Goiânia accident

The radiation source in the Goiânia accident was a small capsule containing about of highly radioactive caesium chloride (a caesium salt) made with the radioactive isotope caesium-137, and encased in a shielding canister made of lead and steel. The source was positioned in a container of the wheel type, where the wheel turns inside the casing to move the source between the storage and irradiation positions. to focus the radiation into a narrow beam. The caesium chloride radioactive source is the blue rectangle, and gamma rays are represented by the beam emerging from the aperture. The activity of the source was 74 terabecquerels (TBq) in 1971. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) describes the container as an "international standard capsule". It was 51 millimeters (2 inches) in diameter and 48 mm (1.8 inches) long. The specific activity of the active solid was about 814 TBq·kg−1 of caesium-137, an isotope whose half life is 30 years. The dose rate at one meter from the source was 4.56 grays per hour (456 rad·h−1) – more than the median lethal dose of 4 grays. While the serial number of the device was unknown, hindering the ability to verify its identity, the device was thought to have been made in the U.S. at Oak Ridge National Laboratory as a radiation source for radiation therapy at the Goiânia hospital. The IAEA states that the source contained when it was taken and that about of contamination had been recovered during the cleanup operation. This means that remained in the environment; it would have decayed to about by 2016. == Events ==

The (IGR), a private radiotherapy institute in Goiânia, The fate of the abandoned site was disputed in court between IGR and the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul, then owner of the premises. On September 11, 1986, the Court of Goiás stated it (the Court) had knowledge of the abandoned radioactive material in the building. Meanwhile, the owners of IGR wrote several letters to the National Nuclear Energy Commission (CNEN), warning them about the danger of keeping a teletherapy unit at an abandoned site, but they could not remove the equipment on their own once a court order prevented them from doing so. On September 15, Pereira visited a local clinic, where he was diagnosed with a foodborne illness; he was told to return home and rest. Interaction with cesium On September 16, Roberto punctured the cesium capsule's aperture window with a screwdriver, allowing him to see a deep blue light coming from the tiny opening he had created. while sitting on the floor. She was also fascinated by the blue glow of the powder, applying it to her body and showing it off to her mother. The egg was also exposed to dust from the powder; Leide absorbed 1.0 GBq and received a total dose of 6.0 Gy, a fatal dose for which medical intervention was ineffective. Leide's mother, Lurdes Ferreira, also got sick from the radiation. Maria Gabriela Ferreira had been the first to notice that many people around her had become severely ill at the same time. On September 28, 1987 – fifteen days after the item was found – she reclaimed the materials from the rival scrapyard and transported them to a hospital. In the morning of September 29, a visiting medical physicist used a scintillation counter to confirm the presence of radioactivity and persuaded the authorities to take immediate action. The city, state, and national governments were all aware of the incident by the end of the day. == Health outcomes ==

News of the radiation incident was broadcast on local, national, and international media. Within days, nearly 130,000 people in Goiânia flooded local hospitals, concerned that they might have been exposed. • Admilson Alves de Souza, aged 18 (5.3 Gy), was an employee of Devair Ferreira who worked on the radioactive source. He developed lung damage, internal bleeding, and heart damage, and died October 28, 1987. • Leide das Neves Ferreira, aged 6 (6.0 Gy), was the daughter of Ivo Ferreira. When an international team arrived to treat her, she was discovered confined to an isolated room in the hospital because the staff were afraid to go near her. She gradually experienced swelling in the upper body, hair loss, kidney and lung damage, and internal bleeding. She died on October 23, 1987, of "septicemia and generalized infection" at the Marcilio Dias Navy Hospital, in Rio de Janeiro. She was buried in a common cemetery in Goiânia, in a special fiberglass coffin lined with lead to prevent the spread of radiation. Despite these measures, news of her impending burial caused a riot of more than 2,000 people in the cemetery on the day of her burial due to fear and disinformation about the bodies possibly contaminating the area. Rioters tried to prevent her burial by using stones and bricks to block the cemetery roadway. She was buried despite the protestors' interference. • Maria Gabriela Ferreira, a 37-year-old woman (5.7 Gy), was the wife of scrapyard owner Devair Ferreira and who turned the material over to the authorities. She became sick about three days after coming into contact with the substance. Her condition worsened, and she developed hair loss and internal bleeding, especially of the limbs, eyes, and digestive tract. She suffered mental confusion, diarrhea, and acute renal insufficiency before dying on October 23, 1987, the same day as her niece, of "septicemia and generalized infection", about a month after exposure. • Israel Batista dos Santos, aged 22 (4.5 Gy), was also an employee of Devair Ferreira who worked on the radioactive source primarily to extract the lead. He developed serious respiratory and lymphatic complications, was eventually admitted to the hospital, and died six days later on October 27, 1987. Devair Ferreira survived despite receiving 7 Gy of radiation. He died in 1994 of cirrhosis aggravated by depression and binge drinking. Ivo Ferreira died of emphysema in 2003. The outcomes for the 46 most contaminated people are shown in the bar chart below. Several people survived high doses of radiation. This is thought in some cases to be because the dose was fractionated. If the dose is spread over a long time period, these mechanisms can mitigate the effects of radiation poisoning.). A thousand people were identified as having suffered a dose which was greater than one year of background radiation; it is thought that 97% of these people had a dose of between 10 and 200 mSv (between 1 in 1,000 and 1 in 50 excess risk of developing cancer as a result The mortality from pancreatic cancer in the Central-Western region of Brasil, which includes Goiás with Goiânia, has seen higher mortality rates than other areas of the country. == Legal matters ==

In addition to a public civil action for damages to the environment that was brought in September 1995 by the Federal Public Prosecution Service (Department of Justice), together with the State of Goiás’s Public Prosecution Service, before the 8th Federal Court of Goiânia, legal proceedings were also brought against the Federal Union; the National Nuclear Energy Commission; the State of Goiás (through its Health Department); the Social Security Institute for Civil Servants in the State of Goiás – IPASGO, which at the time of the accident was the private owner of the land where the IGR was located; the four medical doctors who owned IGR; and the clinic’s physicist, who was also the supervisor. On March 17, 2000, the 8th Federal Court of Goiás ordered the defendants to pay compensation of R$1.3 million (near US$750,000) to the Defence of the Diffused Rights Fund, a federal fund for the compensation of damage to the environment, consumers, property and rights of artistic, historic, or cultural value and other collective rights. In his sentence, the judge excluded the state of Goiás and the Federal Union from the payment of compensation. The CNEN was ordered to pay compensation of R$1 million, to guarantee medical and psychological treatment for the direct and indirect victims of the accident and their descendants down to the third generation, to provide transportation to medical exams for the most serious victims, and was responsible for the medical follow-up for the people of Abadia de Goiás city. The Social Security Institute for Civil Servants in the State of Goiás, IPASGO, was ordered to pay a fine of R$100,000, plus interest as of 13 September 1987, the date of removal of the caesium-137 capsule. As the accidents occurred before the promulgation of the Federal Constitution of 1988 and because the substance was acquired by the clinic and not by the individual owners, the court could not declare the owners of IGR liable. However, one of the owners was fined R$100,000 because he was found liable for the abandoned state of the IGR building where the caesium source was kept, including the removal of gates, windows, timberwork and the roof in May 1987. The clinic's physicist was also fined R$100,000 because he was the technician responsible for the control of the medical manipulation of the radiological device. Although the two thieves were not included as defendants in the public civil suit, the judgement of the court found them directly responsible for the accident. If they had been arraigned as defendants, they certainly would have been convicted, as their actions led to strict (no-fault) liability. However, in terms of criminal intent, they were not aware of the seriousness of their actions in removing the caesium source from its location, and they had no knowledge of the dangers of the radiological device; moreover, there was no danger sign erected in the abandoned clinic in order to ward off intruders. == Cleanup ==

Topsoil had to be removed from several sites, and several houses were demolished. All the objects from within those houses were removed and examined. Those that were found to be free of radioactivity were wrapped in plastic bags, while those that were contaminated were either decontaminated or disposed of as waste. In industry, the choice between decontaminating or disposing objects is based on only the economic value of the object and the ease of decontamination. In this case, the IAEA recognized that to reduce the psychological impact of the event, greater effort should have been taken to clean up items of personal value, such as jewelry and photographs. It is not clear from the IAEA report to what degree this was practiced. After the houses were emptied, vacuum cleaners were used to remove dust, and plumbing was examined for radioactivity. Painted surfaces could be scraped, while floors were treated with acid and Prussian blue mixtures. Roofs were vacuumed and hosed, but two houses had to have their roofs removed. The waste from the cleanup was moved out of the city to a remote place for storage. Aeroradiometric operations were undertaken by low-altitude survey, which was carried out over Goiânia. The radiometric equipment and materials available at the IRD were quickly transported and mounted on a Eurocopter AS350 Écureuil helicopter provided by the police of the state of Goiás. Potassium alum dissolved in hydrochloric acid was used on clay, concrete, soil, and roofs. Caesium has a high affinity for many clays. Organic solvents, followed by potassium alum dissolved in hydrochloric acid, were used to treat waxed/greased floors and tables. Sodium hydroxide solutions, also followed by dissolved potassium alum, were used to treat synthetic floors, machines and typewriters. Prussian blue was used to internally decontaminate many people, although by the time it was applied, much of the radioactive material had already migrated from the bloodstream to muscle tissue, greatly hampering its effectiveness. Urine from victims was treated with ion-exchange resin to compact the waste for ease of storage. The cleanup operation was much harder for this event than it could have been because the source was opened and the active material was water-soluble. A sealed source need only be picked up, placed in a lead container, and transported to the radioactive waste storage. In the recovery of lost sources, the IAEA recommends careful planning and using a crane or other device to place shielding (such as a pallet of bricks or a concrete block) near the source to protect recovery workers. Contamination locations The Goiânia accident spread significant radioactive contamination throughout the Aeroporto, Central, and Ferroviários districts. Even after the cleanup, 7 TBq of radioactivity remained unaccounted for. Some of the key contamination sites: • '''Goiânia's (IGR)''' (), with the previous site having been replaced around 2000 with the modernized (Goiânia Convention Center). • '''Roberto dos Santos's house''' () • Three buses • Forty-two houses • Fourteen cars • Five pigs • Fifty thousand rolls of toilet paper == Legacy ==

The original teletherapy capsule was taken by the Brazilian Army, and since the empty capsule has been on display at the ("Specialized Instruction School") in Realengo, Rio de Janeiro as a memento to those who participated in the decontamination of the area. In 1991, a group of researchers collected blood samples from highly exposed survivors of the incident. Subsequent analysis resulted in the publication of numerous scientific articles. Many of the radioactive substances were cleared after testing. Banned products from Goiânia created a public outcry, citing unjust discrimination. The state government of Goiás established the in February 1988, both to study the extent of contamination of the population as a result of the incident and to render aid to those affected. In popular culture A 1990 film, (Caesium-137 – The Nightmare of Goiânia), a dramatisation of the incident, was made by Roberto Pires. It won several awards at the 1990 Festival de Brasília. Cesium Fallout, a 2024 Hong Kong disaster thriller film, was partially inspired by the Goiânia accident. In Liliana Colanzi's short story collection You Glow In The Dark, the eponymous short story is a fictionalized account of the accident. On March 18, 2026, Gustavo Lipsztein's Netflix original series was released, telling the story of this case. == See also ==