This incident inspired my PhD dissertation on radiation source search. The techniques to search for sources like this are remarkably primitive, even today. My company works on this tech, but it's hard to get traction because the US government basically stopped investing in CBRN technology around when the Cold War ended, and hardly any other countries take it seriously as a threat.

Not that search techniques would have helped stop this incident, they basically didn't even know it was lost until the capsule was already broken and people were dying.

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https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34609730 - February 2023 (185 comments)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29127586 - November 2021 (121 comments)

In 1987, in Brazil, a simple metal capsule left behind in an abandoned hospital triggered one of the worst civilian nuclear accidents in history.