glowboy

English

Etymology

glow +‎ boy or possibly blend of glow +‎ cowboy.

Pronunciation
  • Audio (AU)(file)

Noun

glowboy (plural glowboys)

  1. (slang) A (male) nuclear power plant worker who repairs equipment in areas with extremely high levels of radiation.
    • 1987 September 14, Gene Bylinskey, “Invasion of the service robots”, in Fortune:
      In nuclear plants, robots toil for hours at a time in highly radioactive areas in place of hundreds of employees, called jumpers or glowboys, who worked in short relays so as to minimize their exposure.
    • 1984 November 12, Ron Scherer, “Life Inside a 'Hot' Reactor”, in U.S.News & World Report:
      Across the United States, thousands of employees function daily in and around nuclear reactors. An estimated 5,000 unskilled workers are hired by the industry each year as 'jumpers' or 'glowboys' to repair steam-turbine generators.
    • 1984 October, J.I. Cehn, “Characterization of the temporary radiation workforce at US nuclear power plants”, in Conference on radiation protection standards and regulatory issues:
      A key question to this study is whether the temporary employees are getting assigned the dirty work. It has been alleged that temps are used as glowboys or radiation sponges.
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