Radio Safety Officers to monitor radiation level

KALPAKKAM: India is planning to increase the number of radiation safety officers across the country to strengthen its nuclear disaster preparedness, Madras Atomic Power Station director K Ramamurthy said on Tuesday.He told Express that the Mayapuri incident in New Delhi on April 2010, where a research irradiator was dumped in a scrapyard resulting in high radiation due to the presence of Cobalt-60 in the area, had resulted in the appointment of 18 radiation safety officers. “Now the government is planning to have radio safety officers across the country to monitor radiation levels,” he added.Ramamoorthy also said the equipment to measure radiation, which was only available with the Department of Atomic Energy has now been made available with the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF).Meanwhile, the meteorological data on wind directions in the Environmental Survey Laboratory will soon be automated so that the data can be made available easily to chart out a strategy to contain radiation. “We have all the infrastructure and will be only needing the software to make it automated,” Ramamoorthy said.Interestingly, the National Disaster management Authority (NDMA) has also stressed the need to have data on the change of wind direction during change of climate. The wind direction may impact where the radiation goes at a local level and even across the globe.