THE RADIOACTIVE BOY SCOUT: THE TRUE STORY OF A BOY AND HIS BACKYARD NUCLEAR REACTOR

Christian Science Monitor ^ | Tim Rauschenberg

[cinFLA]

Where was the reactor????

"At the shed, radiological experts found an aluminum pie pan, a Pyrex cup, a milk crate and other materials strewn about, contaminated at up to 1000 times the normal levels of background radiation."

[js1138]

The first guys to build a turbojet engine fired it up indoors.

[Petronski]

BULLETIN OF THE ATOMIC SCIENTISTS, January 1999:

The do-it- yourself reactor
David Hahn wanted to be an Eagle Scout, but he was not interested in typical merit-badge projects. Instead of astronomy, backpacking, or business, Hahn was interested in producing energy. He set out to build his very own breeder reactor in his mother's potting shed.

Hahn never built anything resembling a working reactor. But his merit-badge project got some attention. On June 25, 1995 agents from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) raided his home in the quiet Detroit suburb of Golf Manor. The extremely high levels of radioactivity the EPA found in his backyard shed prompted the agency to declare it a federal Superfund site.

Hahn was remarkably resourceful in his search for radioactive substances. According to Ken Silverstein ("The Radioactive Boy Scout," Harper's Magazine, November 1998), Hahn "figured out a way to dupe officials at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission [NRC into providing him with crucial information he needed in his attempt to build a breeder reactor, and then he obtained and purified radioactive elements such as radium and thorium."

Even at age 15, Hahn knew how to ask nrc officials for information about how to isolate radioactive elements, which isotopes were capable of sustaining a chain reaction, and where he could find commercial sources of radioactive materials. "The nrc gave me all the information I needed," he told Silverstein. "All I had to do was go out and get the materials."

Not that he had to look very far for most of his "reactor" elements. In an interview on cbs This Morning (October 19, 1998), Hahn listed his sources: "I found lantern mantels, which contain thorium dioxide. They sold these at Kmarts. . . . [I got] tritium from bow-and-arrow sights, polonium from electrostatic film brushes, americium from smoke detectors, radium from, of course, radium dials."

But, writes Silverstein, what Hahn really wanted was uranium 235, because it would provide the "biggest reaction." His first approach was to drive hundreds of miles through northern Michigan with a Geiger counter on his dashboard. The search yielded only a few rocks of pitchblende (which contains minuscule amounts of uranium 235), so he decided to go back to his friends at the nrc for help. His contacts at the regulatory commission gave him the address of a Czechoslovakian firm that sells uranium to commercial buyers. That contact resulted in a few more samples of pitchblende. His attempts to isolate and purify the uranium, however, resulted in little more than a small pile of black powder.

Armed with his radioactive cocktail––and a sketch of a checkerboard breeder reactor from one of his father's college textbooks–– Hahn began devising his backyard breeder. He knew that it took at least 30 pounds of enriched uranium––vastly beyond anything he had––to initiate a chain reaction, but he thought he could at least generate some interesting results. "No matter what happened," he told Silverstein, "there would be something changing into something––some kind of reaction going on there."

His makeshift reactor had a "core" of radium, americium, and beryllium that was wrapped in a "blanket" of thorium ash and uranium powder. And it produced. "The level of radiation after a few weeks was far greater than it was at assembly," he recounted. "I know I transformed some radioactive materials."

When his Geiger counter began picking up radiation several doors down from his house, Hahn decided that he had "too much radioactive stuff in one place," and he disassembled the "reactor." By the time the EPA showed up, he had hidden most of the radioactive materials, including the purified thorium pellets, leaving only the radium and americium behind. "The funny thing is," he joked to Silverstein, "they only got the garbage, and the garbage got all the good stuff."

The "garbage" was enough to scare the EPA, which spent $60,000 on the Golf Manor Superfund clean-up. And, according to CBS This Morning, the agency "never sent a bill."
––Michael Flynn

[Itzlzha]

No. And what is P-32?

An isotope of Phosphorous, EXTREMELY high Beta, and a touch of Gamma. While using Anion-Cation resin column chromatography, we would get an INTENSE Cherenkov glow at the top of the column....strong enough to read a book by in a dark room, with the ONLY light coming from behind the 10" lead glass where the 170 Curies of P-32 were...

The stuff was SO hot (radioactive-wise), if you could see photon range, the cell would be brighter than the sun...> 1Million R/Millicurie at point source, and I routinely had 170 Curies!

[cinFLA]

"Hahn never built anything resembling a working reactor. "

[RadioAstronomer]

At UIUC there was (it's now gone) a Triga-A bathtub reactor. I sat on the edge with it "cranked" up into the megawatt range and watched the core glow an incredible blue from the Cherenkov radiation. :-)

[RadioAstronomer]

An overhead satellite that measures radioactivity measured extremely high levels of radioactivity emitting from his mothers garden shed in a little village in Michigan

This is pure codswallop!

[cinFLA]

At UIUC there was (it's now gone) a Triga-A bathtub reactor. I sat on the edge with it "cranked" up into the megawatt range and watched the core glow an incredible blue from the Cherenkov radiation. :-)

I have a bunch of photos of commercial plants during refueling. The Cherenkov radiation can be seen even when they are shut down.

[cinFLA]

"By the time the EPA showed up, he had hidden most of the radioactive materials, including the purified thorium pellets, leaving only the radium and americium behind. "The funny thing is," he joked to Silverstein, "they only got the garbage, and the garbage got all the good stuff."

And now they are printing garbage.

[Cacique]

I'll bet there's a little muslim boy somewhere trying to duplicate the experiment.

[Shryke]

This is pure codswallop!

No doubt you are correct, but why so? Can a geiger-counter (or similar device) be modified for long range detection (i.e. a long-range microphone)?

[meatloaf]

I liked the article about building an X-ray machine. Somewhere I've still got the O1A tube with the mercury getter.

[cinFLA]

No doubt you are correct, but why so? Can a geiger-counter (or similar device) be modified for long range detection (i.e. a long-range microphone)?

The article is designed to scare but the actual radiation values involved here are pretty small. They would be attenuated in the lower atmosphere and completely lost in the background radiation naturally present in the upper atmosphere.

[Shryke]

Understood. However, I am just curious to know if we possess technoogy that can see abnormal amounts of radiation at a distance (like we do with rocket launches). Certain radiation, like Gamma, travels quite a long distance, no?

[cinFLA]

An overhead satellite that measures radioactivity measured extremely high levels of radioactivity emitting from his mothers garden shed in a little village in Michigan.

Resorting to referencing an unknown bood reviewer on a site that is selling the book. hmmm

[cinFLA]

Understood. However, I am just curious to know if we possess technoogy that can see abnormal amounts of radiation at a distance (like we do with rocket launches). Certain radiation, like Gamma, travels quite a long distance, no?

I don't know the limits of our technology but such equipment certainly exists. I am lacking on satellite technology but most of what I have read seems to be related to plane-based observation.

[Cooter]

The EPA cleanup is documented.

[cinFLA]

The EPA cleanup is documented.

And your point is?

[cinFLA]

The EPA cleanup is documented.

So is the police report where they picked him up for stealing tires off of cars and found his suspicious toolbox in the trunk.

[Cooter]

The report does verify part of the author's story. The kid may not have had a working reactor in that shed, but whatever was in there was a little hotter than stolen tires.