On the day of the accident, Slotin’s screwdriver slipped outward a fraction of an inch while he was lowering the top reflector, allowing the reflector to fall into place around the core.
Slotin received a lethal dose of 1,000 rad (10 Gy) neutron and 114 rad (1.14 Gy) gamma radiation in less than a second, while the position of Slotin’s body over the apparatus shielded the others from much of the neutron radiation. Slotin died nine days later from acute radiation poisoning.
a lead suit would have done fuckall in that situation
the amount of lead you can feasibly wear on your body can protect you from, say, dental X-rays, but not from research FAFO-grade gamma radiation
you need several inches of lead and/or tungsten for that kind of shielding. you might also need several feet of concrete if neutron radiation is involved
Lead is good for blocking alpha and beta radiation, but does not do that much against gamma, which was the main radiation he received, so yeah. Probably would not have saved him.
the thickness of lead that would have been required would have prevented him from fucking around with the screwdriver in the first place because he wouldn’t have been able to reach the thing lol
Doing some quick math and numbers pulled from wikipedia, Lead is about 14-15x as effective by volume compared to water at blocking gamma radiation.
I think far more significant in saving the other scientists was the inverse square law. The radiation energy falls off with the square of distance, so Slotin would have received a significantly higher dose just from being right next to it.
After reading the wiki, this is sort of macabre:
But why he no wear lead suit?
Given that it had already tasted human blood.
Why not use the shims designed for this instead of the tip of a screwdriver?
Save 30 seconds by not having to find the correct shims and just use your handy screwdriver.
What’s the worst that could happen?
Obviously to tickle the tail of a dragon, duh
a lead suit would have done fuckall in that situation
the amount of lead you can feasibly wear on your body can protect you from, say, dental X-rays, but not from research FAFO-grade gamma radiation
you need several inches of lead and/or tungsten for that kind of shielding. you might also need several feet of concrete if neutron radiation is involved
Lead is good for blocking alpha and beta radiation, but does not do that much against gamma, which was the main radiation he received, so yeah. Probably would not have saved him.
To be fair, human skin is good for blocking alpha radiation, that’s an extremely low bar.
the thickness of lead that would have been required would have prevented him from fucking around with the screwdriver in the first place because he wouldn’t have been able to reach the thing lol
A human body blocks more than several inches of lead? I need to rethink the design of my bunker.
Doing some quick math and numbers pulled from wikipedia, Lead is about 14-15x as effective by volume compared to water at blocking gamma radiation.
I think far more significant in saving the other scientists was the inverse square law. The radiation energy falls off with the square of distance, so Slotin would have received a significantly higher dose just from being right next to it.
I mean wasn’t the lead shell itself enough to stop it? How thick is the candy shell?
mr owl how many licks does it take to get to the center of the demon core??