Uranium, 8.3 kg of it, seized from scrap dealer near nuclear installation

Joint Commissioner of Police (crime) D Shivanandan said that the scrap dealer has been identified as Mohammed Ansari, who has been arrested and charged under section 41 (d) of IPC. Another associate has also been arrested but his identity has been withheld.

The uranium samples were sent to Bhabha Atomic Research Centre (BARC) for examination which, after examining the seized uranium, coveyed to the police that the material was depleted uranium, in other words U-238 and that it had no radioactivity and had no military significance. Thus, Shivanandan said, prima facie, given the nature of depelted status, it was being speculated that the low-grade uranium could have been stolen from a five-star hospital in the western suburbs using teletherapy unit for protecting doctors from gamma rays emitted from coablt 60 used to irradiate cancer patients.

The theory had few takers from the scientists The Indian Express talked to since 8.3 kg is too large an amount to be obtained from such devices. The assumption that “depleted uranium” or U-238 has no military uses is erroneous. For example, it is used in reinforcing armoured vehicles and converting conventional shells into armour-piercing ones. More important is the fact that it can be used to breed nuclear weapons grade plutonium (Pu-239), though to do this a reactor is required. Otherwise, depleted uranium has no significant peaceful uses, not even in medicine, except in medical teletherapy units as stated above. In such units, depleted uranium replaces lead because of its better attenuation to gamma rays. The other uses relate to its use as deadweight because of its heavy nature to provide stability to say, the wings of the aircraft.

It is against this background, the police version, that the uranium could have been stolen from hospitals, is to be seen. The proximity of the scrap godown to the high security nuclear facility of BARC in Trombay is significant and does not exempt the possibility that the fissile material could have been stolen from one of the experimental reactors. At the moment, however, police are ruling out that out.

Intelligence sources disclosed that there is a possibility the consignment could have been temporarily stored in the godown before it began its clandestine journey across the border. The theory assumes significance in light of the fact Trombay and the adjoining areas of Cheeta Camp have already attained notoriety for activities of ISI.

The isotopes

Natural uranium, a radioactive material, consists of two isotopes, U-238 (93.3%) and U-235 (0.7%). Natural uranium itself can be categorised as “depleted uranium” if the U-235 content is removed and this can happen only in reactors.

Of the two, U-235 is nuclear weapons grade material. However, natural uranium, or U-238+U-235, is also used to generate nuclear elctric energy, particularly in Indian pressurised heavy water reactors (PHWRs).