Radioactive material missing en route to Michigan

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Radioactive material headed to Michigan from an Ohio company never made it to its destination, according to a filing by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission reported this week.

In its "Current Event Notification" report for Wednesday, the commission that regulates commercial nuclear power plants and other civilian uses of nuclear materials in the United States said the Ohio Bureau of Radiation Protection had informed officials about a missing shipment involving Prime NDT Services Inc.

Prime NDT Services is an Ohio-based inspection company that performs testing services in the energy and industrial industries, according to its Facebook page, many involving pipelines and other energy industry equipment.

The Ohio radiation bureau learned from Prime NDT that a source of Iridium-192 was shipped through an unidentified carrier on July 12 from a facility in Strasburg, Ohio, to a facility in Michigan, the NRC said.

"As of July 21, the source has not been delivered ..." the Ohio commission's notice to the NRC reads.

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Iridium-192 is a radioactive isotope of iridium, which can be used in industrial gauges that inspect welding seams in equipment such as pipelines and in medicine to treat certain cancers, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The nuclear commission report categorized the isotope as a "Category 2" level of radioactive material, but did not specify the quantity of material that was being shipped or how it was packaged.

"Category 2 sources, if not safely managed or securely protected, could cause permanent injury to a person who handled them, or were otherwise in contact with them, for a short time (minutes to hours)," the report said. "It could possibly be fatal to be close to this amount of unshielded radioactive material for a period of hours to days."

Steve Fetter, an associate provost and dean at the University of Maryland Graduate School and a member of the National Academy of Sciences Committee on International Security and Arms Control, said the missing material wasn't surprising.

"It's not often, but it does happen because there are so many shipments of radioactive materials, millions every year, that I suppose it's inevitable that occasionally one goes missing or is misplaced," he said.

Fetter said the material typically is stored in a special container, "so there's really no risk to anyone unless that container is breached. And that would not be an easy thing to do. ... This is not something that would be a very attractive target of someone who was looking to steal and disperse a radioactive source because it's metal."

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