Department of the Chief Hygienist of the Ministry of Transport and Construction of the Slovak Republic requested company JAVYS, a. s. to find and identify an item, which showed the elements of radioactivity and was present in the railway wagon with metallic material from the private company, located in the railway station Bratislava – Vajnory after the railway wagon with load of metallic material had been returned from the territory of Austria back to Slovakia.
     On the 15th of February 2017, employees of company JAVYS, a. s., which is authorized to manage the orphaned sources and radioactive wastes of unknown origin, then unloaded the metallic material from the wagon and by measuring the radioactivity of individual components they found and identified contaminated items. These included two pipes of metal with total weight of 30 kg, contaminated by 238U-rad radionuclide. Measured dose rate was 0.0011 mSv/hour. 

     Orphaned sources and radioactive wastes of unknown origin can be found e.g. in scrapyards, iron works or at the borders, but they also come from illegal activities. In 2016, company JAVYS, a. s. carried out 9 collections of radioactive materials of unknown origin, while these predominantly included various components of agricultural and military equipment contaminated by radionuclides.
In 2017, company JAVYS, a.s. carried out five collections of radioactive waste, while in one case it was an item located in the area of a family house in Nitra, part Krškany coming from an illegal activity. This collected item was a stolen medical equipment component. In other three cases these were the components of military equipment, which were collected in metallic waste collection yards and were contaminated by 238U-rad radionuclide. 

After their identification and documentation, collected radioactive materials are transported for further management in Jadrová a vyraďovacia spoločnosť, a.s. Materials, which comply with limits for disposal in the National Radwaste Repository (NRR) are continuously processed and conditioned to safe form into the fibre-concrete containers and are then transported to the NRR for their final disposal.    
   
In the Slovak Republic, Jadrová a vyraďovacia spoločnosť, a. s. (JAVYS) provides activities in the area of back end of the nuclear energy. Its key activities include decommissioning of A1 and V1 nuclear power plants, radioactive waste management, spent nuclear fuel management, management of institutional radioactive waste and collected radioactive materials in the territory of the Slovak Republic. In all its activities, company JAVYS, a. s. pays particular attention to safety, quality and environment protection.

Miriam Žiaková
spokeswoman