Here are the worrisome scenarios 鈥� a radioactive release from Ukraine鈥檚 damaged Chernobyl waste site, which Russian troops now occupy.
Or a worse senario, a nuclear bomb.
there are already higher levels of radioactive activity in Ukraine around Chernobyl, possibly from the soil being disturbed in the exclusion zone.
Officials in Oregon and Washington are at a heightened level of readiness. Their task would be to detect it, understand what it is and where it came from and tell the public how to respond.
Oregon Emergency Management officials say they鈥檙e prepping for a range of potential impacts of what they are calling 鈥渢he Ukraine/Russia crisis.鈥� That includes anything from cyber terrorism to a radiological event.
Mark Henry leads Washington state鈥檚 Radiological Emergency Preparedness and Response team. He lists some of the items that have been assembled by his team for a possible event:
鈥�... radioactive contamination survey instrumentation, air samplers,鈥� he says, 鈥渨hen I鈥檓 talking supplies, I鈥檓 talking smears for actually taking deposition samples, I鈥檓 talking containers for milk samples or water samples 鈥︹��
Henry says he works with about 75 people at Washington鈥檚 Department of Health who specialize in radiological problems.
There are a surprising number of events already in the state, he says. Henry says it can include anything from a radium dial watch breaking, incidents at Hanford, fire hazmat teams that find material in people鈥檚 houses or even a breach of radioactive material in a medical facility 鈥� like at in Seattle in 2019.
Henry says he鈥檚 worked hard to make sure his team is ready for many types of possible incidents for decades. Over the decades, supplies, procedures and protocols have improved. But sometimes resources could still be overrun.
鈥淭here is only so far you can go,鈥� Henry says. 鈥淭here is only so much money, there鈥檚 only so much time and there鈥檚 only so many people. I feel like we are adequately prepared for some type of nuclear event that would happen 鈥� over in the Ukraine.鈥�
But he noted that should an incident happen in Washington or Oregon it would be hard to ever prepare enough.
Henry and his colleagues are currently coordinating with the: U.S. Department of Energy, Pacific Northwest National Lab, National Guard and Washington鈥檚 emergency management teams.
Henry says in any event, the focus would be: 鈥淲hat is the risk from the radioactive isotopes that we鈥檙e seeing to our citizens?鈥�
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