On 8/4/2019, a private citizen found a
gauge belonging to the
Idaho Transportation Department (ITD) in the middle of the road in Caldwell,
Idaho. ITD was notified and promptly sent a Radiation Safety Officer (
RSO) to recover the
gauge. The
gauge was housed in a Type A Category 2 container. Locks to the container were cut, but there appeared to be no tampering with the
gauge itself. The
RSO performed surveys, all of which came back normal. The
gauge was then secured and is back in ITD's possession.
ITD determined the gauge had been stolen from one of their trailers at a job site in Nampa, Idaho. ITD reported this incident to the Idaho State Police and will be reaching out to local law enforcement for the criminal investigation. No other material is believed to have been stolen at this time.
The gauge is a Troxler 3440 moisture density gauge with an 8 mCi Cs-137 and a 40 mCi Am-241/Be source. The source serial numbers are 7710838 and 78-7073 respectively.
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