Air Pollution and Radiation Monitoring in Collective Protection Facilities

Abstract

It has become increasingly important to monitor environment contamination by such chemicals as chemical warfare agents (CWAs) and industrial toxic chemicals (TICs), as well as radiation hazards around and inside collective protection facilities. This is especially important given the increased risk of terrorist or military attacks. The Military Institute of Chemistry and Radiometry (MICR) has constructed and developed the ALERT device for the effective monitoring of these threats. This device uses sensors that detect chemical and radiological contaminations in the air. The CWA detector is an ion mobility spectrometer, TICs are detected by electrochemical sensors, and radiation hazards are detected via Geiger–Muller tubes. The system was designed to protect the crew from contamination. When chemical or radioactive contamination is detected at the air inlet for the shelter, air filtration through a carbon filter is activated. At this time, the air test procedure at the filter outlet is started to test the condition of the filter on an ongoing basis. After detecting contamination at the filter outlet, the system turns off the air pumping and the service can start the procedure of replacing the damaged carbon filter. This paper presents the results of laboratory testing of the ALERT gas alarm detector, which showed high measurements for important parameters, including sensitivity, repeatability, accuracy, and speed.

Keywords

• ion mobility spectrometry (IMS)
• chemical warfare agent (CWA)
• toxic chemical (TIC)
• radiation hazards