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» Happy first-day-of-summer! Back in the day when the dome was my home .. and I served as a Minister of Radiation Safety at numerous Neutron Cathedrals nationwide (.. as a Migrant Nuclear Worker of sorts) .. there was a guy who had performed a radiation survey in a highly radioactive space.
Radiation & Other Unseen Dangers
Later, his supervisor questioned a number that the tech had entered on the document he'd subsequently written up ..
.. because the value had exceeded the maximum capability of the meter.
The technician famously replied that he'd "estimated" the value .. based on the speed at which the needle pegged. =)
It would be like someone asking how fast you were driving .. when your speedometer was pegged hard.
Now, for the uninitiated, this is an honest mistake, and the tech was genuinely trying to report an accurate value.
The correct approach would be to merely document " > xxxx mr/hr ", where xxxx equals the maximum radiation level capable of being detected by the instrument.
An even better approach however, would be to re-survey the area with an ion chamber capable of measuring the higher radiation levels.
Nevertheless, in the weeks & months that followed, it became a running joke among the other techs .. who would perform little skits, such as, when they exited a highly radioactive space, would come out holding their wrist and wincing, as if in pain ..
.. claiming that the needle had pegged with such force that it caused the meter to torque so violently that it nearly broke their wrist. =)
I always found it interesting, if not ironic, that guys who work in such a serious industry .. could be so funny. I mean, I can be funny myself, but these guys are downright hilarious. Highly entertaining. Often funnier than folks you might pay money to see.
Other times, guys would be sitting in the break room, writing up their surveys, seemingly talking to themselves, muttering something like, "Hmmm. Let me see now ..."
.. where they would go about estimating a "torque value" for their meter .. or calculating a "torque coefficient," as it became known. A multiplier, if you will. (As you probably know, smart techs can be wickedly funny.)
» Nuclear-Grade Military Training to Deal With Deadly Unseen Dangers
More seriously, tho .. my point here is that » I have spent many years .. studying and working in a field .. where something you can't see, something you can't taste or smell .. can kill you. Silently. Invisibly. Deadly.
Can't even feel it .. until you start to feel .. a little weird. With enough exposure, it wont be long until you start wishing you were dead.
This has caused me to "view" the world a little differently. Just because I can't see something .. doesnt mean I dismiss it. Or ignore it. Or refuse to believe it exists. No, sir. Not hardly. Au contraire.
I'm not worried about the train coming down the track. I can SEE that. I can hear the whistle blow. I can feel the ground rumble. I can step out of the way. As can any man with even a lick of sense.
We'll return later to this invisible-but-deadly theme. But first, let's discuss something everybody is much more familiar with.
Today's entry in continued in Ye Olde Rad Blog v4 .. see here » Righteousness & the Fearless Hoverboard of Faith