City in Sound; Wilson Sporting Goods

This is Jack Angel with City in Sound. These are stories out of Chicago, city of all things. Among them, the unseen and dynamic gamma rays. Ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one. Ten, nine, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight, eight. Argonne National Laboratory at Lamont is dedicated to exceed what it has done for atomic defense by what it is doing for atomic progress. A fascinating case in point is its high -level gamma irradiation facility, a function with a complicated name but a simple purpose. This is to irradiate certain substances with what are known as gamma rays. Their use has opened a whole new field of preserving and enhancing food. How they are energized and used comprises our story. The Miss Gladys Swope is senior chemist here, the Chemical Engineering Division of the

Argonne National Laboratories of the Atomic Energy Commission. This is a rather big -worded introduction, but Miss Swope exactly what is this facility in which we are now standing. This is a high -level gamma irradiation facility in which we use spent fuel rods from the materials testing reactor in Idaho as our source of gamma rays. Well, now that we know that irradiation of foods is quite a coming field before we get into the technical aspects of it, which I understand absolutely nothing, would you go into the irradiation of food just a little bit from the layman's standpoint? Yes, this facility is used for irradiation of food and for other materials. Most of the work that we do on food irradiation is for the quartermaster food and container institute, because they are interested in finding out rather the army can have fresh meats and vegetables rather than k -rations. I see an

irradiating food preserves them, does it? We can preserve them and we can, what we can call, sterilize them, pasteurize them or sterilize them. You have what looks like a small cafeteria table over there on which are many different types of food. I see chicken and hamburger and pork and corn and various vegetables. Now, are these irradiated? Yes, these have all been irradiated and they've been here some of them for many months, which means that these can stand out in the table without refrigeration and still not spoil. I suppose the army is interested in this because it means that a soldier doesn't have to pack along a lot of k -rations and use a lot of unnecessary gear. What are some of the foods that you irradiate? Well, we've irradiated, I think, almost everything here. This past week

and some of the ones we're doing today have been strawberries, pork, chicken. Didn't you tell me that there are certain foods that you've tested? Of course, you're always testing that don't work out too well in this process. Yes, unfortunately beef doesn't taste very good. And this is too bad because we have here, as you see on the exhibit tables, a nice, beautiful steak. But it really doesn't taste too good. Pork tastes just the same, beef, chicken tastes just the same. What can you do for tomatoes and lettuce and salads and things like that? Well, that's one of the other problems that they're having. Let us wilts and if it's irradiated enough to, shall we say, sterilize it. If they don't irradiated enough to sterilize it, then it decays. On the other hand, there are certain foods that taste better because of their radiation, aren't they? Yes, vegetables and fresh foods,

if only irradiated with 100 ,000 rentkins, not the three to six million that are required for sterilization, taste better. The rentkin is a measuring unit. That's right. You used an X -rays and whatnot. Let me ask you this. As a layman, I've heard a lot about strontium -90 and radioactive fallout and the entrance of these radioactive materials into foods and grains and dairy products that we eat. Now, here you are in this very impressive looking laboratory irradiating food deliberately. Why do you do this? Well, that's a question that worried me at first, too. This is not a reactor. This is merely using the fuel rods after they come out of a reactor. And so there are no neutrons. And it's the neutrons that make material radioactive. So we don't have

to worry about it. I see. Well, now we're about ready to go into the operation that you very kindly set up for us. And before we do, let me just briefly describe where we are. We're looking down into what appears to be a kind of a huge two -story basement swimming pool, a bottom of which is marked off in grids that are designated both numerically and alphabetically. And there's some very peculiar looking square rods down there. Are those the spent rods of which you speak, Ms. Wolf? Yes, those are the fuel rods. And where do these fuel rods come from? These fuel rods come from Idaho. From the materials testing reactor. And I gather that when you say they're spent rods, it means that the reactor there has no further current use for them. And they send them out here for you to use in this irradiating processor. That's right. When a reactor is in

operation, the fuel rods, uranium is there, is used up during the period that's in the reactor. And it can't be, it has to be removed after a certain period of time. But they are, as we say, too hot to handle, so that they have to be cooled for a number of days. So we are using these during the cooling period. And that's the reason for the water. That's right. The water is used both for shielding and cooling. Well, now Joe Harris is the chief technician of this very interesting facility. And I understand that you're about to bring in a container of these spent rods. Unfortunately, we're ready to unload the carrier. It has been delivered, it's transported by rail from Idaho to Lamont, to the Oregon site. Our first procedure is to have it surveyed by our health services people or HP people. To determine how much activity our radiation is coming through the pot and the shielding to protect the personnel operating the unit. And we'll ask Tom Killerley to give us a survey.

Tom, what are the readings? 25MR over the sides and 50 over the top. Good. How is that? That's safe enough for us. 50MR, we could say at the pot for an hour to get our 50MR and that's our total dose. Joe, what have, what have you found that it wasn't safe? What would you do then? Then we'd have to work at long distances and shorter times. We'd have to rotate or form a chain gang to have each operator within the limits of his dose for the day. A dose for the day is 50MR and ends our total of 250 per week. All right, sir, but you have a safe container here and you're bringing it in and know what happens. We'll bring it into the facility. We'll start the crane. I'll give the signal for them to start the crane. Bruce, will you start bringing in the carrier? This is a mighty noisy crane. It's a 15 -ton crane. The carrier weighs 12 .5 tons.

All the proofs. How we have the carriers suspended over the pool, we will add a safety chain to the plug that covers the lead liner. When we remove that, we'll expose the four rods and they'll be ready for transfer. This will be removed when the carrier is resting at the bottom of the canal and entirely underwater. We'll have the safety chain. Oh, yes. That comes now. There we have the safety chain in place and that's anchored to the one -ton train. Now we're ready to proceed to lower to the bottom of the pool. Will you lower to the bottom of the pool? Oh, this looks like a massive diving bell as it goes. It sure is. It looks like a king -sized transformer, Jeff. You've led fully -plated bathasphere as it goes on. We had about 180 gallons of the mineralized water in a carrier. Hold it, Bruce. We'll hold it there to just

above the surface, to upper flange of the carrier, above the surface of the water. We will now evacuate the water that's in the carrier because it has a high activity count. We do this to prevent contaminating the rest of the pool with high activity. We'll remove the lead plug exposing the four elements. Do you remove the lead plug, John? Well, there's got a plug for your bathtub. Sure, as the plug weighs one ton or roughly one ton about 1800 pounds and the carrier is constructed so that you have a natural convection or circulation of water through the fuel elements and out through the outer jacket where the heat is dissipated through the fins on the outer jacket. Now, you notice the glow given off by the fuel elements. Yes, those are the rods. Those are the rods that are the spent fuel elements. This glow is defined as a trinkoff effect given off by gamma particles traveling faster than light. It's like a kind of a blue. It is. It's a very blue glow and very few people have an opportunity to

witness this, except at a sight of this type. This is really a tremendous sight looking down into a clear green pool with dots of blue and down below us there. I don't believe I've ever seen anything quite like it. Usually, when we conduct tours through here, we will darken the room and put the lights out on the water and it has a tremendous effect on our visitors. Oh, I see Bruce with that. Yes, he's ready. Uncanny long pole is placing these rods somewhere. Bruce, you have a tremendously uncanny knack for placing those rods here from a vantage point of about 30 feet above the floor of this pool. It's kind of an extension of your left arm there. That's right. It takes a lot of practice to do that. I'm practicing off for about eight months and I'm just getting down to where I can do it rather easily. It takes a longer time, of course, to become an expert at it. Do you ever miss? Quite often, yes. I don't suppose there's any great harm. You just pick it up off the floor and put it back.

That's right. Just start all over again and try it again. Joe, now what happens at where bottom of the pool you've got the rods on? The procedure is the same for all four rods. We remove the rod. I identify it, see that the numbers correspond with the shipping numbers that we receive. We place it into the radiation rack. Bows the cover and we're back in business again. And you're ready to send on those container earns to be tested. That's right. We change a set of four fuel elements on an average of every six weeks to maintain the intensity in the radiation rack at not less than a million hour per hour. So it'll range from one to three and a half million hour per hour. All right. Just speak of one and three million hour per hour. I notice the impressive safety factors here. These one million and three million hour per hour is. Is this a hazard to working here? Is this a hazard to people? I might explain this a little differently so you'd get the picture right, Jack. That for human being is exposed to 500 rent can

for one hour is considered a lethal dose. And it depends on the individual body cross section. A large personal absorb more of the rays in a given time than a small thin one. Well, the large one would die in about three weeks, the small thin one and six. And that's 500 hour. The fuel rises. We receive them in sets of four and may range from three to five million rent can and the rack is maintained from one to three million rent can. So if you were exposed directly to the equipment without any shielding or benefit of shielding, you'd only have a fraction of a minute and you had your usual dose. Did people work around here without any protective clothing? Well. You dress as we do and we're standing here in the street clothes? That's quite true, Jack. The water acts as a shield. I mean, I trust you. I wouldn't know that. Well, we've had the experience and this has been tested in and out. No, don't fall in. We haven't lost a visitor yet and this is no time to start. So it's safe and modern in a very fascinating process. That's the most beautiful part

about atomic energy work. We try to foresee all the obstacles, all the accidents that may happen before they do happen in institute precautions. What is going on right now is that we have some long cylinders here. These cylinders are around four and eight inches in diameter and 28 inches tall. And into these, we can place five number two cans of food or five number two cans, maybe I should say. These are chest foods. These are chests that are being run. As I said, we are putting in today strawberries, chicken, potatoes, and so on. These are all be down for different irradiation periods. You have a scorekeeper over here on the blackboard. This

John Gates, isn't it? That's correct. What are you doing here on the blackboard behind this... This is a... This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard.

This is the first time we've ever seen a blackboard. These are being placed on a ball in the pool prior to putting them into the radiation rack. These are being proposed to put them into radiation rack. I see. Now they use the term urn and sample container to mean the same thing. That's right. We call these sample urn, they actually are sample cylinders. Of course. Bruce Collin is now going to start putting those in. Of course, Bruce Collin is now going to start putting those in andción gates are going to be operating the timers. What we have to do is to actually determine the timers. very accurately because we may get as much as 50 ,000 R in a minute. Bruce is is groping deep under water there with a long, oh I should say 30 foot rod and he is located one of those containers and is doing what with it. Well he's just picked it up with what we call this long, hand -rolled tool.

Now that it's been placed into a what looks like a kind of a cook stove there. That's right. What is that? That's the irradiation rack and there are 12. Yes go ahead. 12 sample ports in the rack. We hear this background. When you hear them call out Charlie 3 that means that the sample is being placed in a sample port. You know it's a kind of an amazing thing here because you have the distortion in the water is the disturbance and the water is disturbing. Yet your man Bruce here can look through that with his long 30 foot rod and and place them almost exactly into place. He must have kind of dimensional vision here. Well the operators are extremely good at doing this. I he find

anybody to try and do it. I have tried to do it and it's very difficult but it's like playing the piano. Once you learn how it's apparently easy enough but it is it isn't as easy as it looks. It doesn't look easy at all to me. All right we've just about completed our placement of these urn containers from the rack that was lowered into the pool into the cook stove. I very loosely labeled it here and what happens now? Well they will stay in there for the length of time that is needed to get the doses requested by as we call them the customer. Customer here being Army Quartermaster. In this particular case yes. Do you have other customers? We have customers from industry provided they can't get the service somewhere else commercially available service. We have our own laboratory staff and then we had some of the food industry that are

outside the quartermaster program that come to us. Now we will leave those samples in there as long as they need to be to get the dose levels. Incidentally potatoes take the least time because they only require 10 ,000 reds or R and these will be coming out very quickly. Onions only require 10 ,000 R or keep them from sprouting. Well how long will these potatoes and onions last without spoilage? I would say about a year before they will start. No refrigeration necessary. No refrigeration is required. We have some on the table back there. The ham been here that long but it's interesting to see the one that is that has sprouted versus the one that was irradiated which did not. Yes I saw that. That's the way they count the time when

the samples are due to come out so that samples are very accurately timed with timers at major to a hundred of a minute. So these samples having been irradiated are now put back into the crane rack right? That's right. The job for them is done for the moment. That's it. Then they're brought up and we'll be given back to the quartermaster who will make the tests on them or their contractors. I see. Well now Miss Swope we've seen an amazing process here. Are you used, spent rods to irradiate food and tests? Actually why is this so important? Well as I mentioned earlier the army of course is very interested in it on the kind of the getting fresh food and vegetables and meat to the iron forces. But industry is also very interested in it because it will be cheaper as far as story spaces concerned and it will also be possible to get foods

kept without refrigeration until they can get to the refrigeration sources. Doesn't take much imagination to envision produce that can be stored for six months is revolutionizing the phase of the food industry. Yes that is true and then this idea has been brought out that they can make better products or even enhance the flavor of certain products by giving them a low dose of radiation coupled with some of their other processing. How long will it be before this is generally available for commercial consumption for all of us? Well that's a milk question. The first the food and drug administration has to okay it. There's some thought now that that may come about certainly within the next five years so that let us say roughly two to five years. Thank you Miss Swope for one of the great things that the atomic energy is doing for us. Thank you Mr. Angel. The

problem in a changing world is to change it for the better. At Argonne National Laboratory a wonderful age of life and thought is already taking shape. The advancement of atomic knowledge into fields once undreamed of. The chemists and physicists, biologists and technicians at Argonne are at work with the most intricate and complex of all technical phenomena with the one basic equation to enrich and preserve life rather than destroy it. This is Jack Angel with George Wilson an engineer whose recordings here have imprinted city in sound.