Russian Port Officials Find Radioactive Truck on K-Line RoRo

By Shubin Aleksey Andreyevich,

The Panamanian-flagged car carrier MALACCA HIGHWAY was held up at the port of Vladivostock on 11 September after customs officials found one of the trucks on board was radioactive.

The ship was carrying a cargo of second-hand cars and trucks from Japan and a Mitsubishi Pajero was found to be emitting ionizing radiation 26 times greater than the value of natural background radiation.

The equivalent dose rate of gamma radiation on the body surface was 1.28 mc Sv/h as compared to the natural background radiation of 0.05 mSv/h. Furthermore, customs officials note the presence of beta-active radionuclide contamination of the product’s surface, which ranged from 68 to 211 ppm / cm × min.

Since the beginning of 2014 the customs authorities of the Far Eastern Customs Administration revealed 58 radioactive facilities have arrived from Japan consisting primarily of used cars and parts. From them 53 objects were banned by Rospotrebnadzor from being imported into the territory of the Customs Union.

Since the meltdown at Fukushima-1, Far Eastern customs officers have detected 1,161 radioactive items at port control locations, 916 of which have been refused entry.

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