Grand Canyon visitors may have been exposed to radioactive material for two decades
The National Park Service was storing three buckets full of highly radioactive uranium in the visitor area of its Grand Canyon museum for nearly two decades, according to the park safety manager.
The 5-gallon buckets were located near the taxidermy exhibit, and one was so full of uranium ore that it couldn’t be sealed, according to Elston “Swede” Stephenson, a manager who sent a rogue email to all Park Service employees earlier this month, AZ Central reports.
Tour groups, often including children, sometimes spent 30 minutes or more near the taxidermy exhibit for demonstrations. Using standards set by the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Stephenson calculated that children could have been exposed to doses of radiation above federal safety standards within three seconds. Adults could have been exposed to dangerous doses in under 30 seconds.
For unknown reasons, the three buckets full of uranium were moved from a basement in Grand Canyon park headquarters to the Grand Canyon museum when it opened in 2000, according to Stephenson. The buckets were discovered by accident in March 2018 when the hobbyist teenage son of a park employee brought a Geiger counter into the taxidermy-collection room.
https://qz.com/1553777/a-teenager-found-radioactive-material-in-the-grand-canyon-museum/
This is nuts.
= new reply since forum marked as read
...and they were disposed of by guys wearing dishwashing gloves? 
Imagine the lawsuits from employees who were there day after day... wow....
