking of Fresno?
I can see how my post could confuse you
I was referring to the CTBTO monitoring station being in the middle
of the US *west coast*. This was in response to a poster saying the
CTBTO monitoring station was in Sacramento and not LA. I only pointed
out the two USA graph lines to highlight how non-specific the CTBTO
graph was. Guestimating, Sacramento is *roughly* half way up the
west coast.
Yes, it is roughly half way
Yes, it is roughly half way up the west coast. However, the jet stream moves from Alaska to San Diego, and back, over the course of the year. If the jet stream is pointed at Washington state, LA may not get much from it, but Sacto might, and vice versa.
That's correct
But, I'm still more concerned about the methodology used to collect
and measure the sample than where the jet stream was at the time. I
don't think we know what they were measuring. Let alone what percentage
it was when compared to fluctuating background levels.
I think the parent means
I think the parent means middle from Japan to the East coast. Which doesn't make much sense either, because it more like 2/3rds. It's only about 1/3 from Japan to Germany.
The EPA shows lower.
I've been noticing the Radiation Network has been consistently showing
higher CPM levels for weeks now. But, the EPA data shows a lot lower.
http://www.epa.gov/japan2011/rert/radnet-sanfrancisco-bg.html
San Francisco:
2011-05-15 11:42:49 10.0000
2011-05-15 12:43:03 10.0000
2011-05-15 14:43:29 10.0000
2011-05-15 15:43:43 10.0000
2011-05-15 16:43:56 10.0000
2011-05-15 17:44:10 10.0000
2011-05-15 18:44:23 8.0000
2011-05-15 19:44:36 8.0000
2011-05-15 20:44:49 8.0000
2011-05-15 21:45:02 8.0000
2011-05-15 22:45:15 8.0000
2011-05-15 23:45:29 8.0000
2011-05-16 00:45:42 8.0000
2011-05-16 01:45:55 8.0000
2011-05-16 02:46:08 8.0000
2011-05-16 03:46:22 7.0000
2011-05-16 04:46:35 8.0000
2011-05-16 05:46:48 9.0000
Los Angeles is relatively high compared to SF:
http://www.epa.gov/japan2011/rert/radnet-losangeles-bg.html
But, it was relatively high even before 3/11/2011:
2011-03-10 10:11:26 75.0000
2011-03-10 11:11:39 79.0000
2011-03-10 12:11:52 81.0000
2011-03-10 13:12:06 87.0000
2011-03-10 14:12:19 94.0000
2011-03-10 15:12:32 91.0000
2011-03-10 16:12:45 101.0000
2011-03-10 17:12:58 104.0000
2011-03-10 18:13:11 102.0000
2011-03-10 19:13:24 91.0000
2011-03-10 20:13:37 92.0000
2011-03-10 21:13:51 87.0000
2011-03-10 22:14:04 74.0000
2011-03-10 23:14:17 72.0000
San Francisco/Berkeley vs Los Angeles rain sample analysis
Should be interesting to see how BRAWM's upcoming rain sample results compare to those found for Los Angeles?
Let's hope the upcoming results are the same as the last.
Which was no isotopes detected except Be7 for the 4/21-4/24 sample.
I still have real concerns about how EnrivReporter.com collected
and measured their sample. "the wet towel we used to collect the rain
drops (off of plant leaves in our garden)" doesn't sound like a
clean way to get a sample. Sounds like a recipe for cross contamination.
And then comparing the rain measurement (if that's all that actually
got measured) to a constantly varying INTERIOR background level seems
less than ideal.
Hm-m-m-m, Maybe
Hm-m-m-m,
Maybe EnviroReporter is comparing their May 9th rain precipitation findings to the average range of background radiation for their Santa Monica monitoring station; as opposed to constantly varying background radiation levels.
Just maybe....
They are not comparing to a range
They are comparing it to the specific 10 min background period at 9:45pm.
As I pointed out earlier, if they had compared it to other times (such
as 15 min earlier), the % would have been much less or could have been
a negative number in the case of the peak background CPM on 5/5.
5/09/11
10:00 pm 10-minute RAIN PRECIPITATE SAMPLE measured inside average: 54.4 CPM. 54.4 – background of 38.2 CPM = 16.2 CPM over background. 16.2/38.2 = 0.424 or 42.4% above background
9:45 pm 10-minute INTERIOR average: 38.2 CPM
9:30 pm 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 47.3 CPM
5:40 pm 10-minute INTERIOR average: 37.0 CPM
5:30 pm 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 42.9 CPM NORMAL
12:40 pm 10-minute INTERIOR average: 39.0 CPM
12:30 pm 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 43.1 CPM NORMAL
8:40 am 10-minute INTERIOR average: 41.9 CPM
8:30 am 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 41.9 CPM
It is indeed comparing apples with oranges
They are comparing air background levels with rain levels.
And we have seen rain concentrations reported by the BRAWM
team to be MUCH higher than the air. So, I don't think this
should come as a surprise.
And they are comparing the rain to one point in time (9:45pm).
The background CPM level fluctuates quite a bit. And while I
understand them picking the sample closest to the rain sample
(9:45pm for background and 10pm for the rain), they apparently
picked an "interior" sample. Which I assume means it was measured
indoors. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. If they had used the
"NORMAL" "EXTERIOR" number to calculate the percentage, they
would have gotten approx. 27%. If they had used their 47.3 CPM
measurement from just 30 min before their rain sample, they
would have reported the rain to be 15% higher. Had they taken
the sample on 5/5, the peak was at 138 CPM at around 2pm. Then
they would have report d the rain sample as only being only 40%
of background.
http://www.enviroreporter.com/radiation-station-stats/#stats
5/09/11
10:00 pm 10-minute RAIN PRECIPITATE SAMPLE measured inside average: 54.4 CPM. 54.4 – background of 38.2 CPM = 16.2 CPM over background. 16.2/38.2 = 0.424 or 42.4% above background
9:45 pm 10-minute INTERIOR average: 38.2 CPM
9:30 pm 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 47.3 CPM
5:40 pm 10-minute INTERIOR average: 37.0 CPM
5:30 pm 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 42.9 CPM NORMAL
12:40 pm 10-minute INTERIOR average: 39.0 CPM
12:30 pm 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 43.1 CPM NORMAL
8:40 am 10-minute INTERIOR average: 41.9 CPM
8:30 am 10-minute EXTERIOR average: 41.9 CPM
Clarification
The 138 CPM measurement I mentioned above was the EPA Los Angeles
location. Not to insult the Los Angeles or Santa Monica folks, but
they are effectively the same place.
I'm not sure that I found
Okay, I found the link here,
Okay, I found the link here, under their 5/9/2011 data.
They only measured it over 10 minutes. As I said above, if they were to measure it at regular intervals over the course of a few hours, the activity should go back to background as the radon daughters decay away.
Mark [BRAWM Team Member]
If I remember correctly,
If I remember correctly, Mark, I believe that the EnviroReporter originally posted that the rain water they tested was collected over a 6 week period on a towel they had put on top of some outside plants. That seems quite awhile to test. Seems like the half lives should have faded over that time period for the short lived radioactivity.
In view of this, does what you said above, Mark, still apply?
Does that make sense?
I have no idea how one could leave a towel outside for 6 weeks and
then bring it in to test it. Wouldn't that towel be contaminated
by non-rain sources as well? And what did they do? Did they bring
the towel in, wring it out into a jar and then measure it? It would
seem that they would still have to wait as Mark mentioned.
You're right, that would
L.A. Radiation Rain Quote, Michael Collins of EnviroReporter
Michael Collins [of EnviroReporter.com Radiation Station]
May 9, 2011 at 11:51 pm
“….we just tested the precipitation we’ve had at Radiation Station in about 6 weeks and it has come in at 42.2% above normal background. And by the nature of the drop off in ionization picked up by the Inspector pulling away from the wet towel we used to collect the rain drops (off of plant leaves in our garden), it appears to be of alpha and/or beta origin.
Fallout needs a mechanism to come down to earth. It has one now in Southern California and we’re picking it up. It isn’t as dramatic as Potr in St. Louis who used his Inspector to show rain coming in at a whopping 62 times background, but it is clearly not from a natural source.
This is also not the first time Fukushima meltdowns fallout has impacted Southern California. And it won’t be the last. Yet EPA has stopped its special testing. We haven’t.”
------------------
Mark, there also is a contact tab for the EnviroReporter.com Radiation Station;s website at the top of its home page....
I live in Santa Monica, and
I live in Santa Monica, and I am positive that what he meant was they just tested the first rain they've had in 6 weeks. Because it rained the other day for the first time in 6 weeks. We have not had any rain since late March here.
So, I don't think the towel was sitting out there for 6 weeks. Was probably placed outside when the rain started. It rained for several hours.
OK. Thanks for
OK. Thanks for clarification. Wording from original Enviroreporter.com Radiation Station report unclear.
Sounded like they used the towel to wipe/gather rain from plants
"the wet towel we used to collect the rain drops (off of plant leaves in
our garden)"
Does that sound like they simply laid it across the plants and let the
rain soak it? It sounds like they gathered the rain sample by getting it
off the actual leaves. Which, again, sounds like a strange way to go
about it.
"And by the nature of the
"And by the nature of the drop off in ionization picked up by the Inspector pulling away from the wet towel we used to collect the rain drops (off of plant leaves in our garden), it appears to be of alpha and/or beta origin."
This is a totally invalid assumption as well. The way you discriminate alpha, beta and gamma is to keep the detector at a fixed distance from the sample and place material to block the alpha or beta radiation in between.
These detectors have small openings for the GM tube and must be at a constant distance for results to be comparable.
I'm curious if the first sentence was a typo
Did they mean "we just tested the *first* precipitation we’ve had at Radiation Station in about 6 weeks"?
In any case, I believe they still need to measure it over the course
of a few hours as Mark mentioned.
I think they mean that
I think they mean that hasn't rained for about 6 weeks, which is probably correct- I live near the area where they are monitoring.
One does not have to be
One does not have to be Socrates to sense that something's clearly not balancing out on air-quality versus rain.
Of course as has been pointed out on this forum before, there have been some substantial spikes on Radnet-- one, the highest since this all begin -- in Southern California. but people keep brushing them off as a result of "temperature swings".....
If only CalTech had the decency -- and balls -- to provide the public with air quality analysis...
... but, when I was at JPL yesterday they were -- honest to God -- talking about trying to get approval to play with plutonium.
Can you say "Santa Susanna Filed Laboratory"...?
So Cal Spikes for two days...how to explain?
Friday and Saturday in San Diego spiked to all-time highs...the EPA readings were between 150 and 200 for almost two days...definately not typical "background radiation" or fluctuations. However, I called the EPA and that is what he told me. I have been following nation-wide readings, as well as local readings...these are some of the highest. Any ideas OTHER than the obvious?
What did the EPA tell you?
The EPA said that it was or was not typical background radiation or
fluctuations?
typo "Field"....
typo "Field"....