[Piano music]
Yeah, my mom was a dietitian
So she was generally a really healthy person
Had healthy habits, she was a non-smoker
And my brother heard wheezing in her breath
And she had had shortness of breath
And just coughing fits
For a couple months
And, so she finally went to the doctor
And, soon after we found out
That she had stage four lung cancer
[Piano music]
My brother has two kids, so she was a grandma to them
So she spent a lot of time being a grandma
And she enjoyed going out to the Oregon coast
In her basement she had a craft studio
Where she spent a lot of time
Quilting and doing all sorts of crafts
It was a really quick progression from thinking it was
Like, pneumonia or something to
Potentially cancerous, to
The worst cancer that you can get
Before she had cancer, we
Knew almost nothing about radon
The only reason we knew you get lung cancer was from smoking
When we found out that radon causes lung cancer we tested the house
Right away and it was elevated
Five times the EPA action level
You know, we didn't find out about radon
Until after we already knew she had cancer
And it was just another insult to injury
Because, my brother and I had grown up in that house
And our rooms were in the basement so
We thought about our lives
And, like, it was a health impact for the whole family
Every day we think about her not being here
To see him and spend time with him and
Be the grandma we had hoped she would be
Eventually, when we had kids
It's definitely hard and we think about it all the time
Kristine Graff was one of the approximately 21,000
People who fall victim to radon every year in the U.S.
This odorless colorless gas is a killer
It's the second leading cause of lung cancer and
Like lung cancer caused by smoking
It's preventable
But until a few years ago
These kinds of deaths were mysteries
[Piano Music]
Radon is a natural geological hazard
Radon comes out of the ground
From all the sediment and the rock you have
Any place on the face of the earth, it is being generated
It's natural
One of the interesting things here in the Pacific Northwest
The major bedrock that we have here is basalt
And basalt is not a generator of high amounts of radon
Yet, we have some areas that have very, very high values of that
The reason is, it's the sediments that have been brought into the area
We had the Great Missoula Floods
That affected us here in the Pacific Northwest
But, where did the waters and the sediments come from?
British Columbia and Idaho, which have huge amounts of granite
Granite has huge amounts of uranium and thorium in it
And it's sediments are what the Missoula Floods
Have distributed around the Pacific Northwest
Now, what happens is, we capture it in houses
In order to have high radon in a house, you have to have two things
You have to have a generator
So you've gotta have some rock or some sediment
Beneath the house that is producing the radon
And then you gotta have cracks in the foundation
Or ways to get into the house
And then we trap it in the house
Because we're trying to keep the heat in
You have got a problem
Now today the EPA tells us
That twenty percent of all lung cancer deaths
Are a result of radon gas
So we can explain, geologically
Why some areas have higher values than other ones
But even in those low areas
Where the majority of the houses are low
There may be one guy that is gonna be high
So we tell everybody to test your house
And, if it is above four picocuries per liter
Then, you have to start thinking about mitigating your house
It's not going to be 'an arm and a leg'
It's going to be very reasonable
If you test, and it comes out below four, celebrate
Because you are in a house that geologically
Is not producing a lot of radon and you are in good shape
The bottom line is, we understand the science
It's cheap to test and it's cheap to mitigate
We need to let everybody know about that
We're often surprised about where we find high levels of radon
Radon levels vary across the Pacific Northwest and Alaska
Radon is consistently found in most of Eastern Washington,
Eastern Idaho and Idaho's panhandle
In recent years, results above the EPA action level
Have been discovered in Northwestern Oregon
Southwestern Washington and many remote villages in Alaska
The only way to know for sure is to test your home
And have a plan, should you find results above the recommended level
No matter where you live, anywhere in the country
You should always test your home for radon
It's quite an easy process to test for radon
It's very inexpensive
You can purchase a radon test at a local hardware store
Every homeowner should test their home and know
Exactly what their radon level is
Well, you're hoping for a low result
And then you can do continuous testing over the years
But if you do have a high result, it' not a big issue
You can mitigate your home
You can call in a certified contractor to take a look
And design a system that would work well for your home
You shouldn't have to spend a lot of money
To install a system that will keep your family safe
Now that I have the information that I know about radon
And the dangers of it
I can make sure that I'm making my home safe
For my family and my son
And telling my family and friends about radon
And how easy it is to find out if you have elevated levels
And how easy it is to get it mitigated
If you would like to learn more about testing for radon
Go to www.epa.gov/radon