Radioactive Incident Monitoring Network at a central computer based in a DEFRA building in central London. For security reasons, a backup computer is also in operation at a secret location in the UK. The network was set up in 1988 as a response to the Chernobyl disaster in 1986. As well as being of use in an emergency, the stations also serve to record historical data on radiation levels. Radioactive Incident Monitoring Network The Radioactive Incident Monitoring Network (RIMNET) is a network of 91 monitoring stations, used by the Government of the United Kingdom, which records and analyses the level of radioactivity across the
Radiation effects from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster tests. As the isotope signature of the plutonium is closer to that of power-reactor plutonium, TEPCO suggested that "two samples out of five may be the direct result of the recent incident." The more important thing to look at is the curium level in the soil; the soil does contain a short-lived isotope (curium-242) which shows that some alpha emitters have been released in small amounts by the accident. The release of the beta/gamma emitters such as caesium-137 has been far greater. In the short and medium term the effects of the iodine and the caesium release will dominate the