Err, would I be right in thinking that this might be a uranium mine? or am I not reading the sign right?

Photograph:

🔗Kletno-Other-Rock-Mine-Archive-Album-Image-001[linkphoto]Kletno-Other-Rock-Mine-Archive-Album-Image-001[/linkphoto][/link]

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Indeed, the sign does sort-of suggest that it might be a uranium mine! 😮

They have a website at this http://www.kletno.pl/ . My Polish is non-existent, but if you look in the photo gallery there's a very good cross-section of the workings.

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Yep.

There is one in cornwall where uranium was in a lode (quite rare)

South Terras. Very serious levels of radiation.

http://www.dangerouslaboratories.org/rcw3.html 

This is very very interesting indeed

http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=MThTPx8TdAgC&pg=RA1-PA68&lpg=RA1-PA68&dq=south+terras+adit&source=web&ots=eOZdpvbhRB&sig=M_o3q4m74XHfFfEkAsgjo0t90w0&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=2&ct=result#PRA1-PA96,M1 

Indeed, the sign does sort-of suggest that it might be a uranium mine! 😮

They have a website at this http://www.kletno.pl/ . My Polish is non-existent, but if you look in the photo gallery there's a very good cross-section of the workings.

APs description might be a clue as well. 😉

Uranium mine opened by Russians during occupation as a source of material for their nuclear weapons. They used Polish labour who worked unprotected and without knowledge of the dangers. They are now all dead ! Now converted into a museum mine. Visited by a group from Ireland and Shropshire in 2005

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Yes, it is a Uranium Mine open to the public. The Uranium to send to Russian to make a bomb 😉

The Tourist section is only 200 yards long. It is claimed that there is no danger of radiation.

I also believe that pigs can fly.

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Very rough translation:

The Uranium Mine is located on the northern slope Zmijowca in the Massif Snieznika.. It operated in the years 1948-1953, using, among others many tunnels.. Several medieval tunnels, which was conducted in the past mining for iron, silver and copper.

The mine consists of 20 passages on 3 levels, and the total length of the mine is more than 37 km. A total of 20 tonnes uranium ore were extracted.

The Show Mine t No. 18 is on the road from Kletno with Sienna. . It constitutes a system of isolated mines located in the north-east, the uppermost part of the mine. Here you can see many instances of local attractively illuminated minerals (fluorspar, amethyst, quartz and others).. Length of excavations made available to the public approximately 200 m-long. The passage is 1,5-2 m wide and 1.7-to more than 2 m high.

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Thanks rhychydwr!

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I've always wondered how they go about mining heavy metals like this, can anyone tell me? I mean, do they just go in and mine the ore in the same way as they would in say lead mines or whatever or do they have to wear special protective equipment?

Generally they use liittle protection, as a result a lot of Uranium mines tend to be in undeveloped countries where health & safety issues aren't quite so paramount!

I've always wondered how they go about mining heavy metals like this, can anyone tell me? I mean, do they just go in and mine the ore in the same way as they would in say lead mines or whatever or do they have to wear special protective equipment?

Big fans

lead pants??

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This is well worth a read:-

http://www.aarst.org/proceedings/2001/2001_07_Two_Abandoned_Metalliferous_Mines_in_Devon_and_Cornwall_UK_Radon_Hazards_and_Geology.pdf 

If someone has the Old Gunnislake radon paper in full, I'd like to read it.

Stu

http://www.aarst.org/proceedings/2001/2001_07_Two_Abandoned_Metalliferous_ 

Mines_in_Devon_and_Cornwall_UK_Radon_Hazards_and_Geology.pdf

Stick the 2 bits together so there is no gap.

If you're interested in your own health regarding radiation, here is a good start.

Reading that article makes me wonder. I had a kidney removed due to cancer in 2001, and a minor basal cell carcinoma on the face removed this year. The article says that both can be due to radon.

But most of my time underground has been in Scotland, with some at Dyliffe, and maybe a few minutes here and there in some Cornish adits, including one on Kit Hill and some on the coast. I don't imagine the radon level is significant in Craigend limestone mine, for example, but it may possibly be along the Ochil Fault (Blairlogie, Carnaughton Glen, Silver Glen etc) and possibly at Leadhills/Wanlockhead where I have spent considerable time in the late 1960s in some workings which are now inaccessible.

I guess we need to be careful, and it would be useful if people with suitable equipment did check out as many mines as possible. In particular, anyone going to Tyndrum/Cononish would be well advised to check for radon, as there is definitely uranium in the area.

But as we saw the other day in Edinburgh, gas is a more immediate hazard in many cases. I never go near old coal mines for that reason, even though I know where there are some still accessible.

He doesn't go into the factors about why radon progeny cause cancer in detail. Obviously, skin varies from person to person and hard UV is probably as responsible for skin cancer as radon induced tumours. I expect that the data concerning this is a bit shaky.

The only way to find out is to take a geiger counter with you. If you have a look at the other figures, you can have some pretty big doses and not really increase your cancer risk by much. Having said, one molecule of benzene or a stray alpha particle are all it takes. I suppose it's all about probability.

From other reading I've done, you don't want Radon in your eyes or lungs. So goggles and air tanks if you don't want to be really exposing yourself.

From a statistics point of view, I recall that going in Old Gunnislake Mine for an hour was the equivalent of smoking about 10 packets of fags. Something like that, anyway....

As far as I'm aware scientific studies have found no statistical connection between cancers, other than of course lung cancer.
Next to smoking, radon is the second leading cause of lung cancer in the US where it estimated that twenty thousand lung cancer deaths are caused each year by Radon.

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All very interesting, and no-one can predict what the statistics will do to any individual. I agree that UV is often to blame.

I do have a geiger counter somewhere, but it only detects gamma, and to an extent, beta radiation. An alpha detector, which is what I think is needed here, is slightly more difficult. I think that solid state alpha detectors do exist, and will investigate and post something here once I have the facts.

It would be nice to find something robust and inexpensive that would do the job, especially if it could be incorporated into the same device as a gas detector.

Of course alpha radiation isn't dangerous unless it gains access to the body through food or inhalation. In solid matter the alpha particles only travel a few hundreds of a mm. Perhaps a Radon detector might be more usefull.

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The problem is that Radon does emit alphas, and its daughter product Polonium is even worse. So in the lungs they are very bad. But you can hold a powerful alpha emitter in your hand without suffering any damage at all, because as you suggest, the alphas will be stopped by the outer layer of the skin, which is regularly replaced anyway.

But to detect Radon, there are several ways, an alpha detector is probably the most likely to be easily portable. Ideally a mass spectrometer would be useful. as it would detect other toxic gases such as H2S, but I doubt that Radon would be in sufficient concentration to register on it.

I am looking into detectors right now.....

To detect alpha, you need a mica window tube. That's as light as they get.

For gases, you either need quantitative IR spectroscopy (which is bulky, and if minaturised would cost a fortune) or the existing electrochemical sensors.

With mass spec, you would be dragging around some equipment. I would say a headgear and wire rope would be better than SRT!

You either drag around a 60's geiger counter and a miners lamp or you pay and pay bigtime.

I'd ideally like a way of monitoring low oxygen with more ease.

gedon