What radioactive metal glows white hot all the time?

[gary350]

TL;DR Summary

What radioactive metal glows white hot all the time?

1961 My father worked for a well drilling company called, Schlumberger in Lansing MI. One day he told me the company has a radioactive piece of metal that glows white hot all the time we keep it in a cement box in the ground inside a metal box with a lid. Sunday Schlumberger was closed and no one was there my father took me to his work to see the glowing metal. He used a crane to remove the cement lid and another lift to remove metal box lid. He said, we are not suppose to look at it but you can take a very fast 1 second look at it. It looked like it was about 4" diameter 4" long. The company lowers that radioactive metal 1 mile down an oil well shaft and takes readings with test equipment.

What metal will glow white hot all the time?

Will it actually be hot?

 

[jedishrfu]

Could it be Cesium-137?

Because it looks white-hot doesn't mean it is white hot. Cesium is highly radioactive and has been used in medical equipment and in industrial radiology.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesium-137

 

[Baluncore]

To be used for geophysics, in oil well, oil-water porosity analysis, I would expect it to be a fast neutron, or a gamma source. It would probably be accompanied, nearby, by a slow neutron detector.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neutron_probe

A borehole contains water that would not react nicely to a white-hot metal. The "white hot" light would not be black body radiation, it would be a secondary emission of light.

 

[Vanadium 50]

Because it looks white-hot doesn't mean it is white hot.

It is almost certainly not white hot.

To glow write hot under its own internal heat means a very short half life - I estimate 10 years for an alpha source. Multi-kg quantities of such a source would be expensive, dangerous and unnecessary. Besides, how would you lower it down a shaft without melting much of your equipment?

There is one moderately common isotope that will do this: Pu-241. However, because we are not discussing the "Lansing crater", it probably wasn't it.

 

[gmax137]

Jeez, I was going to google 'lansing crater' when it hit me. Time for another coffee.

 

[Bystander]

Jeez, I was going to google 'lansing crater' when it hit me. Time for another coffee.

Okay, I give up...I did just google it, and still do NOT get it.

 

[Vanadium 50]

<sigh>

In the words of Foghorn Leghorn, "That's a joke son. Don't you know a joke when you heard one?"

If you had a chunk of Pu-241 that size, it would also be well above critical mass. And to quote another Warner character "...an earth-shattering kaboom!" And then a big hole where Lansing used to be.

 

[Ibix]

Okay, I give up...I did just google it, and still do NOT get it.

The workplace in question is in Lansing, which you may have missed in the OP. V50 cites the continued existence of the place as evidence that it wasn't a supercritical lump of plutonium.

 

[gmax137]

Growing up, Foghorn Leghorn was my hero.

 

[Bystander]

https://www.lansingstatejournal.com/story/news/local/2018/04/20/parking-national-champ/533910002/

There really is such an entry, hence my extreme confusion...having missed the other more glaringly obvious clues. D'oh.

 

[berkeman]

Thread paused for Moderation...

 

[berkeman]

Thread is reopened while we organize a field trip to Lansing to see if it *really* is still there...

 

[Dullard]

You'll need a slide-rule...

 

[Bystander]

You'll need a slide-rule...

Pogo fan,

<sigh>

In the words of Foghorn Leghorn, "That's a joke son. Don't you know a joke when you heard one?"

If you had a chunk of Pu-241 that size, it would also be well above critical mass. And to quote another Warner character "...an earth-shattering kaboom!" And then a big hole where Lansing used to be.

mixing all the great strips.

 

[Vanadium 50]

At the risk of rerailing the thread, if the material is white hot, why didn't the container glow (at least) red hot?

 

[Bystander]

At the risk of rerailing the thread, if the material is white hot, why didn't the container glow (at least) red hot?

What size "metal box?" Stefan's Law discussion of undefined assumptions will now begin....

 

[Frabjous]

The glow is probably from secondary reactions with the radiation, not direct thermal radiation.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uses_of_radioactivity_in_oil_and_gas_wells, it was probably either a gamma ray or neutron emitter.

Given that your memory is from 1961, standards were probably looser/non-existent so it could be a variety of things.

 

[Baluncore]

Back in the 1970s, Schlumberger had a reputation for being the best down-hole geophysics contractor. They could do it if anyone could, and their prices were appropriate for the quality of the work they did.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schlumberger#Radioactive_sources

 

[Vanadium 50]

What size "metal box?"

It doesn't really matter (within reason). It's not like putting a hot potato in the box. If this is really generating that much internal heat, it's got to go somewhere. If this is as described, its putting out hundreds of kilowatts minimum. Can't keep that boxed up very long.

The glow is probably from secondary reactions with the radiation, not direct thermal radiation.

I really doubt there is that much radiation. If the OP is not misremembering events from 63 years ago, it's more likely phosphorescent paint than anything else.