The Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear complex in Japan is shown in a satellite image provided by DigitalGlobe. Radioactive iodine-131 believed to be from the Fukushima facility was found in low levels in a rainwater sample taken in Boston. (AP PhotoDigitalGlobe)
Low levels of radioactive iodine linked to the nuclear disaster in Japan were detected in a sample of rainwater in Massachusetts, state health officials announced yesterday.
The concentration of radioiodine-131 found in the sample is very low and did not affect the health of the state’s drinking-water supplies, said John Auerbach, commissioner of the Department of Public Health.
The rain sample was taken during the past week in Boston as part of regular monitoring by the US Environmental Protection Agency. No detectable increases in radiation were discovered in the air that was tested in the same location where the rainwater was collected, Auerbach said at a press conference yesterday at the William A. Hinton State Laboratory Institute in Jamaica Plain.
