Back in the 80’s & 90’s it was 300 milli rem per 7 days. A worker could take all that in one shift or any amount during the 7 days that would add up to 300. Of course what you picked up was dropped off after 7 days. If you picked up 25mR then 8 days later you got that back.
You always knew when a big Hot job was on the horizon because all work would stop so they could get all the workers to start at 0 and to be able to take their full dose.
Quickest I was ever burnt out was 1 minute. They had guys lined up a hundred deep outside the zone ready to go in. Those jobs were pretty rare though. That was out at N Reactor on the Hanford site were they were cooking uranium to produce plutonium. Don’t recall ever burning out on a commercial plant.
>> Back in the 80’s & 90’s it was 300 milli rem per 7 days.
In my Navy NUC days (637 class SSN), if I remember correctly the limit was something like 100mrem/week — and as I recall, even working back aft we seldom received more than 15mrem/week during normal at-sea ops.
We all wore TLDs and (again IIRC) they were read weekly.
The biggest short-term dose I ever got was a couple times working in the reactor compartment for a little while (hour or so) — after being shut down for some time, of course. Don’t even remember what that dose was but no more than a few tens of mrem, I think.
I confess I may be fuzzy on the numbers — it was quite awhile ago (late 70s).
By law occupational dose for a “radiation worker” meaning someone who works in an industry where they might be occupationally exposed to ionizing radiation has a dose
limit of 1.25 R per calender quarter and a maximum dose of
5R per calender year. Some employers can and do break that dose down into weekly or daily limits. That is acceptable as long as the cumulative dose does not exceed the legal limits of 1.25R/qtr or 5R.yr.
NON occupational exposure is limited to 10% of occupational
exposure. This means that a secretary working in such a place cannot recieve more than 125mr/qtr or 500mr/yr. In addition there are further limits placed on occupational workers who are pregnant.
This story seems fishy. I doubt that much exposure is being generated “in the wild”.