Are there any concerns over possible radiation in Automobiles/Parts from Japan?

[Mac McQuinn]

With the tragedy in Japan, Are there any concerns regarding possible Radiation contamination of automobiles and parts from Japan? Is this monitored at customs/port of entry? Considering the amount of automobiles entering the US & Canada along with parts support for the U.S. & Canadian based automobile manufacturers, is this a potential risk?

Mac

[ray hampton]

you are concern so I will say YES but I am more concern for the auto maker and for the ship crew that haul the auto to the U S ports

[Callan Campbell]

Yes, we have a restricted order list that requires those parts to be scanned for possible radiation . It slows the ordering process whenever we need a part off this list. What I don't know is how long the special check stays in place. Like, how long could this go on. Most of the stuff is electronic, but some stuff is just normal hard part items.

[Keith Outten]

You would probably be amazed at the contamination that is being spread by birds for miles and miles from those power plants. Secondly there are mice and rats and other little creatures that walk right through the security fences and then back outside spreading the stuff all over the place. The same thing happens around just about all nuclear plants to some extent.
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[Joe Pelonio]

Hondas and Toyotas are still selling like hotcakes, so I would say that many people are not concerned.

We do test everything coming in for radiation at all the container terminals. I accidentally drove through one last year and the DOE people were not happy.

[curtis rosche]

i dont think that any item you buy could absorb enough radiation to make it harmful and i would doubt the half-life of a "second-hand material" to be long enough to cause harm

[Bryan Morgan]

You would probably be amazed at the contamination that is being spread by birds for miles and miles from those power plants. Secondly there are mice and rats and other little creatures that walk right through the security fences and then back outside spreading the stuff all over the place. The same thing happens around just about all nuclear plants to some extent..

This would be more my concern... animals rather than inanimate objects. We've all seen the Godzilla movies, we know how this works...

:D

[Dan Hintz]

i dont think that any item you buy could absorb enough radiation to make it harmful and i would doubt the half-life of a "second-hand material" to be long enough to cause harm
The first part is true... no absorption possible as it's not a biologic. The second part, however, is not true... the half-life of most of those materials is measured in centuries and millennia. The biggest danger would be from contaminated material either being used in the manufacture of a product or contaminated dust ending up on/in the product after manufacture. The latter is the more likely this early in the game.

[Keith Outten]

An alpha emitter, although it cannot pass through a couple layers of skin, if ingested can be very dangerous or fatal depending on the isotope.
Beta emitting isotopes can penetrate thin aluminum however they are less hazardous generally speaking.
Gamma emitting isotopes are very high energy emitters almost identical to X-Rays, the only difference is the source.

Because alpha emitting isotopes have very low energy they would be the most difficult to detect, these are the ones that would worry me. You could scan a container all day long and not be able to detect any activity unless you were in direct contact and your meter was set to its lowest setting.

The half-life of any isotope can never be altered outside of a high tech facility. Depending on the isotope it can be seconds or centuries. You could spend years sitting on a cushion that was contaminated and not no it was there. Dust that contained low levels of alpha emitting isotopes could be missed and probably wouldn't be a problem until you vacumed the carpet or trunk space. Your vacuum cleaner filter would most likely pass enough of the material for you to ingest.

There are risks we all take every day from lots of sources.
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[David Weaver]

Ingestion would be my concern, also. And cesium, if anything. It would have to be some bad luck to get enough iodine, unless you were very young (the - possibly incomplete - reports from chernobyl show iodine having a smaller than expected effect on adults, IIRC, but a very significant effect on children).

I've thought about this with tools, too. I got a couple from tokyo not long after the disaster, and I haven't them yet. Before I do, I will probably scrub them. Very likely not necessary at all, but no great reason not to do it as it won't hurt them.

[Myk Rian]

Do any of you remember the 40s, 50s, and 60s?
We already poisoned our country/world with open air nuclear tests, so don't worry about it.

[Ron Conlon]

This would be more my concern... animals rather than inanimate objects. We've all seen the Godzilla movies, we know how this works...

:D

Hmm.. Mousezilla just does not have the same cachet.

[Brian Vaughn]

When Chernobyll happened, we figured it out before it was announced, because people at nuclear plants were setting off contamination detectors when they were first getting to work...so far, we have not seen the same thing. While there has been some contamination spread around Japan, honestly, you're probably in more danger from Radon in your house or place of work, or like Myk said, in decades old contamination from some of our old testing in this country.

Anything coming into the country is monitored, and checked for radiation, and especially now, with what happened, you can bet the checking will be extra careful.

[Eduard Nemirovsky]

In Russia they just checked pumpers for children recently, and discover high normal level of Iodine, but Cesium and other elements in normal ( according to russian standards) range. Knowing that Iodine half-life 2 weeks, those pumpers where contaminated in just a few weeks from checking!!!
I am not sure that every object coming from Japan going thorough test for radiation, I just can safely assume that most or part of the import are contaminated.
Do I worry - not at all. We did a lot of damage here and there before Japan happened.
Ed.

[David Weaver]

What are pumpers?

[Russ Filtz]

The only way physical objects can be made radioactive is if something radioactive is coating it from the blasts or neutron activation (i.e. high energy neutrons get absorbed by the atoms of the material itself). I'd say the risk is pretty low unless the car parts were being manufactured inside the nuke plant.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_radioactivity

[Eduard Nemirovsky]

sorry pumpers are diapers for children

[Bryan Morgan]

Hmm.. Mousezilla just does not have the same cachet.

Oh sure laugh now but don't come crying to me when your neighbors chihuahua you would otherwise punt out of the way comes and steps on your house and eats your car... :D

[Karl Card]

I cant say that I would not worry at all but at the same time look at all the things around us that can cause cancer etc.. Cell phones for one. It seems that a report comes out and the report says that it is possible that cell phones can cause cancer, then you hear a different story. With being exposed to ham radio, cb radio and the such I know they can help cause cancer by being exposed to the transmission waves, I myself figure a cell phones does also. Just different power. I used to run about 2000 watts on a big tube type linear, kept my radio room warm in the winter...