X-Ray Shoe Fitters
The concept of X-Ray Shoe Fitters was brilliant. The drawback was that nobody understood the danger of using unshielded X-rays around people. Especially when done frequently. Even more especially when blasted directly up at the customers’ genitals, which were located directly above the device as the machine X-rayed their feet. Back then, people were either ignorant of the risks of radiation exposure, or did not take them seriously. The X-Ray Shoe Fitters were supposed to be shielded, but the shield was usually removed to improve the image quality or to make the device lighter. That backfired, and a lot of radiation was scattered in all directions, bathing the bodies of the customers and shoe salespeople in harmful X-rays. Unsurprisingly, there were severe downsides and side effects.
Typical X-ray shoe Fitter viewings lasted about 20 seconds, during which the machine delivered about half the radiation of a chest CT scan. Many customers tried on more than one pair of shoes, and were thus exposed to additional X-ray doses with each pair. Even people in the waiting room were exposed to radiation. Many shoe stores skimped on machine maintenance to save money. That backfired, and caused many X-Ray Shoe Fitters to emit significantly more radiation. Some devices blasted out as much as 300 times more radiation than the maximum safe limit. Most exposed were the shoe salespeople: they got hit with stray radiation dozens of times a day, each and every day they went to work. Many of them suffered adverse health consequences – some quite serious.