Radon Gas in Caves Is there any Epidemiology within Cavers and Miners?

P

Prince of Darkness

Guest
Frank Brown of the Derbyshire Caving Club unfortunately died recently of lung cancer. He was a smoker and was fairly old but it did get me thinking about radon. As some of you may know Frank spent much of his later years digging in Nettle Pot. The environment down there iat the blind end of a series of deep shafts with little ventilation would be ideal for the accumulation of radon. The Block of limestone in which Nettle sits is known to be high in radon and I've seen some figures for some caves in the area which look high. The risks are not easily quantified but there is a possible case for saying that radon might have contributed to his illness. In the case of miners who spend far longer underground. cumulatively, it seems possible that active ventilation would disperse the gas. The normal situation in mines would be drilling which gives rise to high air flows, blasting and ventilation plus use of shafts, trains etc in material and personnel movement would prevail.

What do the panel think?
 

Johnny

New member
I do not know of any researched links between Radon and the death of cavers.

Its a subject that I have often pondered as I have known two cavers both of whome spent long periods underground, died of lung cancer and didn't smoke.

Peak Cavern seem worried enough to have installed ventilation into the cave.
 

graham

New member
I am reasonably certain that no-one has done a study of cavers and possible radon effects. Too many variables. If I were to contemplate such a thing I'd look at miners, as has been noted or, possibly more appropriate, show cave guides. My feeling on the latter is that they last for a hell of a long time.
 
P

Prince of Darkness

Guest
graham said:
I am reasonably certain that no-one has done a study of cavers and possible radon effects. Too many variables. If I were to conte,plate such a thing I'd look at miners, as has been noted or, possibly more appropriate, show cave guides. My feeling on the latter is that they last for a hell of a long time.
They might be in them for a long time but show caves are usually large open spaces with reasonable or good ventilation quite unlike the bottom of Nettle pot in a dig.
Would Peak Cavern be willing to disclose the reasoning behing their installation of ventilation. It must have been done on the recommendation of HSE, the local authority or a consultant of some kind.
 

nickwilliams

Well-known member
A lot of work was done on this (both from the recreational cavers' and the show caves' point of view) in the late 1980's and early 90's - you need to look up the work of the NCA Radon Working Party if you want to know more (although they did not have much to do with the show caves). I know that radon monitoring was done in at least one significant UK show cave over a period of several months. I don't know what the outcome was, but it is my understanding that ventilation shafts/routes were installed in most of the UK's show caves since otherwise the staff would have been subjected to radiation levels which would have brought them within the scope of the ionising radiation regulations.

I don't by any means want to prevent you from looking into this, but I would caution that it's a very considerable can of worms. I'm sure an enquiry with a sound scientific study in mind would be welcomed, but casual enquiries might get treated with a degree of short shrift. It was a fairly controversial topic at the time, as I recall!

One thing which I don't think has ever been done is a study of cavers and diggers who have spent a lot of time underground. I can think of three Derbyshire cavers who have died of lung cancers in the last few years, although they may well include the two who John mentions. I think there probably is interest in doing a proper epidemiological study of this, but it would not be a trivial task.

I can probably name names and places and find more details in my files if you would like to contact me by PM.

Nick.


 

mrodoc

Well-known member
Writing as a humble GP but one who took a back of fag packet look at the issue 20 years ago when it was a hot topic I feel vindicated on my views that it would take years to find out whether cavers were at risk from radon. the reasons are that cancer can take years to develop after exposure, that there aren't a lot of cavers so there won't be many cases and finally smokers should be excluded as radon and fags act synergistically to promote cancer. I reckoned you might see one or two deaths over a number of years that could be linked but proving the exposure to radon would be well nigh impossible. However the worrying demise of some cavers recently does make it likely that we are beginning to see the radon effect emerge.  However some intensive epidemiological work would need to be  done linking the cases with non caving non smoking controls etc etc. and I still think the numbers are likely to be too small to be statistically signficant.
 

Pete K

Well-known member
A number of Derbyshire caves and mines have radon sensors at the moment to try and ascertain which have high levels. I think it is a bigger threat to health than most give it credit for. We have monitoring at the centre I work at so no cave leader gets near the recomended limit over a year. If I understand correctly, in the right caves (Giants etc..), a frequent caver can receive a dose of radon higher than that of a nuclear tech. That can't be healthy. :alien:
 

SamT

Moderator
Yep, I lived in Castleton as a yoof and remember the Radon 'scare' of the 80's.

All homes in the village - including our 1960's bungalow that sat on the shale/clay side of the valley, had the little yellow plastic disc detectors in. They where sent of and analysed and as a result some homes had to have false floors put in and extractors/vents put in to extract the gas from the 'sump' under the floor. (mainly those homes sat on the bed rock around the entrance to the peak cavern gorge.)

I was working as a guide at Treak Cliff at the time, and remember that they had to start logging/monitoring times spent underground by full time staff (us weekend part timers were expendable).

I think as a result, Blue John Mine had extractor fans installed. Treak was considered OK due to the natural draughts. I don't think anything changed at speedwell (though that is the reason for the draught proof door at the bottom of JH, i.e. so that it doesn't affect the draughts and hence alter levels within the show cave area).

And Peak also had extractor fans fitted that pull air out via the Cave Dale cave entrance. This was also the reason that the show cave now terminates at the devils staircase, rather than at buxton water as it did when I were a lad. It was thought that Radon levels beyond that are too high for the full time guides to be exposed to over the course of the year.

As for Giants, if Im not mistaken, I think the Eating House was found to be the area of highest concentration which seems strange as I'd have thought it was perhaps one of the more draughty parts of the cave.

Am I also correct in thinking that it is not in fact the Radon gas itself that is the problem. (Radon being one of the Inert Noble Gases)



I think the 80's scare was caused by this...
[quote author=wikipedia]The danger of radon exposure in dwellings was discovered in 1984 when Stanley Watras, an employee at the Limerick nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania, set off the radiation alarms on his way to work for two weeks while authorities searched for the source of the contamination. They found that the source was high levels of radon ? about 100,000 Bq/m? (2,700 pCi/L) ? in his house's basement, and it was not related to the nuclear plant. The risks associated with living in his house were estimated to be equivalent to smoking 135 packs of cigarettes every day. Following this highly publicized event, national radon safety standards were set, and radon detection and ventilation became a standard homeowner concern. [/quote]

and just to put the willies up you

[quote author=wikipedia]Radon is a significant contaminant that affects indoor air quality worldwide. Radon gas from natural sources can accumulate in buildings and reportedly causes 21,000 lung cancer deaths per year in the United States alone.[1] Radon is the second most frequent cause of lung cancer, after cigarette smoking, and radon-induced lung cancer is thought to be the 6th leading cause of cancer death overall.[/quote]

funny how its all but forgotten - I wonder how many cavers that have recently (say in the last decade) taken up caving are even aware of Radon and its possible effect.
 

Christian_Chourot

New member
SamT said:
Am I also correct in thinking that it is not in fact the Radon gas itself that is the problem. (Radon being one of the Inert Noble Gases)

No. It's radioactive, the fact that it's inert doesn't matter, it's the alpha particles that it releases when it undergoes decay to polonium that ionise DNA and cause damage. So although you could say, ah, but it's the alpha particle that's the problem, that's like saying that uranium isn't harmful because it's the alpha particles that are released on decay that do the damage.

 
P

Prince of Darkness

Guest
mrodoc said:
Writing as a humble GP but one who took a back of fag packet look at the issue 20 years ago when it was a hot topic I feel vindicated on my views that it would take years to find out whether cavers were at risk from radon. the reasons are that cancer can take years to develop after exposure, that there aren't a lot of cavers so there won't be many cases and finally smokers should be excluded as radon and fags act synergistically to promote cancer. I reckoned you might see one or two deaths over a number of years that could be linked but proving the exposure to radon would be well nigh impossible. However the worrying demise of some cavers recently does make it likely that we are beginning to see the radon effect emerge.  However some intensive epidemiological work would need to be  done linking the cases with non caving non smoking controls etc etc. and I still think the numbers are likely to be too small to be statistically signficant.
I agree about the cancer synergy, smoking isn't particularly good for you, as we all know, but together with other factors then becomes (in my opinion) a much greater problem eg industrial dusts.
Barry Davies also of the Derbyshire Caving Club (Finder/digger of Rift Pot) also died of lung cancer a few years ago. He also smoked heavily and acquired histoplasmosis in Mexico, so lots of aggravating factors.
 

AndyF

New member
I'd put the risk of Radon just slighty above Bird Flu and just below Electricity Pylon Luekemia
 

SamT

Moderator
Im with andyF (despite my scare mongering)

I consider it on a par with not exposing ourselves to sunlight incase we get skin cancer.
 

dpegg

New member
AndyF said:
I'd put the risk of Radon just slighty above Bird Flu and just below Electricity Pylon Luekemia

I would have thought it was a bit more of a danger than bird flu or Electricity pylon luekemia which link is as tenuous as headaches and mobile phone masts... though given all the lovely calcite dust we cavers inhale as well as other external factors its probably the same risk of cancer as drinking the benzene in lilt...
 

nickwilliams

Well-known member
It's a problem everywhere, but it's a particular problem in Derbyshire since the shale band which is one of the significant controlling features of the geology in this part of the world contains a small amount of uranium.

Nick.
 

Brains

Well-known member
Problem is worldwide, "primary" source being from granite and secondary source from sediments derived from them, particularly clay minerals. Any low lying poorly ventilated enclosed space may well be vulnerable... :(
 

AndyF

New member
Peter Burgess said:

Ohhh I so wanted to avoid going off on one on this topic, but I just can't help myself....  ::)

I noted two bizarre claims in this document.

The first is that "low air pressure" results in radon being "drawn out" of the rock at a greater rate. This seems to me to be unlikely. Air Pressure is ALWAYS positive and ALWAYS around 14psi. It only varies slightly except at high altitude. At see level up to 1000m (the area of most caves) the variation is negligable, only around 10%.

Rock, on the other hand, does not have gas pressure (!) to any appreciable degree, and any radon gas atoms contained in it's crystaline structure formed by uranium decay will be independent of any external gas pressure. It's my assertion that this statement is utter tosh  ;)

The second point is the vague use of the term "minute radioactive particles" that are the result of radon decay. Well yes, Lead, Bismuthand Polonium are all solids, but just how big are these particles? Well, since Radon is a gas, a given atom of Radon will not generally be stuck to any other, i.e. all Radon atoms are free floating. When a given Radon atom decays, it can and will only produce a single atom of the daughter.

Thus these "minute particles" are in fact "single atoms" and thus will not exhibit particulate behaveiour. And the concept of a "partlcle" of radon daughter product getting stuck in your lung and emitting radiation is simplistic scaremongering. Its possible a single atom can get stuck, but then it can only emit (at worst) 4 alpha particles before becoming lead.... It then uses the alarming term of "up to 50% can be exhaled" Where does that figure come from? Lungs can exhale a lot more than that (think about tobacco smoke - thats particulate, 50% of smoke does not stay in peoples lungs each drag)

So I dislike the misleading term "minute particles" when we are talking single atoms....and it's not that the article is trying to explain to the layman, is it bangs on about half-life, isotpes and Mev, which lay-people aren't going to understand

GRRRR Typical "talk-up-the-problem-can-we-have-some-research-money" bo11ox IMHO

::) Let the flaming begin ...mwahahahahahh




 
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