New technique for determining boundary dose from the Los Alamos Meson Physics Facility

Los Alamos has enhanced its method of measuring radiation at its boundary. Three sheds were built each with an active radiation detection system. Each shed has an IBM compatible computer, an EG&G Ortec 92X Spectrum Master integrated spectroscopy system and an upward-looking germanium detector. The system runs with minimal intervention by the operators because of automated data logging and error reporting. When certain events happen at a shed, the data collection computer in the shed will call the central computer and log the condition. This allows us to track building accesses as well as hardware failures. Once a day the central computer calls each shed to dump the day´s collected data and computes the gamma dose from reported data. This allows the operators to notice trends or abnormal readings