Did you know that old, red-orange Fiestaware cups and saucers are radioactive?
I had heard about it but thought that was a myth. Well, it’s true! I just checked an old cup and saucer “pre-1965” and measured 1.2mR/hr – about 200x the local background! I used a 3 mm Beta particle blocker to further characterize the emission (alpha, beta, or gamma) and that stopped at least 90% of the radiation.
I don’t know the health effects of this amount of beta radiation – yet.
Do you have any old red-orange Fiestaware around the house? Did your family use it while you were growing up?
(If you have some, Don’t throw it out! We can try some experiments!)
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