Why would a pilot wear a film badge dosimeter?

Question

festinger · Answer

A good answer is to think about what a dosimeter does. It measures more much exposure a person has to ionizing radiation, it might be particles or even electromagnetic waves.

When a pilot goes high up, he is nearer to the edge of the Earth's atmosphere, where high energy particles from space first meet something after travelling in mostly empty space. When they bombard, they might knock of electrons from the particles in the atmosphere, making them ions and thus ionising, or cause nuclear reactions, which create radioactive particles, which decay and produce ionising radiation.