The X-ray vans at issue are essentially a version of older airport body scanners mounted on a truck.
X-ray vans continue to be used by law enforcement agencies. They were developed shortly after the 9/11 terrorist attacks by American Science & Engineering Inc. in Billerica, Mass., and deployed by the U.S. military in Iraq and Afghanistan to sweep areas for roadside and car bombs. Because they typically look like blank, white panel trucks, soldiers in Iraq nicknamed them “white devils.”
The Customs documents and technical specifications—which are on the manufacturer’s website—show that the van emits less than 10 microrems of radiation per scan. That’s about twice as much as the old airport body scanners. But it’s extremely low compared to medical X-rays and well within industry standards for acceptable exposure.
The X-ray vans—which reportedly cost between $729,000 and $825,000 each—aredesigned to find organic materials such as drugs and explosives. The rays penetrate the metal in a car or concrete in a building and scatter back to a detector, producing animage of what’s inside. The van can scan while driving alongside a row of shipping containers or while parked as cars pass by. Customs agencies around the world have used them to fight drug and human smuggling.
8-6-2021 (August 6, 2021) is the Snakiest day of the year and it’s also this year’s CircuitPython Day! The day highlights all things CircuitPython and Python on Hardware. See you there!
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
