Sasha 5's Comments
I was skeptical at first, but it does appear to be true. However:
http://www.tpp89.ru/metropol/Personalnyi_cernobyl_anatoliy_bugorskogo.html
is a link to the Russian version of the story where some facts are provided (although some inconsistencies exist there as well)
In this case, the beam was deflected into a small branch for experiments in air (not in vacuum). The previous experiment was not at a high dose, therefore, according to the article, the door interlocks were turned off. (NOTE: door interlocks - are mechanisms that detected when the door is opened and shut off all system that are needed to systain beam in that branch). The warning lights were not flashing because a light bulb burned out. Anatoli called accelerator control to disable beam on that beamline in 5 minutes, but arrived a bit early. Lights were not flashing indicating the beam has been shutoff. Door interlocks were bypassed, so he entered the room. and bend down to check his equipment?
The beam was pencil-sharp (2.3 mm - diameter) and entered the back of the skull exiting around left front nostril. Lucky for him it did not go through any critical organs and was probably of a high energy, which also helped him not depositing all of its energy at the Bragg Peak. (Official quote from his medical records and handicap ID are provided in the article). He felt it immediately but, finished his job, made an entry in the log and went home. In the morning, he went to the hospital with a swollen side of the face. He is fully recovered (except for seizures) and has small spots on entrance and exit of the beam. It is unclear, though probably using the very chamber (dosimeter) he was working on, how do they know the precise dose deposited into him?
Another question: what was the energy of proton beam? At 70 MeV, the depth of the Bragg Peak (a spot where all protons release their energy) is at about 3cm. At 250, it is located at around 30cm deep in water equivalent. In other words, if the energy of the protons was higher than 250 MeV, most of the particles would just fly through his head with very little interactions. Anything less, the entire energy would be deposited somewhere inside his head.
http://www.tpp89.ru/metropol/Personalnyi_cernobyl_anatoliy_bugorskogo.html
is a link to the Russian version of the story where some facts are provided (although some inconsistencies exist there as well)
In this case, the beam was deflected into a small branch for experiments in air (not in vacuum). The previous experiment was not at a high dose, therefore, according to the article, the door interlocks were turned off. (NOTE: door interlocks - are mechanisms that detected when the door is opened and shut off all system that are needed to systain beam in that branch). The warning lights were not flashing because a light bulb burned out. Anatoli called accelerator control to disable beam on that beamline in 5 minutes, but arrived a bit early. Lights were not flashing indicating the beam has been shutoff. Door interlocks were bypassed, so he entered the room. and bend down to check his equipment?
The beam was pencil-sharp (2.3 mm - diameter) and entered the back of the skull exiting around left front nostril. Lucky for him it did not go through any critical organs and was probably of a high energy, which also helped him not depositing all of its energy at the Bragg Peak. (Official quote from his medical records and handicap ID are provided in the article). He felt it immediately but, finished his job, made an entry in the log and went home. In the morning, he went to the hospital with a swollen side of the face. He is fully recovered (except for seizures) and has small spots on entrance and exit of the beam. It is unclear, though probably using the very chamber (dosimeter) he was working on, how do they know the precise dose deposited into him?
Another question: what was the energy of proton beam? At 70 MeV, the depth of the Bragg Peak (a spot where all protons release their energy) is at about 3cm. At 250, it is located at around 30cm deep in water equivalent. In other words, if the energy of the protons was higher than 250 MeV, most of the particles would just fly through his head with very little interactions. Anything less, the entire energy would be deposited somewhere inside his head.
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Thank you. My question was not how to measure energy, but what energy proton beam actually hit Anatoli. I suspect, judging that the exit site of the beam is mentioned, the energy was higher than 250 MeV, otherwise the entire dose would have been deposited inside the skull, leading to a more devastating outcome.
FYI, beam energy can be measured in syncrotrons by detecting the frequency (number of times proton bucket is flying around the ring per second) and beam position within the beam pipe, to figure out the trajectory length of the bucket. Simple (quantum mechanics) math would than produce beam energy as accelerated.
The same article claims however, that the radiation he received was 200 000 rentgen at entrance and 300 000 rentgen at exit. Not sure how it ranslations to radiation dose in Gy. I agree, the dose of 5-6 Gy localized is not lethal.