Dec 08 2006
Order Of Contamination
Major Update: Bumping this to the top. As I predicted if this was a smuggling ring exposed by and accidental (and severe) contamination event the Russians involved would start to get seriously ill. We can now add Lugovoi to the list of those with a heavy dose of Polonium. It would seem he and Kuvton were close enough to the event that killed Litvinenko to get a serious contamination themselves. Did they get it at the event or from seeing Litvinenko right after the event. In any case it makes three seriously poisoned people and I would bet more will succumb soon. Now also should consider the scenario were there was more Polonium than just what exposed these people. Did it travel from the hotels and the multiple rooms to points elsewhere? Or was it combined into a single larger stash that is sitting someplace and possibly still contaminating people. This is the problem with this kind of substance – you sort of have to know the trail to detect the traces. So will Berezovsky or someone else show signs of poisoning to further trace the trail? Will someone at the security firms visited by Litvinenko or Lugovoi succumb? More later.
Update: It seems Kuvton is gravely ill and will easily become the second most contaminated victim of this incident. Now the police will need to retrace all his steps on Nov 1 as well. I think they will find he and Litvinenko at the Millenium Hotel sometime prior to the Scaramella meeting. – end update
I am taking a stab at the degree of contamination found to date on people and at locations to give some idea of the distance of a person or place from what I call ground zero, which is where Litvinenko may have been at the center of an accident handling the Polonium. First the human list from worst to least:
(1) Litvinenko with 50-100 times the lethal dose
(2) Kovtun who took ill and could be anywhere from 10-20 times the lethal dose (comparing him to Litvinenko and Scaramella)
(3) Lugovoi has taken ill and seems to be only slighty less contaminated the Kovtun
(4) Scaramella with 5 times the lethal dose, now out of hospital
(5) Marina Litvinenko – not hospitalized like Scaramella, possibly less than a lethal dose
(6) Millenium Bar Staff
This story notes the Millenium bar staff were many 1,000th’s the level found in Litvinenko. If he had 50 times the lethal dose, then they have s than 5% of a lethal dose.
Totally independentally we have contaminated sites in order of a completely “guestimated” contamination level based on how long they were shutdown (or are still shutdown)
(1) Millenium Hotel Room (Oct 30-Nov 3 Period)
(2) Millenium Hotel Bar
(3) Litvinenko Home
(4) Zakayev Car
(5) Sheraton Hotel Room (Oct 25-28 Period)
(6) Sushi Bar
(7) Berezovsky’s office
(8) Parkes Hotel in Knightsbridge (Oct 16-18 Period)
(9) 25 Grosvenor Street
(10) 58 Grosvenor Street
(11) RISC Management on Cavendish Place
(12) 3 2 Airplanes
(13) British Embassy
(14) Arsenal Stadium
These are just my estimates but they are helpful in determining who may bave been contaminated when. For example, I believe Kovtun and Litvinenko are the two prime vectors who were present at the incident in the Hotel room at the Millenium Hotel which appears to be a large, accidental contamination. They in turn trailed Polonium and infected secondary people like Scaramella and possibly Lugovoi. As time passed from the initial incident (which had to happen prior to the meeting with Scaramella) then potency of the trail detoriated. That is why the Millenium Bar staff and Litvinenko’s wife have fractions of a lethal dose and Scaramella as a 5 times a lethal dose.
For the record, I cannot see how all 7 bar staff at the Millenium Hotel Bar could have sniffed ‘vapours’ from Litvinenko’s drink. That seems a bit far fetched that each and every nose made it over his beer. But with Litvinenko, Kovtun and probably Lugovoi all trailing Polonium 210 then there is a more likely scenario for the contamination. I am wondering if these folks all worked behind the bar or serving on the floor (as opposed to in the back). Probably so.
Update: Well that question was answered fast.
Seven workers at a London hotel visited by ex-spy Alexander Litvinenko on the day he was poisoned have tested positive for low levels of radiation.
The Health Protection Agency said the staff who were working at the Pine Bar at the Millennium Hotel in Grosvenor Square on November 1 “appear to have been exposed to low levels of polonium-210”.
A statement said: “There is no health risk in the short term and in the long term the risk is judged to be very small on the basis of initial tests.”
The HPA said it is also testing staff who were working at the bar on October 31 and November 2.
Note they were exposed to low levels. If everyone at the bar was exposed to low levels as well then the poisoning event could not have taken place at the Millenium Bar (which I would wager is what we will find to be the case).
We don’t know how much polonium was at the home of Litvinenko = they had lots of time to clean it up. The father has contamination; the son and the wife have contamination. We don’t know when the father saw his son last – he may not have been at the house in the 2 hours before L. went to the hospital. The contamination of at least the wife is greater than the 7 bar workers – I still think that polonium was stored in the house at least part of the time between Oct 16 and Nov. 1 and the wife had cumulative exposure. I am still puzzled by initial reports of the time line regarding the newspaper stand….
As I’ve been saying, there have been no large spills. The Millennium hotel room hot spot was probably high specific activity, not secondary contamination, but still a small amount of radioactivity.
the latest from interfax – take it with a grain of PO
“Kovtun has been found to have an acute form of radiation sickness, internal contamination with alpha-radiation nuclides with a developing reaction of his vital organs: the liver, kidneys and intestine,” Interfax quoted an unnamed medical source as saying.
Also, everything about this is new because it is the first Po210 poisoning (excepting Curie’s assistant), the vapours idea makes sense to me if the Po behaves in someone’s mouth or in their tea in just the same way it behaves in any other container… that it spreads and flied out of the container due to “recoil,” which is the explosive effect of nuclear fission sending Po atoms flying… a bit like popcorn popping with no lid on. So if Sasha had a large amount of Po in his mouth he could have had Po flying out of his mouth by this mechanism.
Jerry go google polonium and “nail biter” and read the article.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=&xml=/health/2006/12/04/nspy204.xml
the link for the spills in Britain in the 50’s
On the first occasion, in 1953, a worker in the polonium department was found to have high levels of alpha radiation in his routine urine test.
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It was found that the man was “a bad nail-biter” and this was why he had ingested enough tiny traces of polonium over a period of months to show up on the scan.
and
The second, much more serious incident occurred in 1955, when 15 workers in the section where polonium was processed were exposed when a load of waste material was spilled over a table.
The material was gathered up into a large paper bag, but then the worst happened. “While collecting the waste into the bag, it was accidentally compressed and a puff of air came up into the faces of two men,” the report said.
“Because it was known that the waste was grossly contaminated, it seems reasonable to assume that the doses were received by inhalation.”
Jerry,
If I may say so your lack of a chemistry background is beginning to show. “recoil” comes from openining a container and changing the nature of any air that was in balance with the liquid up until the container is opened. It is caused, I presume, by the fact liquids always dissipate gases into the air boundary and fresh air requires a new balance to be achieved.
There is no recoil once the balance has been obtained – as in an open beer or drink. The atoms do not move at all really. It is the radiation that is emitted from the atoms. And in a drink glass that radiation can only be out the top and travel centimeters.
Now in a dust or aerosol form the material can float in the air and land on surfaces and stick. Or it can be rubbed from one surface to another.
The other method is from bodily fluids, but almost all the contamination I have read about was urine. Litvinenko seemed to show no excretions in the hospital except in the urine. So it seems clear the material stays inside the body and possibly the intestinal tract and exits from urine primarily.
So, with that chemistry framework, a liquid transport such as a drink has little possibility to contaminate unless it was drank or spilled on you. It is possible it was a ‘spill’.
The reason I refer to a spill is the easiest form of the material to handle is a liquid suspension (to keep the material from flying away in a dust form) or disolved in an acid solution. It could be in an acid salt (an acid solution dried into a solid form).
AJStrata
Pine Bar: the pine bar is a great area for pre dinner drinks in a cosy atmosphere or to enjoy our pianist until the early hours –
When does this bar open?
You guys are full of crap, especially you AJ. Look up alpha recoil/aggregate recoil if you can make the effort and you will see that recoil refers to the impact of alpha particle on other atoms… that this is responsible for the creepy spreading behavior of Po210 – very much like the simple popcorn analogy I gave, the Po creeps out of any container through this process. I can’t believe you haven’t clued into this reading about Po over the past weeks, must be because you have no chemical understanding whatsoever. As to whether this is how Scaramella, Kovtun, and the bar workers became contaminated, it is only an original hypothesis for an entirely novel situation.
http://www.ornl.gov/~webworks/cppr/y2005/rpt/122446.pdf
Secondly, referencing nail biters really doesn’t apply to this case IMO , and avoids the issue raised, because it was a deliberate poisoning with much higher levels of Po involved.
Jerry,
I appreciate you have your theories but you have no right to come onto my blog and start slinging insults. This is a warning that I will ban you from here if all you can do to defend your arguments is sling insults. I have a degree in biology and know chemistry and physics extremely well. The recoil theory was associated with the opening of containers and I did read it. I also understood what it meant.
Now chill out or bug off.
“At this moment a team of investigators from the prosecutor-general’s office, in the presence of specialists from Scotland Yard, is questioning Lugovoy,” RIA news agency quoted a source close to the case as saying.
I’m staying away from ex-KGB chechen sympathizing London based suisi eating polonium smugglers this Christmas. Its dangerous for my health.
AJ,
“So, with that chemistry framework, a liquid transport such as a drink has little possibility to contaminate unless it was drank or spilled on you. It is possible it was a ’spill’.
The reason I refer to a spill is the easiest form of the material to handle is a liquid suspension (to keep the material from flying away in a dust form) or disolved in an acid solution. It could be in an acid salt (an acid solution dried into a solid form). ”
In liquid solution the Po should be stable – when the container is absolutely sealed. However, if the container is opened there is immediate risk of poisoning because of the volatility of the Po solution. A reference: http://www.springerlink.com/content/uj80778k66h377u3/
There is a possibility that someone carried an improperly sealed container.
Another possibility is that from what I understand Po-210 is sometimes used to label bills. Perhaps, unknown to the people involved in the money labeling process, the labelling went wrong and some bills were more highly contaminated than would be desired.
If the threesome met that morning there would have been contamination on Litvinenko when he bought the newspaper so they had to have met after 12’00. Theypeoblably went up to one of the guys rooms at the Millenium and the accident occurred there. Does anyone know who’s room the accident happened? They probably opened the container and if it was in powder from it flew out . Probably Litvinenko was holding the container and that is why he got the larger dose. Kovrun and Lugovoi were robably standing some distance away and they got smaller doeses but still extremely lethal. Then they all trailed polonium all over town since it was on their clothes. What I don’t understand is why Litvinenko died so fast and the other two are just now getting sick. Maybe because of the smaller doses they received.
The trail Litvinenko left would be gauged by the strength of the contamination at each site. I wonder if the news has published this. I don’t recall seeing anything about this but this case is getting confusing with all the what-ifs. But the only importance of this trail is to shore up the fact that the accident happened at the Millenium and they were smuggling polonium and accidently killed themselves. And the next questions are who else was involved in the smuggling and where was it going. The where from is the question after that.
AJ, when the experts refer to recoil in relation to polonium contamination they are referring to alpha recoil/aggregate recoil, not to a hypothetical container being dropped onto the floor.
bumping this up from thread below: from SKy News Pictures
The Sheraton Park Lane Hotel in Picadilly, where the radioactive substance was found in the penthouse suite – the premises back on to Mr Berezovsky’s offices. Pictures at Sky news
and that 3 of Berezovsky’s offices showed radiation – down st, and 2 on Grosvenor Square? also pictures at Sky news
Barbara. Litvinenko was invited up to that room in the Millenium but declined. He never left the bar.
Jerry:” there have been no large spills. The Millennium hotel room hot spot was probably high specific activity, not secondary contamination, but still a small amount of radioactivity” That’s what I recall.
I agree with Mariposa BTW that it is likely that Berezovsky was also one of the assassin’s targets.
Boris and his PR machine have been pretty quiet lately – I’ve only noticed one thing: Goldfarb distancing Litvinenko from the Chechnya/Muslim conversion. Why?
oops except for this: Alex Goldfarb, said the former spy sipped tea during the meeting, while Lugovoi said he recalled ordering a bottle of gin (Millenium hotel)