Rain and Milk update 5/17
5/17 (7:22pm): We collected a small rain sample two days ago and analyzed the data, now available on our rainwater page. This is our fourth rain sample in a row where we haven't detected any radioisotopes from Japan. Yesterday we collected a much larger rain sample and just started counting it with our detector -- this should set an even better limit on the presence of the isotopes. That sample should be analyzed about two days from now.
A milk sample with a Best By date of 5/19 was added to our Milk results. We have our third non-detection of I-131 in milk, and the levels of Cs-134 and Cs-137 continue to decline.
Mark [BRAWM Team Member]
Thank you BRAWM for your
Thank you BRAWM for your dedication and timely data. I am very encouraged to see that there are undetectable amounts of Japan's radioisotopes in the last rainwater sample but please continue your testing in all areas! Many thanks once again for your hard work.
Ditto!
Ditto!
Add my voice to the chorus of "thanks", BRAWM / UCBNE...
...So. Bottom-lining where we are, on May 17:
Four weeks, now, since ANY radionuclides were detected in precipitation by BRAWM -- and a day longer than that since any I-131 or C-137 were found in rainwater samples by the Team.
Two and a half weeks, and three separate samples, since I-131 was detectable in pasture-cow milk by BRAWM.
If the current "trend line" -- developed over the last seven samples, going back to April 18 -- holds for Cs-137 and -134, they should "disappear" below the (current) non-detect line in two to two and a half weeks. (Of course, I expect BRAWM will up its count times and, perhaps, sample sizes if and when that happens, so, as has happened in other media, their NDA threshhold may drop some, resulting in continued detections but at ever-more-minute levels.)
For myself, I'll just say this: At the point when milk becomes "safe", and remains that way for, say, a month, I, personally, will consider this crisis to have passed its peak and will begin to decompress. Not until then -- if for no other reason, then simply because until that point, I expect cesium will continue to aggregate in certain foods.
But I am beginning to discern the light at the end of that tunnel, and I thank God for BRAWM / UCBNE, and all mercies -- great, small, and unknown to me.
Rick Cromack.
Allen, Texas
Here is the caveat: Cesium 137 has a 29 year half life
and it is in the soil and grass and plants.
While radioiodine and radiocesium 134 have relatively short lives, cesium 137 does not and ALL of the cesium which has blanketed the country is travfelling around in the food chain and environment. It IS dispersing and thus diluting to some degree exzcept that it MAY be also bioaccumulating as it dispersing into grass, hay, soil, milk, and other crops which cows eat.
It seems as if NEW deposits have relatively reached near their end, the fact is that ONCE radiocesium 137 is HERE it is basically here for 300 years and will move from plants to soil to animals to milk to soil (when plants die) and SOME of it will sin into the earth and be absorbed in trees which, when burned, will release more radiation into the air where it will travel and settle again.
So TOO SOON to expect cesium 137 to disappear from the tests. It will just be MOVING in the food chain and environment and MAYBE it will disperse to nondetectable amounts in a year or so and MAYBE it will just continue to be seen again and again in different food products.
BTW, I watched the Fairewinds videos and I trust Gunderdsen (he was a nuke industry engineer) and he says that the tower IS leaning AND even TEPKO says on NHK that new explosions cannot be ruled out. So still just TOO SOON to lay back. I need you to keep watching my back and helping encpurage BRAWM to increase their testing and sampling of more food chain pathways (root veggies, carrots, peppers, fruit, and what about califonria WINES and grapes - the cesium will be THERE too in the 2011 harvest. Avocados, grapefruit, oranges, lemons, limes, apples, pears, etc. The Csium is IN the soil and may have sunk to the roots where it will be drawn up. We NEED to keep it up!
Cheers and thanks gain for your props in the other threaqd
True, but what is practical
I agree that the cesium will still be in the environment. We can't completely avoid the radionuclides, so I'm looking to do what is practical given that, to minimize risk.
I think if the next rainwater sample shows non-detectible levels, then we are likely not receiving significant additional deposition. (Assuming no new major releases from Fukushima.) If it's no longer raining at higher levels into the grasses and soils, then we've reached a point where it is more evenly distributed. Once it's non-detect in milk for about a month, then I think it indicates that we've reached a pretty even distribution.
In other words, when it's evenly distributed, we can't avoid it and at that point it won't matter much what you eat and drink.
Yeah...
...That's pretty much where I line up, too, there, Anonymous. Matter of fact, as far as the one-month non-detect "threshhold" for milk goes, we might have been quoting each other!
Bill, I hear what you're saying. The latest numbers I looked at seem to indicate that North America is going to receive somewhere between 50% and 100% of what our continent got dusted with after Chernobyl, as far as cesium is concerned -- which is still just a fractional amount of what Europe got in '86. I know we shouldn't be cavalier about that sort of deposition -- there's a reason Chernobyl, even today, is such a reviled name around the world -- but at this point, as I've said before, a Chernobyl-sized outcome is all right by me, increased cancers and all. It's a helluva lot better than it COULD have been, anyway, and might yet be.
Again, not laughing it off, just trying to be realistic, here. The world is what it is.
Rick Cromack.
Allen, Texas
remember, this may be local.....
These measurements are in the greater Berkeley area. Different regions may carry a higher, or lower, risk.
Watching how the beta counts on the EPA monitors pop around, it really does seem like there is NOT a uniform distribution and radiation seems to travel in pockets or waves.
Sure would be nice, if there isn't a lot of radiation around, if the governments would do some various testing to show us that this is true, so folks have some local proof and could relax.
Be careful of the EPA beta counts
It's normal for them to "pop around" all the time. In San Francisco,
the only possible evidence of radiation from Japan in the EPA beta gross
count is a relatively slight increase in avg CPM levels. Mostly below
40 CPM (normal avg of around 25). With 3 VERY brief spikes above 50 CPM
(two at approx. 100 and one approx. 75, which were gone within 2 samples).
There isn't a lot to say "ah-ha!!! There it is!!!". But, the same thing
occured during Feb of this year. With even higher spikes of 176, 209 & 313.
If you ever wonder about perceived increase in beta gross count, just do
a little research of the historical data in the EPA system:
https://cdxnode64.epa.gov/radnet-public/query.do
So, what's the moral to the story? Don't sweat the erratic behavior of the
EPA beta gross counts. If you do, you won't need to worry about radiation.
The stress will send you to an early grave......
LOL... Well put, and pithy to boot, Anonymous...
...I have come to the conclusion that the EPA Gross Beta Counts are sort of like a human body's temperature -- it might be able to tell you that SOMETHING may be going on, but it's impossible to diagnose, exactly, WHAT. The Gamma lines are little better. Pretty, but since there's no context provided or direct linkage to known radionuclides of concern, it's basically data without reference, which is nearly useless.
Our tax dollars at work, naturally.
Rick Cromack.
Allen, Texas
Some other posters have
Some other posters have noticed that there were similar peaks before Fukushima.
Why isn't cesium showing up from previous releases?
Hi Bill,
I obviously understand your concerns about cesium. But, if it remains
in the environment for 300 years, why is THIS deposition such a concern
after decades of other releases? Shouldn't it already exist in the soil
and the rest of the food chain? If not, where did the previous deposition
go? And why did it go away/drop below levels of concern so quickly?
Thanks!!!
Thanks for the quick turnaround on this!!! The BRAWM team continues
to deliver.