The following was received from the
New York State Department of Health (
NYSDOH) via fax:
NYSDOH was notified in writing by an administrator for Emagin Corporation on December 18, 2019 (letter dated December 5, 2019), that two Nuclecel In-Line Ionizers had been lost and unable to be located at the licensee's facility in Hopewell Junction, New York.
These two devices are NRD, LLC P-2021 ionizers. Both devices contain sealed Po-210 sources with 10 mCi per device (assayed at the time of production). The device serial numbers are A2JY966 with source s/n 057171, and A2HM243 with source s/n 047955. Both sources are believed to be decayed down to greater than 14 half-lives to date.
According to the licensee, these sources were identified as lost during periodic housecleaning of their facility clean room approximately three years ago. The licensee attempted to locate the devices at that time and continues to attempt to locate the devices. The licensee also states that NRD, LLC verified that the devices in question were not returned to their facility.
NYSDOH will continue to monitor this incident under NYSDOH Incident No. 1312. The licensee will be providing additional information on the event, corrective actions, and steps to prevent recurrence in the future.
EVENT REPORT ID NO.: NY-19-11
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