Class 7 labels: radioactive material (trefoil, white or yellow)
The package contains radioactive material, and the category says how much radiation reaches its surface: I-WHITE least, III-YELLOW most.
Who puts it on the box
The sender (consignor): hospitals, laboratories, industrial radiography and nuclear suppliers.
How to read it
Keep people and film away from it and do not stay near it longer than needed. The transport index on II and III labels is worked out from the dose rate at 1 metre, used to limit how many such packages are carried together.
What it does not promise
It does not promise the package is safe to open or that a damaged one is harmless; and very small amounts travel as “excepted packages” without this label.
A mark on a parcel is the sender’s statement about what is inside and how it should be handled. It is not a certificate that the parcel is packed safely, that anyone handled it as marked, or that your carrier accepts it: for what you may send, read the carrier’s own terms.
- What it looks like
- A diamond with the radiation trefoil at the top and the figure 7 at the bottom: category I-WHITE all white with one red bar; II-YELLOW and III-YELLOW with a yellow top half and two or three red bars, a box for the transport index and the contents and activity written in. A separate fissile label reads “FISSILE” with a criticality safety index.
- Regulation
- ADR 2025, 5.2.2.2.2, label models No. 7A, 7B, 7C and 7E; UN Model Regulations 5.2.2.2.2
- Kind of mark
- A dangerous-goods mark or label from the UN Model Regulations, applied in Europe by ADR (road) and its sister agreements for rail and waterways, and on the same pattern by the US 49 CFR. It says the package holds dangerous goods.
- Also called
- Radioactive label; Radioactive I-White; Radioactive II-Yellow; Radioactive III-Yellow
Related
Other marks with the same shape
Sources
Each document was fetched and read on the date shown. Written in our own words; quotations are the documents’ wording.
- Regulator guidance — Health and Safety Executive (UK regulator for the carriage of dangerous goods): Carriage of dangerous goods manual — Consignment procedures: marking and labelling of packages (ADR 5.2) — Package labels are the “hazard diamonds” of ADR 5.2.2 with the class number; specimen labels are in ADR 5.2.2.2.2 and sizes in 5.2.2.2.1.1; the consignor is responsible for marking and labelling. Checked 2026-09-27.
- Law adopting the same mark — US Government Publishing Office (govinfo), 49 CFR, edition of 1 October 2024: 49 CFR Part 172 Subpart E — Labeling (§§ 172.400–172.450, the hazard class labels) — §§ 172.436–172.441: RADIOACTIVE WHITE-I (white, red “I”), YELLOW-II and YELLOW-III (yellow top half, white lower half) and the FISSILE label. Labels are at least 100 mm on each side with an inner border about 5 mm inside the edge (§ 172.407). Checked 2026-09-27.