The U.S. Army TACOM Radiation Safety Program Manager in Warren, MI was notified via email of what appeared to be U.S. Army material containing radioactive sources were for sale on eBay. The program manager was not able to find the listing but the information received indicated that the material was already sold or the listing expired. When the program manager contacted eBay about the material and the seller, eBay was uncooperative, citing privacy of the individuals selling/buying the material.
The program manager contacted the U.S. Army Criminal Investigative Command in Troy, MI and provided them with all the information pertaining to the material. Since the material was not recovered, the U.S. Army considers the material lost/stolen.
The materials are two M8A1 Chemical Agent Alarms each containing nominally 300 microcuries of Am-241.
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