ShareThisRECYCLED RADIATION
Editors:
Today on the SHNS wire we are moving RECYCLED RADIATION a 10-story package by reporter Isaac Wolf that investigates a dark and overlooked corner of recycling.
Mining a previously unknown government database, Wolf discovered that thousands of consumer goods and millions of pounds of metal and its byproducts have been contaminated by radiation.
The package is moving category A and includes photos. The sked follows and is also listed on newssked03.
RAD-MAIN (Wolf, SHNS) -- Thousands of everyday products and materials containing radioactively tainted metals are surfacing across the United States and around the world. But because of haphazard screening, an absence of oversight, and substantial disincentives for businesses to report contamination, no one knows how many tainted goods are in circulation. 2,800. With photos: SH09E400RADIOACTIVE, SH09E403RADIOACTIVE, SH09415RADIOACTIVELOGO, SH09416RADIOACTIVELOGO.
RAD-HOTPOTATO (Wolf, SHNS) -- No one is in charge of protecting Americans from products made from radioactively tainted metal, and the case of a radioactive cheese grater illustrates the lack of oversight. 1,000.
RAD-NODUMP (Wolf, SHNS) -- Since last summer, 36 states have had nowhere to dump the radioactively tainted metal, material and products that have surfaced within their borders. 325. With photo: SH09E409RADIOACTIVE.
RAD-RECOVERY (Wolf, SHNS) -- The U.S. government's only effort to hunt down castoff radioactive items has recovered just 4 percent of the estimated 500,000 tainted metal products and material unaccounted for across the country-- and it has a two-year backlog. 500. With photo: SH09E410RADIOACTIVE.
RAD-INDIANA (Wolf, SHNS) -- Though few knew it at the time, an Indiana manufacturer unknowingly used metal blended with a dangerous radioactive isotope to make parts for 1,000 La-Z-Boy recliners a decade ago, triggering a government effort to keep the chairs out of American living rooms. 1,200. With photo: SH09E411RADIOACTIVE.
RAD-FLORIDA (Wolf, SHNS) -- A Florida metal processing plant inadvertently melted a radioactive item -- creating 1.4 millions of pounds of contaminated waste and posing potential health threats to metal-plant workers and the environment. 900. With photo: SH09E404RADIOACTIVE.
RAD-CALIF (Wolf, SHNS) -- A quarter-century after two Mexican foundries produced thousands of pounds of radioactive metal, the contaminated material continued to cross the U.S. border and reach California. 850. With photo: SH09E406RADIOACTIVE.
RAD-SOLUTIONS (Wolf, SHNS) -- Requiring scrap yards and recycling facilities to use radiation monitors and to report every time they detect low-level radioactive materials are just two of the measures experts say would protect us better from contact with contaminated metal and products. 250. With photos: SH09E401RADIOACTIVE, SH09E413RADIOACTIVE.
RAD-TENN (Wolf, SHNS) -- An obscure government database lists 880 instances in which radioactive metals have found their way into Tennessee scrap yards, trash dumps and recycling facilities. 1,000. With photos: SH09E405RADIOACTIVE, SH09E407RADIOACTIVE.
RAD-TEXAS (Wolf, SHNS) -- For more than a month in the summer of 2006, a metal recycler in Longview, Texas, produced half a million pounds of radioactive material, state and federal documents show. 1,120. With photo: SH09E412RADIOACTIVE.
EDRADIATION (Dale McFeatters, SHNS) -- The hidden radiation around us. 415. Editors: This is moving category K and is also listed on opedsked03.
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, http://www.scrippsnews.com)
