1) Tritium readily forms water when exposed to oxygen.
2) As it undergoes radioactive decay, tritium emits a very low energy beta particle and transforms to stable, nonradioactive helium.
3) In a controlled environment, it can have a half life of 12+ years. In the open air or seawater would decay(oxidize) almost instantly.
When it does decay, it gives off a beta particle which is not ionizing ratiation.
Pfflier, how dare you introduce facts into this heartrending tragedy. True or not, it will certainly do some good for the well-meaning former ACLU attorney who must deal with the exorbitant rents on Bridgeway in Sausalito. Perhaps he is also dealing with supporting a sailboat as many of the environmentally sensitive in Sausalito - and maintaining a birth in Sausalito takes courage and money.
During my decades of nuclear detector work I was never without a dosimeter in my wallet. Navy ships are bristling with radiation detection and measurement devices, some of which do an amazing job of detecting ionizing radiation at remarkable distances (my experiments were usually up close and personal) using ship-based sensors, as well as satellites and airplanes. Of course the attorney will not be shaking down the Navy or confusing a jury with these data.. Attorney Bonner is certainly looking for a juicy settlement, so facts mean much less than publicity, which even Fox News is contributing to, perhaps related to its ownership by the Saudi Royal Family. One of the desirable attributes of nuclear power generation is that radiation measurement is so ubiquitous and so sensitive the natural background, radon or cosmic ray generated radiation must be accounted for.
This lawyer is probably getting donations from all the old lefty organizations, the superstitious, vegans, Alex Jones aficionados, and once could count on the communists and Saudis. Now that China and Russia are signing many more contracts to partner with countries who are learning the price of ignorance, and the cost of believing Al Gore, their antinuclear agitprop may not be as generously funded.
Our presidential science advisor, John Holdren, was one of them, both antinuclear and communist, as his students and readers at David Horowitz’ Marxist journal Ramparts, knew quite well, a doctrinaire Marxist, working for the inevitable socialist revolution. Holdren’s students at UC Berkeley, of which I was one, generally had no idea.
Notice such articles seldom offer numerical evidence, and this sick sailor claim will almost certainly be like the babies with leukemia resulting from Three Mile Island, from their drinking the milk from cows in Pennsylvania. Cows in Pennsylvania didn’t have a measurable increase in radiation in their milk, and Three Mile Island released less radiation than would be experienced by someone moving to Denver for six months.
There are long-lived populations living in towns in Brazil, India, and several other locations which names I have long forgotten with natural background radiation in the 5 Rem range, much more than even Fukushima exposed those in the town, and more than those living in Chernobyl were exposed to, except for some workers at the plant.
Three workers exposed during the initial critical radiation event died. Chernobyl had an increase in leukemia and other radiation associated diseases for a few years, the official reports claim about 60 citizens over 5 years, though that number is exceeded by leukemia statistics in many parts of the world, and even in The Ukraine. The average coal plant releases more ionizing radiation than a commercial nuclear plant, of which there have been two meltdowns in over sixty years of operation, Three Mile Island and Fukushima.
Chernobyl’s reactors were not commercial reactors, having no steel containment vessels nor reinforced concrete buildings. They were graphite core reactors designed to produce plutonium for weapons which happened to produce usable heat for use by civilians both for heating and electricity generation. The coal plants that replaced the reactor that melted have long been known (US EPA estimates) to kill an additional two hundred people each year from hydrocarbon emissions and the resulting premature cardiorespiratory illness. Scrubbers in coal plants do not remove radioisotopes - at least not by design.