Overview

• Mistras Group Limited pleaded guilty at Newton Aycliffe Magistrates’ Court on May 22 to breaching the Ionising Radiations Regulations 2017 and was fined £26,000 and ordered to pay £11,353 in costs.
• The case arose from a December 2020 incident at the company’s former Hartlepool site when a gamma-emitting source was not returned to its shielded container, exposing a 69-year-old radiographer.
• An HSE investigation found that required pre-use safety checks were neither completed nor recorded and that provided electronic personal dosemeters and radiation monitors were not used.
• Inspectors also uncovered failures in local rule compliance and supervision, and noted that Mistras Group had previously faced enforcement actions for similar safety lapses.
• HSE radiation specialist Elizabeth Reeves warned that industrial radiography hazards demand rigorous protection measures to keep worker exposures as low as reasonably practicable.