The following report was received via e-mail:
An exit sign containing tritium was discovered missing from the MEDRAD facility located at 150 Victory Road in Saxonburg, PA (Butler County) on the evening of October 1, 2009. The sign was an Isolite product with 11.5 curies of H-3; two were purchased less than a year ago. The company interviewed employees and conducted an internal investigation to determine what happened to the sign; they are still uncertain about how it was lost. MEDRAD plans to return the other sign to Isolite.
MEDRAD contacted Isolite and they could not find any record of the tritium exit signs in their database. MEDRAD had received the two tritium exit signs via an electrical contractor, who in turn installed the exit signs at MEDRAD.
The State will continue to keep NRC informed of the status of our investigation.
PA incident # PA090031
THIS MATERIAL EVENT CONTAINS A "LESS THAN CAT 3" LEVEL OF RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL
Sources that are "Less than IAEA Category 3 sources," are either sources that are very unlikely to cause permanent injury to individuals or contain a very small amount of radioactive material that would not cause any permanent injury. Some of these sources, such as moisture density gauges or thickness gauges that are Category 4, the amount of unshielded radioactive material, if not safely managed or securely protected, could possibly - although it is unlikely - temporarily injure someone who handled it or were otherwise in contact with it, or who were close to it for a period of many weeks. For additional information go to http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1227_web.pdf
This source is not amongst those sources or devices identified by the
IAEA Code of Conduct for the Safety & Security of Radioactive Sources to be of concern from a radiological standpoint. Therefore is it being categorized as a less than Category 3 source