Two men arrested with 7 kg radioactive uranium in Mumbai | Hacker News Reader

Two men arrested with 7 kg radioactive uranium in Mumbai

indiatoday.in

85 pointsxbmcuser54 comments

This is fear mongering worthy of "Fox News" here in the US.

Uranium is about $30/pound... and 7kg is about 15 pounds.. so $450 of uranium?

Source: https://ycharts.com/indicators/uranium_spot_price#:~:text=Ur....

Uranium is toxic, and burns, but it's not a high explosive, just something you don't want to ingest or inhale, lest you get heavy metal poisoning, and an increased risk of cancer.

[Addendum] Long ago I was talking with colleagues who worked at a Nuclear Power Plant, they described the inbound fuel shipments as something you could camp on top of.

Also: It takes the resources of a nation state to separate vast quantities of natural uranium into U-235 or other pure isotopes.

but article mentions it's worth ₹21 crore (2.8 million USD). If only these news media were little bit more curious, BARC would not hesitate in giving details,

> and burns

Do you mean it is flammable, or that it damages tissue as an acid would? I don't believe either is the case. It's not something in the form of dust you would want to inhale, but clothing and skin would stop anything unenriched uranium would produce.

Uranium is pyrophoric when finely divided.

So are many metals. But in lump form, few are.

Uranium metal and uranium dioxide are listed as pyrophoric when in "fine powder form"

"Indeed, according to one author, normally stable UO2 may be pyrophoric or oxidize rapidly even at room temperatures when in very fine powder form (specific surface area >10 sq.m/g). Coarser powders, as is more commonly the case, may require elevated temperatures (>300 C) to oxidize.

Cordfunke, E.H.P., The Chemistry of Uranium, Elsevier Publishing Company, 1969. "

https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/gen-comm/info...

SDS: https://www.energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2020/11/f80/SDS-Uran...

You could make a really stupid fire starter stick out of it, scrape with a knife and toxic sparks are now in the air.

Fearmongering nonsense. This was natural uranium ore, not explosive, not highly radioactive, not dangerous, cannot realistically be used for any nefarious purpose.

This was a scrap dealer trying to make a little money in hard times. There is absolutely nothing to see here except the profound stupidity of humans over-reacting to something they know nothing about. Move along.

That's interesting that it was exactly 7kg. Maybe they read this document first:

(§ 40.22 Small quantities of source material.) https://www.nrc.gov/reading-rm/doc-collections/cfr/part040/p...

"(a) A general license is hereby issued authorizing commercial and industrial firms; research, educational, and medical institutions; and Federal, State, and local government agencies to receive, possess, use, and transfer uranium and thorium, in their natural isotopic concentrations and in the form of depleted uranium, for research, development, educational, commercial, or operational purposes in the following forms and quantities:

... (2) No more than a total of 7 kg (15.4 lb) of uranium and thorium at any one time...

Wrong country.

Perhaps it was bound for the USA eventually though?

The article does not even say what the ratios of the isotopes are. If it was depleted or uranium with an unenriched amount aka natural amount of trace U-235. Its not really any problem. Heck they make boat keels out of depleted uranium.

This article says it's 'natural uranium' https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/finance/news/two-arrested-7kg-n...

If its natural why are we arresting people for 7kg. 7kg of unenriched uranium is nothing to worry about. If they had many tons and were planning on enriching then maybe be concerned.

Anti-terror squad needs something to do.

This was my question as well; according to some other articles it was "natural uranium"[1]. This also isn't the first time, it happened in 2016 as well.[2]

[1]: https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/mumbai/mumbai-two-h...

[2]: https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/mumbai/two-held-wit...

> The uranium was seized and was sent to BARC in Mumbai for analysis. A report was received that the substance is Natural Uranium, which is highly radioactive and dangerous to human life.

Article does not mention those details but if BARC has concluded that it was radioactive then it most definitely is radioactive.

Right but lots of things are radioactive. The point is that the headline might give the impression that this could have been used to make a bomb or something. If it was natural uranium 7kg is peanuts. You need tons and tons to get enough fissionable material for one bomb.

The radioactivity even from enriched uranium is not much of a concern. Take a look at the half life U-238 and U-235

Uranium has no stable isotopes. Some are more radioactive than others, but ‘radioactive’ uranium is a redundant term.

Bananas are radioactive. The ground under your house is probably radioactive. Saying something is radioactive is meaningless without saying _how_ radioactive it is.

Check out this website where you can order 99% U235! So it might not even be possible to enrich uranium to the point where it spontaneously...fissures. https://www.isotopes.gov/products/Uranium

Interesting how confidently they describe uranium as "highly explosive". I'm about 99% sure that isn't true.

Well U metal can oxidize so I guess if you made it into a powder it could react violently???

But no, 7Kg of natural U is not “highly explosive”.

A report was received that the substance is Natural Uranium, which is highly radioactive and dangerous to human life.

Right. Ordering info from United Nuclear for uranium metal: "Caution: Use normal safety precautions (wear a filter mask/respirator and gloves) when working with Uranium metal. Accidental inhalation or ingestion of Uranium particles can be dangerous. Machining will produce particles that can spontaneously ignite producing radioactive smoke. Note: adult signature required upon delivery."

If you want some uranium ore, it's on Amazon.[1]

Meanwhile, Uranium Energy Corporation purchased 2,105,000 pounds of uranium oxide, which they are stockpiling as an investment.[2]

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Images-SI-Uranium-Ore/dp/B000796XXM

[2] https://markets.businessinsider.com/news/stocks/uranium-ener...

I can't tell from the article if this is enriched uranium (which would be really scary), or just uranium as it comes out of the ground (which would be much less scary, although still not great).

I wonder if unenriched but still radioactive uranium chucked inside a conventional explosive bomb would be as scary as that sounds to me.

Pretty sure they call that a dirty bomb.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dirty_bomb

Not really. Basically just slightly scarier than the bomb itself.

It's not an effective terrorist strategy, since slightly raising cancer risk over a long period of time is one of the least dramatic and fear inspiring things.

The really dangerous stuff they don't seem to do, like lighting the forests on fire at the height of fire season, or engineering an airborne pandemic. Thankfully.

You would be in more danger from the Uranium acting as a heavy metal ion poison than from radiation.

Breathing fine powders of metal ions is generally unwise--radioactive or no.

> The uranium was seized and was sent to BARC in Mumbai for analysis. A report was received that the substance is Natural Uranium, which is highly radioactive and dangerous to human life.

They are saying its natural Uranium.

So 7kg natural uranium is not something you want in your pocket, but not such a big deal either.

The main reason not to put it in your pocket is that it'll pull your pants down uncomfortably. You don't want to grind it into a fine powder and breathe that in, or ingest it, but the toxicity is a bigger threat than the radioactivity.

"Natural Uranium" in solid form isn't really what I would call "highly reactive and dangerous to human life", so I don't find this statement to be that definitive.

"While the CDC has published one study that no human cancer has been seen as a result of exposure to natural or depleted uranium" -- wikipedia article on uranium.

I got excited at first and worried about the enrichment. The article mentions its natural uranium at some point.

Its really not that scary after all. Id be more scared with the security implications of 7Kg of fentanyl than natural U.

It's natural Uranium. "Highly explosive and radioactive" is just sensation seeking news. Naturally occuring Radon-222 which is also an alpha emitter with a half life of 3.8 days instead of 4.68·10e9 years is a lot more radioactive than Uranium-238. It's still a toxic heavy metal.

I love how it’s described as “highly explosive”

This seems dumb exaggeration. I assume 'natural uranium' refers to ore which is not particularly radioactive nor dangerous.

It certainly isn't explosive, you can buy it on ebay.

Yeah, but 7kg of ore wouldn’t cost $1.5 million.

That's more like the price of highly enriched uranium (weapons grade). Reactor uranium is nowhere near that expensive, and of course neither is natural uranium. Maybe the police used the highest price they could find for the charge and leave it to the defendants to argue that it's incorrect.

You can use the ore to produce potent sources for calibration and such. As it is though, this seems like an overreaction.

Radon detector / Alpha-beta radiation source. https://fusor.net/board/viewtopic.php?t=9166

So they found some guys selling uranium ore - if you could build a bomb with that, they would have done that back in Rome.

The clown posse photo fits perfectly, then - a bunch of tourists presenting their latest costumed catch, complete with the obligatory nose sticking out of a mask.

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/mumbai/mumbai-nia-c... It was "Natural Uranium" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_uranium worth $2.9 million USD.

Despite the headline Coronavirus is the biggest threat to India now.

If you want to learn more about Uranium, this recent podcast was pretty good: https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-stuff-you-should-know-269...

This would be news if they'd somehow managed to make non-radioactive uranium. ALL naturally occuring uranium isotopes are radioactive. A stable (synthetic) isotope would be big news, and the existence of a process to get 7kg of such would be huge!

Sadly that's not what this is. This is just overzealous policing.

crore is 10,000,000 -> with the current exchange rate of 21.00 INR = 0.29 USD -> value of the Uranium is $USD 2.9Mil

To put that in perspective, $2.9M in uranium is nearly 50 tons of "yellowcake", aka U₃O₈.

But! It takes ~780 lbs of uranium ore to produce one pound of yellowcake (worth about $30).

So $2.9M in uranium ore is about 39,000 tons. Is that a lot?

Well, it's about 0.02% of Cameco's proven reserves, but a little much to casually walk out with.

Sources:

https://www.cameco.com/businesses/uranium-operations/canada/...

https://tradingeconomics.com/commodity/uranium

Huge difference between naturally occurring (mildly radioactive but not explosive) uranium and highly-enriched uranium (highly radioactive and potentially explosive) this article makes no distinction.

And the perpetrator's name is conveniently "Abu Tahir"

as per reddit, it was just unenriched U ore

I know nothing but what I can google, but ore must be worth like 4 cents a pound. So the estimate of value is odd.

Uranium isn't highly explosive.

Holy sheet

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