The following information was provided by the
California Department of Public Health (
RHB) via email:
On March 22, 2022, at approximately 0834 PDT, the ARSO/Field Operations Manager of Southern California Geotechnical contacted RHB Brea concerning the moisture/density gauge, CPN, MC-1DR, serial number MD 20400784, (Cs-137 0.370 GBq, Am-241, 1.85 GBq) that had been found missing along with the Authorized User since 3/18/2022 when he was last seen at a jobsite at 1740 Mountain Avenue, Norco, CA and did not report for work on Monday, March 21, 2022. [ARSO/Field Operations Manager] has contacted emergency contacts of the Authorized User and the employment agency he was hired through with no response at this time. [ARSO/Field Operations Manager] has also notified Orange County Sheriff and filed a missing person's/stolen property report, reference number 22-009329. A copy of the theft report will be forwarded to the RHB Brea office to be included as part of this report. [ARSO/Field Operations Manager] will contact local newspapers to attempt to retrieve the stolen radioactive gauge as well as notifying local servicing vendors of radioactive gauges to be alert for the serial number of the stolen gauge in case it turns up for service. The investigation will continue to determine if the radioactive gauge and the Authorized User can be found. This is being reported to the NRC Operations Center as a 24-hour report under 10CFR30.50(b)(2) since the radioactive gauge has been lost and it can not be determined what condition the sources are currently in."
CA incident no.: 32222
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