Sample Vial Secure Container

International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors must maintain continuity of knowledge on all safeguard samples and, in particular, on those samples drawn from plutonium product and spent fuel input tanks at a nuclear reprocessing plant's blister sampling station. Integrity of safeguard samples must be guaranteed from the sampling point to the moment of sample analysis at an accepted local laboratory or at the IAEA's Safeguards Analytical Laboratory (SAL) in Seibersdorf, Austria. The safeguard samples are drawn at a blister sampling station with inspector participation and then transferred via a pneumatic post system to the facility's analytical laboratory. Transfer of the sample by the pneumatic post system, arrival of the sample in the operator's analytical laboratory, and storage of the sample awaiting analysis are very time consuming activities for an inspector, particularly if continuous human surveillance is required for all these activities. These activities could be observed by ordinary surveillance methods, such as a video monitoring system, but this would be cumbersome and time consuming for both the inspector and the operator. This paper describes a secure container designed to assure sample vial integrity from the point the sample is drawn to the treatment of the sample at a facility's analytical laboratory.