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RSO - Safety and Storage

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DirtSmuggler

DirtSmuggler

Geotechnical
Sep 29, 2021
29
Hello

Our geotech department has a soil lab and in the soil lab, the Troxler gauges are stored with two layers of penetration in a storage closet. Our lab manager restricts anyone without a nuke badge into the soils lab due to Troxler gauges being there (in a locked closet within the soils lab). We, the geotech department, need to go into the soils lab to look at the soils samples and compare them to the field logs. Not having free access is a huge issue. We looked through the Radiation Safety manual and it does not address this issue. This lab manager likes to throw his weight around and create lots of issue for the geotech department personnel. He has to open the door to the lab for us, grant us access, and then watches us, and then locks up the soil lab after we leave. My supervisor doesn't want to waste money on nuke gauge training and getting badges for employees who will never use the gauge, just so we can use the soil lab to look at samples. The station we would use is more than 15 feet away from the storage closet. Any ideas on what to do?

Note: Lab manager is not even an engineer. Got lucky with the job and position and feels threaten by all engineers in the company. he manages the lab and coordinates special inspections. He makes lots of mistakes and we have to correct them before signing off on his work. Huge ego issue. Can't fire due to having friends higher up in the company. He likes to make things difficult for all engineer employees however he can.
 
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Read the Troxler manual. I believe it states that 15 feet is the distance where the source produces no more than natural background radiation, with zero shielding.

If you want to crush him like a bug, start back charging the lab for all delays, mistakes, reworking of samples etc. that he is causing.
 
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Put them in a locked charging cabinet inside a locked closet. If needed build a closet around the cabinet.

Or make someone else the RSO.
 
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The manual just says the dosimetry badge only needs to be used while using the equipment. It doesn't say anything about people working at a station near the storage closet. His argument is that a badge is needed just to be in the vicinity and to have access to the soil lab (and passcode to the door to enter the soil lab). I've worked at many other companies, at two of them, EVERYONE had badges, not because they were in the vicinity but just in case there was an emergency and they had to go in the field and use the equipment. One company I was at, I didn't have the badge and regularly went into the soil lab to look at samples or even do testing while being about 15 feet away from the storage where the gauges were kept, and no issues at all. They never had a problem, and it was never an issue, even when we were audited. It's just here, with this lab manager, it's a problem. We all suspect he's making up this rule because we can't find it anywhere. I just want to make sure from others that I'm not missing anything before I'm force to take this all the way to the top (CEO). He doesn't want us in the lab without his permission. We must always require his presence.
 
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Working in multiple firms with labs, the nuclear densometers were not in the labs. They are stored near a building entrance for ease of loading, in a typically smaller room which could be locked from the outside and inside entrance and a then inside a locked cabinet. We never had restrictions on going through the rooms to go in and out of the building. My current firm has the device cabinet inside a locked closet room just inside the loading entrance.
 
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Does this individual think the field personnel are keeping all of the workers on the jobsite 15 feet away from the device while testing?

The more I practice engineering, the more I wish I had taken psychology classes. We get to deal with all kinds of interesting characters. This joker is on a power trip, for whatever reason. He seems to think it gives him authority over you. Personally, I've never seen a soils lab with that level of access control. The gauge storage definitely requires security, but the lab???
 
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