Stream of Radioactivity ‘Slightly Above’ Normal Crossing U.S.

A stream of radioactivity “slightly above” normal levels is now moving across the United States, with small amounts of the particles emitted during the Soviet nuclear accident detected at high altitudes off the West Coast, U.S. officials said Monday.

The Environmental Protection Agency stepped up inspections of milk and rainwater, but officials continued to say they anticipate no risk to health “as of this time.” However, they added that they do not yet know whether precautions may be issued about the drinking of rainwater or milk.

Sheldon Meyers, director of radiation programs for the EPA, said a group headed by the Food and Drug Administration is trying to determine whether advisories should be issued.

‘Honestly Don’t Know’

“Hopefully, before tomorrow is out, we’ll have something to put out” on the question, Meyers said. “We honestly don’t know. The material could be so dissipated that when it does show here (on the ground), it will not be a problem at all. Whether a precaution will be issued about drinking water depends upon the levels found.”

U.S government aircraft detected “patches” of the radioactive cloud at altitudes of 18,000 feet and 30,000 feet off the Gulf of Alaska and the Washington and Oregon coasts over the weekend. A weather map shows one of the streams moving eastward across Northern California and into the Midwest.

In Berkeley, state Health Director Kenneth Kizer said that California has not experienced any detectable increase in radiation. “Even if there were radiation, it would not be at a level that would present any kind of danger,” Kizer said.

Another Over the Pacific

A lower-level, more concentrated radioactive cloud is still over the Pacific in the Northwest and probably will reach the United States in the “next couple of days,” an EPA spokesman said. He described as “remote” the possibility that health advisories would be issued.

EPA Administrator Lee M. Thomas, who called the radioactivity in the cloud patches already in the United States “slightly above background levels,” said the particles will be detected within days in U.S. rainwater. At present, he added, there doesn’t appear to be anything to indicate public health or environmental consequences.”

Winds blowing at 100 m.p.h. at jet stream levels brought “small amounts of radioactivity that mixed upward” across the Pacific Ocean from Japan, an EPA statement said.

Radioactivity Measure

The radioactivity in one of the patches over the United States was recorded at 2.5 picocuries per standard cubic meter, the other at 12 picocuries. Normal background level radiation can vary from 0 to 2 picocuries.

Meyers said the EPA has not yet received an analysis of the particles within the cloud patches and stressed that the government wishes to avoid “panic.”

“Most water supplies go through treatment plants, and even if iodine-131 (a particle resulting from the fallout) got into the water, it would be removed by carbon filters,” Meyers said. “The point is we don’t view that as a major problem.”

While scientists say radiation levels in Europe indicate profound problems for those exposed near the Chernobyl site, Dr. Henry Wagner, professor of Medicine and Radiology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, said Monday that the accident should produce no significant long-term health effects beyond the borders of the Soviet Union.

John M. Urbanchuk, an agriculture specialist with Wharton Econometric Forecasting Associates in Philadelphia, told a subcommittee of the Congressional Joint Economic Committee on Monday that the Soviets will probably have to increase their food imports of grain, vegetable oils, dairy products and meat over at least the next year because of the accident.