I got a "BREAKING NEWS" alert yesterday from Boston.com informing me Low-level radiation from Japan had been found in rainwater in Massachusetts. It's not dangerous, but it's fascinating:
Low levels of radioactive iodine linked to the nuclear disaster in Japan were detected in a sample of rainwater in Massachusetts, state health officials announced yesterday.Small world, after all.
The concentration of radioiodine-131 found in the sample is very low and did not affect the health of the state’s drinking-water supplies, said John Auerbach, commissioner of the Department of Public Health.
The rain sample was taken during the past week in Boston as part of regular monitoring by the US Environmental Protection Agency. No detectable increases in radiation were discovered in the air that was tested in the same location where the rainwater was collected, Auerbach said at a press conference yesterday at the William A. Hinton State Laboratory Institute in Jamaica Plain.
Again, public health officials keep stressing that these levels of radioactivity aren't dangerous. And, radioactive iodine has a half-life of eight days.
According to Gallup's latest polling on the environment, Americans do have serious, legitimate concerns about water:
At least three in four Americans surveyed in Gallup's 2011 Environment poll say they worry a great deal or a fair amount about contamination of soil and water by toxic waste, pollution of rivers, lakes, and reservoirs, pollution of drinking water, and the maintenance of the nation's supply of fresh water for household needs.
