Thom Shanker
The New York Times
3/14/2011
WASHINGTON — American Navy officials in Japan said early Monday that 17 military personnel who had been aboard three helicopters assisting in the earthquake relief effort had been exposed to low levels of contamination.
Cmdr. Jeff A. Davis, a spokesman for the American Seventh Fleet in Japan, said the Navy personnel — who apparently had flown through a radioactive plume from a damaged nuclear power plant — had been ordered to dispose of their uniforms and to undergo a decontamination scrub that had successfully removed radioactive particles.
“They received very, very low levels of contamination,” Commander Davis said in a telephone interview from Japan early Monday.
“It certainly is not cause for alarm,” he said. “It is something we have to watch very carefully and make sure we are able to monitor, and to mitigate against this environmental hazard.”
The Navy personnel aboard the three helicopters had received the equivalent of one month’s natural background radiation from the sun, rocks or soil, he said.
The helicopter crew members had landed aboard the U.S.S. Ronald Reagan, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier whose on-board sensors had indicated that the warship, too, had been exposed to airborne contamination at very low levels. The helicopter crew members were tested individually with hand-held radiation monitors.
The article continues at The New York Times.
Related articles from NYT:
- Military Crew Said to Be Exposed to Radiation, but Officials Call Risk in U.S. Slight (March 14, 2011)
- Radioactive Releases in Japan Could Last Months, Experts Say (March 14, 2011)
- Several Plant Workers Are Ill, but Radiation Risk in Japan Is Seen as Low for Now (March 14, 2011)
- Second Explosion at Reactor as Technicians Try to Contain Damage (March 14, 2011)
