Dangerous Levels Of Radiation Recorded In Multiple Canada Locations As Fukushima Radiation Dangers Continue

Dangerous levels of radiation have been detected in multiple locations in
Canada as governments and the corporate media continues to cover up the
real dangers posed by the Fukushima nuclear disaster.

The Intel Hub, by Alex Thomas, July 19, 2011

Multiple videos have been released [go to the web site link and view the
videos] showing high levels of radiation in Canada as the corporate media
continues to cover up the real dangers posed by the  Fukushima nuclear
disaster.

The tests were taken in multiple places in Canada including Lake Louise
BC, Kelowna BC, Red Deer/Edmonton, and Hope BC.

The radiation tests that were taken near Lake Louise BC clearly showed
harmful radiation levels up to 1.66 mcSv/hr .

So far Canadian and American authorities have remained silent. We must
DEMAND action from local health authorities. If these levels of radiation
are being picked up in Canada it seems only a matter of time before they
reach the west coast of the United States.

This should be a RED ALERT to all Americans and Canadians!

Source: http://blog.alexanderhiggins.com/2011/07/19/dangerous-levels-radiation-recorded-multiple-canada-locations-fukushima-radiation-dangers-continue-36141/

More than 3 millisieverts of radiation has been measured in the urine of 15 Fukushima residents of the village of Iitate and the town of Kawamata, confirming internal radiation exposure, it was learned Sunday.

Both are about 30 to 40 km from the Fukushima No. 1 power plant, which has been releasing radioactive material into the environment since the week of March 11, when the quake and tsunami caused core meltdowns.

“This won’t be a problem if they don’t eat vegetables or other products that are contaminated,” said Nanao Kamada, professor emeritus of radiation biology at Hiroshima University. “But it will be difficult for people to continue living in these areas.”

Kamada teamed up with doctors including Osamu Saito of Watari Hospital in the city of Fukushima to conduct two rounds of tests on each resident in early and late May, taking urine samples from 15 people between 4 and 77.

Radioactive cesium was found both times in each resident.

Read full article

Fukushima nuclear plant operator TEPCO admitted on May 15 that nuclear fuel at reactor 1 started melting soon after the on March 11 earthquake. “Because there is similar damage to the fuel rods at the No. 2 and 3 reactors, the bottoms of their pressure vessels could also have been damaged,” as the TEPCO senior official Junichiro Matsumoto said.

3,000 tons of radioactively contaminated water has been discovered at Fukushima nuclear power plant. The contaminated water could reach the sea through the holes that the melted rods burnt through the vessel. The engineers are now saying that they can no longer flood the reactors in order to cool them, so what will be the next plan to cool down the melting material within the reactors? As Greenpeace is strongly saying these days, “the fact that TEPCO has used more than two months to confirm the complete meltdown, shows the apparent inability of the nuclear industry to face such disasters.”

Source: www.greenpeace.org

Hard Lessons from Chernobyl and Fukushima
by Jim Harding, Originally published in RTown News, April 15, 2011

Source: https://sites.google.com/site/cleangreensaskca/Home/jim-harding-s-column/health-and-trust-hard-lessons-from-chernobyl-and-fukushima

Health has barely made it into the federal election. But it and the related issue of “trust” are at the top of our concerns. There’s been some talk about increasing healthcare costs — but nothing about protecting environmental and human health.

As we approach Chernobyl’s 25th anniversary (the melt-down occurred April 26, 1986), the nuclear disaster continues at Fukushima. As with Chernobyl, various “experts” continue to reassure us that the radioactivity isn’t a threat to our health.  We knew
otherwise before Fukushima. In 2010, Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment was published by the New York Academy of Sciences.

It was written by three internationally-noted scientists – a biologist, ecologist and physicist — who reviewed 5,000 scientific reports and concluded that between 1986 and 2004 there were 985,000 people who died, mostly of cancer, as a result of Chernobyl.

CHERNOBYL FALLOUT

Chernobyl had a global reach. Ten percent of the poisons fell on Asia, including northwest Japan, now being poisoned again. Five percent fell on North Africa; plutonium was even found in Nile River sediments. At least one percent made it to North America, largely due to the explosion of reactor # 4 which sent a radioactive cloud 10 km upwards. There was significant irradiation of Arctic plants and animals.

But the hardest hit regions were Ukraine, Russia and Belarus. Cancer mortality increased 40% in Belarus. The radioactive poisons causing the devastation included Cesium 137, Plutonium 239, Iodine 131, Strontium 90 and their decay-products. Because some of the poisons have half-lives ranging from 20,000 to 200,000 years, their concentrations “will remain practically the same virtually forever”.

The number hospitalized for acute radiation sickness turned out to be more than 100 times the IAEA estimate. Children in particular were affected; in the most contaminated areas the percentage of children who were healthy dropped from 80% to 20%. And not only humans were affected; plant mutations increased sharply. Increased tumors, immune disorders and shortened life expectancy occurred in animals. Survival rates of barn swallows in the most contaminated areas have been “close to zero”; those that hatched had ghastly abnormalities such as two heads.  But we no longer have to look to birds (the canary in the mine) as an early warning system.  After Chernobyl children have become “our canaries”.

The scientists concluded that Chernobyl “was the worst technogenic accident in history”.

They condemned “the nuclear industry’s willingness to risk the health of humanity and our environment with nuclear power plants”, noting these “will result, not only theoretically, but practically, in the same level of hazard as nuclear weapons.”

HALF-TRUTHS ABOUT JAPAN

We now face half-truths or outright lies about Fukushima, which could still turn out to be worse than Chernobyl. After a month we know that three nuclear reactors and four spent fuel storage areas are still at risk. A cement crack near reactor # 2 recently allowed nearly 3 million gallons of highly radioactive water to leak into the ocean, where fish are now contaminated. One hundred and sixty-five Japanese groups are rightly calling for an expansion of the evacuation zone around Fukushima. On April 12th authorities finally rated Fukushima a “7”, equivalent to Chernobyl as a “major accident”. While they claim that radioactive releases are, so far, one-tenth that of Chernobyl, they admit they still don’t know how to stop the radioactivity and it could take up to 30 years at a cost of $10 billion to decommission the dismantled reactors. The Fukushima site will remain radioactive for thousands of years.

But we continue to be told that the radiation is too low to affect our health. Ignorance abounds! Thankfully on March 29th the Scientific Secretary of the European Commission on Radiation Risk, Dr. Chris Busby, weighed into the debate. He notes that one reassuring British “nuclear expert” was a past employee of Nuclear Fuels. Another turned out to be a psychologist, not a radiation scientist. And then there’s George Monbiot, who, claiming no one had yet died from radiation sickness, has embraced nuclear power because of fears that Fukushima will lead to a return to coal plants.

Busby correctly points out that all these pseudo-experts fail to distinguish between external radiation and internal radioactivity. Once you experience external radiation, it’s over, though it may affect you, depending on the dose, over time. However if you ingest radioactive particles, such as those released when a reactor’s containment system is breached, or when there is a melt-down, they can endlessly irradiate your DNA.

CANCER RESEARCH

Epidemiological studies (e.g. by Steve Wing) show the greater incidence of cancer from the Three-Mile partial melt-down in 1979, and, as Busby says, “…court cases are regularly settled on the basis of cancers” from this. Busby notes that Swedish research (by Martin Tondel) found a direct link between the level of contamination from Chernobyl and increased cancer: an 11% increase for every 100 kBq per square metre of contamination. (kBq or kilobecquerel means 1,000 nuclear decays per second). He notes that the IAEA already estimates that the contamination rates from Fukushima are from 2 to 9 times this (i.e. 200 to 900 kBq/sq metre) “out to 78 km from the site”. This means cancer rates could increase between 22% and 99%. This 78 km radius around Fukushima is about 7 times greater than the area known as the Chernobyl exclusion zone, which is defined as “555 kBq/sq metre and above”.

The “nuclear experts” interviewed by the mainstream media accept a mathematical risk model long discredited by empirical research. It is based on “absorbed dose”, which is an average, and greatly underestimates internal radioactive exposure. As Busby says, it “would not distinguish between warming yourself in front of a fire and eating a red hot coal”. Yet it’s the internal radioactive particulates that are the most dangerous because their ongoing dose can go to a single cell and it is this “that causes the genetic damage and ultimate cancer.”

NUCLEAR SECRECY

Why can’t we trust the “nuclear experts”? It goes right back to the beginning of the military-industrial nuclear system. In 1959, when the superpowers were still testing H-Bombs, the UN’s World Health Organization (WHO) signed an agreement to allow the pro-nuclear regulator, the IAEA, to approve any research on radiation. Ever since it has hidden behind erroneous risk estimates which, as Busby points out, are “based entirely on external acute high dose radiation from Hiroshima”. The March 16, 2011 The Independent, notes the nuclear industry from its start “has taken secrecy to be its watchword”. History’s biggest secret ever was the Manhattan Project which built the first A-Bomb. The UK had the first catastrophic nuclear accident at Windscale in 1957; the official report on this was kept confidential until 1988. Numerous nuclear mishaps at the US weapons plant at Rocky Flats were kept secret for over four decades. The Soviet Union kept secret three major nuclear accidents at its weapons plant in the Urals, and tried to keep Chernobyl secret until scientists discovered the radioactive plume over Sweden.

This has all happened here too. That uranium mined around Uranium City in the 1950s was going into US nuclear weapons was kept secret from us until the late 1970s, and this is still not widely known or reported in the daily press. Tepco, the Fukushima operator and a major customer and partner of Cameco, has a litany of cover-ups. In 2002 its senior executives resigned for covering up “a large series of cracks and other damage to reactors”.

In 2006 Tepco admitted “it has been falsifying data about coolant materials in its plants.”

Tepco has regularly misreported levels of radioactivity at Fukushima.

Those who spout falsehoods about the safety of the nuclear industry perhaps should be held criminally responsible for the devastation that they try to cover-up. To re-earn the public trust, politicians and authorities must start telling the whole truth and nothing but the truth about radioactivity and health. This didn’t happen after Chernobyl and it isn’t happening about Fukushima.

Radiation readings at Japan’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi station rose to the highest since an earthquake and tsunami knocked out cooling systems, impeding efforts to contain the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl.

Two robots sent into the reactor No. 1 building at the plant yesterday took readings as high as 1,120 millisierverts of radiation per hour, Junichi Matsumoto, a general manager at Tokyo Electric Power Co., said today.

That’s more than four times the annual dose permitted to nuclear workers at the stricken plant.

[Note: these are measurements of the penetrating gamma radiation only; they do not include the less-penetrating beta and alpha radiation. (GE)]

Radiation from the station, where four of six reactors have been damaged by explosions, has forced the evacuation of tens of thousands of people and contaminated farmland and drinking water.

A plan to flood the containment vessel of reactor No. 1 with more water to speed up emergency cooling efforts announced yesterday by the utility known as Tepco may not be possible now.

“Tepco must figure out the source of high radiation,” said Hironobu Unesaki, a nuclear engineering professor at Kyoto University. “If it’s from contaminated water leaking from inside the reactor, Tepco’s so-called ‘water tomb’ may be jeopardized because flooding the containment vessel will result in more radiation in the building.”

[Note: This is not clearly stated.  If the containment vessel is flooded while it is leaking, there will be more radioactive material "flushed out" from the damaged core, leading to an increase in penetrating gamma radiation  levels outside the vessel but still inside the containment building. (GE)]

Decontaminating Robots

Tepco plans to decontaminate the two iRobot Corp. Packbot robots before sending them into a building tomorrow or later to further investigate the damage, spokesman Takeo Iwamoto said. High radiation in the reactor buildings prevents engineers from working inside them, Iwamoto said.

The cores in reactors 1, 2 and 3 and the spent fuels rods in reactor 4 have been damaged. Tepco has been using fire trucks, concrete pumps and other emergency measures for nearly seven weeks to pour millions of liters of water to cool the units after the accident.

Tepco started moving the radioactive water, which leaked to the basements and trenches, to a waste storage facility on April 19. Tepco transferred 1.89 million liters of the water from the trenches near reactor No. 2 as of 7 a.m. today, Iwamoto said. The utility plans to install a second pump after transferring 2.5 million liters.

Tepco shares fell 3.3 percent to 412 yen today in Tokyo. The shares are down about 80 percent since the quake and tsunami struck on March 11, leaving almost 26,000 people dead or missing.

Less Damage

Reactors 1 and 2 are less damaged than estimated, Tepco said in a statement today.

As much as 55 percent of the No. 1 reactor core at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi station was damaged, compared with its earlier estimate of 70 percent.

“We revised the core damage data because some readings on the containment vessel monitors were wrong,” Matsumoto said. “There was also a recording mistake. We are investigating why this happened.”

The assessment for the No. 2 reactor was cut to 25 percent from 35 percent, while that for the No. 3 unit was raised to 30 percent from 25 percent.

“It seems a reasonable estimate that three reactor cores may be damaged to a similar extent,” said Unesaki. The new estimate “doesn’t indicate lower or higher risks at the plant.”

Radiation in Tokyo’s water supply fell to undetectable levels for the first time since March 18, the capital’s public health institute said today.

The level of iodine-131 in tap water fell to zero yesterday, and cesium-134 and cesium-137 also weren’t detected, the Tokyo Metropolitan Institute of Public Health said today.

[Iodine-131, cesium-134 and cesium-137 are man-made radioactive poisons that can only come from irradiated nuclear fuel.  Iodine-131 has a  half-life of about 8 days, so it will be completely gone from the environment in a few months.  Cesium-134 has a half-life of about 2 years, so it will be completely  gone from the environment after a few decades.  Cesium-137 has a half-life of 30 years, so it will not be completely gone from the environment until several centuries have elapsed. (GE)]

Tokyo residents were told on March 23 that the city’s water was unsafe for  infants after iodine and cesium levels exceeded guidelines.

To contact the reporters on this story:

Tsuyoshi Inajima in Tokyo at
tinajima@bloomberg.net;

Michio Nakayama in Tokyo at
mnakayama4@bloomberg.net

To contact the editor responsible for this story:

Amit Prakash at
aprakash1@bloomberg.net

Follow this link to sign the petition: http://blog.canpan.info/foejapan/daily/201104/24

The Japanese government is celebrating Children’s Day,
a national holiday on May 5th, by dramatically raising
radiation exposure limits in schools.

Robert Alvarez, April 29, 2011

Source: http://www.ips-dc.org/blog/japans_nuclear_catastrophe_leaves_little_to_celebrate_on_childrens_day

May 5 is Children’s Day, a Japanese national holiday that celebrates the
happiness of childhood. This year, it will fall under a dark, radioactive shadow.

Japanese children in the path of radioactive plumes from the crippled nuclear
reactors at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi power station are likely to suffer health
problems that a recent government action will only exacerbate.

On April 19, the Japanese government sharply ramped up its radiation
exposure limit to 2,000 millirem per year (20 mSv/y) for schools and
playgrounds in Fukushima prefecture. Japanese children are now permitted
to be exposed to an hourly dose rate 165 times above normal background
radiation and 133 times more than levels the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency allows for the American public.

Japanese school children will be allowed to be exposed to same level
recommended by the International Commission on Radiation Protection
for nuclear workers. Unlike workers, however, children won’t have a choice
as to whether they can be so exposed.

This decision callously puts thousands of children in harm’s way.

Experts consider children to be 10 to 20 times more vulnerable to contracting
cancer from exposure to ionizing radiation than adults. This is because as
they grow, their dividing cells are more easily damaged — allowing cancer
cells to form. Routine fetal X-rays have ceased worldwide for this reason.
Cancer remains a leading cause of death by disease for children in the
United States.

On April 12, the Japanese government announced that the nuclear crisis in
Fukushima was as severe as the 1986 Chernobyl accident. Within weeks of
the 9.0 earthquake and tsunami, the four ruined reactors at the Dai-Ichi power
station released enormous quantities of radiation into the atmosphere.

According to the Daily Youmiri, Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency
(NISA) announced that between 10 and 17 million curies (270,000- 360,000 TBq)
of radioactive materials were released to the atmosphere before early April,
a great deal more than previous official estimates.

Even though atmospheric releases blew mostly out to sea and appear to have
declined dramatically, NISA reports that Fukushima’s nuclear ruins are
discharging about 4,200 curies of iodine-131 and cesium-137 per day into the
air (154 TBq). This is nearly 320,000 times more radiation then the now
de-commissioned Connecticut Yankee nuclear power plant released over a year.

NISA’s estimate is likely to be the low end, given the numerous sources of
unmeasured and unfiltered leaks into the environment amidst the four wrecked
reactors. On April 27, Bloomberg News reported that radiation readings at the
Dai-Ichi nuclear power station have risen to the highest levels since the
earthquake.

With a half-life of 8.5 days, iodine-131 is rapidly absorbed in dairy products
and in the human thyroid, particularly those of children. Cesium-137 has a
half-life of 30 years and gives off potentially dangerous external radiation.
It concentrates in various foods and is absorbed throughout the human body.
Unlike iodine-131, which decays to a level considered safe after about three
months, cesium-137 can pose risks for several hundred years.

Measurements taken at 1,600 nursery schools, kindergartens, and middle
school playgrounds in early April indicate that children are regularly getting
high radiation doses. Radiation levels one meter above the ground indicate
that children at hundreds of schools received exposures 43- 200 times above
background. And this is outside of the “exclusionary zone” around the Dai-Ichi
reactors, where locals have been evacuated. Japan’s Ministry of Education
and Science has limited outdoor activities at 13 schools in the cities of
Fukushima, Date, and Koriyama Cities.

Although the extent of long-term contamination is not yet fully known, disturbing
evidence is emerging. Data collected 40 kilometers from the Fukushima’s
nuclear accident  show cumulative levels as high as 9.5 rems (95 mSv)
– nearly five times the international annual occupational dose. Soil beyond the
30-kilometer evacuation zone shows cesium-137 levels at 2,200 kBq per
square meter — 67 percent greater than that requiring evacuation near
Chernobyl.

Three-fourths of the monitored schools in Fukushima had radioactivity levels
so high that human entry shouldn’t be allowed, even though students began
a new semester on April 5.

PETITION AGAINST THE INCREASE OF “ACCEPTABLE” RADIATION TO 2,000 millirem per year (20 mSv/y) FOR JAPANESE SCHOOL CHILDREN AND PLAY GROUNDS

Follow this link to sign the petition: http://blog.canpan.info/foejapan/daily/201104/24

Johannesburg – A total of 91 Eskom workers were contaminated with a small amount of radiation while doing maintenance work at the Koeberg power plant, the parastatal said on Monday.

During maintenance on Koeberg Unit One, 91 workers tested positive for cobalt 58 as they left the site on September 12, said Eskom spokesperson Karen de Villiers.

The workers then had body scans to search for the radiation. It is believed that they were contaminated with airborne radiation, possibly from dust particles.

The site was shut down for two days while tests were conducted

The Democratic Alliance has accused Eskom of mishandling the contamination and risking the health of workers.

“The DA has been informed by an inside source at Koeberg that workers at the plant were not immediately evacuated, contrary to the claims by an Eskom spokesperson,” said DA MP and spokesperson for public enterprises Pieter van Dalen.

De Villiers said the radiation the workers were exposed to was low, about 0.5% of the annually allowed exposure limit.

“Frankly, they would pick up more radiation from a couple of plane trips to Joburg,” she said.

De Villiers added that cobalt 58 was a ‘very short-lived radiation’ and would leave the bodies of the workers easily.

She said the workers would continue to be monitored in the coming weeks.

The site at Koeberg Unit One was shut for two days while tests were being conducted.

She said the company also counselled the workers on the contamination.

“We had a chat with the workers because the issue was an emotional one,” said De Villiers.

Van Dalen said Eskom was ‘downplaying’ the matter and the party would ask the government for an inquiry.

“It is concerning that Eskom would downplay this matter. It is clear that an investigation needs to take place, to ensure that any mistakes that have occurred are not repeated,” he said.

-          SAPA

http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Koeberg-workers-contaminated-20100920

Related Link:

Koeberg shut down due to corrosion

-          http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/Koeberg-shut-down-due-to-corrosion-20100313

The government has pulled the plug on its ambitious nuclear energy programme after pumping more than R9-billion into it over more than 11 years. There have been suggestions that this figure is far higher than declared and allegations that PBMR funding resulted in various slush funds. There are also suggestions that the PBMR project may continue to be funded in the US and may yet try to rear its ugly head in South Africa. What we want to know is what will happen with the PBMR “test” fuel factory established at Pelindaba and why were no environmental reports made public from the several years of pebbles experimentation that transpired in the hills of Hartbeespoortdam? And what ever became of the nuclear pebbles produced at Pelindaba that were shipped overseas for testing? – Comment from CANE

In a letter dated July 5, Public Enterprises Minister Barbara Hogan told the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM): “The minister of finance has clearly stated that there will be no further funding for the company, and I would like to reiterate that this position has not changed.

“It is clear that the remainder of the cash on hand is to be utilised solely for the winding down of the company as well as the preservation of the intellectual property.”

One objective was to design, license and build a prototype nuclear reactor plant, which, if successful, would have paved the way for building small power plants to help meet SA’s needs.

The company operates as an independent entity governed by an agreement between founding investors Eskom, the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) and US nuclear giant Westinghouse.

It has spent R5-billion on projects since 1994, including R2.7-billion on a demonstration power plant, which was to have been built at the Western Cape’s Koeberg nuclear power station, but was later scrapped. In the process, the company wasted R268-million on the manufacture of a major component of the demonstration power plant, a 2000-ton reactor pressure vessel.

The vessel, which is due to leave the Spanish port of Santander next Sunday, will be stored at Saldanha Bay for R10000 a month as the company can no longer afford the R1.4-million it will cost to transport it to Pretoria.

Business Times was told that the company decided to have the component shipped to SA as it would have been liable for R34-million in VAT had it remained in Spain. Nuclear experts were unanimous this week that the vessel would have to be scrapped as the PBMR company changed the original design of the demonstration power plant last year to 200MW from 400MW. The vessel can function in a 400MW power plant only.

Although the part is unfinished, as the contract for its construction was cancelled last year, PBMR was forced to pay the Spanish builder R268-million for the incomplete product. The original contract price was R317-million.

Payments to companies that made parts for the demonstration power plant include:

• R503.2-million to Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries for a helium turbine for the power plant;
• R256.8-million to German company SGL Carbon for manufacturing carbon reflector blocks; and
• R256-million for graphite for the demonstration power plant.

The company also spent millions of rands manufacturing coated uranium oxide particles encapsulated in graphite fuel spheres, which were sent to Russia for testing.

However, staff say the financial cut-off did not stop the company recently giving golden handshakes of R1.8-million each to some of its general managers.

Last year, the company’s 11 executives were paid a combined R18-million in salaries and other benefits. Other big payments since 1994 include:

• R2-billion to mostly overseas consultants;
• R115.9-million for building rental;
• R707.9-million for the construction of a pilot fuel plant; and
• R172-million for overheads.

Hogan recently turned down a rescue plan proposed by the NUM that included a request for a R262-million government bail-out until March next year. In a detailed submission to Hogan, the union called on the auditor-general’s office to conduct a forensic investigation into the company’s financial affairs.

The union also called on the government to suspend the company’s board and executive officers. It said some engineers and scientists were “inappropriately qualified” for nuclear reactor engineering applications.

“The actions of certain individuals can be treated as sabotage for changing the design almost every second year. It seemed as if they did not want to see the reactor built.”

Union general secretary Frans Baleni deplored the company’s “wasteful expenditure. The closure is marked by serious allegations of corruption and unethical conduct. We would be pleased if it can be investigated thoroughly,” he said.

A nuclear expert employed at PBMR blamed the board and executives for the company’s failure. “The technology in terms of electricity production was good, but the only problem was that it was not well managed. Nothing was ever achieved by the company. It was a waste of taxpayers’ money.”

Eskom said in a short statement that it was a minority investor, and referred queries to PBMR.

PBMR’s acting chief executive Alex Tsela declined to comment, referring all questions to the company’s corporate communications department, which could not be reached for comment.

The chairman, Alistair Ruiters, could not be reached for comment either.

• - govenderp@sundaytimes.co.za

Source: http://www.timeslive.co.za/business/article555632.ece/Government-pulls-plug-on-PBMR

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/spy-talk/2010/07/south_africas_dirty_bomb_myste_1.html

South Africa’s ‘dirty bomb’ mystery

If dirty bombs are such an overblown threat, and radioactive material so easily available, why are people still trying to steal it?

South African police are investigating what the five mokes busted with a Cesium-137 device at a Pretoria gas station last week were up to.
All of them are South African citizens, but not much else is known about them, police said.

Indeed, much about the July 9 incident is a mystery.

Authorities said the “industrial nuclear device” found with the men contained a small amount of radioactive material. The men intended to sell the device to parties unknown for 45 million Rand, the equivalent of$6 million to $7 million. Police said the men were also planning to sell a larger nuclear device, which police are searching for, according to South African reports.

“We don’t know what these suspects’ intentions were, and we need to find the device quickly,” police said, according to Canada’s online Digital Journal.

Likewise, South African authorities told SpyTalk over the weekend that “the origin of the device is still not known.”

South African reporter Graeme Hosken says the substance was of a type of Cesium used in South Africa’s mining industry. Cesium is also used in nuclear medicine and is manufactured in significant quantities at the Pelindaba nuclear plant near Pretoria.

Pelindaba was involved in another mysterious incident in 2007, when its highly guarded operations center was broken into by two armed gangs. One official was shot during the attack, which some believe was aimed at stealing highly enriched uranium. The case remains unsolved.

In last week’s incident, “there are no known linkages of the suspects with any groupings or persons from foreign countries,” according to a South African investigative file made available to SpyTalk. “None of them ever traveled across the SA borders.”

One of the suspects, Andre Le-Sar, 37,“ previously worked at the YSCOR arms factory in Van Der Bijl Park [an industrial zone south of Johannesburg],” according to one of the South African investigators, “but was unemployed at a stage and is now a self-employed plumber.”

No details could be learned about the four others being held, beyond their ages and residences of record.

But that’s just part of a larger mystery.

In 2002, U.S. intelligence sources, backed by Bush administration officials, reported in 2002 that al Qaeda had designs for a “dirty bomb.” Fears mushroomed that Washington and other Western capitals were unprepared to cope with such an attack, which involves salting conventional explosives with radioactive materials.

But the threat was hyped, many believe. The government eventually dropped its dirty-bomb conspiracy charges against American Jose Padilla, the Bush administration’s poster boy for the threat.

“Dirty bombs are very overblown,” says Richard Barlow, who once tracked black-market nuclear materials for the CIA and Defense Department. “There are vast quantities of available material out there if someone wanted to make one.”

The Washington Post’s Joby Warrick reported in 2002 that “U.S. businesses and medical facilities have lost track of nearly 1,500 pieces of equipment with radioactive parts since 1996. …”

Security of the materials has been tightened since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, but experts say determined thieves wouldn’t have a hard time obtaining them.

Outside of a couple of Chechen plots against Moscow, and notwithstanding last week’s bust in Pretoria, the question remains: Why hasn’t a credible dirty bomb plot surfaced in the West since 9/11?

Graham Allison, a former assistant secretary of defense, said it may just be a matter of theatrics: al-Qaeda likes things that go boom — big, big boom. “Well, if you look at 9/11, and you look at al-Qaeda and their m.o., and you look at what they said, you know that they like big, spectacular events that kill large numbers of people,” Allison said on the PBS program “Nova” back in 2003.

A cesium plume lofted by dynamite, in other words, is peanuts compared with the real deal — a nuclear bomb.

“The press spokesman for Mr. bin Laden put out a rather chilling statement, which said that they’re required to kill four million Americans, including women and children, in order to balance the scale of the atrocities that we and the Israelis have visited upon the Arab population,” Allison said. “If you are trying to kill a lot of people at one time, you’re at the high end of violence, which is nuclear. There is something almost like the moth to the flame with respect to the nuclear threat.”

Not really comforting.

That leaves the last week’s mystery in Pretoria. With such hot goods virtually falling off trucks, how could even scam artists hope to fence cesium for upwards of $6 million, as the South African police believe?

Maybe the answer lies with P.T. Barnum: “There’s a sucker born every minute.” But who were those suckers in Pretoria?

Update: MSNBC’S Rachel Maddow picks up the story with a shout-out to SpyTalk.