CTBTO tweeted Sweden sensors have detected higher than usual levels of isotopes produced by nuclear fission probably from somewhere on or near the Bal

[sharon sanders]

Lassina Zerbo is the Executive Secretary of the CTBTO, a position which he assumed on 1 August 2013.


Lassina Zerbo

@SinaZerbo
?
Jun 26
22 /23 June 2020, RN #IMS station SEP63 #Sweden

detected 3 isotopes; Cs-134, Cs-137 & Ru-103 associated w/Nuclear fission @ higher[ ] than usual levels (but not harmful for human health). The possible source region in the 72h preceding detection is shown in orange on the map.

CTBTO and 6 others

 

[Mary Wilson]

Radioactivity is blowing in the air

Invisible for humans, but detectable for radiation-filters. A cloud with tiny levels of radioactivity, believed to originate from western Russia, has been detected over Scandinavia and European Arctic.

Read in Russian | Читать по-русски

By Thomas Nilsen
June 26, 2020

First, in week 23 (June 2-8), iodine-131 was measured at the two air filter stations Svanhovd and Viksj?fjell near Kirkenes in short distance from Norway’s border to Russia’s Kola Peninsula. The same days, on June 7 and 8, the CTBTO-station at Svalbard measured tiny levels of the same isotope.

... “We are currently keeping an extra good eye on our air-monitoring system,” says Bredo M?ller with DSA’s Emergency Preparedness unit at Svanhovd.

While iodine-131 is only measured in the north, in the Kirkenes area and at Svalbard, Swedish and Finnish radiation authorities inform about other isotopes blowing in the skies over southern Scandinavia.

...All these isotopes indicate that the release comes from a nuclear-reactor. Iodine-131 has a half-life of 8 days, and given the small amount measured in the north, this isotope could be gone before the radioactive cloud reached the southern parts of Finland and Sweden a week after the first measurements in the north. That be, if the release was somewhere in the Arctic or northwestern Russia and winds were blowing south or southwest.

Neither of the Scandinavian radiation agencies will speculate about the origin.

https://thebarentsobserver.com/en/e...scandinavia-and-svalbard#.XvX2OawTFW4.twitter

 

[Emily]

https://yle.fi/uutiset/osasto/news/nordics_detect_elevated_radiation_levels_around_baltic/11422183

• Uutiset
• News

News 27.6.2020 17:48| updated 27.6.2020 18:59
Nordics detect elevated radiation levels around Baltic

Finland says the low concentrations of radioactive material found in air samples pose no danger.
...
"Radiation from the Chernobyl disaster is still circulating. These readings are only slightly elevated in relation to the regular radioactive backdrop," Vesterbacka said, adding that STUK would naturally investigate the source of the radiation.
...
"Investigations are still ongoing...at this point we would not want to come out and say the radiation originated in Russia," she said.

Vesterbacka underlined that the elevated levels do not indicate an explosion occurred, saying that an environmental leak would yield readings that were tens of times higher.

STUK is due to publish the results of its investigation next week...

https://tass.com/world/1172279

MOSCOW, June 27. /TASS/.
Two nuclear power plants in northwestern Russia - the Leningrad NPP and the Kola NPP - operate normally, with radiation levels being within the norm, a spokesperson for Rosenergoatom Concern (part of the Rosatom state nuclear energy corporation) told TASS.

"Both stations are working in normal regime. There have been no complaints about the equipment’s work. Aggregated emissions of all specified isotopes in the above-mentioned period did not exceed the reference numbers. No incidents related to release of radionuclide outside containment structures have been reported," the company said.

There. Everything is fine.

 

[Mary Wilson]

(Recent activity in regards to increase in radiation levels)

Wildfires 'edge closer to Chernobyl nuclear plant'
13 April 2020

Tour operator Yaroslav Emelianenko said one had reached the abandoned town of Pripyat, which used to serve the plant.

He said it was now just 2km (1.24 miles) from where the most dangerous waste from the plant was stored.

Greenpeace said the fires were much bigger than the authorities realised.

The NGO's Russia branch, quoted by Reuters, said the largest fire covered 34,000 hectares, while a second fire just a kilometre from the former plant was 12,000 hectares in area.

Mr Emelianenko also said that if the fire engulfed Pripyat it would be an economic disaster, as supervised tourist visits provided valuable revenue.

...Police said the fire had been burning since the weekend of 4 April, after a man set fire to dry grass near the exclusion zone. It has since moved closer to the nuclear plant.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52274242

 

[Mary Wilson]

Ukraine scientists see signs of hope after huge Chernobyl fires

by Oleksandr Savochenko
JUNE 12, 2020

...In the spring a huge fire battered the Chernobyl exclusion zone, devastating the lush forests at the scene of the world's worst nuclear accident and dealing a major blow to its ecosystem.

"This pine forest will never be reborn," Borsuk, the 32-year-old head of the flora and fauna lab at the Chernobyl reserve, told AFP, adding a new ecosystem will form in its place.

The fire, which broke out in April and was only put out in mid-May, reached to within just 1.5 kilometres of the protective dome over a ruined reactor, according to Greenpeace.

The blaze—the largest since the 1986 catastrophe—spanned 66,000 hectares (14.8 acres), including 42,000 hectares of forests.

The fire also tore through 10 abandoned villages and an old cemetery near the village of Rozsokha, leaving behind burnt iron crosses and charred nameplates.

Authorities said that no increase in radiation levels had been detected and there were no human casualties.

https://phys.org/news/2020-06-ukraine-scientists-huge-chernobyl.html

 

[JJackson]

N.B. 66,000 hectares is about 163,000 acres, 660sq km or 255sq miles, depending on your preferred unit.

 

[Emily]

Maybe the isotopes with the longer half-lives could be from released Chernobyl residue from the fires. But the iodine-131 has a half life of only 8 days. That could be from something else going on in Russia.
https://www.atsdr.cdc.gov/sites/oakridge/docs/orr_iodine_tech-factsheet_508.pdf

 

[JJackson]

Pure speculation only
I 131 is a U235 fission decay product and large amounts would be produced while the reactor was running - hence the big release when containment was breached. U 235 being a solid was also released but did not travel very far but some would have been lifted by the fire and deposited in the surrounding area. It will continue to decay, at a very low rate. The forest fire would once again be releasing the U 235 in the vegetation and lift it in the smoke where it will blown to new areas while it continues to decay. This will raise the I 131 level slightly along the clouds path bring I 131 to new areas. We need a nuclear chemist and meteorologist to calculate the mass of U 235, and its decay products that decay to I 131, that would have been moved by the fire, how much I 131 would have been created by them and if that could account to the small rise in background levels detected.

 

[Emily]

Thanks, JJackson! You may be as close to a nuclear chemist as we get and that is fine by me. I wondered about nuclear fuel production since the US and Russia are in a new arms race. It might be impossible to tell the difference between a power reactor and fuel production with the signatures. What will be, will be.