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Why not just put it in a bulky plastic blister pack, like we do for like, razors? Make the tiny thing larger and harder to lose?

But it already was larger; It was part of a “density gauge” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_densitometry). It’s not as if somebody but this in a trouser pocket (would be extremely foolish, of course) or laid it on the car’s dashboard (slightly less foolish, but still extremely so) and then lost it.

I wouldn’t know whether the pictures on that Wikipedia page resemble what this was on, but I expect it to have been of similar size.

The problem was that something (¿excessive car vibrations?, ¿a speed bump?, ¿bad packaging? ¿bad design of the gauge? That’s to be researched) dislodged it from that device and that it then dropped out of the car.

Now I wonder why wasn't it glued, packed or something in larger material. I think there should be something light and relatively non-opaque for radiation.

I haven’t read any indication that safety rules weren’t followed, so presumably because whatever it was packed in was deemed safe enough.

Well by all accounts (of people that seem competent on the internet...) the source is just fine as it's own beacon. Even detectable by a low flying helicopter with the right equipment.

Well, by the account of the article you are responding to the source has been lost.

Not very useful beacon if you don't detect when you lost it or you need to put an enormous search party to find it.

We have GPS devices with satellite comms that can periodically transmit information about where they are that anybody who plans to trek in the wilderness can buy and use to start a SAR operation.

> What an engineer thinks: "Why not attach this thing to a beacon so that it can't be lost?"

Or put cameras everywhere to deter crime.

I am not asking to limit anybody's freedom. A beacon would be attached to radiation source.

Unless you are an individual who walks around with a highly toxic, highly dangerous radiation source, requiring it to have a beacon will not limit your freedom.

As to putting cameras to deter crime, they are shown not to work. The crime just moves to where there are no cameras. Or stupid people will crime anyway. US is leading or close to leading in both crime rates and incarceration rates, at least in the western world. Suggesting the basic premise of what US is doing may be flawed, from engineering standpoint.

Right. but things they have in common are questionable cost/benefit, and, undoubtedly, unintended consequences.

It also is not a better way to solve the problem. Now someone has to replace the batteries of the "beacon" or remember to charge it? How are they going to remember? Why not just have that same person remember to check that the source is secured properly?

> Right. but things they have in common are questionable cost/benefit, and, undoubtedly, unintended consequences.

Attaching a beacon to highly dangerous radiation source is questionable, and has "undoubtedly" unintended consequences?

Looks like searching for a problem where there isn't one.

Why not just have that same person remember to check that the source is secured properly?

Because "Just do the right thing first" isn't actually a good harm reduction or problem prevention strategy? Shit goes wrong and you should have a system where lots of shit has to go wrong all at the same time before it causes a problem.

> "Why not attach this thing to a beacon so that it can't be lost?"

It’s literally radioactive. It is a beacon.

It was literally lost. A properly engineered beacon cannot be lost this way as long as it operates.

> He said a search vehicle was driving past at 70 kilometres per hour on the Great Northern Highway when a detection device revealed radiation.

They found it because it is literally a beacon.

I think the idea would be to have a gieger counter in the vehicle near the pellet that can detect the pellet radiation, and sound an alarm in the vehicle if the pellet radiation is no longer detected, so the driver knows immediately that the pellet has become unsecured.

They found it because they got incredibly lucky.

If it would have bounced just a few meters further off the road, landed in a ditch and get covered by something, or its emission beam angled away from the road/sky (for directional sources), it might never be found (or not before it causes some harm).

Visible light is electromagnetic radiation too. Does this mean that an LED is the same thing as an AirTag?

I'm not sure if this specific source is isotropic or directional, but it's very possible for it to be both extremely hard to detect from even a couple of meters away, yet still pose a great hazard.

AirTag it

Because the battery would be too heavy.

It's a 6x8mm cylinder, fingernail-sized. They're little pellets that get inserted into larger machines for medical imaging.

See also (or don't, it's a bit gruesome): the Goiânia accident.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goi%C3%A2nia_accident