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| Dangerous Radioactive Substance Is Stolen in Mexico | Dangerous Radioactive Substance Is Stolen in Mexico |
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| Thieves in Mexico have stolen a truck carrying a potent radioactive isotope commonly used for medical purposes that can be extremely dangerous if exposed, the International Atomic Energy Agency said Wednesday, raising fears that the theft involved a more sinister motive, like the manufacture of a dirty bomb. | |
| The agency, the nuclear monitor of the United Nations, said it had been informed by the Mexican authorities that the truck carrying the isotope, cobalt 60, had been stolen in the town of Tepojaco, near Mexico City, on Monday. The truck had been transporting the isotope from a hospital in the northern city of Tijuana to a radioactive waste storage center, the agency said. | The agency, the nuclear monitor of the United Nations, said it had been informed by the Mexican authorities that the truck carrying the isotope, cobalt 60, had been stolen in the town of Tepojaco, near Mexico City, on Monday. The truck had been transporting the isotope from a hospital in the northern city of Tijuana to a radioactive waste storage center, the agency said. |
| “The Mexican authorities are currently conducting a search for the source and have issued a news release to alert the public,” the agency said in a statement on its website. | “The Mexican authorities are currently conducting a search for the source and have issued a news release to alert the public,” the agency said in a statement on its website. |
| At the time of the theft, the statement said, the cobalt 60 had been properly shielded from exposure. However, it said, “the source could be extremely dangerous to a person if removed from the shielding or if it was damaged.” | |
| The statement did not elaborate on whether the thieves knew what they were stealing. But cobalt 60 is one of the ingredients commonly cited as a possible component of a dirty bomb, a combination of explosives and radioactive material. | |
| Counterterrorism officials, long concerned about dirty bombs, have said they are far more useful in spreading panic than in actually causing casualties or significant health concerns. Some experts say the bomb part might not be necessary — simply scattering a radioactive isotope in a densely populated area would have the same effect, but the person delivering the isotope would probably receive a large dose. | |
| After the Sept. 11 attacks, the United States went on a campaign to ensure that cobalt 60 and other isotopes commonly used in medicine and industry were better protected against theft, so that they were less likely to be obtained for dirty-bomb use. | |
| In an online guide to radiation protection, the Environmental Protection Agency identifies cobalt 60 as a substance used in a range of industrial and medical applications, including radiotherapy in hospitals. Large amounts of cobalt 60 are also used to sterilize spices and some foods because its powerful gamma rays kill bacteria and other pathogens without damaging the products or leaving them radioactive. | |
| The E.P.A. guide also warns that cobalt 60 is known to cause cancer. “Because it emits such strong gamma rays, external exposure to cobalt 60 is also considered a significant threat,” it says. | The E.P.A. guide also warns that cobalt 60 is known to cause cancer. “Because it emits such strong gamma rays, external exposure to cobalt 60 is also considered a significant threat,” it says. |
| Industrial and medical users periodically replace used cobalt 60 with fresh supplies because, as with all radioactive isotopes, its emissions slowly weaken over time; its half-life is 5.27 years. | |
| Mexican news reports said the truck had departed Tijuana on Nov. 28 en route to a repository 30 miles northeast of Mexico City. When it stopped at a gas station, two armed men ordered the driver out of the truck, tied him up and made off with the truck. | |
| Bandits and organized crime groups prey on trucks along Mexican roadways, and many trucks carry warnings that they are tracked by satellite, though it was unclear if that was the case with this stolen truck. It also was not the first time a dangerous cargo like cobalt 60 had been seized by outlaws in Mexico. | |
| On the country’s Excelsior television network on Wednesday, Mardonio Jimenez Rojas, an operations supervisor at the Nuclear Security Commission, said that in past thefts the target was the truck, not the cargo. In the 1980s, he said, after a theft in Ciudad Juárez near the United States border, the cobalt 60 was found to have been used in reinforcing rods for construction, causing a health scare. | |
| Mexico also is not the first country where radioactive isotopes have gone astray. In 1987, scavengers found another isotope often used in medicine and industry, cesium 137, from an abandoned radiation treatment machine in the central Brazil city of Goiania. At least four people died and 24 were hospitalized; several hundred people were found with traces of contamination. | |
| The Nuclear Threat Initiative, an anti-proliferation group, keeps a list of incidents involving theft, smuggling or unauthorized transport of radioactive materials, counting 15 incidents in 2012. It also noted the theft of cesium 137 in Estonia twice in the mid-1990s. | |
Reporting was contributed by Randal C. Archibold from Mexico City, Matthew L. Wald from Washington and Patrick J. Lyons from New York. |