AERB report fails to trace cobalt-60 source

  • 19/04/2010

  • Times Of India (New Delhi)

New Delhi: The radioactive waste, identified as cobalt-60, found in the Mayapuri scrap market last week could have come from more than one source, claims the report submitted by the Atomic Energy Regulatory Board to Delhi Police. The report, however, did not specify where the radioactive waste might have come from, saying only that it could be industrial or hospital waste which could have come from outside India. On April 9, AERB had collected eight samples of cobalt-60 after reports of five persons admitted to hospital because of radiation exposure began to filter out. Later, three new samples, which made two people sick, were collected and sent to Narora Atomic Research Centre by AERB. The report prepared by scientists from AERB and BARC claims the cobalt-60 seized from the Mayapuri junkyard is of different intensities, suggesting there might be more than one point of origin. DCP (west) Sharad Agarwal said,