#  >  > Living And Legal Affairs In Thailand >  >  > Thailand and Asia News >  >  Japan Earthquake: Fukushima

## StrontiumDog

*http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/0..._n_834380.html
*

*Japan Earthquake: 7.9 Magnitude Earthquake Hits, 19-Feet High Tsunami Feared                                    * 

 Posted: 03/11/11 01:05 AM                                                                                                                

 

TOKYO, March 11 (Reuters) - An earthquake measuring 7.9 struck off the   northeast coast of Japan on Friday, shaking buildings in the capital   Tokyo and triggering a 6-metre tsunami warning, NHK reported.

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## RepublicansAreNazis

Darn!

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## harrybarracuda

Lots of tsunami warnings....




> TOKYO (BNO NEWS) -- A massive earthquake struck off the coast of  northeastern Japan on early Friday afternoon, seismologists said,  prompting tsunami warnings for multiple countries. 
>  The 7.9-magnitude earthquake at 2.46 p.m. local time (0546 GMT) was  centered about 179 kilometers (111 miles) east of Sendai in Japan. It  struck about 10 kilometers (6.2 miles) deep, making it a shallow  earthquake, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). 
>  JMA issued a tsunami warning, saying a major tsunami could strike  parts of the Pacific coast. A tsunami warning is also issued for Russia,  the Marcus Islands and Northern Marianas. Meanwhile, tsunami watches  have been issued for Guam, Wake Island, Taiwan, Yap, Philippines,  Marshall Islands, Belau, Midway Island, Pohnpei, Chuuk, Kosrae,  Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Nauru, and Hawaii.

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## RepublicansAreNazis

What part of Japan was it near?

Got it Miyagi. Must be where Mr Miyagi lives.

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## StrontiumDog

Some Tweets coming in...

Kenji_Hall   Kenji Hall                                                 
            tsunami warnings issued. building on fire in odaiba on #Tokyo harbor. aftershocks continue. phones not working. #quake

Al Jazeera's [at]melissakchan reports she felt the #Japan #quake all the way in #Beijing. Powerful quake rocks Japan - Asia-Pacific - Al Jazeera English

Pacific Tsunami Warning Center issues tsunami warning for Japan, Russia, Marcus Islands, Northern Marianas: TSUNAMI WARNING ISSUED FOR JAPAN, RUSSIA AND OTHER REGIONS - Thailand Forum

mpoppel: Japan quake could be MUCH stronger than 7.9.. some agencies put quake as high as 8.9

NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
            Expanding Regional Tsunami Warning (Pacific): a tsunami warning is in effect for japan/russia/marcus is./n. marianas a t… http://j.mp/eNfHiW

Magnitude 7.9 #earthquake strikes northern #Japan, swaying Tokyo buildings; #tsunami warning in effect: 7.9 Magnitude Quake Hits Japan; Tsunami Warning - ABC News -JM

mpoppel: NEW STRONG AFTERSHOCK - 7.5 PERHAPS #quake #japan

sabai_sabai   Aaron Christe                                             
            Smoke rising from Odaiba after #Tokyo #quake Twitpic - Share photos and videos on Twitter

Japan earthquake live news Japan earthquake live news on Twitpic

       In Nagoya central Japan between Tokyo and Osaka. hardhat wearing newscaster reports it was a 7.9 in Tokyo. NO casualties yet

          It was the longest one I have ever felt- in 17 years!

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## Larn

USGS has just upgraded the magnitude to 8.8
Source SKY news

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## StrontiumDog

REUTERSFLASH   ReutersBreakingNews                                             

            Tsunami of 4 meters hits pacific coast of Japan

Reuters   Reuters Top News

            FLASH - Japan earthquake upgraded to 8.8 magnitude - USGS

http://twitpic.com/48ddyh

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## StrontiumDog

CNN 500 MPH waves striking the coast of Japan.... some photos

CNN International photo of large pool of water from tsunami i... on Twitpic



Tsunami hits japan after quake on Twitpic



CNN International: 500 MPH waves striking coast of Japan (pho... on Twitpic

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## StrontiumDog

sabai_sabai   Aaron Christe                                             

       another #quake 7.4 in Ibaraki

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## StrontiumDog

> USGS has just upgraded the magnitude to 8.8
> Source SKY news


Adjusted the headline  :Smile: 

So, 2 aftershocks, a 7.5 and 7.4 reported....nasty. 

Enormous quake. 

From the photos coming in the skyscrapers seem to have coped well with this brutal quake.

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## harrybarracuda

They're showing the tsunami hitting on Sky News.

It's a biggie alright.

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## StrontiumDog

USGS lists Japan quake as magnitude 8.9 Magnitude 8.9 - NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN Tsunami warning information http://1.usa.gov/gcmXHG

kgoradio: TOKYO (AP) - Japanese television shows major tsunami damage in northern Japan.

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## StrontiumDog

Terrifying video on BBC...Tsunami is enormous, washing away everything...I've taken some photos....can't believe what I am seeing!

There are going to be deaths.

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## harrybarracuda

I'm not sure how far inland they are filming, but the first wave looks to be about a couple of metres. As we learned in 2004, they often come in groups.

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## StrontiumDog

Japanese are reporting the Tsunami was 7.3 metres higher than normal sea level!!!

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## harrybarracuda

OK got NHK World on now. Airports, expressways closed. Miyagi waves recorded at 4 metres, others expected at 6 metres.

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## Bexar County Stud

God, this is horrible...hard to watch. Those poor people

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## harrybarracuda

Fuck me. There are people sat in their cars watching it approach. Are they fucking mad?

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## harrybarracuda

Amazing footage - they are showing a second wave coming in.

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## Bexar County Stud

Tsnumai warning for Russia, Wake Island, Guam, Taiwan

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## larvidchr

Looks pretty bad at-least as far as property damage is concerned, lets hope not to many is going to get hurt  :Sad: 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=O-0oo_QsZdY

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## harrybarracuda

> Tsnumai warning for Russia, Wake Island, Guam, Taiwan


And the rest (see Post #3).

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## harrybarracuda

There are a stream of about four or five waves around 05.-1km apart, hitting the coastline straight on, but they don't appear to have the same strength as the first one thank god.

This is 90 minutes after the quake.

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## harrybarracuda

Sendai Airport is awash. Will make relief efforts difficult until it's receded.

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## harrybarracuda

Honeda airport has reopened three runways and circling aircraft can now land <!>

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## StrontiumDog

Series one...

The tsunami washing over the countryside...







Watch the lorry....this happened over seconds...

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## harrybarracuda

Massive fire in Horton Spheres at a refinery in Ichihara. Bloody hell, if they go up...

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## koman

Revised to and 8.9 now and the entire Tokyo transit system is shut down......

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## Loy Toy

Absolutely terrible and I hope loss of life is minimal.

Mother nature seems to be upset at the moment.

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## koman

Best prepared country in the world for something like this.....if you really can prepare for something like this....hope they got it right cause it looks really bad..........

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## harrybarracuda

These maps don't always post properly so here's the link:

USGS Data and Maps

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## Sailing into trouble

8.9!!! Just getting news in Canada. Buildings still swaying in Tokyo 30mins after quake!
Harry did you say that people sat watching the wave approach. In Japan that is incredible, they rehearse so much have they forgotten about the devastation in Thailand!

Now we have told the west coast here could be hit. My boat is 3 hours away. Wish i had paid the insurance now. Krap

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## sabaii sabaii

Wow, that is some force of nature

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## dirtydog



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## StrontiumDog

First deaths now being reported in Japan. 

Tsunami alerts all over the Pacific. Aftershocks still occuring, another 6.8 reported in Tokyo this time.

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## drawp

didn't see it posted yet, but Al Jazeera English is streaming it -- Al Jazeera English: Live Stream - Watch Now - Al Jazeera English

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## dirtydog



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## dirtydog



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## harrybarracuda

Tsunami warning sirens will be sounded in Honolulu shortly. (Added: waves not expected for several hours).

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## dirtydog



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## StrontiumDog

Some more snaps of the live TV pics...

Tsunami waves



Heading to shore...



Sendai airport, surrounded, people on the roof...



Oil refinery on fire...so far it hasn't gotten worse than this...

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## dirtydog

*Tsunami hits north-eastern Japan after massive quake*



A massive earthquake has hit the north-east of Japan, triggering a tsunami that has caused extensive damage. 

         Japanese television showed cars, ships and even buildings  being swept away by a vast wall of water after the 8.9 magnitude  earthquake. 

         Officials said the wave could be 10m (33ft), and numerous casualties are feared.

         The quake struck about 250 miles (400km) from Tokyo at a depth of 20 miles, shaking the capital.

         The tremor at 1446 local time (0546 GMT) was followed by a series of powerful aftershocks.

         Seismologists say it is one of the largest earthquakes to hit Japan for many years.


         The tsunami warning was extended to the Philippines, Indonesia and the Pacific coast of Russia. 

         Tsunami waves hit Japan's Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures, officials said.

         Japan's NHK television showed a massive surge of water sweeping away buildings, cars and ships.

         The earthquake also triggered a number of fires.

         There were reports of about 20 people injured in Tokyo after the roof of a hall collapsed onto a graduation ceremony.

         There were also reports of injuries in Tokyo after.


BBC News - Tsunami hits north-eastern Japan after massive quake

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## Loy Toy

Some of the Japanese nucleur plants have shut down automatically but it cannot be confirmed if there is any damage or radiation leaks according to the Prime Minister.

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## robuzo

Was chatting with my partner at the office in Tokyo when it hit. As of 10 minutes ago there were still aftershocks:
Jeff:  shaking again...sigh. this be gettin' old now
 me:  I guess so
 Sent at 2:45 PM on Friday

Waiting for tsunami reports from Chiba. Tohoku got creamed.

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## harrybarracuda

Yep, sirens off in Hawaii, waves expected in five hours at about 3am local time.

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## harrybarracuda

Going back to the Horton Spheres, there are 8 or more of them, and one of them is absolutely ablaze. If the rest contain LPG, it's extremely difficult for the fire services to get in safely, because if one of those goes it will be like an extremely large bomb going off.

I'm surprised they have been placed in such close proximity to each other.

Frightening.

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## StrontiumDog

7th biggest earthquake ever recorded the BBC said earlier....

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## robuzo

Still feeling very slight aftershocks in Tokyo.

Still coming in rapid succession.

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## StrontiumDog

mpoppel   Michael van Poppel                                             

            Quake overview: 8.9, 6.4, 6.4, 6.8, 7.1, 6.3, 6.3, 5.8, 5.9, 6.3, 6.1, 6.1, 5.9, 5.8

(so far)

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## robuzo

Some series of quakes:
Earthquake List for Map of Asia Region

 	MAG	UTC DATE-TIME
y/m/d h:m:s	LAT
deg	LON
deg	DEPTH
km	 Region
MAP	5.6	2011/03/11 07:56:15 	  37.130	 142.305 	 34.0 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	5.8	2011/03/11 07:42:55 	  36.406	 141.919 	 29.9 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	5.9	2011/03/11 07:38:26 	  39.250	 142.783 	 29.1 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.1	2011/03/11 07 :28: 12 	  36.802	 141.911 	 24.0 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.1	2011/03/11 07:25:33 	  37.916	 144.621 	 15.0 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.3	2011/03/11 07:14:59 	  36.648	 141.811 	 25.0 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	5.9	2011/03/11 07 :13: 47 	  36.051	 142.347 	 28.5 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	5.8	2011/03/11 07 :10: 59 	  37.899	 142.734 	 30.0 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.3	2011/03/11 06:57:14 	  35.758	 140.992 	 30.2 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.3	2011/03/11 06:48:47 	  37.993	 142.764 	 22.3 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	7.1	2011/03/11 06:25:50 	  38.106	 144.553 	 19.7 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.8	2011/03/11 06 :15: 45 	  36.126	 140.234 	 30.2 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.4	2011/03/11 06 :07: 21 	  36.401	 141.862 	 35.4 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	6.4	2011/03/11 06 :06: 11 	  39.025	 142.316 	 25.1 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	8.9	2011/03/11 05:46:23 	  38.322	 142.369 	 24.4 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
---

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## StrontiumDog

Another YouTube vid...the speed of the tsunami is terrifying.

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## harrybarracuda

The Gaddafi family must be cracking open the bubbly as we speak.

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## dirtydog



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## StrontiumDog

18 aftershocks reported, all above 5.4, biggest still 7.1

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## Travelmate

On that vid you can see the car/s turning around and trying to race away! Hope they made it!!

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## StrontiumDog

18 confirmed dead...NHK

But going to rise...

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## Frankenstein

It's unreal how fast that thing is moving.

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## ItsRobsLife

I just woke up, switched on the TV and saw the footage on the news.
Seemed unreal at first, thought it was a spoof or the latest sci-fi disaster movie.

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## Norton

> But going to rise...


18 "confirmed" dead only from earthquake I believe. Toll will be much higher when tsunami aftermath and death count tallied.

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## SandMike

The first reports I saw on the BBC from the 2004 Tsunami reported the same low numbers ...

That was some time after swimming out of my hotel room in Patong !!

This brings back all the memories, and I sincerely hope this is nowhere near as bad but looking at the TV, I think the final death toll will be of a similar magnitude.

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## The Muffinman

Holy crap, just spent a couple of hours at the gym only to come back to this disaster. Watching CCN now, pictures of a massive blaze. Looks terrible, hope casualties can be kept at a minimum.

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## harrybarracuda

Looking at USGS there's been a small quake (3.2) right next to Hawaii. They don't call it the Ring of Fire for nothing, do they?
I wonder if this is a direct result of plate movement from the Christchurch Quake?

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## Loy Toy

26 confirmed dead. One is already too many.

My sincere condolences and sympathy to any Japanese forum members or those with Japanese loved ones.

Such a horrible tradegy.

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## StrontiumDog

Video of tsunami hitting Sendai airport

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## Poo and Pee

from all my years here, i have felt nothing like this. it really was scary.

aftershocks are still happening now.

here is a video i took of an aftershock about 20 minutes after it hit

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## Mid

> here is a video i took of an aftershock about 20 minutes after it hit


this is what makes TD , thanxs for posting

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## robuzo

^^The emotional reactions people have to earthquakes are interesting. One might expect Japanese to be fairly used to them, but while some people remain calm, others panic, while others have emotional breakdowns or get depressed. The girl being comforted in the video reminded me of this. I could tell that my colleague in Tokyo was really starting to feel down in response to aftershock followed by aftershock. He complained of nausea. There is something unique about the feelings elicited by a quake as compared to other catastrophic events. For example, hurricanes can be just as damaging and deadly, but they don't show up without warning, so perhaps that's why the emotional reactions to them are not really the same as those in response to earthquakes.

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## ItsRobsLife

It's incredible how well the buildings have survived such a massive quake. 
Not unexpected of course, as Japan has always championed it's building and safety technique.  :smilie_clap:

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## Loy Toy

> One might expect Japanese to be fairly used to them, but while some people remain calm, others panic, while others have emotional breakdowns or get depressed.


It was the Japanese plan to escape this "distaster waiting to happen country" over 100 years ago and when they invaded China and joined Germany in the second world war.

They know full well that human building technolgy cannot withstand the big one and that is yet to happen.

I suppose they go through life knowing that disaster is only a rumble away much the same as the residents of San Francisco and others who live on these seismic hot spots.

I guess if the Japanese race is going to remain a global power, let alone survive they will have to again look at other locations to live.

These type of events will only remind them about this fact.

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## dirtydog

> here is a video i took of an aftershock about 20 minutes after it hit


Be a good idea to stay away from big glass windows.

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## Takeovers

> They know full well that human building technolgy cannot withstand the big one and that is yet to happen.


The Japanese believe otherwise, I am sure. They trust their buildings. But only the large new Highrises. A lot of old and low residential houses may not stand.

BTW on german TV a geologist said this earthquake may be followed by others over the next years. The dreaded big one for Tokyo is now more likely and not less than before.

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## hopskimoet

Just woke up! Man! The death toll is going to be huge.

I was just watching the the tsunami (on TV) going inland and it was taking out cars and trucks as they was trying to escape. 

8.9! It's a biggie! Tsunami alerts on the west coast of the USA!

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## harrybarracuda

2012 it is then. Bloody Mayans.

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## StrontiumDog

*Smoke rises from Japan's Odaiba bay*


 Black smoke rises from a building in Tokyo's Odaiba bay area after strong earthquakes hit Japan Friday, March 11, 2011. (AP Photo/Yasushi Kanno, The Yomiuri Shimbun)  JAPAN OUT, CREDIT MANDATORY



*The tsunami wipes out a town*




*Waves of debris destroy most things in their path*




*Wreckage at a port in Miyagi Prefecture in northern Japan*


 People watch the aftermath of tsunami tidal waves  covering a port at  Kesennuma in Miyagi Prefecture, northern Japan, after  strong  earthquakes hit the area Friday, March 11, 2011. (AP  Photo/Keichi  Nakane, The Yomiuri Shimbun)  JAPAN OUT, CREDIT MANDATORY



*After the tsunami in Miyagi Prefecture*


Image: ap

 Houses, cars and other debris are washed away by tsunami tidal waves in Kesennuma in Miyagi Prefecture, northern Japan, after strong earthquakes hit the area Friday, March 11, 2011. (AP Photo/Keichi Nakane, The Yomiuri Shimbun)  JAPAN OUT, CREDIT MANDATORY



*A burning building in Tokyo*


Image: ap



*The tsunami strikes Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture*


Image: ap



*Office workers in Tokyo watch buildings sway in the aftershock*


 Office workers in Tokyo's Shiodome district near Tokyo  Bay stay on  the pedestrian deck, observing surrounding high-rise office  and hotel  buildings swaying Friday, March 11, 2011, shortly after a  7.9-magnitude  earthquake has struck off Japan's northeastern coast. (AP Photo/Koji Sasahara)



*Reporters take cover at the AP's Japan bureau*





Read more: Pictures: The Japanese Earthquake And Tsunami

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## hopskimoet

Why do people take refuge under a desk? Are they mad.

I'd be heading for the door and away from any structure.

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## hopskimoet

The Red Cross have issued warnings that some waves are bigger than some pacific islands.

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## StrontiumDog

Reuters   Reuters Top News                                             
            FLASH: 44 confirmed dead, many missing after Japan quake: report

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## hopskimoet

Footage of the waves going inland.

meh.

http://www.liveleak.com/

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## StrontiumDog

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             
    Tsunami carries away ship with 100 people on board, Miyagi police tell Kyodo News

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             
            Officials fear tsunami may have washed over entire islands in Pacific - CNN

msnbc_world   msnbc.com - World                                             
            State of emergency declared at Japan nuke plant Emergency declared at Japan nuke plants - World news - Asia-Pacific - msnbc.com

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## Loy Toy

Just been reported that a boat with 100 people on board was swept away and unaccounted for.

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## hopskimoet

I guess we will get the true number of deaths when it all subsides.

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## StrontiumDog

Reuters   Reuters Top News                                             

            FLASH: Fires reported at more than 80 locations after Japan quake: report

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## StrontiumDog

mpoppel 

            Death toll from Japan quake rises to over 50 - Kyodo

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## Rural Surin

> Looking at USGS there's been a small quake (3.2) right next to Hawaii. They don't call it the Ring of Fire for nothing, do they?
> I wonder if this is a direct result of plate movement from the Christchurch Quake?


More than likely. If one pays attention to activity throughout the pan-Ring of Fire zones, you'll find that seismic activity is grouped, setting off earth movement everywhere within days and weeks of each event. Since the NZ quakes, there has been noticeable tectonic movement....most not reported. Not to put a morose damper to these horrific scenes, but has anyone noticed that earth movement is becoming greater and stronger in the last 5-10 years? The experts suggest that deep volcanic activity has increased over recent periods. This reflects the very active plate movement of the earth's inner crust.....

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## StrontiumDog

BBCWorld   BBC Global News                                             

            Two thousand residents near Fukushima nuclear plant in #Japan urged to evacuate, reports Kyodo News: BBC News - Japan tsunami

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## StrontiumDog

RT_com   RT                                             

            Japan quake death toll 61 #news #japan #tsunami

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## Gerbil

> Two thousand residents near Fukushima nuclear plant in #Japan urged to evacuate, reports Kyodo News: BBC News - Japan tsunami


Yep, the cooling has failed there and they are having problems shutting it down.  :Sad:

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## Mid

youtube.com

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## StrontiumDog

A road in Japan destroyed by the earthquake

Yfrog Photo : yfrog.com/h47gtkjj - Shared by thaitvnews



tokyoreporter   Tokyo Reporter             
            Fuji TV has death toll up to 73, injuries at 244.

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## robuzo

> They know full well that human building technolgy cannot withstand the big one and that is yet to happen.


They got a rude awakening when the Kobe quake occurred. They (civil engineers in Japan) were quite smug after the LA earthquake, reassuring everyone that elevated highways and such would never fall down in Japan, they were safely built. Wrong.




> I suppose they go through life knowing that disaster is only a rumble away much the same as the residents of San Francisco and others who live on these seismic hot spots.


There are mini-quakes that happen daily or several times daily- most are not big enough to be consciously noticed, although in some places, like parts of Izu, earthquakes are felt almost daily. Even the tiny ones are registered in one's pacinian corpuscles, which detect Rayleigh waves. I have often wondered if these constant subconscious reminders of impending doom don't in some way account for the prevailing sense of pessimism and doom that seems to be part of the Japanese character. Notice how the Tokyo office workers in the photo above are all wearing black?

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## Poo and Pee

the aftershocks havent really stopped.

as somebody who has spent a fair bit of time on boats, i can tell you i feel like somebody who has spent a day out at sea, and still havent got my land-legs.

it really is scary.

 the density of the city really comes home to you when you realize there is litterally nowhere to run - there are overhead power cables anywhere there are not buildings...

*
whow!!! ....a big aftershock just now*  :Sad:

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## Rural Surin

Regardless of the arrogant rhetoric that might display itself from the likes of engineers, experts, authorities.....there is no such entity as _earthquake proof_ and _earthquake ready_ infrastructure. Mother Nature will win every time.

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## chitown



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## ItsRobsLife

> Regardless of the arrogant rhetoric that might display itself from the likes of engineers, experts, authorities.....*there is no such entity as earthquake proof and earthquake ready infrastructure.* Mother Nature will win every time.


The fact that modern constructions in Japan have just gone through an 8.9 earthquake without falling down would prove otherwise. 

 ::chitown::

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## robuzo

> Originally Posted by Rural Surin
> 
> 
> Regardless of the arrogant rhetoric that might display itself from the likes of engineers, experts, authorities.....*there is no such entity as earthquake proof and earthquake ready infrastructure.* Mother Nature will win every time.
> 
> 
> The fact that modern constructions in Japan have just gone through an 8.9 earthquake without falling down would prove otherwise.


Maybe so, but it doesn't matter what sort of sturdy building on rollers or whatever is constructed in some parts of Tokyo Soil liquefaction - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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## StrontiumDog

According to Kyodo News : Miyagi police say 200-300 bodies found at coastal area in Sendai city. #JapanQuake

BBC reporting the same.

Also reporting an explosion at the petro-chemical plant in Sendai

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## Takeovers

> Originally Posted by Rural Surin
> 
> 
> Regardless of the arrogant rhetoric that might display itself from the likes of engineers, experts, authorities.....*there is no such entity as earthquake proof and earthquake ready infrastructure.* Mother Nature will win every time.
> 
> 
> The fact that modern constructions in Japan have just gone through an 8.9 earthquake without falling down would prove otherwise.


But that does not sound sufficiently alarmist. Have a green.

There are failures of courss but very many buildings stand through what would destroy whole cities decades before.

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## ItsRobsLife

> Originally Posted by ItsRobsLife
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Rural Surin
> ...


Exactly, 'the big one' may well destroy them all, but 8.9 is the biggest ever and the technology has worked. 

I wouldn't expect RS to come back and substantiate his statement, he never does.

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## Loy Toy

> The fact that modern constructions in Japan have just gone through an 8.9 earthquake without falling down would prove otherwise.





> There are failures of courss but very many buildings stand through what would destroy whole cities decades before.


I just watched a group of sceismic scientists being interviewed on Asian News and when asked the question they raised their eyebrows.

Maybe it is just good luck that we have not seen an 8.9 on-land earthquake as yet but it can happen and nobody can guess the outcome.

Tokyo was a long way away from today's quake and still suffered damage due to cracks that occurred from the recent tremors.

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## robuzo

^Much of Tokyo is built on reclaimed land. It really won't matter what kind of buildings are sitting on that land if an 8+ quake strikes. Read about liquefaction- the ground under Tokyo Disneyland was affected by liquefaction today, and the epicenter was 230 miles away! In parts of Tokyo where the land is more solid, like Shinjuku, Nakano, Ikebukuro, etc., the buildings are packed so close together that the fires will be absolutely devastating.

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## ItsRobsLife

Well let's hope there isn't an 8.9 quake directly under Tokyo to test the theory.

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## Takeovers

Building foundations ca be built even for that kind of ground. The problem is that knowledge of liquefacation is relatively recent. If buildings have been designed without that in mind they may fail, that is true.

If I recall correctly it was at some earthquake in San Francisco where they found out about it as structures failed that were supposed to stand.

Yes we cannot be too sure. But we learn from every disaster.

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## StrontiumDog

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             

            USGS has measured 67 aftershocks with a 5.0 magnitude or above in Japan since the quake Latest Earthquakes in the World - Past 7 days

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## Takeovers

> Well let's hope there isn't an 8.9 quake directly under Tokyo to test the theory.


But that is what we are waiting for and it has become more likely.

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## StrontiumDog

mpoppel 

            Death toll at least 288 now, says Kyodo

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## harrybarracuda

Something we tried to get Microsoft to develop after the 2004 tsunami, but which they decided they couldn't do because of the "legal implications" (twats).

Good on Google for activating it again.

It allows you to post your details for others to find, or your request for information on others.






Can be found here:

Google Information Page

Google Person Finder

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## Poo and Pee

^ thanks harry

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## robuzo

> Originally Posted by ItsRobsLife
> 
> 
> Well let's hope there isn't an 8.9 quake directly under Tokyo to test the theory.
> 
> 
> But that is what we are waiting for and it has become more likely.


The last one over 8 on the Nankai Trough was in 1854. We are long overdue.  The 1923 Tokyo earthquake killed more than a 140,000.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> Why do people take refuge under a desk? Are they mad.


Because it's a lot safer than staggering about falling over and bumping into things, and you're less likely to be hit by a lump of falling masonry.

----------


## Gerbil

Just seen the latest pictures.... An aerial view of Miyagi Prefecture showed that just about all of it was on fire.  :Sad:

----------


## StrontiumDog

Bunch of images doing the rounds on various sites....

Tsunami hits Japan - USATODAY.com Photos


The town of Oarai is submerged after a tsunami in  Ibaraki prefecture (state). The tsunami, spawned by the largest  earthquake in Japan's recorded history, slammed the eastern coast  Friday, sweeping away boats, cars, homes and people.


Light planes and vehicles sit among the debris  after they were swept by a tsumani that struck Sendai airport in  northern Japan on Friday.


Waves of a tsunami hit residences after a  powerful earthquake in Natori, Miyagi prefecture (state), Japan.  The  largest earthquake in Japan's recorded history slammed the country's  eastern coast.


Cars and other Debris swept away by tsunami tidal  waves are seen in Kesennuma in Miyagi Prefecture, northern Japan, after  strong earthquakes hit the area


Vehicles are crushed by a collapsed wall at a  carpark in Mito city in Ibaraki prefecture on March 11, 2011 after a  massive 8.9-magnitude earthquake hit Japan.


Earthquake-triggered tsumanis sweep shores along Iwanuma in northern Japan


Fishing boats and vehicles are carried by a tsunami wave at Onahama port in Iwaki city, in Fukushima prefecture, northern Japan


An aerial shot shows vehicles ready for shipping  being carried by a tsunami tidal wave at Hitachinaka city in Ibaraki  prefecture Japan

----------


## StrontiumDog

A few more...


Houses are shown in flames as the Natori river  tsunami tidal waves flood over the surrounding area in Natori city,  Miyagi Prefecture, northern Japan.


Tsunami waves swirl near a port in Oarai, Ibaraki Prefecture (state) Japan


A tsumani triggered by a powerful earthquake makes its way to sweep part of Sendai airport in northern Japan.


A truck remains stranded on a road damaged by a powerful earthquake in Iwaki city, Fukushima prefecture (state), Japan.

----------


## hopskimoet

> Originally Posted by hopskimoet
> 
> Why do people take refuge under a desk? Are they mad.
> 
> 
> Because it's a lot safer than staggering about falling over and bumping into things, and you're less likely to be hit by a lump of falling masonry.


Indeed. But, what use is a wooden desk against a lump of masonry or concrete that could be quite large in size. In fact, what use is a wooden desk if the whole building decides to collapse? 

The last place I'd take refuge is under an MDF panel.

It reminds me of the UK governments advice as what to do in the event of a nuclear strike. The advice was make to a shelter with wooden doors, in the corridor of the house. That's great advice when faced with high yield nuclear ordnance.

----------


## ItsRobsLife

Incredible pics. 

You can plan against devastation by an earthquake, but not against a tsunami. 
There was footage on the news of cars driving on the highways being inundated. 
The death toll will surely rise.  :Sad:

----------


## hopskimoet

10,000 up, apparently....

----------


## StrontiumDog

Pacific Tsunami Fears Ease As Surge Passes http://bit.ly/gn9vP7

----------


## Chairman Mao

> Originally Posted by Marmite the Dog
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by hopskimoet
> ...


As well as softening any blows from above, I believe it also gives you more chance of getting some breathing space should it all end up as rubble, with you somewhere underneath. 

It sounds like you're convinced it's all nonsense anyway, so don't worry about it.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> 10,000 up, apparently....


10,000 up what?

----------


## harrybarracuda

Apparently the Reactor issue is "under control".

Death toll expected to rise to over 1,000.

----------


## buriramboy

Death toll will be well into the thousands, you just have to watch all the coverage on the news, lots of those poor fokers had no hope.

----------


## hopskimoet

> Originally Posted by hopskimoet
> 
> 
> 10,000 up, apparently....
> 
> 
> 10,000 up what?


Death toll....ffs.

----------


## The Gentleman Scamp

Why Sendai.  :Sad: 

My heart goes out to my ex, she's here but all her family and her home are in Sendai.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Reports: Radiation level rising in Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant turbine building #news #japan #tsunami #Fukushima

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by hopskimoet
> ...


Do you have a source?

Or just a wild guess?

----------


## Loy Toy

> My heart goes out to my ex, she's here but all her family and her home are in Sendai.


Pass on my best wishes and sympathy for me if you get to speak with her Scampy and I hope her family are safe and well.

She seemed like a nice lass.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Kyodo News Agency still reporting >1,000.

Half metre wave hits North Mexico.

Reactor still "under control" and water being pumped back into the cooling system, according to Sky.

----------


## hopskimoet

> Originally Posted by hopskimoet
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> ...


Expert predictions from Sky News.

----------


## Gerbil

1841: The situation at the nuclear reactor at Fukushima seems to be worsening. Japanese authorities are now to release radioactive vapour to ease pressure, AP news agency reports. Engineers are trying to fix the cooling system to the main reactor, damaged in the quake.

----------


## Moonraker

A 7.5 has just gone off apparently.

----------


## harrybarracuda

2.39pm:  A Japanese minister says a radioactive leak likely to come from the  damaged nuclear plant in Fukushima – 240km (150 miles) north of Tokyo –  is expected to be small. Reuters reports:"It's  possible that radioactive material in the reactor vessel could leak  outside but the amount is expected to be small and the wind blowing  towards the sea will be considered," Chief Cabinet Yukio Edano told a  news conference.
"Residents are safe after those within a 3km  radius were evacuated and those within a 10km radius are staying  indoors, so we want people to be calm," he added.The  plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co, said pressure had built up  inside a reactor at the plant after the cooling system was knocked out  by the earthquake, the largest on record in Japan.  The company had been operating three out of the six reactors at the  Fukushima Daiichi plant at the time of the quake, all of which shut  down. The remaining three had already been shut down for planned  maintenance.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Newsnow have a crawler specifically for this subject:

Newsnow Hot Topics: Japanese Earthquake




> Expert predictions from Sky News.


 :rofl:

----------


## Gerbil

> and the wind blowing towards the sea will be considered


Hmmm... So the fallout will land on North Korea?

*Edit* Whoops, No, they're west, not east arent they.

----------


## hopskimoet

> Newsnow have a crawler specifically for this subject:
> 
> Newsnow Hot Topics: Japanese Earthquake
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 			
> 				Expert predictions from Sky News.


Are you mentally retarded or something?

----------


## Mid

youtube.com

----------


## The Gentleman Scamp

I can't bear to hear the voice of that CNN anchorwoman any longer, the one in the purple dress and lipstick who has a voice like Bart Simpson with nasal congestion.

Wish I had BBC or Al Jizz, no annoying people on there. This bitch can 'go beyond boarders' with Richard Quest as far as I'm concerned.

----------


## Jesus Jones

Possibly awestruck, but some of those drivers didn' t appear to be doing a very good job at trying to escape.  Single fine traffic and some what appeared to be waiting at lights or junction? They weren't abandoned either as the front cars we making a steady turn. This is while the devestation is headed their way.

----------


## StrontiumDog

http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/03/11...an-earthquake/


Houses lie flattened after a powerful earthquake in Iwaki, Fukushima prefecture.

March 11th, 2011
 08:30 PM ET

*[8:30 p.m. ET, 10:30 a.m. Tokyo] ﻿*Ecuadorian  President Rafael  Correa ordered the evacuation of the Galapagos Islands  and of cities  along the country's coast Friday.

*[7:45 p.m. ET, 9:45 a.m. Tokyo] ﻿*Potentially  dangerous problems  cooling radioactive material appear to have cropped  up at another of  the Tokyo Electric Power Company's nuclear plants.  Kyodo reported  Saturday the power company alerted authorities that the  cooling system  at three of the four units of its Fukushima Daini plant *–* which is different from the Fukushima Daiichi reactors, nearby in northeastern Japan in the Fukushima prefecture *–* has failed.

 The news agency also reported Saturday that Japan's nuclear safety   agency ordered the power company to release a valve in the Fukushima   Daiichi plant's "No. 1" reactor, in order to release growing pressure.   This comes amid Kyodo's reports, citing the same Japanese agency, that   radiation levels were 1,000 times above normal in the the control room   of that facility's "No. 1" reactor.

*[6:50 p.m. ET, 8:50 a.m. Tokyo]* California Gov.  Jerry Brown  declared a state of emergency in Del Norte, Humboldt, San  Mateo and  Santa Cruz counties Friday after tsunami waves moved ashore in  those  areas.

*[6:45 p.m. ET, 8:45 a.m. Tokyo]* In addition to the  United  States, 24 countries have offered to provide assistance to Japan,   including the dispatch of rescue teams, and the provision of relief   supplies and transportation, the foreign minister said, according to   Kyodo, among them: Australia, China, South Korea, Mexico, Thailand, New   Zealand, Singapore, Indonesia, India, Russia, Turkey, Germany, France,   Belgium, the United Arab Emirates, Switzerland and Jordan.

*[6:15 p.m. ET, 8:15 a.m. Tokyo]* As day breaks  Saturday in  Japan, tsunamis continue to wash ashore on the Pacific  northeast coast,  toss about cars and boats like toys and forcing  residents to seek  refuge on the roofs of buildings. A fire has broken  out in the city of  Kesennuma, NHK reports.

 At least 427 are dead, with 200 to 300 bodies unidentified, NHK reports.

*[5:15 p.m. ET, 7:15 a.m. Tokyo]* A 25-year-old man who was washed out to sea while trying to photograph the tsunami in northern California was confirmed dead Friday, according to Del Norte, California, authorities.

*[4:50 p.m. ET, 6:50 a.m. Tokyo]* Chile upgraded a  tsunami  warning to an alert for residents of the Easter Islands on  Friday  evening and urged coastal residents of Chile to evacuate to  higher  ground, CNN Chile reported, citing the country's interior  minister.  Elsewhere, Ecuadorian President Rafael Correa said Friday that   off-shore drilling has been halted because of the tsunami warning   triggered by the 8.9-magnitude earthquake in Japan.

*[4:45 p.m. ET, 6:45 a.m. Tokyo]* Radioactive  substances could  have already leaked at the quake-hit Fukushima No. 1  nuclear plant, the  operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Saturday,  according to Kyodo News.

 Radiation has been more than eight times the normal level at a   monitoring post near the main gate of the plant, the Nuclear and   Industrial Safety Agency under the industry ministry said.

*[4:14 p.m. ET, 6:14 a.m. Tokyo]* What's  next for Japan? Robert  Jensen, whose company assists in natural  disaster recovery efforts,  says, "right now Japan is in the life-saving,  immediate-response mode,  not the recovery mode. In the next several  days as it moves to recovery  mode, Japan will have to take care of its  citizens and meet the basic  needs of food, water and shelter."

 The Japanese are very good at this, he says, but the scope and scale   this time are significantly greater. "Japan hasn’t seen damage like this   since World War II."
Read the full post at Global Public Square blog

*[3:56 p.m. ET, 5:56 a.m. Tokyo]* An estimated  6.3-magnitude  earthquake has hit near the west coast of Honshu - the  latest in a  series of aftershocks and fresh temblors that struck on and  around  Japan's largest island within a span of 70 minutes early Saturday   morning. A 6.2-magnitude quake hit at 3:59 a.m., followed by six more   with magnitudes no less than 5.2.

----------


## StrontiumDog

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             

            At least 124 quakes magnitude 5 or higher strike near Honshu, Japan, coast since 8.9 quake hit area Friday -USGS

Residents of Iwanuma, Miyagi Prefecture, who spent night atop building, rescued - Asahi Shimbun

6.1-magnitude earthquake strikes Tonga -USGS http://1.usa.gov/gykqvD

Nearly 2-foot-high tsunami hits Easter Island, no damage reported; Chilean coast still in danger - TVN Chile via NBC

Japanese boat swept away by tsunami found, all 81 aboard airlifted to safety - reports

----------


## StrontiumDog

Aerial view of the devastation from NHK this morning....

----------


## StrontiumDog

Aftermath: The remains of houses are surrounded  by broken wood and concrete after flood waters engulfed Iwaki town,  Fukushima prefecture


 
The sheer force of the quake is evident in this image of the road in Fukushima which has been flipped, buckled and broken


 
 
Explosion: Flames reach hundreds of feet into  the sky after a natural gas facility in Chiba near Tokyo explodes after  the earthquake, while right, a fire tears through residential houses in  Yamada in northern Japan

 
Menace: Wave upon wave heads towards the coastline which has already been breached by an earlier onslaught


 
This extraordinary image shows how the quake split this road in Satte on the island of Honshu right down the middle


 
 
Two women in Urayasu city, Chiba, scramble up a  road that was buckled by the force of the quake. Right, a young woman  wells up and leans on her friend as the true scale of the disaster that  has claimed the lives of hundreds of people becomes apparent 

 
Collapsed: Three shocked employees look at what  has become of the factory in Sukagawa city, Fukushima, where moments  earlier they had been working

 
Raging seas: The tsunami pours through trees and  engulfs homes on the coast of Natori, Miyagi Prefecture, after the  earthquake struck

  
The same scene just moments later shows how  the entire area with dozens of homes is completely obliterated by the  unforgiving  waters which swept away anything in their path. Bobbing about on the  surface is all the debris the waters have picked up along the way


Read more: Japan earthquake and tsunami: The moment mother nature engulfed a nation | Mail Online

----------


## misskit

All of this is distressing to watch and able to do nothing.

Luckily, I have been in contact with my husband and his family. Family in Tokyo are ok, just inconvenienced and very upset. 

So sorry for everyone inside and outside Japan who can't contact their loved ones. Especially those in Sendai. My heart goes out to all.

----------


## StrontiumDog

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/201...its_japan.html

Lots more at the link...


14
A  building is in flames near Sendai airport, Miyagi prefecture (state),   Japan, after a powerful earthquake, the largest in Japan's recorded   history, slammed the eastern coasts Friday, March 11. (Kyodo   News/Associated Press)   #


19
Fishing  boats and vehicles are carried by a tsunami wave at Onahama  port in  Iwaki city, in Fukushima prefecture, northern Japan. (Fukushima   Minpo/AFP/Getty Images) #


20
A tsunami, tidal wave smashes vehicles and houses at Kesennuma city in Miyagi prefecture, northern Japan. (AFP/Getty Images)  #


26
This  aerial shot shows the tsunami tidal waves moving upstream (left  side)  in the Naka river at Hitachinaka city in Ibaraki prefecture on  March 11.  (AFP/Getty Images) #


27
Houses,  cars and other debris are washed away by tsunami tidal waves in   Kesennuma in Miyagi Prefecture, northern Japan, after strong  earthquakes  hit the area Friday, March 11. (Keichi Nakane/Associated  Press/The  Yomiuri Shimbun) #


28
Houses swept by a tsunami smoulder near Sendai Airport. (Reuters) #


45
Residents  walk through the rubles of residents collapsed by a powerful  earthquake  in Iwaki, Fukushima prefecture Japan. (Kyodo News/Associated  Press)  #


46
This  National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) image  released  on March 11, 2011 shows model runs from the Center for Tsunami  Research  at the NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory showing  the expected  wave heights of the tsunami as it travels across the  Pacific basin. The  largest wave heights are expected near the  earthquake epicenter off  Japan. The wave will decrease in height as it  travels across the deep  Pacific but grow taller as it nears coastal  areas. In general, as the  energy of the wave decreases with distance,  the near shore heights will  also decrease (e.g., coastal Hawaii will  not expect heights of that  encountered in coastal Japan). Tsunami waves  rolled thousands of miles  across the Pacific Ocean after a massive  earthquake off Japan and washed  ashore in Hawaii early March 11. (NOAA)   #


47
Buildings  burn in Yamada town, Iwate prefecture (state) after Japan's  biggest  recorded earthquake hit March 11. (Associated Press/The Yomiuri  Shimbun)  #

----------


## StrontiumDog

^ please note, I selected a few images from the above 2 sites, there are lots more at both links, but I didn't want to repost ones I had already posted. Bigger versions of the smaller images I posted earlier are at both as well. 

Amazing images.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> 
> Newsnow have a crawler specifically for this subject:
> 
> Newsnow Hot Topics: Japanese Earthquake
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Why, because I question the quality of Sky News' reporting?

The cunts were sat here in Bahrain for a two weeks calling a traffic roundabout "Pearl Square".

They just sensationalise everything to keep people watching their frigging commercials.

From Bloomberg this morning:




> The quake, which shut down airports and trains in Tokyo, leaving millions of commuters stranded, killed close to 500 and left more than 1,000 missing, according to the National Police Agency.


I would think the National Police Agency would have slightly more accurate information than the...




> Originally Posted by *hopskimoet*  
> _10,000 up, apparently...._


you supposedly heard from a Sky Expert.

The scale of this tragedy is still enormous, but thanks to Japan's experience of quakes and tsunamis going back decades, it is mercifully much smaller than the figure you quote.

Please provide your source next time, because I still see Sky quoting the Kyodo figure of 1,000 or more.

----------


## harrybarracuda

The stupidity of some people beggars belief.




> The tsunami waves set in by devastating  Japanese earthquake on Friday swept at least seven people out to sea in  the states of Oregon and California along the U.S. Pacific Coast with  one man remained missing.
> 
>     According to the U.S. Coast Guard,  three people had gone to the Northern California coast near the Klamath  River to take pictures of the arrival of tsunami waves around 10 a.m.  local time when they were swept out to sea.
> 
>     Two of them made  safely back to shore, but the third remained missing who is still being  searched by helicopters, the Coast Guard said in a press release.
> 
>     In Oregon, four people were rescued by local firefighters and one  almost drowned near Pistol River south of Gold beach, local emergency  management coordinator said.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> Raging seas: The tsunami pours through trees and  engulfs homes on the coast of Natori, Miyagi Prefecture, after the  earthquake struck
> 
>   
> The same scene just moments later shows how  the entire area with dozens of homes is completely obliterated by the  unforgiving  waters which swept away anything in their path. Bobbing about on the  surface is all the debris the waters have picked up along the way


Except it's not the same scene. The usual shoddy standard from the Daily Mail...

----------


## harrybarracuda

An update on the Nuclear plant:




> U.S. President Barack Obama said on Friday  that the United States rushed coolant to a Japanese nuclear power plant  as a precaution after a 8.9-magnitude earthquake hit the U.S. ally.
> 
>     Obama told reporters at the White House that when he spoke to  Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan on Friday morning, he " specifically  asked him about the nuclear plants and their potential vulnerability as a  consequence of the earthquake."
> 
>     Obama said he was told the  Japanese authorities were monitoring the situation very closely and so  far no evidence of radiation leaks had been seen. "But obviously you've  got to take all potential precautions," the president added.
> 
>      He said he had asked his Energy Secretary Steve Chu to be in close  contact with the Japanese side to provide any assistance necessary, "but  also to make sure that if, in fact, there have been breaches in the  safety system on these nuclear plants that they're dealt with right  away."
> 
>     Japan's Kyodo news agency said that radiation leak  could occur at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant though the amount would  be small. The International Atomic Energy Agency said that it is ready  to provide assistance if requested.
> ...

----------


## harrybarracuda

The Pacific warning system seems to have had the desired effect, as well as the expected waves being much lower than some 'experts' predicted.




> WELLINGTON (AFP) - A tsunami triggered by the powerful earthquake in  Japan ploughed across the South Pacific Saturday but no serious damage  was reported and it was treated more as a curiosity than a danger.
> Dozens  of low-lying island nations were placed on alert after a monster  10-metre (33-foot) tsunami smashed into Japan following the devastating  8.9 magnitude earthquake centered near the northeastern city of Sendai.
> The  death toll from the earthquake and tsunami is expected to be more than  1,000 in Japan, but *the wave appeared to have little power when it hit  the South Pacific and there were no reports of lives lost.*
> In the  Marquesas islands sirens blared, warning residents to flee to higher  ground. *Although waves up to three metres (10 feet) were forecast they  were less than a metre when they arrived*, but still flooded some houses.
> In New Zealand, civil defence officials warned of waves of just over one metre and advised people to stay away from beach areas.
> However,  the first wave "was rather insignificant and hardly visible to the  naked eye," said civil defence operations manager David Coetzee as  hundreds of people made their way to the shoreline to see what the fuss  was about.
> "It looks pretty good out there and we are not the  first ones out," Graeme Barnard told the Waikato Times newspaper as he  set out for a day's fishing off Hamilton on the west coast of the North  Island.
> In Tonga, where a tsunami that killed nine people 18  months ago remains fresh in the memory, many people rushed to higher  ground for safety while others tested the power of the tsunami by going  for a swim.
> "The current was flowing differently and you could  feel it in the water," said Matangi Tonga editor Pesi Fonua who entered  the water near the capital Nuku'alofa.
> ...

----------


## robuzo

> An update on the Nuclear plant:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 			
> 				U.S. President Barack Obama said on Friday  that the United States rushed coolant to a Japanese nuclear power plant  as a precaution after a 8.9-magnitude earthquake hit the U.S. ally.
> 
> ...


Japan has a crap nuclear plant safety record, and the J-government cannot be trusted to provide accurate, up-to-date information. One worry is that because the government and TEPCO are so untrustworthy, Japanese people tend to magnify any admission of trouble into something far worse (or maybe not!) than the actual situation.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Japan has a crap nuclear plant safety record, and the J-government  cannot be trusted to provide accurate, up-to-date information. One worry  is that because the government and TEPCO are so untrustworthy, *Japanese  people tend to magnify any admission of trouble into something far  worse (or maybe not!) than the actual situation*.


Bit like Sky News or The Sun then.

Mind you, if you remember the way the Russians first reported Chernobyl, which would you prefer?

 :Smile:

----------


## Rural Surin

> The stupidity of some people beggars belief.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 			
> 				The tsunami waves set in by devastating  Japanese earthquake on Friday swept at least seven people out to sea in  the states of Oregon and California along the U.S. Pacific Coast with  one man remained missing.
> 
> ...


Stupidity perhaps, it's possible that these folks weren't aware of events or any forewarning....beachcombing tends to distract one from 24 fvcking hours a day info absorption.

----------


## good2bhappy

just seen some footage of a big wave hitting the coast
Incredible, the power was immense. It picked up what looked like a warehouse as if it was a matchbox

----------


## KAPPA

Does NOAA have a text messaging service within US? Thailand?

----------


## robuzo

This went up 30 minutes ago on the Asahi Shinbun site:
福島第一原発１号機、溶融開始か　爆発的な反応の恐れも
No. 1 Fukushima nuclear power plant- fusion may have begun, fear of explosive reaction
---
For Japanese readers: asahi.com

----------


## Chairman Mao

> Mind you, if you remember the way the Russians first reported Chernobyl, which would you prefer?


By sheer chance I picked up an old Nat. Geographic and it was the 1 year anniversary of Chernobyl edition. Was sad to see that it was heralding how little damage had been done...

Birth defects and radiation illnesses were yet to arrive en masse.

----------


## good2bhappy

Japanese govt saying meltdown is a possibility!!
Oh shit!

----------


## Chairman Mao

*Japan nuclear authorities say high possibility of meltdown at Fukushima Daiichi No.1 reactor* - Jiji:  /RT [at]REUTERSFLASH: 

Doesn't sound too healthy.

----------


## Loy Toy

Oh oh.............The China Syndrome and one for all those believers who say todays building technology can over-ride Mother Nature's wrath.

----------


## mobs00

Japan fears nuclear plant meltdown - Asia-Pacific - Al Jazeera English




> Japanese nuclear authorities said that there was a high possibility that nuclear fuel rods at a reactor at Tokyo Electric Power's Daiichi plant may be melting or have melted, Jiji news agency reported on Saturday.





> Radiation 1,000 times above normal was detected in the control room of one plant, although authorities said levels outside the facility's gates were only eight times above normal, spelling "no immediate health hazard".

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Stupidity perhaps, it's possible that these folks weren't aware of  events or any forewarning....beachcombing tends to distract one from 24  fvcking hours a day info absorption.


Perhaps you missed the bit that said:




> three people had gone to the Northern California coast near the Klamath  River to take pictures of the arrival of tsunami waves


Like I said, stupid.

----------


## robuzo

> Oh oh.............The China Syndrome and one for all those believers who say todays building technology can over-ride Mother Nature's wrath.


Not to mention human stupidity.

----------


## mobs00

Report on the reactor starts at about 1:50. The reactor is 100 times bigger than Chernobyl.

----------


## Loy Toy

^^ I am immediately worried about the distance and with regard to exactly how far my family is away from Japan.

Nuclear fallout can cover most of Asia.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Depending which way the wind is blowing.

----------


## good2bhappy

and rain

----------


## harrybarracuda

Not preempting anything, but this makes interesting reading if you're thinking of relocating.

Chernobyl Fallout Data

----------


## mobs00

Here are the trade winds.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Looks like NHK are reporting the evacuation zone has been extended to 10km (I'm afraid I can't read or speak Japanese!).

----------


## mobs00

Here's the current jet stream.

http://www.wunderground.com/global/R...JetStream.html

----------


## Norton

> Looks like NHK are reporting the evacuation zone has been extended to 10km


Also saw on TV they are now venting radioactive steam into atmosphere. 

The better of two evils. Either venting or heightening the risk of a meltdown.

----------


## misskit

Here is a Japanese news site in English for you Mr. Barracuda. 

The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## robuzo

NHK WORLD English NHK report in English

----------


## good2bhappy

chilling news

----------


## mobs00

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> Looks like NHK are reporting the evacuation zone has been extended to 10km
> 
> 
> Also saw on TV they are now venting radioactive steam into atmosphere. 
> 
> The better of two evils. Either venting or heightening the risk of a meltdown.



NHK WORLD English


*Venting air from reactor container suspended*

The operation at Fukushima No.1 plant to lower pressure of the containment vessel has been suspended due to high radiation levels at the site.

----------


## harrybarracuda

NHK have now gone back to live English. They are advising people on what to do in the event of a nuclear accident. Moist towels over the face, avoid drinking water, food contamination, etc.

They seem a little bit unprepared to be honest, lots of pauses while the reporter waits for information.

----------


## Mid

arrr yes safe clean , green nuclear power .........................

----------


## harrybarracuda

One of the observation stations has moved 4m apparently. If I recall, Phuket moved 35cm in 2004.

----------


## good2bhappy

Fukushima reactor showing 1.7m (about 1/3) of fuel rod exposed, up from 90cm before. Present Caesium indicates probable melting. Going critical?

----------


## Loy Toy

Japan must be the most risky country in the world to build something as deadly as a nuclear reactor on.

Foolhardy arrogant humans who build these structures with little or no idea about the consequences.

God knows what will happen WHEN they experience an 8.9 earthquake on land and close to these reactors.

----------


## koman

> arrr yes safe clean , green nuclear power .........................


Well;  if you go building your power stations right in front of the biggest and most active subduction zone on the planet.  WTF were they thinking??
My understanding however is that the reactors were not damaged by the earthquake or tsunami directly.  The problem seems to be power failures both internal and external, which shut down the cooling systems.  It may be splitting hairs but.....not enough data to really know yet. 

 I've always thought nuclear power stations should be sitting on a mile thick layer of bedrock...and a million miles from any earthquake zone......oh and have a fail safe power supply.  I'm not a nuclear engineer or anything. It just seems like a more sensible kind of place to put them; instead of on the fault lines...
Seems a bit like building your house on a flood plane and just hoping that a flood will never come.

----------


## drawp

> The powerful earthquake that unleashed a devastating tsunami Friday appears to have moved the main island of Japan by 8 feet (2.4 meters) and shifted the Earth on its axis."


From CNN, Quake moved Japan coast 8 feet; shifted Earth's axis - CNN.com

----------


## Mid

*Radiation leak confirmed at quake-hit nuclear plant in Japan (Update)*

*TOKYO,*  March 12 (RIA Novosti) - Radioactive cesium leak has been confirmed in  and near the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant after a 8.9-magnitude  quake hit northeast Japan on Friday, the Kyodo news agency said on  Saturday.

 The cooling system has failed at three reactors of the Fukushima No. 2  nuclear plant as well, the plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co.  said. The Nuclear Safety Agency has called for evacuation from the area,  Kyodo said.

 People from areas surrounding the Fukushima plant are being evacuated.

 Radiation levels inside the plant rose to 1,000 times above the norm,  and are about eight times above the norm outside the plant, the agency  said. 

Radiation levels increased as power shortages caused the reactor  to overheat, the Tokyo Electric Power Co. said, adding that the failsafe  system at the No. 2 plant had stopped functioning as the temperature of  coolant water topped 100 C.

 The operator of the two plants plans to release pressure in  containers housing their reactors to prevent the plants from getting  damaged and losing their critical containment function. But the action  would involve the release of steam that would likely include radioactive  materials, Kyodo said.

 Until now, Japanese officials have been making controversial comments on the accident, mostly denying the leak.

_snip

_en.rian.ru

----------


## superman

On the BBC news at 2pm (Thai time) it said that there was a controlled release of raioactive steam to prevent a pressure build-up blow out.

----------


## harrybarracuda

AFP: Explosion heard and white smoke seen at Quake hit Nuclear Plant.

----------


## Larn

^ Now saying Fukushima nuclear plant

----------


## Mid

_Several people appear to have been injured after reported Fukushima plant explosion - media

_https://twitter.com/reutersflash

----------


## mobs00

^

Sky News, First for Breaking News, Latest News and Video News from the UK and around the World




> An explosion is reportedly heard and white smoke seen at a quake-hit nuclear plant in Japan, amid fears of a meltdown.

----------


## mobs00

Japan earthquake | Page 15 | Liveblog live blogging | Reuters.com

Japan Nuclear Safety Agency: has heard explosion was not at reactor

by Reuters_TonyTharakan at 2:57 PM


_Few minutes later the same guy reports this:_


Outer structure of building that houses reactor at Fukushima plant appears to have blown off - NHK

by Reuters_TonyTharakan at 3:12 PM

----------


## mobs00

From NHK

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/




> Tokyo Electric Power Company says an explosion was heard at its nuclear power plant in quake-hit Fukushima Prefecture, but details remain unknown.The company also said several workers were injured.

----------


## Mid

duplicate of # 188 , apologies

----------


## harrybarracuda

Daily Mail's front page says "100,000 feared dead".

By who exactly? The English press really are a fucking disgrace.

----------


## Mid

live streaming

NHK WORLD English

list : Japan Tsunami – Watch and Follow Live Streaming and Real-Time Updates

----------


## harrybarracuda

NHK: "Radiation Team Deployed".

----------


## Mid

_Tokyo fire department sending special nuclear rescue team to Fukushima - TV

_Japan earthquake | Page 15 | Liveblog live blogging | Reuters.com

_Tepco says explosion may have been hydrogen used to cool Fukushima plant  - Kyodo; Tepco says 4 people taken to hospital after reported  explosion, no word on condition - Jiji_

http://live.reuters.com/Event/Japan_earthquake2

----------


## Larn

NHK reporting walls and roof destroyed in blast at nuclear plant

----------


## Mid

Mat - Explosion en direct a la centrale de Fukushima #séisme #nucléaire - TwitVid

 Reportedly a video of the explosion at *#Fukushima*. Unconfirmed.
https://twitter.com/search?q=%23Fukushima


that don't look like a small explosion

----------


## HermantheGerman

Green Peace Germany said Meltdown has begun.

----------


## mobs00

^^





Look at the shockwave at :48 seconds in. Wow.

----------


## Mid

nhk-gtv on USTREAM: NHK

live pics , commentary in Japanese

----------


## mobs00

Japan Earthquake | Radiation detected at Japan nuclear plant





> An explosion was heard from a quake-hit Japanese nuclear plant and smoke was seen billowing from it today, as several workers were injured and radioactivity rose 20-fold outside, reports said.

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> By who exactly? The English press really are a fucking disgrace.


"arry" my son I tend to agree with you...but not as disgraceful as the c*nts who designed the safety systems used in the "FuckUshima" plants! It's the same old rhetoric "no leaks" "no danger" "don't panic" followed by oops we made a miscalculation...it's time to kiss your arse goodbye!

----------


## Mid

_


patrick2000 before and after images from the #fukushima 第一 reactor. outside cover of the leftmost building is gone as of JST 15:36. Yfrog Photo : yfrog.com/gzz71bdj - Shared by patrick2000_

----------


## HermantheGerman

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> By who exactly? The English press really are a fucking disgrace.
> 
> 
> "arry" my son I tend to agree with you...but not as disgraceful as the c*nts who designed the safety systems used in the "FuckUshima" plants! It's the same old rhetoric "no leaks" "no danger" "don't panic" followed by oops we made a miscalculation...it's time to kiss your arse goodbye!



Have the Japs admitted yet that they lost the WAR ?

----------


## Mid

_Fukushima press conference to start shortly. We will do our best to translate.

_https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

----------


## Mid

Stunning picture of explosion in Fukushima, via [at]makitanaka http://bit.ly/gHiiEN

----------


## robuzo

> nhk-gtv on USTREAM: NHK
> 
> live pics , commentary in Japanese


Mid- is there a trick I need to know to get Ustream to work in Thailand? Different browser, proxy, or something? I keep getting redirected to some site run by our local tinpot dictatorship.

----------


## Mid

try a proxy ?

----------


## mobs00

^^ works for me

----------


## mobs00



----------


## Mid

_NHK  saying, if you can, get as far from the power station as possible. If  you can't cover your skin with long shirts, trousers etc
_
https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo


Edano takes the podium.

----------


## mobs00

Mid, if those images are correct in post #202 than according to this map it looks like one of the power plants may have blown. (middle, left side of map)

----------


## Mid

Edano says please try and conserve electricity. Beware of chain email that may be scaremongering.                        less than 5 seconds ago   via Echofon                             Edano reminds us that it's getting dark, the tsunami alert is still present, we should stay in a safe place.                        2 minutes ago   via Echofon                             Edano keeps repeating that they are doing their best and that we should remain calm.                        4 minutes ago   via Echofon                             Edano is repeating himself - not sure what happened. Trying to gather more info. Trying to confirm people are ok.                        5 minutes ago   via Echofon                             They are still assessing the situation                        6 minutes ago   via Echofon                             They are not sure yet whether the explosion originated from the fuel rodhttps://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

----------


## Mid

*nobi*                            Edano: False rumors are  circulating they can be hazardous to rescue operation; don't spread  rumors.枝野：チェーンメールなど出回っていて救助活動の妨げに。ヘリコプターの取材も自粛を。                     half a minute ago   via web                                   Retweeted by TimeOutTokyo and 3 others                             Edano now telling media to report responsibly and to be aware that helicopter noise can scare/disturb residents.https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

----------


## Mid

> it looks like one of the power plants may have blown.


pic in 205 suggests it was rather big .

----------


## Mid

Japan chief cabinet sec Edano: expands evacuation area at No. 2 plant to 10 km

https://twitter.com/REUTERSFLASH

----------


## Mid

2nd question: Is 10 km safe enough?

https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo


Edano: We always estimate conservatively. At the moment, 10km seems safe.

----------


## hopskimoet

Jesus. I just saw the footage of the nuclear power station exploding. It doesn't get anymore serious than this.

----------


## Mid

from the blogworld .....................

sorry 'bout that , ancient news now .

----------


## Bower

BBC reporters saying roadblocks now at 60k from power stations, anybody inside the this area being told to stay indoors.

----------


## Stinky

> _NHK  saying, if you can, get as far from the power station as possible. If  you can't cover your skin with long shirts, trousers etc
> _
> https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo
> 
> 
> Edano takes the podium.


 Good one, that's as uselful as barrier cream against tanks.

----------


## Mid

_The evacuation area around the 2nd nuclear reactor has also been widened to a 10k radius, as a precaution.

_https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo
_
Japan chief cabinet secretary Edano: Confirms radiation leak at Fukushima plant_

http://live.reuters.com/Event/Japan_earthquake2

----------


## mobs00

2012 is coming. It may not be a joke this time.....

----------


## Bower

Sooner or later some brave souls are going to have to go in on the ground to sort this.

----------


## Bower

I wonder how they can maintain the other 3 reactors when they are all so close together ?

----------


## Mid

More than 5000 evacuated so far. Towns taking them in are low on space, food, blankets. (NHK)                        less than a minute ago   via Echofon                             Still people not yet  evacuated within 10km radius, mainly elderly and those living alone.  Police and Self Defence Force trying to reach themhttps://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

----------


## mobs00

Use this animation to model the jet stream for the coming days. If there is radio active mater in the atmosphere it will definitely be heading towards the west coast of the US.

http://squall.sfsu.edu/scripts/nhemjetstream_model.html

----------


## Mid

*UKinJapan*                            Grateful if British  nationals could confirm if they are safe by contacting FCO: +44 (0)207  008 0000 and japan.earthquake[at]fco.gov.uk

https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

----------


## robuzo

> Sooner or later some brave souls are going to have to go in on the ground to sort this.


The bravery and sacrifice of some of the workers at Chernobyl was astonishing. Some knew full well they would die- horribly. Knowing the Japanese they will not have trouble finding brave people to do what must be done. I hope it won't be too late.

----------


## mobs00

Seems to be a news blackout now. No new news is coming in. After the explosion it seems that all the news sources are just rehashing the explosion and giving no new updates on the current state of things.

----------


## Loy Toy

> Knowing the Japanese they will not have trouble finding brave people to do what must be done. I hope it won't be too late.


 
I agree. If there was one race of people who will pool together, make sacrifices and to overcome these terrible tragedies it will be the Japanese.

All the rest of us can do is wish them the best and offer moral support and when neccessary.

----------


## mobs00

Here are the 2 plants.

http://www.spiegel.de/wissenschaft/t...750479,00.html

----------


## Mid

NHK is reporting that the Fukushima evacuation radius has been raised from 10km to 20km

https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

----------


## hopskimoet

The northern port of Kamaichi was hit by a huge tsunami today. The footage was morbidly amazing.

----------


## StrontiumDog

ayakomie: One worker stuck in the in the reactor 2 facility found dead, TV Asahi

----------


## StrontiumDog

SkyNewsBreak: AFP: Japanese military find 300-400 bodies in Iwate's Rikuzentakata city

----------


## StrontiumDog

More amazing footage of the tsunami ripping a city in the north east to bits...ITN news report..

----------


## Moonraker

The death toll must be enormous.

----------


## Takeovers

An expert on BBC World just said the Metal Reactor Core has most likely not been breached. In that case the worst will probably not happen. The vast majority of the nuclear fuel would still be contained.

It was also said the emergency cooling worked for 1 hour. And that took away much of the heat. The heat production goes down rapidly from that time. So every hour that goes by without breach of the reactor core protection makes the big disaster less likely.

Hope it is true.

----------


## ItsRobsLife

I'd rather come here to TD to find out what is going on instead of the television. 
As with all major disasters, in the absence of hard facts the tv news turns to endless speculation, 
pulling in any punter or pundit that can add a background voice to the continuous video loop they run. 

BBC are speculating about the power plant explosion and had an 'expert' tell the viewers that explosions at nuclear facilities are relatively safe, apparently if you look at the amount of deaths over the amount killowatts produced you'll find that hydro electric power is much more dangerous because when hydro electric dams burst they kill more people !!! 

I mean what the fuck, if you don't have anything worth saying and all... 

Ok people, just keep eating the beef, our experts have it all figured out. 

 ::chitown::

----------


## StrontiumDog

^^^ 1,300 is being said to be the latest...

600 plus the official toll. The above number is speculation.

I'd say both are too low.

Edit....

Latest Death Toll Estimate Tops 1600 In Japan http://bit.ly/fWNIZT

----------


## Mid

> BBC are speculating about the power plant explosion and had an 'expert' tell the viewers that explosions at nuclear facilities are relatively safe, apparently if you look at the amount of deaths over the amount killowatts produced you'll find that hydro electric power is much more dangerous because when hydro electric dams burst they kill more people !!!


nuclear spin doctors quick to earn their money .

----------


## Thetyim

> It was also said the emergency cooling worked for 1 hour


So have I got this right.?
The earthquake took out the electricity supply to the cooling system.
The tsunami took out the diesel powered backup generators.
And the 2nd back-up battery supply, which is supposed to run for 8 hours, only worked for one hour.

----------


## Mid

^

the US military also delivered some replacement coolant somewhere in the mix .

----------


## Chairman Mao

> The death toll must be enormous.


It is surprising that the official one is yet to breach 1000 (last time I saw anyway). Imagine it will sky rocket within the next few days.

----------


## Loy Toy

The damaged reactor is over 40 years old and probably hasn't been upgraded with today's technology due to greed.

----------


## Bower

> Originally Posted by Moonraker
> 
> 
> The death toll must be enormous.
> 
> 
> It is surprising that the official one is yet to breach 1000 (last time I saw anyway). Imagine it will sky rocket within the next few days.


I was expecting to hear by this morning that the deaths were already in the 10's of thousands, remarkable if it isn't.

----------


## robuzo

> Seems to be a news blackout now. No new news is coming in. After the explosion it seems that all the news sources are just rehashing the explosion and giving no new updates on the current state of things.


Will be an announcement at 6:30 BKK time. Can't wait.

----------


## Takeovers

> So have I got this right.? The earthquake took out the electricity supply to the cooling system. The tsunami took out the diesel powered backup generators. And the 2nd back-up battery supply, which is supposed to run for 8 hours, only worked for one hour.


They were not very clear. I understand the Diesel Generators providing full cooling capacity worked for 1 hour. After that it was down to batteries. Probably not at full capacity.

----------


## Mid

At  8.30pm, Prime Minister Kan and Mr Edano will broadcast another press  conference on Fukushima. We'll try and keep up for you again.

Press conference about to begin.

https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

----------


## Mid

The backup system that should have switched on seems to have failed.                        3 minutes ago   via web                             The earthquake brought about a much larger tsunami than anyone ever expected.                        3 minutes ago   via web                             On Fukushima: He knows that many people are concerned.https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

I should mention the above is the Japanese PM speaking


.

----------


## Mid

Please remain calm.                        3 minutes ago   via web                             "Not a single resident will suffer any ill effects."                        3 minutes ago   via web                             He's now discussing the fact that he raised the evacuation radius. It's only one of many measures they plan to take.                        4 minutes ago   via web                             The nuclear power plant number 1 reactor has had "a new development". Edano will explain more later.https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

more from the Japanese PM

----------


## mobs00

> Originally Posted by mobs00
> 
> 
> Seems to be a news blackout now. No new news is coming in. After the explosion it seems that all the news sources are just rehashing the explosion and giving no new updates on the current state of things.
> 
> 
> Will be an announcement at 6:30 BKK time. Can't wait.


The PM didn't say much though did he.

----------


## Mid

The procedure began at 8.30pm                        1 minute ago   via web                             He is concerned about the  container, of course, and wants to make sure it doesn't leak. So he's  decided to fill it with sea water.                        2 minutes ago   via web                             He's repeating that point. The radiation leakage has not really changed, so please remain calm.                        3 minutes ago   via web                             The radiation level actually decreased, he claims, after the explosion.                        4 minutes ago   via web                             The density of the  radiation amount did not increase following the explosion. The earlier  reported figure, 1050, was actually inaccurate.                        4 minutes ago   via web                             There will not be any massive radiation leaks.                        5 minutes ago   via web                             He's insisting that the inside container was not damaged.                        5 minutes ago   via web                             The container inside didn't collapse.                        6 minutes ago   via web                             The power plant is covered with  steal container, and the outside is covered with reinforced concrete. This is what collapsed,                        6 minutes ago   via web                             At 3.36pm there was an explosion.                        7 minutes ago   via web                             As the PM said, the Fukushima number 1 power plant is on my agenda.                        7 minutes ago   via web                             Edano is up next.https://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo

the above is Edano speaking

----------


## Takeovers

^ Sounds good unless he is lying. And why would he if the lie will be exposed within hours?

----------


## mobs00

Full translation of officials comments.

Twitter





> Is there really no risk of a radiation leak?
> 8 minutes ago via web
> 
> No, because we're filling the container with boric acid and sea water.
> 8 minutes ago via web



Someone should have asked if he was confident enough of this to go have a look.

----------


## Little Chuchok

nips couldn't lie straight in bed!

----------


## robuzo

^J-politicos are masters of equivocation, obfuscation, circumlocution, and prevarication. The Japanese language lends itself very nicely to this. Also, they lie.

Japan isn't really a nanny state. It's more like a high school principal state. "Calm down people! Everything is under control!"

----------


## StrontiumDog

cnnbrk   CNN Breaking News                                             

            Official: Blast at Fukushima nuclear plant caused by "water vapor that was part of the cooling process." #quake Japan quake, tsunami death toll risesThis Just In - CNN.com Blogs

----------


## mobs00

From Spiegal Online. Translated with google.

Google bersetzer




> The worst case scenario has happened: The Japanese government is now officially a meltdown in the ruins of a Fukushima nuclear power plant from. She spoke of an "unprecedented disaster". The evacuation zone has been extended to people fleeing.

----------


## Mid

*Boric acid*, also called *boracic acid* or *orthoboric acid* or *acidum boricum*, is a weak acid often used as an antiseptic, insecticide, flame retardant, in nuclear power plants to control the fission rate of uranium,  and as a precursor of other chemical compounds. It exists in the form  of colorless crystals or a white powder and dissolves in water. It has the chemical formula H3BO3, sometimes written B(OH)3. When occurring as a mineral, it is called sassolite.

The presence of boric acid and its salts has been noted in seawater. 

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikiped...iki/Boric_acid

----------


## mobs00

Red Alert: Nuclear Meltdown at Quake-Damaged Japanese Plant | STRATFOR

----------


## The Gentleman Scamp

Is the U.S. helping Japan out of international goodwill and unity or will it want something in return when Japan is back on it's feet?

----------


## Thetyim

> Boric acid, also called boracic acid or orthoboric acid or acidum boricum, is a weak acid often used as an antiseptic, insecticide, flame retardant, in nuclear power plants to control the fission rate


Only used in PWR reactors
This is a BWR reactor

----------


## mobs00

^ So you are calling Edano a liar?




> http://twitter.com/TimeOutTokyo#
> 
> Is there really no risk of a radiation leak?
> 8 minutes ago via web
> 
> No, because we're filling the container with boric acid and sea water.
> 8 minutes ago via web

----------


## mobs00

^^ You are quite right though.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fukushi...ar_Power_Plant




> BWRs do not use boric acid to control fission burn-up, leading to less possibility of corrosion within the reactor vessel and piping. (Corrosion from boric acid must be carefully monitored in PWRs; it has been demonstrated that reactor vessel head corrosion can occur if the reactor vessel head is not properly maintained. See Davis-Besse. Since BWRs do not utilize boric acid, these contingencies are eliminated.)


I did read though where someone mentioned that by using boric acid in a BWR reactor it actually helps to cool it off but at the same time poisons it.

Report: Meltdown at Japan reactor may be underway 




> Yep, this is an end of the world scenario last ditch effort. Boric acid, typically not used in BWRs, is a neutron absorber. They’re poisoning the reactor to maintain as much shutdown margin as possible and seawater is probably what they use for fire water. As an aside commercial PWRs use boric acid in the coolant as a means to control reactivity. It’s called chemical shim.


True or not? I'm not a nuclear scientist.

----------


## Thetyim

Despite all the calming talk it sounds like the reactor is finished and that there is no way of saving it.  

Just hope and pray that the floor is not cracked, that is the nightmare scenario.

----------


## steevee

I just heard that Thailand is offering $165,00 in aid. More 'when the extent of the damage is known'. Wow, generous.

----------


## robuzo

> I just heard that Thailand is offering $165,00 in aid. More 'when the extent of the damage is known'. Wow, generous.


Japan doesn't need cash, but $165,000 in food and medical supplies would be a nice gesture.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan planning to distribute iodine, a radiation antidote, IAEA says. #quake Japan quake, tsunami death toll risesThis Just In - CNN.com Blogs

9,500 people unaccounted for in Miyagi's Minamisanriku #news #japan #fukushima #tsunami

----------


## StrontiumDog

An aerial view showing a concertinaed train amid crumbled homes near Kisenuma city, Miyagi prefecture, 12 March, 2011

Friends of The Nation's Photos | Facebook

----------


## Thetyim

^^
Those twitter links don't work for me

----------


## robuzo

> 9,500 people unaccounted for in Miyagi's Minamisanriku #news #japan #fukushima #tsunami


They are saying 10,000 on NHK, no English link yet. Half the population of the town. Probably a lot of old people, Japan's rural population is surprisingly old. The horror.

----------


## Mid

this should Thetyim

Japan quake, tsunami death toll risesThis Just In - CNN.com Blogs

it's rather slow to load .

----------


## Bower

Euronews reporting nearly10,000 people unaccounted for in Minamiisanriku.
New earthquake measuring 6 reported at Fukishima.
Japenes army find 300-400 bodies in Rikuzentakata.

----------


## Mid

> New earthquake measuring 6 reported at Fukishima.


hard to find a timeline on this , think it is prior to the explosion at the reactor not after . ?

*Updated Fri Mar 11, 2011 10:38pm AEDT*

_The USGS reported at least eight strong aftershocks, including a 6.8 quake on the mainland 66 kilometres north-east of Tokyo._


http://www.xxx.xxx.xx/news/stories/2...11/3161866.htm

----------


## StrontiumDog

^ No, new magnitude 6.0 aftershock at Fukishima one hour ago.

Another aftermath video

----------


## StrontiumDog

6.4 magnitude aftershock hits near stricken Fukushima nuclear plant, USGS and local media report Magnitude 6.4 - NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN

NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    4.9 earthquake, near the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 11:14pm at epicenter (21m ago, 67km S of Mito, depth 25km). http://j.mp/fSb2Ed
7 minutes ago *Favorite* *Retweet* *Reply* 

     »
 
NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    5.2 earthquake, near the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 10:57pm at epicenter (34m ago, 115km SE of Iwaki, depth 24k… http://j.mp/gvBQw8
11 minutes ago *Favorite* *Retweet* *Reply* 

   »
 
NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    5.8 earthquake, near the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 11:03pm at epicenter (15m ago, 159km SE of Morioka, depth 2… http://j.mp/giGCSU
25 minutes ago *Favorite* *Retweet* *Reply* 

   »
 
NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    5.3 earthquake, near the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 10:26pm at epicenter (20m ago, 117km ESE of Morioka, depth … http://j.mp/frYUoO
56 minutes ago *Favorite* *Retweet* *Reply* 

   »
 
NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    6.4 earthquake, near the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 10:15pm at epicenter (20m ago, 33km NE of Iwaki, depth 38k… http://j.mp/gRyBgF
1 hour ago *Favorite* *Retweet* *Reply* 

   »
 
NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    4.9 earthquake, off the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 10:50pm at epicenter (29m ago, 264km E of Sendai, depth 25k… http://j.mp/e4yAFn
1 hour ago *Favorite* *Retweet* *Reply* 

   »
 
NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    5.8 earthquake, off the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 10:53pm at epicenter (21m ago, 242km ESE of Sendai, depth 19… http://j.mp/dWK4OD
1 hour ago *Favorite* *Retweet* *Reply* 

   »
 
NewEarthquake   Earthquakes Tsunamis                                             
    4.9 earthquake, off the east coast of Honshu, Japan. Mar 12 10:43pm at epicenter (23m ago, 257km E of Iwaki, depth 35km). http://j.mp/hccSSY

----------


## Mid

> No, new magnitude 6.0 aftershock at Fukishima one hour ago.


source please ?

edit

thanxs .

 HONSHU is west of TOKYO and Fukishima is NE

^

guess I can ignore Google maps then 

35 km (21 miles) NE of *Iwaki, Honshu, Japan*
73 km (45 miles) ESE of *Koriyama, Honshu, Japan*
84 km (52 miles) SE of *Fukushima, Honshu, Japan*
217 km (134 miles) NE of *TOKYO, Japan

*http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquak...usc00020na.php

----------


## Bower

> Originally Posted by Bower
> 
> New earthquake measuring 6 reported at Fukishima.
> 
> 
> had to find a timeline on this , think it is prior to the explosion at the reactor not after . ?
> 
> *Updated Fri Mar 11, 2011 10:38pm AEDT*
> 
> ...


Reuters report it as happening at 1315GMT

----------


## StrontiumDog

> Euronews reporting nearly10,000 people unaccounted for in Minamiisanriku.
> New earthquake measuring 6 reported at Fukishima.
> Japenes army find 300-400 bodies in Rikuzentakata.


More on this....Was watching NHK, they showed before and after photos of this port town...it is just gone. Horrifying. 

Japan quake toll hits 613; nuke plants overheat

 
A record 8.9-magnitude earthquake unleashed a 10-metre (33-foot) high wave that tore through coastal towns

_TOKYO (Agencies)         Around 10,000 people are reported missingin the Japanese port  town of Minamisanriku in Miyagi Prefecture and at least 613 people have  been confirmed dead as authorities on Saturday scrambled to prevent  meltdown at two nuclear plants after a monster tsunami devastated a  swathe of northeast Japan._

----------


## Poo and Pee

thanks for all of the posts here guys. 

i'm in tokyo, and the best way for me to keep updated seems to be from links posted here. good stuff!!

----------


## deathstardan

Aljazeera English have just reported that some people near the radiation leak are now showing signs of  radiation exposure...No numbers though.

----------


## Gerbil

> authorities on Saturday scrambled to prevent meltdown at two nuclear plants after a monster tsunami devastated a swathe of northeast Japan



Isn't it about now that Godzilla shows up?

----------


## StrontiumDog

*More video from last night. The city of Kesennuma burns...
*

*Japan earthquake fire Kesennuma City*

*


*

----------


## StrontiumDog

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/live/asia...e#update-10776


A ship is washed aground in Kamaishi City, Iwate, by the tsunami which followed the Japanese earthquake [Picture: Reuters]

----------


## StrontiumDog

> Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> 
>  No, new magnitude 6.0 aftershock at Fukishima one hour ago.
> 
> 
> source please ?
> 
> edit
> 
> ...


 *Honshu: Japan's Main Island*

----------


## harrybarracuda

> A ship is washed aground in Kamaishi City, Iwate, by the tsunami which followed the Japanese earthquake [Picture: Reuters]


Jesus wept, that is some ship, too.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Minamisanriku - NHK now...the water came up to the 4th floor of the hospital....! Hospital is a 5 story building and about the only building left standing. 

Town of 17,000. 10,000 missing there.

 
  Buildings are covered with mud in  Minamisanriku town, Miyagi prefecture in northern Japan after a  powerful       tsunami destroyed the area. Picture: AP                                                  _
Source:_ AP

NHK report with the above information and before and after pictures of this devastated area...

----------


## StrontiumDog

Cars crushed in Yabuki, Fukushima after earthquake hits Japan (Getty)

http://www.channel4.com/news/photo-g.../image/image10

----------


## Takeovers

> Sounds good unless he is lying. And why would he if the lie will be exposed within hours?


To answer my own question. He would lie, to avoid panic. No good strategy.

----------


## harrybarracuda

We've seen this before. The London Tube bombings and the "electrical problem" story, to avoid people stampediing.

----------


## robuzo

> Aljazeera English have just reported that some people near the radiation leak are now showing signs of  radiation exposure...No numbers though.


90 according to Asahi.

Also, have an explanation for the explosion; hot steam contacting the exposed fuel rods caused hydrogen to be produced. Hydrogen go boom. Asahi science reporter says this was predictable, so the question is whether TEPCO had taken any measures to remove the hydrogen. I'm guessing not.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Also, have an explanation for the explosion; hot steam contacting the  exposed fuel rods caused hydrogen to be produced. Hydrogen go boom.  Asahi science reporter says this was predictable, so the question is  whether TEPCO had taken any measures to remove the hydrogen. I'm  guessing not.


I wonder if they even had the capability to do so without an adequate power supply?

----------


## The Gentleman Scamp

Thailand has offered Japan $165,000 - wow, how generous...Frankly I'm embarrassed for my educated and more importantly life educated Thai friends who have advanced beyond the childish money mentality here.

----------


## robuzo

^^Don't know, but Asahi will take every opportunity to break TEPCO's balls, and they should.

----------


## harrybarracuda

NHK report that the hospital in the middle here is a five storey building, and the water made it to the fourth floor.

Poor sods.

----------


## robuzo

> Thailand has offered Japan $165,000 - wow, how generous...Frankly I'm embarrassed for my educated and more importantly life educated Thai friends who have advanced beyond the childish money mentality here.


Japan is rich as God, Scamp, never mind the money. The interesting question is whether Japan has evolved past the reaction they had to offers of foreign assistance after the Hanshin earthquake. Unbelievably absurd stories of opportunities squandered due to petty officials insisting on strict enforcement of petty rules. Your girlfriend can probably tell you about it, or you could look it up.

It's a damned shame about Sendai. One of the nicest, most livable cities in the country. It was leveled during the war, so I guess they'll be starting over again, again.

----------


## The Gentleman Scamp

That was my point..  As somebody said earlier - how about that amount in supplies?

I mean... 5 mil baht is a nice condo.

----------


## Muadib

Considering the 7.0 earthquake in Haiti killed over 300,000 people, I would expect the death toll from this disaster to grow significantly in the coming days... It will take many years for Japan to recover from this tragedy, if ever... That is if they can prevent a meltdown and contain radiation at the Fukushima reactor... If not, it won't matter... 

Japan: Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant Explosion; Workers Injured, Radiation Dangers Heightened - ABC News

----------


## The Gentleman Scamp

CNN fucked up again, sorry Thailand I retract my previous critique.

Thailand is sending rescue teams, their Navy and sniffer dogs as well as other supplies and more donations to come. This from a Thai website translated by a trusted friend.

----------


## Loy Toy

> It will take many years for Japan to recover from this tragedy, if ever


As I quoted earlier on in this thread the Japanese race have long outgrown their little islands.

Not only is the place a disaster waiting to happen it really has nothing to offer regarding natural resources for such a economic driven race of people.

Having said that they have purchased half of Australian and maybe they will have to relocate to a place like that in the next 100 years either by hook or by crook.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> the Japanese race have long outgrown their little islands.


Their population is shrinking very fast and will probably halve in the next 50 years, so there'll be plenty of room for the rest of the Poms to move there, leaving the UK to be taken back to the Stone Age by the Muzzies.

----------


## ItsRobsLife

> It will take many years for Japan to recover from this tragedy, if ever


Of course they will recover. This is the greatest catastrophe they have had in recent times, but as with Kobe in 1995, they will learn from it and move on. 
The Japanese have been living with earthquakes and tsunamis since there were inhabitants on that group of islands, tsunami is a Japanese word. 

Japan has been in an economic slump for the last decade, the reconstruction that is required will increase employment and the capital injection will boost the economy. Of course they need to get that reactor under control and there may be long term implications, but nothing that is insurmountable.

----------


## StrontiumDog

WSJ   Wall Street Journal                                             

            Japanese officials are using seawater to cool the damaged nuclear reactor and prevent a meltdown on.wsj.com/ev8bOV

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Considering the 7.0 earthquake in Haiti killed over 300,000 people, I would expect the death toll from this disaster to grow significantly in the coming days...


Most of the dead in Haiti were crushed in collapsed buildings. From the coverage I've seen, this isn't such an issue, since Japan has spent years developing construction technology, and you can see from Tokyo that the damage isn't as bad as, say, Christchurch. 

I would say the tsunamis have taken the most lives, which casts doubts on the effectiveness of Japan's tsunami warning system, or perhaps illustrates the damage to roads and so on that perhaps stopped people escaping the carnage.

NZ is sending a team of 50 apparently. Fantastic gesture given their own problems. Good on them.

----------


## StrontiumDog

http://blogs.aljazeera.net/live/asia...e#update-10776

2:05am        

  Officials are checking residents of the area around the Fukushima nuclear power plant for signs of radiation poisoning.

----------


## Mid

> Jesus wept, that is some ship, too.


indeed , it is a coastal freighter and they rang from 400 to 2000 tons .

----------


## Mid

_KABUL - ONE of impoverished Afghanistan's most violent provinces on  Saturday offered $50,000 in aid to help victims of Japan's earthquake  and tsunami, officials said._

_The cash has been offered by officials in Kandahar province  in southern Afghanistan, which is seen as the birthplace of the Taleban  and is one of the areas worst affected by violence in Afghanistan's  near-ten year war._

_'On behalf of the residents of Kandahar, mayor Ghulam Haidar  Hamidi announced $50,000 in aid to the people affected by earthquakes  and tsunami in Japan,' a statement from Kandahar's provincial governor  said._


Afghan province offers aid to Japan

----------


## Mid

_Amid a series of moderate aftershocks struck off the east coast of  Honshu since Friday, another reactor in Fukushima has also lost its  emergency cooling system, Japan's nuclear power safety agency said on  Sunday. 
_
_An official of the Japan Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency told a  news conference that the emergency cooling system of the No. 3 reactor  is no longer functioning. 
_

Moderate Quakes Causing Problem in No. 3 Reactor

mid : bold mine .

----------


## mobs00

Live earthquake map.

Live Earthquake Mashup

----------


## mobs00

I don't like facebook but even the top nukes have a fan page. IAEA below.

https://www.facebook.com/notes/inter...01193423243785


Japanese authorities have informed the IAEA that the explosion at Unit 1 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant occurred outside the primary containment vessel (PCV), not inside. The plant operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), has confirmed that the integrity of the primary containment vessel remains intact.

As a countermeasure to limit damage to the reactor core, TEPCO proposed that sea water mixed with boron be injected into the primary containment vessel. This measure was approved by Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) and the injection procedure began at 20:20 local Japan time.

Japan has reported that four workers at Fukushima Daiichi were injured by the explosion.

NISA have confirmed the presence of caesium-137 and iodine-131 in the vicinity of Fukushima Daiichi Unit 1. NISA reported an initial increase in levels of radioactivity around the plant earlier today, but these levels have been observed to lessen in recent hours.

Containment remains intact at Fukushima Daiichi Units 1, 2 and 3.

Evacuations around both affected nuclear plants have begun. In the 20-kilometre radius around Fukushima Daiichi an estimated 170000 people have been evacuated. In the 10-kilometre radius around Fukushima Daini an estimated 30000 people have been evacuated. Full evacuation measures have not been completed.

The Japanese authorities have classified the event at Fukushima Daiichi Unit 1 as a level 4 ‘Accident with Local Consequences’ on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES). The INES scale is used to promptly and consistently communicate to the public the safety significance of events associated with sources of radiation. The scale runs from 0 (deviation) to 7 (major accident).

Japan has also confirmed the safety of all its nuclear research reactors.

The IAEA continues to liaise with the Japanese authorities and is monitoring the situation as it evolves.

----------


## mobs00

International Nuclear Event Scale - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

INES Level 4: Accident with local consequences

Impact on People and the Environment
Minor release of radioactive material unlikely to result in implementation of planned countermeasures other than local food controls.
At least one death from radiation.
Impact on Radiological Barriers and Control
Fuel melt or damage to fuel [at]resulting in more than 0.1% release of core inventory.
Release of significant quantities of radioactive material within an installation with a high [at]probability of significant public exposure.

Examples:
Sellafield (United Kingdom) – 5 incidents 1955 to 1979[4]
SL-1 Experimental Power Station (United States) – 1961, reactor reached prompt criticality, killing three operators.
Saint-Laurent Nuclear Power Plant (France) – 1980, partial core meltdown.
Buenos Aires (Argentina) – 1983, criticality accident during fuel rod rearrangement killed one operator and injured 2 others.
Jaslovské Bohunice (Czechoslovakia) – 1977, contamination of reactor building.
Tokaimura nuclear accident (Japan) – 1999, three inexperienced operators at a reprocessing facility caused a criticality accident; two of them died.
Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant (Japan) – 2011, reactor shutdown after the 2011 Sendai earthquake and tsunami, failure of emergency cooling caused an explosion. This rating is likely provisional and subject to change.[5]

----------


## Muadib

Here is a link to an interactive map of the Japanese earthquake zone, showing the primary earthquake and all aftershocks... There are also icons on the map with links to youtube video & tv coverage from that zone...

Japan Earthquake and Tsunami - Map & Satellite Images | Disaster Relief & Support

----------


## Mid

> This rating is likely provisional and subject to change.


that ain't comforting as the only way it can go is to get worse .

----------


## mobs00

^ According to the IAEA the INES rating level 4 was given by "The Japanese Authorities". You think they may have fudged the numbers a point or two?

----------


## Mid

given from your post #312 , that a level 4 is an _accident with local consequences_ which we know to be correct it is difficult to see how it could be down graded thus if it is subject to change the only way open is an increase in severity .

----------


## mobs00

*Another Japan nuclear reactor fails*

By Thomas H. Maugh II, Los Angeles Times
March 12, 2011, 4:25 p.m. PST

Japan earthquake, Fukushima Daiichi, No. 1: Another Japan nuclear reactor fails - latimes.com

A third reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 plant loses its emergency cooling capacity, bringing to six the number of reactors that have failed at the two Fukushima nuclear power plants since the earthquake and tsunami.

(click link for more)

----------


## mobs00

^^ I guess it all depends on what is considered local or wider consequences. The difference between level 4 and 5.

----------


## Mid

> A third reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 plant loses its emergency cooling capacity,


this I think is the same one as in post #309 ?

----------


## mobs00

*Danger Posed by Radioactivity in Japan Hard to Assess*

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/13/sc...n.html?_r=1&hp

Published: Saturday, 12 Mar 2011 | 7:39 PM ET

The different radioactive materials being reported at the nuclear accidents in Japan range from relatively benign to extremely worrisome.

The central problem in assessing the degree of danger is that the amounts of various radioactive releases into the environment are now unknown, as are the winds and other atmospheric factors that determine how radioactivity will disperse around the stricken plants.

(snip)

The big worries on the reported releases of radioactive material in Japan center on radioactive iodine and cesium.

“They imply some kind of core problem,” said Thomas B. Cochran, a senior scientist in the nuclear program of the Natural Resources Defense Council, a private group in Washington.

The active core of a nuclear reactor splits atoms in two to produce bursts of energy and, as a byproduct, large masses of highly radioactive particles. The many safety mechanisms of a nuclear plant focus mainly on keeping these so-called fission products out of the environment.

(snip)

(click link for more)

----------


## mobs00

^^ I think so.

----------


## mobs00

According to the news on TV (CNN) there is a possible meltdown happening. They are getting conflicting reports out of Japan but it seems that reactor #3 (the 6th reactor to have problems in the articles above) is starting to heat up.

watch the news here:

CPS WIRE [LIVE VIDEO STREAMS] is a resource to access real-time news feeds from global media outlets

----------


## mobs00

Info on reactor #3 and MOX fuel.


*Fukushima to Restart Using MOX Fuel for First Time*

Fri, Sep 17 2010 7:45 AM 

Fukushima to Restart Using MOX Fuel for First Time - Nuclear Power Industry News - Nuclear Power Industry News - Nuclear Street - Nuclear Power Portal

Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO) said it was preparing to restart the 784 megawatt No.3 reactor at its Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear plant on Friday, at which it is set to burn so-called mixed-oxide (MOX) fuel for the first time.

Fukushima is a nuclear power plant located in the town of Okuma in the Futaba District of Fukushima Prefecture. With 6 operating units located on site, Fukushima is one of the largest nuclear plant sites in the world. Fukushima is the first nuclear plant to be constructed and run entirely by TEPCO.

Asia's biggest utility said if all goes as planned, the reactor will start generating power on Sept. 22 and begin commercial operations on Oct. 26.

It had shut the reactor at the northern Japan plant for planned maintenance on June 19.

During the shutdown, TEPCO prepared for uranium dioxide as well as MOX fuel to be burned at the reactor, making it the first time the company will use the recycled fuel.

Other power companies have started using the recycled fuel as part of Japan's goal to move towards a closed cycle where it recycles its own spent fuel and then burns recovered uranium and plutonium as MOX fuel. 



MOX fuel - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mixed oxide, or MOX fuel, is nuclear fuel containing more than one oxide of fissile or fertile materials. Specifically, it usually refers to a blend of oxides of plutonium and natural uranium, reprocessed uranium, or depleted uranium which behaves similarly (though not identically) to the low-enriched uranium oxide fuel for which most nuclear reactors were designed. MOX fuel is an alternative to low enriched uranium (LEU) fuel used in the light water reactors that predominate nuclear power generation.
One attraction of MOX fuel is that it is a way of disposing of surplus weapons-grade plutonium, which otherwise would have to be disposed as nuclear waste, and would remain a nuclear proliferation risk.[1] However, there have been fears that normalising the global commercial use of MOX fuel and the associated expansion of reprocessing will itself lead to greater proliferation risk.[2][3]



What is MOX? - NIRS

(snip)

MOX is dangerous

Use of MOX fuel attacks commercial nuclear reactors where they are the weakest. Many reactors are aging prematurely, and cracks are appearing in vital reactor components. Most atomic reactors were not originally designed to use MOX fuel and MOX makes key reactor components age even faster.

Because of its high "neutron flux" levels, the reactor pressure vessel can become embrittled and fail during accident conditions. A nuclear accident involving MOX fuel could cause a meltdown more serious than Three Mile Island or Chernobyl, because the levels of radiation inside a reactor using MOX are even higher than in a normal atomic reactor.

(snip)

----------


## mobs00

More aftershocks.

Latest Earthquakes in the World - Past 7 days


Update time = Sun Mar 13 1: 12: 10 UTC 2011

         MAG	 UTC DATE-TIME   	   LATdeg    LON deg      DEPTH km	 Region
MAP	 4.7  	2011/03/13 01: 08: 42 	  36.443 	  142.187 	 26.4 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	 5.2  	2011/03/13 00: 47: 05 	  39.102 	  143.311 	 24.9 	 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	 5.0  	2011/03/13 00: 43: 17 	  38.072 	  142.700 	 26.4 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	 4.9  	2011/03/13 00: 32: 58 	  36.037 	  140.851 	 25.4 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP	 4.8  	2011/03/13 00: 15: 48 	  36.624 	  141.759 	 25.0 	 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN

----------


## Butterfly

> Use of MOX fuel attacks commercial nuclear reactors where they are the weakest. Many reactors are aging prematurely, and cracks are appearing in vital reactor components. Most atomic reactors were not originally designed to use MOX fuel and MOX makes key reactor components age even faster.
> 
> Because of its high "neutron flux" levels, the reactor pressure vessel can become embrittled and fail during accident conditions. A nuclear accident involving MOX fuel could cause a meltdown more serious than Three Mile Island or Chernobyl, because the levels of radiation inside a reactor using MOX are even higher than in a normal atomic reactor.


hopefully the operators of the nuke plant in Japan can read English or knows about this or else things will get much worse very soon

----------


## mobs00

A large 6.2 aftershock just hit

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&sour...e=UTF8&t=h&z=7


Earthquake Details

This event has been reviewed by a seismologist.
Magnitude
6.2
Date-Time
Sunday, March 13, 2011 at 01:26:07 UTC
Sunday, March 13, 2011 at 10:26:07 AM at epicenter
Location
35.742°N, 141.731°E
Depth
24.5 km (15.2 miles) set by location program
Region
NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
Distances
132 km (82 miles) ESE (121°) from Mito, Honshu, Japan
165 km (103 miles) SSE (153°) from Iwaki, Honshu, Japan
179 km (111 miles) E (87°) from TOKYO, Japan
Location Uncertainty
horizontal +/- 12.5 km (7.8 miles); depth fixed by location program
Parameters
NST=392, Nph=398, Dmin=329.5 km, Rmss=0.86 sec, Gp= 32°,
M-type="moment" magnitude from initial P wave (tsuboi method) (Mi/Mwp), Version=B
Source
U.S. Geological Survey, National Earthquake Information Center:
World Data Center for Seismology, Denver
Event ID
usc00021dt

http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquak...usc00021dt.php

----------


## koman

Just heard a nuclear spokesman on Japan TV saying "the things we thought would work well, did not go as well as we had expected"  "we have had to move back a few steps"    With two reactors in trouble now,  and a distinct possibility of a core melt....I wonder what a few steps back means?   Seems to be a bit of straw clutching going on..

----------


## mobs00

https://www.facebook.com/note.php?no...01267533236374

Latest IAEA update on Japan Earthquake (13 March 2011 0235 CET)

by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Sunday, March 13, 2011 at 9:56am
Japanese authorities have informed the IAEA that Units 1, 2, and 4 at the Fukushima Daini nuclear power plant retain off-site power but are experiencing increased pressure in each reactor. Plant operators have vented the containment at each of the three units and are considering further venting to alleviate the increase in pressure.

Daini Unit 3 is in a safe, cold shutdown, according to Japanese officials.

Japanese authorities have reported some casualties to nuclear plant workers.  At Fukushima Daichi, four workers were injured by the explosion at the Unit 1 reactor, and there are three other reported injuries in other incidents. In addition, one worker was exposed to higher-than-normal radiation levels that fall below the IAEA guidance for emergency situations. At Fukushima Daini, one worker has died in a crane operation accident and four others have been injured.

In partnership with the World Meteorological Organization, the IAEA is providing its member states with weather forecasts for the affected areas in Japan.  The latest predictions have indicated winds moving to the Northeast, away from Japanese coast over the next three days.

The IAEA continues to liaise with the Japanese authorities and is monitoring the situation as it evolves.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Kyodo: 1,167 missing in Fukushima Pref.

                 Kyodo: Fukushima plant radiation briefly at 1,204 micro sievert

Kyodo:  Radiation at No. 3 reactor very small, under control, fresh water injected into reactor

----------


## mobs00

Some good info on nuclear plants. An easy read.

Nuclear energy 101: Inside the "black box" of power plants - Boing Boing




> "There's zirconium in the fuel rods. When you overheat the reactor core, the first thing that happens is that the zirconium begins to react with steam or water and forms zirconium oxide and hydrogen," he says. "You get a mixture of steam and hydrogen. When you release steam into a secondary building [to decrease pressure in the core], the steam condenses and leaves behind just the hydrogen. Then all you need is an ignition source and you can get a hydrogen burn. That's what happened at Three Mile Island. I don't know if that's what happened in Japan, but it's likely to be the source of that explosion."

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv...smic-activity/

How bad is it?*

*RADIATION*  Japanese officials on said Saturday that radiation levels per hour at  the site at one point were 1,000 times the amount an individual should  be exposed to in a year — posing severe health risks to workers at close  proximity. At least nine individuals in the area had shown possible  exposure to some level of radiation, and an official with Japan’s  nuclear safety agency said that number could rise to as high as 160  millisieverts. 

 
*
RADIOACTIVE ELEMENTS*  After Chernobyl in 1986, thousands of cases of thyroid cancer were  attributed to radioactive iodine in the food supply. Cesium, which was  also released, increases the risk for other cancers. Japanese officials  said that cesium and radioactive iodine had been detected on Saturday  near the site, and they have begun distributing pills to block  radioactive iodine from accumulating in people’s thyroids.

----------


## StrontiumDog

15 more people near nuclear plant exposed to radioactivity, Kyodo reports #quake Japan quake, tsunami death toll risesThis Just In - CNN.com Blogs

----------


## StrontiumDog

'Partial melt' of fuel rod at stricken reactor – Japan envoy 'Partial melt' of fuel rod at stricken reactor  Japan envoy - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos

----------


## StrontiumDog

AP: Japanese government spokesman says partial meltdown is likely under way at second reactor

cnnbrk: Authorities presuming meltdowns may be under way at 2 other reactors #quake http://on.cnn.com/fyrSuV

----------


## Butterfly

jesus, things getting worse by the hours

----------


## mobs00

Before an after

https://picasaweb.google.com/1180792...3600944/Japan#

----------


## mobs00



----------


## mobs00



----------


## mobs00

Many more satellite photos here:

https://picasaweb.google.com/1180792...3600944/Japan#

----------


## Cujo

which way's the wind blowing?

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by mobs00
> 
> Use of MOX fuel attacks commercial nuclear reactors where they are the weakest. Many reactors are aging prematurely, and cracks are appearing in vital reactor components. Most atomic reactors were not originally designed to use MOX fuel and MOX makes key reactor components age even faster.
> 
> Because of its high "neutron flux" levels, the reactor pressure vessel can become embrittled and fail during accident conditions. A nuclear accident involving MOX fuel could cause a meltdown more serious than Three Mile Island or Chernobyl, because the levels of radiation inside a reactor using MOX are even higher than in a normal atomic reactor.
> 
> 
> hopefully the operators of the nuke plant in Japan can read English or knows about this or else things will get much worse very soon


The effect of irritation on steel is well understood world wide.  It causes changes in the steel structure that makes the material become more brittle over time.  Steel that becomes brittle has a higher incidence of developing cracks during normal thermal cycles the steel goes through. (with plant load changes)  This is exactly why Nuclear plants are "decommissioned" because the steel properties have been altered over time, and are subject to higher probability of cracking.  

In the larger pressure components, steels are very thick, measured in multiple inches.  Cracking does not result in eminent or  immediate failure.   It takes time and a lot of thermal cycles to allow a crack to propagate .  Even with crack propagation over time - it is seldom of a magnitude to cause a large rupture or complete dumping of contents.    

It would take a large amount of cracking and a major overpressure event to cause a reactor containment failure.  The steel thicknesses involved are significantly thicker than conventional boiler pressure vessel construction.

The phenomenon of steel embrittlement can be caused by the strong alkaline water chemistry involved in conventional steam boilers.  A strong alkaline water chemistry is required, to prevent  "acid attack" in the steel surfaces. The alkalinity in conventional boiler water chemistry is a trade off that yields much longer life over non treated water.   It takes excessive alkalinity carried over a long period of time to produce steel changes, and results in observations of cracking in pressure components subjected to high temperatures and the alkaline substances.  This is why boiler pressure components under go periodic internal exams.  I have made many such inspections of conventional boilers.     

Nuclear containment vessels - are not easily inspected, which is also why they are so much more overbuilt than conventional boilers - for the same working pressure. You can rest assured that steel changes as a result of neutron impingement is well understood world wide, and has been the subject of great study.  

MOX perhaps is more dangerous, because of its different radioactive materials involved,  but worry over a significantly different neutron flux density level is not warranted.   IF this were that MOX has much different Neutron fluxl levels, the case MOX fuel loaded into a reactor designed for conventional Uranium would produce a reactor difficult to moderate (control).   It would be difficult to soak up the neutrons in a way to balance and control the reaction.   It is well known that up to 2/3 of the power output from higher density nuclear plants (near the end of their fuel cycle's ) comes from energy and neutron release of other products (besides the U components).  MOX is a hazard because of its components, not from a greatly varied neutron flux density.   The real concern, regardless of fuel type should be of a catasthropic melt down.   That is where the danger and unpredictibliity reside.

This is the danger of the "melt down" situation spoken about.  It goes beyond a simple thermal issue.   When fuel rod assemblies begin to melt -  They lose their geometry.  It is the geometry between fuel spacing (combined with moderation techniques) that allow the nuclear reaction to be controlled.    Under a worse case, where the fuel rods melt in mass -  It produces gradually developing solid mass of fuel - with no ability to achieve any moderation of neutrons within that mass.  This action allows the nuclear reaction to increase with out control.  Resulting in higher heat generation, more thermal stress, and a potential for more melting down.   Japans decision to pump in sea water with boron is probably the best available stop gap.  Boron moderates Neutrons and the sea water is abundant and will provide cooling capacity.

Many years ago this idea of run away core "melt down"was in the US referred to as "The China Syndrone" -  Because the larger mass of fissionalble material, without control of the reaction would reach high enough temp's to melt through most materials.  Under gravitational forces - the mass could begin to penetrate into the earth, because few materials will withstand that kind of temperature.   Uranium fuel with a melting point of almost 1200 C and a boiling point of about 3800 C goes well beyond what conventional materials can contain.  Steel sags and yields around 1500 C.   Earth crust and mantle materials are liquid (lava) at 1100 to 1200 C.   It becomes fairly clear that a reactor core meltdown is capable of reaching much higher temp's than can be contained.   Provided there is no significant heat removal from the mass.   

Because the fissioning of Uranium is a chain reaction that depends upon neutrons, with a large mass and no geometry remaining it is possible that the reaction can accelerate to a point of nuclear like explosion as well.  It actually would depend a great deal on how the melted core forms up.   

These are all risk factors that will weigh in for Japan, as they manage this crisis.   The pattern of  some management of emergency cooling and fuel core stability, and then later revelations that nuclear reactor cores are are overheating and losing some reaction controls - imply that core destabilization have taken place.   The more it happens, the harder it is to control core temperature.    When a large amount of core meltdown takes place, even full functioning cooling systems are less than capable of handling all the heat released by a large fissioning mass, which is no longer subject to any meaningful control.    

Sorry to say a pretty catastrophic pattern is emerging here.  I remember all the discussion's after TMI - about the rational to cluster nuclear plants, as a way to increase on site resources and consolidate risk.  Both seem to have been proven strategies - but they also represent a major shortfall if a large event (as the Tsunami) impacts a cluster.   Grouped in close proximity - a major containment breach would render the entire location (with adjacent plants)  as too hot to inhabit.  Reducing the ability of staff to manage adjacent sites also in trouble.  So one event domino would precipitate issues with other plants, also under stress events from the Tsunami. 

It is not well known, but in the aftermath of Chrenoble - where many who came to the front lines to manage the melt down (while receiving near lethal doses of radiation) were saved by the efforts of ARMAN HAMMER, who set up a rapid major western medical intervention to treat plant workers.  He assembled a team, resources, and pulled all the strings needed to get them in on the ground.   ARMAN is well know for Occidental petroleum and his early ties to Russia.  His was also an MD with a bold humanitarian side.

It is my hope that the events in Japan do not spin out of control amid their nuclear clusters - like the wildfire that Chernobyl became.   At this point - The outcome appears to be little more that a coin flip from reality.

----------


## misskit

From NHK's website today.

Japan's Meteorological Agency says the magnitude of Friday's earthquake that hit the Pacific coast of northeastern Japan was 9.0 instead of 8.8 as earlier announced.

----------


## misskit

> which way's the wind blowing?


West, out to sea.

----------


## Loy Toy

> West, out to sea.


How is this radiation poisoning going to affect sea and bird life?

As always we seem to be getting a fraction of correct information and with regard to what is really happening which is a crime on its own.

I understand the need to control people and offset panic but this is really getting ridiculous.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Originally Posted by misskit
> 
> West, out to sea.
> 
> 
> How is this radiation poisoning going to affect sea and bird life?
> 
> As always we seem to be getting a fraction of correct information and with regard to what is really happening which is a crime on its own.
> 
> I understand the need to control people and offset panic but this is really getting ridiculous.


With the transport and communications infrastructure damaged so severely, what would you rather they did?

Say "You're about to get covered in radioactive dust that will probably kill you"?

This is the archetypal "perfect storm", with disaster being piled onto devastation that was piled on to pure havoc.

The primary mission must surely be to find those still alive and get them out to safety. At present, that seems to be what they are trying to do.

----------


## KAPPA

^^ More about saving face, I would think. Japan is already suffering economically, its cars exposed as unsafe, facing a vanishing youth with an expanding elderly population. What's next, Mount Fuji?
 It's Time to Say , Sayonara ?

----------


## misskit

^ I don't know about the sea and bird life, but a map someone posted here earlier with the wind currents showed any fallout blowing right to the US West Coast.

----------


## Chairman Mao

> After Chernobyl in 1986, thousands of cases of thyroid cancer were  attributed to radioactive iodine in the food supply.


Think they can say goodbye to their food export market for the next, I dunno, 30 years.

----------


## KAPPA

This is our arrogance of exploitation, last year BP, Next year? All the years after? 
 How much garbage and pollutants has just been sucked into the Pacific, another garbage patch.  I for see a generation of scavengers living on the sea trawling. Maybe the last of humanity.

Now a nuclear disaster, maybe of global proportions? How much can we shit where we eat?    We are all the consumer demanding the cheap energy and ignoring the risks. We make the choices.

  OT sorry. Anyway.  Karma for  Japan's whale hunting?

 And from what I would hope to be a reliable source: USing  Iodine to protect against thyroid cancer

http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionuclides/iodine.html
 More at link:
  ...If large amounts of radioactive iodine are released during an                  nuclear accident, large doses of stable iodine may be distributed                  by government agencies to keep your thyroid gland from absorbing                  too much radioactive iodine: Raising the concentration of stable                  iodine in the blood, increases the likelihood that the thyroid                  will absorb it instead of radioactive iodine. (Note: Large doses                  of stable iodine can be a health hazard and should not be taken                  except in an emergency. However iodized table salt is an important                  means of acquiring essential non-radioactive iodine to maintain                  health.

__

 Except we have cesium involved, correct?  Note how there is no protection described.
__

http://www.epa.gov/radiation/radionu...#protectmyself
What can I do to protect myself and my family from cesium-137?                            Cesium-137 that is dispersed in the environment, like that from                 atmospheric testing, is impossible to avoid. However the exposure                 from cesium-137 in the environment is very small. 
               Serious exposure is unlikely. People most likely to accidentally                  encounter a cesium-137 source typically work in scrap metal sorting,                  sales and brokerage, metal melting and casting, and in municipal                  landfill operations. They may unwittingly encounter an industrial                  instrument containing a sealed cesium-137 radiation source.

----------


## MakingALife

A point of prospective.

It was 1979, when I had an opportunity in the late spring to sit in with a group for a 3 hour debriefing lecture about the failure chain at Three Mile Island.  It was put on at Brookhaven National Labratory, on Long Island.   The lecture was very detailed, and it went through step by step the observations open to control room personnel & telemetry, as well as all their actions taken to try and manage the primary cooling system failure that precipitated the TMI incident.   

I am not going to rehash it here,  and much of the details have been lost from my memory.   The plant had undergone a major upgrade and outage period  before the incident.    

Two manual valves (with no control room indication) which were in the "emergency reactor cooling system" had been mistakenly left closed after the maintenance outtage / upgrade.    By mistake they were closed, and unknown to the operating staff.    When the primary cooling failure took place, and the plant operators started to SCRAM the reactor, and activate the emergency cooling system...  That system simply was not delivering water.   It took about 8 minute's for plant personnel -  to get into the plant and to the respective valves - to get them open....  Once opened up emergency cooling was being supplied to the reactor.

The lack of primary and emergency cooling for 8 minutes was all it took for reactor core to sustain damage that was irreversible.  Even with all the efforts to shutdown / moderate the nuclear reaction through rapid shutdown etc.    The control room telemetry pointed to a rapidly rising pressure spike, and precipitated their decision to open pressure releasing valve - releasing contaminated steam.  

The control room personnel executed the best response they had trained for, and made the best calls all around.  The plant staff performed exemplary in their ability to get to the large manual valves and get them open in that time span.   With all these best efforts, irreversible damage took place in the core, with a partial melt down taking place.   The balance of the aftermath of TMI was spent trying to manage the reactor temperatures and pressures and ramp down and stabilize the reactions.   They were on a wild ride, but did well.

The incident pointed to a flaw in the design of the emergency cooling system - to have two manual valves, with no remote indication or operation possible - in a critical system.   It also pointed to a human failure in the start up sequence - which should have checked and made sure those valves were in the open position, before plant operation.   Human error.

8 minutes with no cooling = irreversible fuel core damage that resulted in a partial melt down that took place despite every action taken.   A melt down that continued to develop even with some cooling restoration that had taken place.

Japan in their release of information, are remaining optimistic and cautious.  It is a reasonable posture, since it is not possible to see inside the core to understand exactly what is happening.   

The nuclear fission process is complex.  It involves fast released neutrons a the heart of the reaction, and delayed neutrons that take place from other fission produced compounds that release neutrons in a much more delayed fashion.    It is those delayed neutrons that allow nuclear plants an ability to easily restarted if the reaction is brought below critical point.  These are factors that weigh in, and make control efforts for a partial core melt down - difficult to manage over time.  There is a window of time, when a reaction is dropped below critical point where it can be easily returned to critical (self sustaining with surplus neutrons).   When portions of the fuel mass change geometry and the effect of some neutron moderation is lost - It only propagates more delayed neutrons release that could rapidly ramp up the reaction.  

The issue of reaction management in the face of a core meltdown involves cooling to maintain geometry of the existing core, and neutron moderation to manage fuel core areas where a sustained reaction remains.   It is a cooling and time dependent set of events.

It is only observable from the external telemetery - which points to larger observations (pressure / tempeature, cooling flow, steam release flows etc).   Reading and specific indications of interal core condition are not able to be determined.

Hence Japan - does not want to alarm the world and speculate.  They do see the large patterns (of temps / pressure etc) and recognize them as a potential indication of core trouble and melt down taking place.

They are now involved in that wild ride towards thermal and reaction stabilization of the facilities.   You can be sure that all data garnered from the plants indication and controls is being examined in detail by the sharpest minds with experience, to pattern match it against other plants that have sustained core damage.   Japan remains cautious and optimistic, knowing only a future forensic exam will reveal the core's condition.   That may well take a significant cool down period to be able to make that examination. 

It is a good bet to say that most of the reactors receiving sea water / boron mixtures are going to be toast - unrecoverable and require scrapping.   The rest of the power cycle associated with those reactors are probably going to continue to be servicable for their remaining life - but the reactor in question getting injections now are toast.    

Refueling is done easily.  Replacing an entire reactors core - usually means the large containment structure has to be cut open.   That effectively can not be done.  It would be lower in cost - to construct a new reactor and containment, than to try and renew a badly damage reactor.   

Moving out into the future, with many nuclear plants build in coastal areas -  the issue of plants built with Tsunami exposure will require a reevaluation.   

In particular the issue of EDG (Emergency Diesel Generator) on site hardening against Tsunami inundation, or impacts on EDG fuel tank inundation.  As a secondary question will be the on site voltage bus that normally provides services to the plant.  If these busses were lost as a result of Tsunami action - that will have to be changed in other plants that carry the same risks.    Typically this bus comes from the plant but is infed back into the plant to the plant from an external switch yard.   The heartiness of that switch yard and connection will come under issue in all coastal nuclear plants with Tsunami exposure.

The safety components (self fed bus, robust EDG to support plant bus, and critical battery back up) will all be revised after Japans incidents are reviewed.

----------


## Chairman Mao

> a map someone posted here earlier with the wind currents showed any fallout blowing right to the US West Coast.


Well, it'll have to travel 8 feet farther than before.
_
Japan's recent massive earthquake, one of the largest ever recorded, appears to have moved the island by about eight feet (2.4 meters), the US Geological Survey said Saturday._

----------


## KAPPA

And some alternative info on iodine:

Does Iodine Really Protect Against Radiation?

__

In the wake of the reactor explosion at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Plant, Japanese officials are planning to give citizens iodine to  "protect" against radiation, but the question then arises: does iodine  really protect against radiation?
 The answer is both yes and no.  Unfortunately, the answer would really be, in most cases, no.  According to the CDC,  potassium iodine is great for protecting people against radioactive  iodine, which is one of the things released in the Japan nuclear reactor  explosion.  However, it only protects the thyroid gland.  It does not  protect the rest of the body.
 Here's how it works: after a radiological event, radioactive iodine  may be released into the atmosphere.  It can then enter a human body by  being breathed into the lungs, or being ingested through contaminated  food or water.  The CDC calls that “internal contamination.”   The  thyroid gland could be easily damaged by the chemical, as it readily  absorbed iodine, but the potassium iodine blocks the radioactive iodine  from being taken into the gland.
 It should be noted that if a person has hyperthyroid (overactive),  frequently they simply give him radioactive iodine to take to "kill" the  gland.  Thereafter, the patient takes a thyroid supplement for the rest  of his or her life.


*Howver, potassium iodine cannot protect against radioactive agents,  such as cesium, which was also released in the Japanese reactor  explosion*.


  It cannot prevent an agent from entering the body and  damaging other portions, such as the lungs if ingested via breathing.   It cannot reverse the damage caused by radioactive iodine once it has  been done to the thyroid. 
 In effect, what Japan is doing with their implmentation of a  distribution of potassium iodine is protection against radioactive  iodine, but that is it.  It will be good against thyroid damage, but as  an extreme example, you couldn't have save someone from the effects of  the radiation from fallout from the Nagasaki or Hiroshima atomic bombs  through the use of iodine.
 That said, the CDC still has a series of recommendations about the use of potassium iodine (KI):
_After a radiologic or nuclear event, local public health or  emergency management officials will tell the public if KI or other  protective actions are needed. For example, public health officials may  advise you to remain in your home, school, or place of work (this is  known as “shelter-in-place”) or to evacuate. You may also be told not to  eat some foods and not to drink some beverages until a safe supply can  be brought in from outside the affected area. Following the instructions  given to you by these authorities can lower the amount of radioactive  iodine that enters your body and lower the risk of serious injury to  your thyroid gland._
_The FDA has approved two different forms of KI—tablets and  liquid—that people can take by mouth after a nuclear radiation  emergency. Tablets come in two strengths, 130 milligram (mg) and 65 mg.  The tablets are scored so they may be cut into smaller pieces for lower  doses. Each milliliter (mL) of the oral liquid solution contains 65 mg  of KI._ 
_According to the FDA, the following doses are appropriate to take  after internal contamination with (or likely internal contamination  with) radioactive iodine:_ 
_Adults should take 130 mg (one 130 mg tablet OR two 65 mg tablets OR two mL of solution).__Women who are breastfeeding should take the adult dose of 130 mg.__Children between 3 and 18 years of age should take 65 mg  (one 65 mg tablet OR 1 mL of solution). Children who are adult size  (greater than or equal to 150 pounds) should take the full adult dose,  regardless of their age._refer to link more info

----------


## koman

> A point of prospective.
> 
> It was 1979, when I had an opportunity in the late spring to sit in with a group for a 3 hour debriefing lecture about the failure chain at Three Mile Island.  It was put on at Brookhaven National Labratory, on Long Island.   The lecture was very detailed, and it went through step by step the observations open to control room personnel & telemetry, as well as all their actions taken to try and manage the primary cooling system failure that precipitated the TMI incident.   
> 
> I am not going to rehash it here,  and much of the details have been lost from my memory.   The plant had undergone a major upgrade and outage period  before the incident.    
> 
> Two manual valves (with no control room indication) which were in the "emergency reactor cooling system" had been mistakenly left closed after the maintenance outtage / upgrade.    By mistake they were closed, and unknown to the operating staff.    When the primary cooling failure took place, and the plant operators started to SCRAM the reactor, and activate the emergency cooling system...  That system simply was not delivering water.   It took about 8 minute's for plant personnel -  to get into the plant and to the respective valves - to get them open....  Once opened up emergency cooling was being supplied to the reactor.
> 
> The lack of primary and emergency cooling for 8 minutes was all it took for reactor core to sustain damage that was irreversible.  Even with all the efforts to shutdown / moderate the nuclear reaction through rapid shutdown etc.    The control room telemetry pointed to a rapidly rising pressure spike, and precipitated their decision to open pressure releasing valve - releasing contaminated steam.  
> ...


Thanks you for that. Finally someone who actually seems to know what the the hell they are talking about! 

I heard on Japanese TV that this power station had no less than 13 (thirteen) backup diesel generators....which all failed.   Surely that can not be the case.
What could cause all 13 units to fail.  Is it not more likely that the failure(s) was not the generators, but the delivery system which fed the power to drive the cooling systems?  Not that it really matters much I suppose.

----------


## KAPPA

Here's more at the link that text is lifted from. 

an introduction to energy sources


And here, 

http://www.elib.edu.et/openbitstream...6/2/503392.pdf




> Thanks you for that. Finally someone who actually seems to know what the the hell they are talking about!

----------


## Loy Toy

> With the transport and communications infrastructure damaged so severely, what would you rather they did?





> I understand the need to control people and offset panic but this is really getting ridiculous.


I think I already made my position clear Harry.  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic): 

The authorites have had enough time to dance around the truth and foreign experts are now coming out and called them liars.

I ask you a few questions?

Is it better to either say we don't know or claim no radiation leaks? 

Is it better to tell your fellow citizens the truth or build mistrust?

----------


## Takeovers

> I heard on Japanese TV that this power station had no less than 13 (thirteen) backup diesel generators....which all failed. Surely that can not be the case. What could cause all 13 units to fail.


It was mentioned on BBC or CNN that the generators were disabled by the Tsunami following the earthquake. That would explain why they started up and then shut off after some time. 
But the claim was not repeated and I cannot find a reference to it. Time will tell.
I don't know which station because I switched between several and info gets blurred.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Is it better to either say we don't know or claim no radiation leaks? 
> 
> Is it better to tell your fellow citizens the truth or build mistrust?


They're evacuating 300,000 around the area, and have said they're doing it because of radiation leaks. I don't think it matters one iota to those affected if it's ten or a thousand times the safe level.

In my opinion, the priority is to find the people still alive and in need of assistance, and get them out.

This desperate desire for the "truth" about the nuclear plant seems to be overshadowing the massive humanitarian issue.

Who gives a shit about radiation poisoning if you are dying of your injuries, dehydration, hypothermia or infection?

Not one of them. All they care about is getting to safety.

I think you have your priorities a bit unbalanced is all. No offence intended.

----------


## Warwick

> Just heard a nuclear spokesman on Japan TV saying "the things we thought would work well, did not go as well as we had expected" "we have had to move back a few steps"


A superb example of Japanese obfuscation. Compare it to Emperor Hirohito's words when he had to announce to the Japanese people that they had lost the war "The war has developed not necessarily to Japan's advantage."

----------


## Loy Toy

> I think you have your priorities a bit unbalanced is all.


My priortity is the truth and the Japanese have been labelled liars Nuclear experts ariound the world and with regard to the exact situation.

Tsunami warnings were sent out in advance so other countries could prepare accordingly and to protect their own citizens.

Nuclear disasters are automatically covered up by the locals but the ramifications globally cannot be ignored.

The Japansese fail to accept that their problem can affect many other countries at risk and if things worsen if it is not serious enough already.

Absolutely ignorant in my opinion.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> I think you have your priorities a bit unbalanced is all.
> 
> 
> My priortity is the truth and the Japanese have been labelled liars Nuclear experts ariound the world and with regard to the exact situation.
> 
> Tsunami warnings were sent out in advance so other countries could prepare accordingly and to protect their own citizens.
> 
> ...


Not really quite sure how to interpret that rant. 

By the way, how exactly do you know precisely what is going on _in situ_, and which bits do you consider to be lies?

----------


## Loy Toy

> Not really quite sure how to interpret that rant.


As you have in the past and labelled my post bullshit. Then when I catch you out you go missing as with the your Changi airport bullshit.  :tieme: 




> By the way, how exactly do you know precisely what is going on in situ, and which bits do you consider to be lies?


That's exactly the point I am trying to make.

Nobody knows what's going down as the Japanese are probably not telling the truth as pointed out by global experts.

This nuclear problem is not only a Japanese problem, it is a global regional risk and the local authorites need to come clean now.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> Tsunami warnings were sent out in advance so other countries could prepare accordingly and to protect their own citizens.


Japan had about 10 minutes to warn its citizens of a possible tsunami, and I'm pretty sure that 99.9% of Japanese are more than aware of the risk of a tsunami following a sizeable earthquake.

Nowhere is any country more prepared than Japan in these matters, but the only real understanding is that there's pretty much fek all you can do to prepare for a disaster like this.

With regard to the failings of the nuclear power plants, it hasn't happened before, and now that it has, I'm sure all will be done to ensure power cannot be interrupted to the cooling system in future.

----------


## good2bhappy

Miyagi Police Dept Chief said the death in the prefecture will exceed 10,000; 379 bodies are recovered as of noon

----------


## harrybarracuda

I think this sounds pretty straight up to me.




> Thousands were evacuated on Saturday following an explosion and leak  from the facility's No. 1 reactor in Fukushima, 240 kilometres north of  Tokyo, where there is believed to have been a partial meltdown of the  fuel rods. 
>   Now engineers were pumping in seawater, trying to prevent the same thing  from happening at the No. 3 reactor, the government said *in apparent  acknowledgement that it had moved too slowly on Saturday*. 
>   "Unlike the No.1 reactor, we ventilated and injected water at an early  stage," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told a news briefing. 
> *Asked if fuel rods were partially melting in the No. 1 reactor, Edano  said: "There is that possibility. We cannot confirm this because it is  in the reactor. But we are dealing with it under that assumption. We are  also dealing with the No.3 reactor based on the assumption that it is a  possibility."* 
>   Nuclear plant operator Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO) said radiation  levels around the Fukushima Daiichi plant had risen above the safety  limit but that it did not mean an "immediate threat" to human health. 
>   It said earlier it was preparing to vent steam to relieve pressure in  the No.3 reactor at the plant and the government had warned of a rise in  radiation during the procedure. 
>   Some 170,000 people have been ordered to evacuate the area covering a  radius of 20 kilometres around the plant in Fukushima near Iwaki. A  meltdown refers to a very serious collapse of a power plant's systems  and its ability to manage temperatures. A complete meltdown would  release uranium and dangerous byproducts into the environment that can  pose serious health risks.

----------


## misskit

Japan continued to grapple Sunday with widespread damage from its biggest recorded earthquake and massive tsunami that hit northeastern and eastern regions two days ago, with the number of reported victims topping 2,000 and a crisis escalating at two nuclear plants.

Local governments have been unable to contact tens of thousands of people, and at least 20,820 buildings have been fully or partially damaged in quake-hit areas, according to local officials and a tally by the national governments.

from
Victims top 2,000 in Japan quake-tsunami, nuclear crisis continues - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## harrybarracuda

> As you have in the past and labelled my post bullshit. Then when I catch  you out you go missing as with the your Changi airport bullshit.


Please stick on topic. Just because I related my own experiences of Changi to you, and they don't match your imaginative version, does not make them "bullshit". 

I'll ask you again: Where have the Japanese been telling lies? And how are you getting information from the scene that proves this to you? Or are you once again making stuff up that suits your argument?

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> Nowhere is any country more prepared than Japan in these matters


Would have been better if the cooling systems had held up or at least the reactor processes might have been shut down before overheating. 




> With regard to the failings of the nuclear power plants, it hasn't happened before, and now that it has, I'm sure all will be done to ensure power cannot be interrupted to the cooling system in future.


Reads like a contradiction...I think you mean't to say it hasn't happened in Japan before but they have had on or two near problems prior to this massive earthhquake and now "stable door and horse" springs to mind.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> the reactor processes might have been shut down before overheating


And that takes how long to achieve?

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> And that takes how long to achieve?


Probably too long and that's the reason for learning from previous accidents in Japan's neuclear industry (and others worldwide) that you state have never happened.

Care to read about how the well prepared and safest neuclear industry (Tokai) circumvented safety procedures in order to save time and almost caused another meltdown?

Tokai at it's best...certainly NOT the best safety record for sure!

*http://www.n-base.org.uk/public/report_links/jap_accident.html*

----------


## harrybarracuda

From Australia:




> Sydney - Japanese officials should brief other nations on  the threat  posed by quake-damaged nuclear power plants, Australian  Foreign  Minister Kevin Rudd said Sunday.  
>   Rudd told national  broadcaster ABC that he had spoken to Japanese  Foreign Minister Takeaki  Matsumoto about the threat posed by power  plants damaged in Friday's  quake.  
>   'We, and the rest of the international community, need  urgent  briefings on the precise status of these reactors,' Rudd said.  'We  are seeking further co-operation on the technical and safety  aspects  of these from the Japanese government.'


and from the US:




> WASHINGTON (AFP) – The US Nuclear Regulatory Commission said Saturday  it has sent two experts to Japan, where authorities were seeking to  calm fears of a reactor meltdown in the aftermath of a massive  earthquake.
>  “We have some of the most expert people in this field in the world  working for the NRC and we stand ready to assist in any way possible,”  commission chairman Gregory Jaczko said in a statement announcing the  deployment.
>  The NRC — an independent agency mandated by Congress to regulate US  commercial nuclear power plants and other nuclear materials — said the  pair were experts in boiling water nuclear reactors and are part of a  broader US aid team sent to the disaster zone.
> 
> 
>  The commission has activated “its Maryland-based headquarters  Operations Center since the beginning of the emergency in Japan, and is  operating on a 24-hour basis,” the statement added.

----------


## Loy Toy

> Please stick on topic. Just because I related my own experiences of Changi to you, and they don't match your imaginative version, does not make them "bullshit".


Yer right..... :mid:  Imagination by whom and to debate a certain topic.  :ourrules: 




> Or are you once again making stuff up that suits your argument?


I have been listening to the same media and expert reports as you have for the last 2 days and I am quite amused how you have absorbed this information.

You then ask me about me how I get information from the scene?

Nuclear problems are always covered up or played down whilst people are at this time being treated for radiation exposure, even being quarantined as we type.

The point I am trying to make, (which you labelled a rant) is that Japan has not only responsibilities to it's own citizens but to citizens of neighbouring countries to tell them them the truth which unfortunately seems to be not happening at the moment.

----------


## Bazzy

Just watching the tv news here in Oz, the quake is now considered a magnitude 9.0, there haven't been so many of them in history.

----------


## harrybarracuda

I don't disagree (see Post #370 - one country asking, another country sending people to find out).

I would imagine the best people to advise are the ones on their way, given:




> There are currently 23 General Electric Mark I reactors in the U.S.--the  design that exploded at Fukushima. A top Atomic Energy Commission  official first proposed banning this design nearly 40 years ago.

----------


## harrybarracuda

I can't cut and paste from this PDF with the tools available, but it does give an interesting perspective:

http://nirs.org/reactorwatch/acciden...actorsinus.pdf

----------


## Thetyim

> I heard on Japanese TV that this power station had no less than 13 (thirteen) backup diesel generators....which all failed. Surely that can not be the case.


Either the air intakes or the fuel storage was below the level of the incoming tsunami

----------


## harrybarracuda

Just occasionally something comes along that makes you just speechless with awe. How lucky is this gentleman?:




> A Japanese Self-Defence Force destroyer has rescued a  60-year-old man from the sea some 15 kilometres off Fukushima prefecture  after a massive tsunami swept coastal regions following a magnitude 8.9  earthquake on Friday.
>  The man, identified as Hiromitsu Shinkawa from the city of  Minamisoma, was spotted floating in sea on a piece of roof after being  swept along with his house, the defence ministry said.
>  The deadly wall of seawater surged as far as two kilometres inland,  leaving random debris, vehicles and the ruins of wood houses jutting  from the mud.
>  The rescued man is conscious and in good condition, ministry  officials said, adding he was transported to a hospital by helicopter.
>  At the city of Fukushima, about 80 kilometres north-west of the  stricken nuclear power plant, there have been reports of panic buying at  supermarkets and petrol stations running dry.
>  Japan has committed 100,000 troops - about 40 per cent of the armed  forces - to spearhead a mammoth rescue and recovery effort, with  hundreds of ships, aircraft and vehicles headed to the Pacific coast  area.
>  The world is rallying behind the disaster-stricken nation, with offers of help even from Japan's traditional rivals. 
>  The massive earthquake, one of the largest in recorded history,  appears to have shifted the main Japanese island by about 2.4 metres,  the US Geological Survey said.
>  Two days after it struck about 400 kilometres north-east of Tokyo,  aftershocks were still rattling the region, including a strong  6.8-magnitude tremor on Saturday and a 6.3 quake on Sunday.
>  While the official death toll from the quake and tsunami that  followed nears 900, many more are feared dead as thousands remain  unaccounted for.

----------


## Little Chuchok

Video - Breaking News Videos from CNN.com

An 'expert' talks about the reactors

----------


## harrybarracuda

Another Sendai before and after.

Feb 26th:



March 12th:

----------


## HermantheGerman

Radiation has hit Tokio.

----------


## Butterfly

how long before it reaches Thailand ?

----------


## crippen

^  Get in the shower B/F!   Wash the radio-activity off! :Smile:

----------


## HermantheGerman

> As you have in the past and labelled my post bullshit. Then when I catch  you out you go missing as with the your Changi airport bullshit. 
> 
> 
> Please stick on topic. Just because I related my own experiences of Changi to you, and they don't match your imaginative version, does not make them "bullshit". 
> 
> I'll ask you again: Where have the Japanese been telling lies? And how are you getting information from the scene that proves this to you? Or are you once again making stuff up that suits your argument?



Telling lies on purpose or not ?
May I remind you folks about Tschernobyl. All of our governments have lied to us about this accident. 
I think that the japanese are also lying on purpose in order to stop hysteria.
Amazing how calm the Japanese are at this moment. Could you imagine New York with the same scenario.
The worst is yet to come.

----------


## HermantheGerman

> how long before it reaches Thailand ?


Winds will be changing direction next week. Blowing land inward.

----------


## HermantheGerman

> ^  Get in the shower B/F!   Wash the radio-activity off!


Not with a japanese girl   :Smile: .

----------


## Takeovers

> Originally Posted by crippen
> 
> 
> ^  Get in the shower B/F!   Wash the radio-activity off!
> 
> 
> Not with a japanese girl  .


Sorry for OT. But what is wrong with a japanese girl in the shower?

----------


## crippen

A girl with B/F!!!   Come on now! :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## koman

> Originally Posted by koman
> 
> I heard on Japanese TV that this power station had no less than 13 (thirteen) backup diesel generators....which all failed. Surely that can not be the case.
> 
> 
> Either the air intakes or the fuel storage was below the level of the incoming tsunami


Well, if that is the case, they need to have a serious chat with their risk management people. This nuclear power station is located on a coast which even primary school kids know is subject to earthquakes and tsunami's, so why would they leave the back up power system, which is critical to safe operation, wide open to being swamped by a tsunami FFS...?  Does not seem to make much sense.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> May I remind you folks about Tschernobyl. All of our governments have lied to us about this accident.


Well yours might have, Herman, but there's plenty of others that told us about it. The Russians were the ones that covered it up until the geiger counters were going off all over Europe and then people realised they were somewhat understating it.

Now the truth of what happened then is in the public domain.

In this instance, they have admitted that they are battling to avoid a major release of nuclear material, and evacuating 300,000 people, so doesn't sound to me like much of a cover up.

----------


## Thetyim

> why would they leave the back up power system, which is critical to safe operation, wide open to being swamped by a tsunami FFS...?


They didn't envisage such a huge tsunami.
The ground is about 2 meters above sea level. The tsunami was at around 20 meters. 
Buoys reported one wave at 250 feet coming into Japan.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Well, if that is the case, they need to have a serious chat with their  risk management people...<snip>.....why would they leave the back up power system, which is  critical to safe operation, wide open to being swamped by a tsunami  FFS...?


I'm wondering if the defences and the structure were built to survive the type of earthquakes to which they had become experienced? I say this because there is much mention of coastal towns being deluged after their "tsunami defences" were breached, which might indicate why people perhaps did not flee despite being given warnings.

You have to remember this is (now adjusted) a massive 9.0 earthquake. If they start designing now for 10.0 earthquakes and 20 metre tsunamis, what's the betting that along will come a 10.2 and 30 metre waves.

You have to remember that nobody bordering the Indian Ocean even gave a shit what a tsunami was as recently as a little over six years ago (bar a few visionary individuals who were written off as eccentrics or scaremongerers).

----------


## StrontiumDog

Official: 2nd Japan reactor at risk of explosion Official: 2nd Japan reactor at risk of explosion - World news - Asia-Pacific - msnbc.com

----------


## good2bhappy

Here's a quote from Naoto Takeuchi, head of the Miyagi prefecture police, carried on Kyodo: ''We have no choice but to deal with the situation on the premise that it [the death toll] will undoubtedly be numbered in the ten thousands.''

----------


## Thetyim

^^
""At the risk of raising further public concern, we cannot rule out the possibility of an explosion," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told a news briefing. "

Oh Shit

----------


## Chairman Mao

Looks like they might have a volcano to deal with too.

From NHK

Google Translate

# Volcanoes: Kirishima
#：2011年3月13日午後6時15分 When: 6:15 pm March 13, 2011
#   Phenomenon: the eruption continues
#   1500m Colored Smoke: 1500m above the crater
#   White Smoke:
#    Kino Mukai plume: Azuma Minami (City Shibushi Soo, Kagoshima City, Miyazaki Prefecture, Miyakonojo direction)

Which incidentally had it's biggest eruption for 50 yrs 6 weeks ago.

----------


## StrontiumDog

^ been erupting on and off since January, although it has become a bit more active as of now....

Shinmoedake - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

*Shinmoedake* (新燃岳) is a volcano in Kyūshū, Japan, and a part of the Kirishima cluster of volcanoes. It is believed to have formed between 7,300 and 25,000 years ago.[2]  Past observed records include eruptions in 1716, 1717, 1771, 1822,  1959, 1991, 2008, and 2009. The latest eruptions began on January 19,  2011, and the alert level was raised to 3 on January 27.[1] As of February 2011, a lava dome was growing in the volcano's crater.[3]
 Shimoedake is also notable for having been used as a location in the 1967 James Bond film, _You Only Live Twice_, as the volcano in which the villains' secret rocket base is located.[4]

----------


## StrontiumDog

Fukushima Fallout: How Bad Could It Get? Video: Fukushima Nuclear Fallout: How Bad Could It Get? | World News | Sky News

----------


## Chairman Mao

> although it has become a bit more active as of now....


What's your info on it now?

----------


## Poo and Pee

just found my good friend's family home has been washed away in fukushima. he has also lost atleast one friend  :Sad:

----------


## StrontiumDog

Some amazing footage at the start of this news report...





Also check this link for some more amazing Tsunami footage, the moment it hit....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-12725646

----------


## Poo and Pee

> Originally Posted by Loy Toy
> 
> Tsunami warnings were sent out in advance so other countries could prepare accordingly and to protect their own citizens.
> 
> 
> Japan had about 10 minutes to warn its citizens of a possible tsunami, and I'm pretty sure that 99.9% of Japanese are more than aware of the risk of a tsunami following a sizeable earthquake.
> 
> Nowhere is any country more prepared than Japan in these matters, but the only real understanding is that there's pretty much fek all you can do to prepare for a disaster like this.
> 
> With regard to the failings of the nuclear power plants, it hasn't happened before, and now that it has, I'm sure all will be done to ensure power cannot be interrupted to the cooling system in future.


spot on marmite.

this is one of the largest earthquakes in world history - very hard to prepare for.

people in the worst effected areas all recieved text messages via moblle phones - but with only minutes notice, there is not much you can do..

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2011/03/13...iation-levels/*



People evacuate Saturday from the flooded airport terminal building in Sendai, Japan.

*[5:37 a.m. ET, 6:37 p.m. Tokyo]* Japan Meteorological  Agency has  canceled all tsunami advisories. Meanwhile, the death toll  from the  quake rose on Sunday to 977 dead. At least 739 people are  missing and  1,683 are injured, according to the National Police Agency  Emergency  Disaster Headquarters.

*[4:47 a.m. ET, 5:47 p.m. Tokyo]* A round of sirens  urged people  to go to higher ground in Sendai, a city affected days  earlier by a  tsunami. The tsunami advisories by local officials were  prompted by  aftershocks following an 8.9-magnitude earthquake that  struck last  week.

*[3:46 a.m. ET, 4:46 p.m. Tokyo]* A second explosion  could occur  at an earthquake-struck nuclear plant in northeastern Japan,  a  government official told reporters Sunday. Chief Cabinet Secretary   Yukio Edano said an explosion could occur in the buliding housing the   No. 3 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.

*[3:12 a.m. ET, 4:12 p.m. Tokyo]* At least 160 people  are being  tested for radiation exposure after tens of thousands of  residents were  evacuated in the wake of an explosion at a nuclear  reactor damaged by  Friday's massive quake and tsunami. FULL STORY

----------


## koman

> Well, if that is the case, they need to have a serious chat with their  risk management people...<snip>.....why would they leave the back up power system, which is  critical to safe operation, wide open to being swamped by a tsunami  FFS...?
> 			
> 		
> 
> I'm wondering if the defences and the structure were built to survive the type of earthquakes to which they had become experienced? I say this because there is much mention of coastal towns being deluged after their "tsunami defences" were breached, which might indicate why people perhaps did not flee despite being given warnings.
> 
> You have to remember this is (now adjusted) a massive 9.0 earthquake. If they start designing now for 10.0 earthquakes and 20 metre tsunamis, what's the betting that along will come a 10.2 and 30 metre waves.
> 
> You have to remember that nobody bordering the Indian Ocean even gave a shit what a tsunami was as recently as a little over six years ago (bar a few visionary individuals who were written off as eccentrics or scaremongerers).


Yes I agree.  We tend to plan for what is probable rather than what is possible, but you would think that after the 2004 Tsunami  (which was a bit of a wake-up call) and the particular nature of the ocean floor off Japan (massive subduction zone)
it might have prompted somebody to secure the emergency backup power source. It is after all a nuclear power station, not a frigging resort hotel or something. It's not rocket science. 

I lived in Victoria BC some years ago.  A neighbor of mine was a guy called Dr. Gary Rogers....(who happens to be an earthquake expert)...told me once that the events of the last few days were virtually guaranteed to happen...it was just that we did not know if it would be tomorrow of 300 years from now.  The west coast of Canada and NW US could experience something similar any time.  There is a huge subduction zone about 200 kms off the coast of Vancouver Island. Washington State and Oregon (Juan de Fuca plate and Pacific plate in collision)  It's not nearly as active as the one off Japan...which may mean that when it finally does crack..the shock wave and resulting tsunami could be very powerful and destructive because the stresses have been building up for a very long time. 

The last major slippage of the fault was abut 300+ years ago and they have established that the quakes happen every 300 years or so.... on one occasion the shore line "adjusted" by about two meters.!! Fortunately the local Indians had not build any nuclear power stations... :mid:

----------


## Marmite the Dog

I wonder how well San Francisco will deal with the massive earthquake that will happen there most likely within our lifetimes? Probably the most stupid place to build a city on the US West coast.

----------


## StrontiumDog

> Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> 
> 
> although it has become a bit more active as of now....
> 
> 
> What's your info on it now?


About the same as yours mate...there is a link to a NHK report somewhere, but I couldn't get it to open. 

It is bubbling but not much else from what I can gather from Twitter. I guess the amount of disturbance caused by this earthquake is going to set off a few other spots...just guessing of course, but it seems a reasonable suggestion. 

A lot of stress is going to have built up along several fault lines now too, that was some shift...and I'd expect another big quake relatively soon (soon in geological terms...!) along the subduction zone. Again, pure guess work, but an educated one...well sort of educated.  :Smile:

----------


## KAPPA

http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/201...1ac72ca2746b95

Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) said March 12  that the explosion at the Fukushima Daiichi No. 1 nuclear plant could  only have been caused by a meltdown of the reactor core, Japanese daily  Nikkei reported. This statement seemed somewhat at odds with Japanese  Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano’s comments earlier March 12, in  which he said “the walls of the building containing the reactor were  destroyed, meaning that the metal container encasing the reactor did not  explode.” 
 NISA’s statement is significant because it is the government agency  that reports to the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy within the  Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry. NISA works in conjunction with  the Atomic Energy Commission. Its role is to provide oversight to the  industry and is responsible for signing off construction of new plants,  among other things. It has been criticized for approving nuclear plants  on geological fault lines and for an alleged conflict of interest in  regulating the nuclear sector. It was NISA that issued the order for the  opening of the valve to release pressure — and thus allegedly some  radiation — from the Fukushima power plant. 
 NISA has also overseen the entire government response to the nuclear  reactor problems following the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. It is  difficult to determine at this point whether the NISA statement is  accurate, as the Nikkei report has not been corroborated by others. It  is also not clear from the context whether NISA is stating the  conclusions of an official assessment or simply making a statement.  However, the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), the operator of the  Fukushima nuclear plant, also said that although it had relieved  pressure, nevertheless some nuclear fuel had melted and further action  was necessary to contain the pressure. 
 If this report is accurate, it would not be the first time statements  by NISA and Edano have diverged. When Edano earlier claimed that  radiation levels had fallen at the site after the depressurization  efforts, NISA claimed they had risen due to the release of radioactive  vapors.

Read more:  Japanese Government Confirms Meltdown | STRATFOR

----------


## Thetyim

> I'm sure all will be done to ensure power cannot be interrupted to the cooling system in future.


Already done.
Modern reactors are designed with a gravity fed emergency cooling system

----------


## harrybarracuda

While look for a separate video, I came across one on NZTV which said a documentary they showed 15 years ago spoke of the damage that a big quake would do to Christchurch given the geology of the place.

And what did they do about that? Not a lot, by the sound of it.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan agency says 70 percent chance new major #quake in next three days. Japan quake live blog: Likelihood of 7.0 tremblor at 70%, agency says – This Just In - CNN.com Blogs

----------


## ItsRobsLife

> Japans Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) said March 12  that the explosion at the Fukushima Daiichi No. 1 nuclear plant could  only have been caused by a meltdown of the reactor core [...] the operator of the  Fukushima nuclear plant, also said that although it had relieved  pressure, nevertheless some nuclear fuel had melted and further action  was necessary to contain the pressure. 
>  Read more:  Japanese Government Confirms Meltdown | STRATFOR


Is this the most up to date statement so far?

----------


## crippen

How??

----------


## StrontiumDog

Supposedly a photo of reactor one today, after the explosion... looks a bit farked...

----------


## StrontiumDog

From earlier today...

Japan&#039;s twin disasters: March 13 Live Blog | Al Jazeera Blogs

1:27pm        

  Our correspondent  Steve Chao was just reporting live for us in the town of Natori,  where smashed cars and rubble are littered across big  swathes of land.  He says many bodies have been pulled out since floodwaters  receded but  there is yet no official count of the dead and injured. There is no   electricity and phone lines are disrupted.

----------


## koman

> I wonder how well San Francisco will deal with the massive earthquake that will happen there most likely within our lifetimes? Probably the most stupid place to build a city on the US West coast.


San Francisco's EQ would be caused by a different type of fault which produces a different type of shock wave, and because the fault in inland there would not be a tsunami.  The subduction zones off Japan, Pacific NW of US and Canada,  and S. American produce the biggest quakes, and because they fuck up the ocean floor, cause tsunamis.   I think the biggest quakes every recorded have been off Chile...as high as 9.5 in 1960. 

The San Andreas fault (California) is very active but it's frequent  sideways slippage relieves pressure buildup. It has the potential to have a big slip every once in a while and when it does, it can sent out a very big shock wave, but no water displacement.  The subduction earthquakes are caused by one tectonic plate forcing itself downwards under another plate and trusting  it upwards over time. When the pressure gets too high the plate underneath fails and the other plate drops.   The huge displacement of water causes the tsunami and the crash sends a big fucking shock wave out to wreck everything that's not on a thick layer of solid bedrock.  Records show that increases in activity are cyclical and it is normal to have long periods of little activity followed by a period of frequent and often severe events.  Look like we may have entered one of the latter... :mid:

----------


## ItsRobsLife

Lot's of footage of wreckage on the news but very little info about the nuclear reactors. I can only assume the news is bad.

----------


## Loy Toy

> Lot's of footage of wreckage on the news but very little info about the nuclear reactors. I can only assume the news is bad.


That's what is worrying me mate.

The old saying no news is good news cannot be used here as the deafly silence is kinda like the calm before the storm.

The other horrible thing is that all the fossil fuel moguls are probably wringing their hands together with glee.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan #quake death toll rises to 1,217, hundreds more missing. Death toll, nuclear meltdown fears rise in Japan - CNN.com

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Originally Posted by Chairman Mao
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> ...


Do you know, if you've been bashed from pillar to post by a 9.0 quake, smashed and soaked by a tsunami the size of an Oak tree, and then you get irridiated to boot, I think it would just about deserve a frigging Victoria Cross if you could survive a hail of molten rock as well.

Poor bastards.

----------


## Bower

> Supposedly a photo of reactor one today, after the explosion... looks a bit farked...


Not such a big explosion if the steel frame remains intact ?

----------


## Thetyim

> Supposedly a photo of reactor one today, after the explosion... looks a bit farked...


Don't worry about reactor one it contains uranium
Reactor three however contains uranium and plutonium if that one leaks it is a huge problem

----------


## StrontiumDog

AP photo - 60-year-old man was floating off the coast of Fukushima's Futaba town on the roof of his house Yfrog Photo : yfrog.com/hsipfvbj - Shared by thaitvnews

----------


## Takeovers

> Don't worry about reactor one it contains uranium


How do you come to that conclusion? Those fuel rods are well used. New they contain uranium, a mix of U235, the actual fuel and a lot of U238. That is not a big problem. But during its lifetime besides other radioactive fission products some plutionium will be produced from the Uranium 238.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan quake live blog: Japanese PM rallies citizens: 'We can do it together' – This Just In - CNN.com Blogs


Vehicles block a canal in Tagajo, Miyagi prefecture Sunday after they were deposited there following the quake and tsunami.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Story to go with the photo 3 above...

http://news.sky.com/skynews/Article/201009115951461

*                         'Miracle' Rescue Of Man Swept Out To Sea                    * 

12:53pm UK, Sunday March 13, 2011                     
                                          Juliet Bagnall, Sky News Online                     

*                                                                                           Amidst the horrors of the Japanese  earthquake, one man had a miraculous escape after being swept nine miles  out to sea by the resulting tsunami.                                                                              * 

 
An aerial view of the earthquake and tsunami damage at Minamisoma

Sixty-year-old Hiromitsu Shinkawa was discovered clinging to  the wreckage of his house two days after the disaster struck, officials  said.

  He was plucked to safety by a Maritime Self-Defence Force destroyer  which spotted him floating on a piece of roof in waters off Fukushima  prefecture.

  The survivor, from the city of *Minamisoma*  which has been virtually obliterated, was swept out along with his  house after the massive tsunami tore into Japan's north-east coast.

*Hundreds  of people were killed and at least 10,000 people are reported missing  from the area after huge waves swept away everything in their path.*

  Ministry officials said Mr Shinkawa was conscious and in "good condition" after his rescue.

  He was airlifted to hospital by helicopter.

 
People stand next to collapsed houses in Minamisoma

      "I ran away after learning that the tsunami was coming," Mr Shinkawa told rescuers, according to Jiji Press.

"But I turned back to pick up something at home, when I was washed away.  I was rescued while I was hanging to the roof from my house."

The government has said at least 1,800 people are believed to have lost  their lives in the disaster, and police estimate more than 215,000  people are huddled in emergency shelters.

However, the police chief of the badly-hit Miyagi prefecture said that  the death toll was certain to exceed 10,000 in his district alone.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Another image...

Yfrog Photo : yfrog.com/hsjwhvlj - Shared by aunonline

----------


## StrontiumDog

Reuters:  France urges citizens to leave Japan's Tokyo region France urges citizens to leave Japan's Tokyo region | Reuters #eqjo #tsunami

----------


## Thetyim

> How do you come to that conclusion?


"A meltdown at the No. 3 reactor could be more serious than at the other reactors because it is fueled by both plutonium and uranium, BBC News reported. The others have only uranium fuel. "

Official: 2nd Japan reactor at risk of explosion - World news - Asia-Pacific - msnbc.com

----------


## Takeovers

> "A meltdown at the No. 3 reactor could be more serious than at the other reactors because it is fueled by both plutonium and uranium, BBC News reported. The others have only uranium fuel. "


I see. But as I said in my post when the Uranium fuel rods have been used they too contain plutonium. Enough of that to extract it for new fuel rods. So the difference would be there but would be gradual only.  Any kind of Plutonium release is devastating.

Edit: BTW I see a major radioactive release of the Chernobyl kind more devastating than the earthquake and tsunami, even if the latter have caused so many deaths. I fear the long term effects more. Call me a cynic.

But I still have hope they can avoid that scenario.

----------


## StrontiumDog

A bunch of images I'd not seen before....so thought I'd post them here. 

Photo gallery - Japan earthquake and tsunami - Channel 4 News


The wave from a tsunami crashes over a street in Miyako City, Iwate Prefecture in northeastern Japan


A woman looks at the damage caused by a tsunami and earthquake in Ishimaki City.


A family walks past buildings destroyed by a tsunami in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, in northern Japan


A person walks past an overturned squid-fishing boat tossed onto land by a tsunami in northern Japan


A picture taken from the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force helicopter shows the central part of the town of Minamisanriku


Burned-out cars are pictured at Hitachi Harbour in Ibaraki Prefecture in northeastern Japan


Smoke rises from a burning factory following an earthquake and tsunami in Sendai, northeastern Japan


Oil refinery on fire near Tokyo after Japan's 8.9 magnitude earthquake (Getty)

----------


## Butterfly

they are pouring seawater in the nuclear plant core, that basically means that the vessel has melted since seawater is not really recommended for the vessel

you wouldn't pour seawater if you knew you could save the vessel from a meltdown, apparently they are past that stage

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Japanese volcano erupts - Times LIVE
*
*Japanese volcano erupts* 

  Mar 13, 2011 3:01 PM | By Sapa-AFP 

* A volcano in southwestern Japan erupted Sunday after nearly two  weeks of relative silence, sending ash and rocks up to four kilometres  (two and a half miles) into the air, a local official says.*

It was not immediately clear if the eruption was a direct result of the  massive 8.9-magnitude earthquake that rocked northern areas Friday,  unleashing a fierce tsunami and sparking fears that more than 10,000 may  have been killed. 

   The 1,421-metre (4,689-feet) Shinmoedake volcano in the Kirishima range  saw its first major eruption for 52 years in January. There had not been  any major activity at the site since March 1. 

  Authorities have maintained a volcano warning at a level of three out of five, restricting access to the entire mountain.

----------


## Takeovers

> you wouldn't pour seawater if you knew you could save the vessel from a meltdown, apparently they are past that stage


They are long past trying to save anything. They try to keep the steel containment from melting.

----------


## Gerbil

> they are pouring seawater in the nuclear plant core, that basically means that the vessel has melted since seawater is not really recommended for the vessel
> 
> you wouldn't pour seawater if you knew you could save the vessel from a meltdown, apparently they are past that stage


Note to Japanese Government: BF is not the best person to take advice from when dealing with any sort of cooling or heating systems. See his 'water heater' thread here for proof.  :bunny3:

----------


## Gerbil

> Japanese volcano erupts


Hmmm.... Quite a catalog of disasters now:

Earthquake
Tsunami
Fire storms
Nuclear plant meltdowns
Volcano

about the only thing they havent had yet is a meteor strike!

----------


## robuzo

æ±æ¥æ¬å¤§éç½ï¼ãæ©ãéãã¦ãå½ãã  ãé²ç½ç¡ç·â¦åä¸é¸ - æ¯æ¥ï½ï½(æ¯æ¥æ°è)
Abbreviated translation by Sei Takeguchi:
Miki Endo (age 25) was a Minamisanriku town employee in charge of disaster management. She worked in the town hall and started making public announcements right after the quake, addressing local residents to evacuate to higher ground. She kept making announcements encouraging people until a tsunami swallowed the town hall. 10 employees survived on the hall's rooftop by hanging on to its wireless broadcast tower. Miki was not among them. She stayed in the broadcast room on the third floor. Her mother evacuated to an elementary school and later heard from one of the ten rooftop survivors that she/he saw her daughter getting swept away. One of the mother's friends told her that she heard her daughter's voice making announcements all the way to the very end. Minamisanriku is the town where 10,000 of its 17,000 residents are unaccounted for.

----------


## StrontiumDog

cnnbrk: Death toll after Japan #quake and #tsunami rises to 1,353, police say. Japan quake live blog: Emergency declared at Onagawa nuclear power plant – This Just In - CNN.com Blogs

----------


## Muadib

> Originally Posted by Thetyim
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by koman
> ...


Ignorance or arrogance, take your pick...

----------


## Muadib

> I wonder how well San Francisco will deal with the massive earthquake that will happen there most likely within our lifetimes? Probably the most stupid place to build a city on the US West coast.


I seriously doubt the founders of San Francisco had access to seismic and geological information on the region in 1776...  :mid:

----------


## Gerbil

> I seriously doubt the founders of San Francisco has access to seismic and geological information on the region in 1776...


The 1906 Earthquake there should have been a big clue that rebuilding in the same place was not a terribly bright idea.

----------


## BobR

> Reuters:  France urges citizens to leave Japan's Tokyo region France urges citizens to leave Japan's Tokyo region | Reuters #eqjo #tsunami


Retreat! A national tradition.  There's something that seems absolutely ridiculous about any Country suggesting its citizens run away from Japan or even Tokyo out of fear. The Japanese are strong intelligent people who will recover from this, and it seems very doubtful the French need to take any more precautions than the Japanese Government will take.

I thought I was long past the point of feeling personally effected by any World news, but I honestly feel disgusted and mournful over this.

----------


## StrontiumDog

> æ±æ¥æ¬å¤§éç½ï¼ãæ©ãéãã¦ãå½ãã  ãé²ç½ç¡ç·â¦åä¸é¸ - æ¯æ¥ï½ï½(æ¯æ¥æ°è)
> Abbreviated translation by Sei Takeguchi:
> Miki Endo (age 25) was a Minamisanriku town employee in charge of disaster management. She worked in the town hall and started making public announcements right after the quake, addressing local residents to evacuate to higher ground. She kept making announcements encouraging people until a tsunami swallowed the town hall. 10 employees survived on the hall's rooftop by hanging on to its wireless broadcast tower. Miki was not among them. She stayed in the broadcast room on the third floor. Her mother evacuated to an elementary school and later heard from one of the ten rooftop survivors that she/he saw her daughter getting swept away. One of the mother's friends told her that she heard her daughter's voice making announcements all the way to the very end. Minamisanriku is the town where 10,000 of its 17,000 residents are unaccounted for.


So sad.

RIP

----------


## Muadib

> they are pouring seawater in the nuclear plant core, that basically means that the vessel has melted since seawater is not really recommended for the vessel
> 
> you wouldn't pour seawater if you knew you could save the vessel from a meltdown, apparently they are past that stage


US nuclear scientists have described what the Japanese are doing as a "last ditch effort" to prevent a meltdown by pumping sea water and boron into the core... 

VPR News: At Crippled Japanese Nuclear Plant, 'Last-Ditch Effort' To Prevent Meltdown

----------


## BobR

> I wonder how well San Francisco will deal with the massive earthquake that will happen there most likely within our lifetimes? Probably the most stupid place to build a city on the US West coast.


The same way America deals with everything else; thousands of frivolous lawsuits, finger pointing accusations and government aid for those who should have bought  private insurance.

----------


## Muadib

^ Is this really the time for your hatred of the US to manifest itself Bob? 

Besides, San Francisco, in case you don't know, is a Spanish name... Why you might ask? Because San Francisco was founded as a Spanish Mission, not a US outpost...

----------


## BobR

> ^ Is this really the time for your hatred of the US to manifest itself Bob? 
> 
> Besides, San Francisco, in case you don't know, is a Spanish name... Why you might ask? Because San Francisco was founded as a Spanish Mission, not a US outpost...


Not intended as a hate statement. Litigation is inevitable every time a building collapses, and much like Katrina, people who responsibly bought insurance will use it, and people who irresponsibly did not buy insurance will expect the government to pay for their mistake.

----------


## robuzo

> Reuters:  France urges citizens to leave Japan's Tokyo region France urges citizens to leave Japan's Tokyo region | Reuters #eqjo #tsunami


This is very troubling, jokes about French cowardice aside. One of the first things I told my colleague in Tokyo, who is accusing me of taking the meltdown possibility too seriously, was to wait until embassies of countries that actually give a damn about their nationals to start telling people to leave town. If the US, Britain, or Germany does this the Japanese will panic.

----------


## StrontiumDog

UN nuclear watchdog says Japan reports lowest state of emergency at Onagawa nuclear power plant Japan says state of emergency at Onagawa - IAEA - AlertNet #jpquake

----------


## Loy Toy

How many plants if that now?

When the Prime Minister come out and announced that a number of plants had been shut down on Friday I feared the worst.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Water injected into troubled nuclear power plant to avert disaster | Kyodo News
*
*Water injected into troubled nuclear power plant to avert disaster*

 TOKYO, March 13, Kyodo

 Japanese authorities scrambled Sunday to  avert a nuclear disaster, injecting seawater into overheating reactors  and relieving the pressure inside at a nuclear power plant in Fukushima  Prefecture that was hit and shut down by Friday's devastating  earthquake.

 While acknowledging that the core of the No. 3 reactor at the  Fukushima No. 1 plant may have been deformed due to overheating, Chief  Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano denied it has led to a ''meltdown,'' a  critical situation where fuel rods have melted.

 The top government spokesman warned, however, that a hydrogen  explosion similar to one that blew away part of a building housing  another reactor at the same facility on Saturday could occur at the  reactor.

 Large amounts of hydrogen were formed when the water injection  procedure temporarily ran into trouble and they may have filled the  upper part of a building housing the No. 3 reactor, Edano said at a news  conference.

 The developments came after the cooling systems for some of the  plant's reactors failed following the magnitude 9.0 earthquake which hit  northeastern and eastern Japan on Friday. The failure led the power  plant's No. 1 reactor core to partially melt Saturday, triggering fears  of a nuclear disaster.

 Hidehiko Nishiyama, a senior official of the Economy, Trade and  Industry Ministry indicated Sunday that the core of the No. 3 reactor  has also melted partially, telling a news conference, ''I don't think  the fuel rods themselves have been spared damage.''

 The plant operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co., commonly known as  TEPCO, began injecting fresh water into the No. 3 reactor's core vessel  on Sunday to deal with the problem that the tops of MOX fuel rods were 3  meters above the water inside.

 But after trouble developed with a fresh water pump, the company was  forced to pour seawater into it, a step that will eventually lead to the  reactor's dismantlement. As a result, water levels began rising again,  Edano said.

 Radiation around the reactor rose above the legal limit to 1,557  micro sievert per hour at 1:52 p.m., but the figure went down to 184  about 50 minutes later. Given the radiation level, Edano said a hydrogen  explosion is unlikely to affect human health even if one occurred.

 Meanwhile, radiation monitored at the Onagawa nuclear power plant in  Miyagi Prefecture on the Pacific coast shot up from late Saturday  through early Sunday, Tohoku Electric Power Co. said, adding that  radiation levels were low but about 700 times as high as normal.

 The government's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said it was  likely caused by the radioactive substances that scattered when a  hydrogen explosion hit the troubled Fukushima plant on Saturday,  dismissing the possibility that the Miyagi plant was to blame.

 The No. 3 reactor was the sixth reactor overall at the Fukushima No. 1  and No. 2 plants, which are located about 11 kilometers apart, to  experience cooling failure since the massive earthquake and ensuing  tsunami struck Japan on Friday.

 The nuclear crisis raised fears of radiation exposure.

 Nineteen people who had evacuated from an area within 3 km of the No.  1 plant were found exposed to radiation, joining three others already  confirmed to have been exposed, the Fukushima prefectural government  said Sunday.

 In addition, about 160 people are feared to have been exposed to radiation, according to the government agency.

 The Fire and Disaster Management Agency said that 15 people were  found to have been contaminated with radioactive material at a hospital  located within 10 km of the reactor. 

 To measure radiation for residents who may have been exposed to it  and determine whether they need emergency treatment, the National  Institute of Radiological Sciences sent 17 doctors and experts to the  city of Fukushima on Sunday.

 Meanwhile, electric power companies in other regions and Japan  Nuclear Fuel Ltd. have dispatched a total of 48 people to help TEPCO  deal with the crisis at the two nuclear power plants in Fukushima.

 An explosion Saturday at the No. 1 plant blew away the roof and part  of the walls of the building housing its No. 1 reactor's container.

 The government and nuclear authorities said there was no damage to a  steel container housing the reactor, noting that the blast occurred as  vapor from the container turned into hydrogen and mixed with oxygen  outside.

 On Sunday, TEPCO continued new cooling operations to fill the  troubled No. 1 reactor with seawater and pour in boric acid to prevent  an occurrence of criticality.

 Following the explosion, the authorities expanded from 10 km to 20 km  the radius of the evacuation area for residents living in the vicinity  of the Fukushima plants.

----------


## StrontiumDog

^^ 2 plants....

Different reactors in different states....at 2 different sites. 

Scary stuff indeed. 

Onagawa seems to be a low risk at the moment...

 Fukushima reactor 3 is the most likely to blow up/melt down it seems.

----------


## HermantheGerman

> May I remind you folks about Tschernobyl. All of our governments have lied to us about this accident.
> 			
> 		
> 
> Well yours might have, Herman, but there's plenty of others that told us about it. The Russians were the ones that covered it up until the geiger counters were going off all over Europe and then people realised they were somewhat understating it.
> 
> Now the truth of what happened then is in the public domain.
> 
> In this instance, they have admitted that they are battling to avoid a major release of nuclear material, and evacuating 300,000 people, so doesn't sound to me like much of a cover up.


You are wrong hb ? Every country that has been affected by Chernobyl has been lied to. Information has been deliberately concealing, covered up, etc. The seriousness of this accident has been played down for years. A bit like the "little"BP oil spill or 3 Mile Island Harrisburg. Big Money Big Lies !
Name a country HB.

----------


## Moonraker

> ^^ 2 plants....
> 
> Different reactors in different states....at 2 different sites. 
> 
> Scary stuff indeed. 
> 
> Onagawa seems to be a low risk at the moment...
> 
>  Fukushima reactor 3 is the most likely to blow up/melt down it seems.


There's a 3rd separate plant in trouble as well now

----------


## StrontiumDog

cnnbrk: Death toll in Japan #quake and #tsunami rises to 1,597, police say. Japan quake live blog: Death toll climbs to 1,597, authorities say – This Just In - CNN.com Blogs #tsunami

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> 
> they are pouring seawater in the nuclear plant core, that basically means that the vessel has melted since seawater is not really recommended for the vessel
> 
> you wouldn't pour seawater if you knew you could save the vessel from a meltdown, apparently they are past that stage
> 
> 
> US nuclear scientists have described what the Japanese are doing as a "last ditch effort" to prevent a meltdown by pumping sea water and boron into the core... 
> ...


Gentlemen:  Everyone references the sea cooling - as if that's all there is.   Cant forget the boron injection as well.....  The VPR link speaking about the merit sea water cooling and boron  injection now ongoing is spot on.  Thanks for referencing that link.  

Sea water to cool (because the normal  reserve feed water system is probably exhausted) - Boron to suck  up  neutrons - to reduce the nuclear reaction.   Both items are important.   Stabilize the portion of the nuclear reaction that boron can be  effective with, and cooling to prevent more thermally induced core  deterioration. Its the only option open. Not much else open for them.

With regard to these "explosions"...  Japan sources have referenced this  to a hydrogen explosion, because of impacts of cooling process, after  it was begun.

Understanding it is simple... The source of the hydrogen is from the  disassociation of the water molecule - in the presence of the elevated  core temperatures.  Waters dissociation creates hydrogen and oxygen.  Some of the hydrogen may also be from the chemistry reaction - if they are using boric acid.  This process takes place in the reactor core.

In the containment vessel the water added also produces a spike in steam pressure inside the containment vessel.  Dumping off the excess pressure through controllable relief valves - will reduce pressure.   If vented inside the reactor building (which is normal) - It will allow a pocket of hydrogen and oxygen to be present inside the building.   Which has potential to be highly explosive.  It would not take much to set it off.  

I am not going to belabor the point about the disassociation of water under extreme temperature.  Folks can look it up. I have seen the demo's done at fire schools many times, that show the follow of using water to extinguish a molten metal fire (such as magnesium).  Water in that situation disassociated into hydrogen & oxygen, plus the rapid flashing into steam, scatters the fire mass and adds fuel and oxidizer.  Violent reaction !!!  Eye opening !!!!  Think holiday sparkler x 1 Million. 

The issue that will tell the tail for Japans ability to get past the current moment - Is the degree of reactor core damage sustained.   The more damage sustained, the harder it all is to manage.   Please remember TMI's lesson - only 8 minutes or so of cooling loss (at their normal power level) - set in motion a chain of events that took the best they had to manage choices from that point.

More comments:  About the EDG failures, and or plant bus failure (take your pick).  Losing 13 EDGs is unacceptable.  Even having only 3 or 4 EDG's on line would have kept minimum cooling systems in service. Loss of all suggest a common factor was involved.

About the "Station bus" that runs the nuclear plant..
Large Utility generator's generate voltages typically at 13 KV ( 13,000 volts) to 23 KV (23,000 Volts). This voltage is too high to drive plant equipment.   Most larger plant equipment (such as large motors for cooling pumps or feed pumps) - operate at 4160 Volts.  This is the typical station bus to run a plant.   Power generated from the main plant generators is usually passed to a distribution and switch gear yard.  There the voltage is stepped up for transmission  to the grid (which is typically 115 KV - 115,000 Volts or higher).  it is done through larger transformers.   The same main generator voltage - in the transmission yard also gets stepped down to a 4160 V station bus, which is sent back into the plant - to run the equipment.   

If the switch yard area became inundated by Tsunami waves -  It would trip main generators off line (through ground fault sensing & over current relays.  This action would also black out the step down transformers that generate the 4160 for the station bus.   

This kills power to the station equipment.   In such an event -  Breakers would open in the switchyard that also open the connection to this external bus.    The plants diesel generators are designed to come on line, during loss of the station bus, and automatically parallel to the station bus, and ensure the breaker to the external supplied 4160 is opened.    This situation immediately restores station power - even if the main generator is off line or the switchyard is dead.

These EDG's are designed start and pull full load in a very short period of time (seconds).   The engines are kept hot and fully ready to go.  It still remains so stressful to the engines (to go from stopped to full load) that the engine life is tracked by the number of times this process takes place.   Most are rated for a lifetime of 50 full load starts (before major maintenance is required).   A lot of engine wear takes place in such a rapid start and load conditions.

The EDG's restore full plant power - to all internal station bus functions.  Effectively the plant becomes an isolated generating island - supporting its own needs - even if the rest of the grid were black and the main generators were off line.  The breaker automation ensures that the EDG's align to the station bus, and the other switchyard source remains no longer connected.   

Why 13 EDG's failed ?  Good question.  The probability of that event is astronomical, under conventional design thinking.   One can only speculate the exact cause, until the details become public.  It will likely prove to be a common element involved for all units, and it is probably already known to the plant operator and Japanese authorities.   

The obvious choices could include - fuel related issues, or air intake issues.    Less obvious reasons could include differential ground fault protection that is commonly fitted on large generators (whether EDG or not).  Any contact with sea water on the electric side of those EDG's would take the EDG machines rapidly off line and trigger a shutdown due to ground fault.  Other Less obvious reasons could be that the controls which directly operated the EDG's (controls such as starting functions, safety functions, shutdown functions etc) were knocked out due to sea water.   Most of those controls would operate off battery back up power,  but typically the engine automatic start up and load acceptance  rely's on PLC or similar computer control logic.  If the EDG controls get taken down - NO EDG's run.  

Plant battery back up - is probably not sufficient to drive 4160 V 3 phase A/C motors, nor have the capacity to drive equivalent HP - DC motors.   The power consummed is too large for any battery bank.   The emergency batterys - might drive a few standby turbine lube oill pumps, or provide Plant control power for automation.  That is about the extent of it.  Batteries cant run cooling pumps for any period of time.    IF they could -  No loss of cooling would have taken place.

The Nuclear plant core support equipment rely upon either station buss (from external yard), or EDG power through an internal buss, and batteries are reserved for small LO pumps and controls.    LO pumps may be in the range of 15 to 30 HP.   Large cooling pumps are several thousand HP.  Its a 100 x order of magnitude difference.

Forensics will decode and map the failure chain - to explain why main and emergency cooling systems had no power available to run them.   What remains to be seen - is how well the current reactors can be kept cool and sub critical, even with some potential fuel core compromise.   If they can finesse that path - Japan will dodge a major nuclear disaster.   If they cant finesse that path, and fuel core damage continues to develop in spite of current available cooling -  Then Japan will have a major meltdown, breach of containment - and a large release of nuclear material.   It matters less what the fuel core is, It matters more on the resources they have that can continue to cool and moderate the reactions till the cores have cooled enough.   

This will be trial and error.  Control room metrics will define the process.   The level of damage inside the core - is what drives the show,  because at the heart of it - that's where the reaction takes place and where the heat comes from.    

At this point - The Japan operators would seem to be far enough into the process that they should have a good awareness that they are remaining able to keep core reactions moderated enough that no run awaycan take place.   

This should not be confused with the issue of smaller amounts of radiation released - by the containment pressure vessel venting that may have to be done along the way.  That is a needed step - If they want to be able to salvage the situation and prevent a runaway reaction and a full scale containment vessel breach.   Fretting over the small radioactive releases is like throwing the baby out with the bathwater.   People have to recognize the Japanese operators are working to prevent a large scale meltdown, because that's where their plant turns into scorched earth and a hot zone that cant be touched for quite some time.  Its also where all the dirty mid step radioactive isotopes, along with the heavier isotopes get scattered to the four winds and stain the landscape with fallout that has half lives that are measured in centuries or longer.    

This is the current picture they face and are solving.   Without knowing the many details - Yesterday I considered it a coin toss, whether a major melt down took place.  As time marches forward and their successes continue - probably for a good outcome (only minimal releases) weigh in on their sides.   They may well have another hydrogen explosion,  again - that is less sever than saving the fuel core from a large scale melt down.

----------


## Butterfly

> to prevent an occurrence of criticality


that's basically after a meltdown, isn't it ? when the tubes are melting into each other and there is no space between them and they start creating mass

----------


## steevee

> Originally Posted by Muadib
> 
> 
> ^ Is this really the time for your hatred of the US to manifest itself Bob? 
> 
> Besides, San Francisco, in case you don't know, is a Spanish name... Why you might ask? Because San Francisco was founded as a Spanish Mission, not a US outpost...
> 
> 
> Not intended as a hate statement. Litigation is inevitable every time a building collapses, and much like Katrina, people who responsibly bought insurance will use it, and people who irresponsibly did not buy insurance will expect the government to pay for their mistake.


People who responsibly purchased insurance will inevitably be fucked over by their insurance company who will try however possible to wriggle out of paying claims from natural disaster.

----------


## drawp

> Originally Posted by BobR
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Muadib
> ...


Have to agree with this; insurance companies aren't exactly the most honest, although the farther you get away from the US the more honest they do seem to get.. Let's just hope that the Japanese who need assistance actually get it.  

So far the Japanese government response seems to be a lot better than what happened in 2005 with Katrina.  It's also amazing at the support shown by all of the foreign governments.. guess it pays to have good diplomatic ties (wonder if Pakistan is rethinking their foreign policy now).

----------


## drawp

Scientific American has a good article explaining the worst case scenario at the Fukushima power plant

Nuclear Experts Explain Worst-Case Scenario at Fukushima Power Plant: Scientific American




> Nuclear Experts Explain Worst-Case Scenario at Fukushima Power Plant
> The type of accident occurring now in Japan derives from a loss of offsite AC power and then a subsequent failure of emergency power on site. Engineers there are racing to restore AC power to prevent a core meltdown.
> By Steve Mirsky  | March 12, 2011 | 46
> Share Email Print
> 
> The Japan Earthquake and Tsunami
> On March 11, a powerful, magnitude 8.9 quake hit northeastern Japan, triggering a tsunami with 10-meter-high waves that reached the U.S. west coast. Here's the science behind the disaster 
> 
> First came the earthquake, centered just off the east coast of Japan, near Honshu. The horror of the tsunami quickly followed. Now the world waits as emergency crews attempt to stop a core meltdown from occurring at the Fukushima Daichi nuclear reactor, already the site of an explosion of the reactor's housing structure.
> ...


the TLDR version:  


> Finally, Bergeron summed up the events so far: "Based on what we understand, the reactor has been shut down, in the sense that all of the control rods have been inserted. Which means there's no longer a nuclear reaction. But what you have to worry about is the decay heat that's still in the core, that will last for many days.

----------


## Butterfly

game over for Japan I suppose,

France, Germany, Switzerland Suggest Nationals in Tokyo Consider Leaving - Japan Real Time - WSJ

----------


## Muadib

> So far the Japanese government response seems to be a lot better than what happened in 2005 with Katrina.  It's also amazing at the support shown by all of the foreign governments.. guess it pays to have good diplomatic ties (wonder if Pakistan is rethinking their foreign policy now).


Yes, the US military responded to the Japanese disaster much faster than for the Katrina hurricane and flooding in New Orleans... US military were in the air from Osaka the same day as the tsunami... Odd, innit...

----------


## harrybarracuda

02:25GMT NHK reporting 3m Tsunami approaching the North East coast, due to hit in minutes; and 2nd explosion at Fukushima nuclear plant.

AFP: Japanese soldiers ordering residents to higher ground.

----------


## good2bhappy

yes pictures on NHK, no 3 reactor gone, another hydrogen explosion

----------


## harrybarracuda

NHK now reporting "No tsunami detected".

----------


## good2bhappy

downgrading Tsunami alert

----------


## Cujo

> downgrading Tsunami alert


For where?

----------


## StrontiumDog

Tokyo Electric Power Co. says 3 injured, 7 missing after explosion at Japan Fukushima nuclear plant 

Central control room of No.3 reactor remains intactb - Chief Cabinet Secretary Edano

----------


## StrontiumDog

VOA - Second Blast Rocks Japanese Nuclear Powerplant: Explosion at Fukushima plant occurred mid-morning Monday Second Blast Rocks Japanese Nuclear Powerplant | News | English

----------


## MakingALife

> Scientific American has a good article explaining the worst case scenario at the Fukushima power plant
> 
> Nuclear Experts Explain Worst-Case Scenario at Fukushima Power Plant: Scientific American
> 
> Bergeron summed up the events so far: "Based on what we understand, the reactor has been shut down, in the sense that all of the control rods have been inserted. Which means there's no longer a nuclear reaction. But what you have to worry about is the decay heat that's still in the core, that will last for many days.


[/quote]

The Scientific American article is an excellent reference for the current situation.  Thanks for posting it.  The article makes pretty clear another potential reaction source for hydrogen that originates from the reactor core.  The thermal disassociation of water takes place above 2500 C.   While fuel melting takes place around 1200 C.   At this point no one really knows the core temperature reached, and therefore one of several hydrogen producing mechanisms was active.

Their reference to plants surviving a "Station Black out" condition - with mechanisms built in that ensure control power and a restoration of some manor of station bus - as a pathway to restore station safety systems, and an eventual restart pathway.   This kind of design - is built into practically every power station, ocean vessel, hospital, or any enterprise that requires critical services.  

From my own ocean vessel and power plant experience -  This automatic reserve power functionality is tested and documented weekly.  Often with the sensing circuits for the EDG  allowed to see a "loss of power" simulation - to ensure they start automatically and are prepared to take load.  Obviously the Nuclear plants EDG's are tested a bit differently - so they dont have to endure the high stress of rapid starts and high loading in service.  

My perception from the ariel photos that  EDG's are located separately and distributed from the reactor.  This makes it unlikely that this equipment has any open avenue to supply power to the station, without going through the switch yard.   Most likely the switchyard was hit by sea water and badly damaged.

Reading between the lines of the SA article - it seems to imply that nuclear facilities remain without their internal station bus at this point.   That suggests the pathway to deliver station power is still compromised.

Large flat bed portable generators are capable of being wheeled up and patched in fairly quickly.  That scenario is not viable if the station bus continues to remain badly grounded at some external point.  

Obviously the steam turbine driven pumps are viable method to provide cooling water, and they are being utilized for best advantage.   They deserve kudos for having designed their nuclear plant to have this feature and to have the cross connects in place to supply sea cooling to the feed water system, in the event the kind of catastrophic loss, such as they are undergoing here.   

The decision to go to this cooling method represents a 
life cycle end point for any facility - so its a costly decision.  On balance it is considerably cheaper than facing the prospect of a major nuclear incident due to a full melt down and containment breach.   Hence their decision to execute the method on Unit 3, after observing Unit 1's behavior on loss of water level.  
It is well to recognize that these units were older and nearing life cycle end points.   

Facing the complexities of the inability of their plants to recover support functions - Safety and not economics drove their choice.   Dealing with Unit 1 - they probably delayed the decision for sea cooling, in hopes of being able to restore station services, and some time was wasted in trying to explore that restoration.    Plant operators probably watched the reactor telemetry with horror, while facility managers worked a strategy in play that resulted in the choice to supply sea cooling.   

Unit 3 activity took place later, most likely in part because the reactor may well have been holding water level better, despite potential pressure releases.   When the declining water level pointed to fuel core risks - They didnt wait to execute the proactive last resort strategy that seemed effective for unit 1.  Courageous difficult choices that all have consequences.

----------


## Stinky

2,000 bodies found on 
Japanese shores - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

2,000 bodies found on Japanese shores
Some 2,000 bodies have been found on two shores in Miyagi Prefecture following Friday's devastating earthquake and massive tsunami, as Japan struggles to grasp the whole picture of the disaster.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Video of second explosion today...

----------


## harrybarracuda

The operator says radiation levels at the No. 3 reactor are "within legal limits". That story's wearing a bit thin.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Quite an incredible image.

----------


## drawp

> The Pentagon was expected to announce that the aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan, which is sailing in the Pacific, passed through a radioactive cloud from stricken nuclear reactors in Japan, causing crew members on deck to receive a months worth of radiation in about an hour, government officials said Sunday.


http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/14/wo...a/14plume.html

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://english.aljazeera.net/news/as...314279315.html

Fresh blast at Japan nuclear plant                *  

                                                                     Reports of casualties as new explosion rocks quake-hit Fukushima plant,  sparking radioactive fears amid nuclear crisis.

                                                                            Last Modified: 14 Mar 2011 04:48 GMT                                               

 *
Tokyo Electric Power company said 11 workers are injured and seven are missing after the blast [GALLO/GETTY]* 

A new explosion rocked Japan's stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear  power  complex, sending a plume of smoke into the air and touching off  fresh  concerns of radioactive leak in Japan.

 After Monday's blast, Japan's nuclear safety agency said it could not   confirm whether or not the hydrogen explosion at the plant's No.3   reactor had led to an uncontrolled leak of radioactivity.

 Three reactors had already been in danger of overheating in Japanese   town of Fukushima which has caused huge amount of concern. But   authorities said that a large-scale radiation leak was unlikely.

 Japan's chief cabinet secretary said a hydrogen explosion occurred on   Monday at the facility's Unit 3, Associated Press news agency reported.   The blast was similar to an earlier one at a different unit at the   facility.

*Stock market plunges*

And the Japanese markets, which opened for the first time since the disaster occurred, reacted badly.

 Share prices dropped sharply by more than five per cent within the   first hour of trading on Monday. Moving quickly to try to keep financial   markets stable, the Bank of Japan said it will inject $85bn into the   money market to try to bring some stability.

 The humanitarian crisis is deepening too, with thousands of people   still missing as a result of Friday's 8.9 magnitude earthquake and   tsunami that are believed to have killed as many as thousands of people.

 Rescue workers on Monday found two thousand bodies in Miyagi province, one of the hardest hit regions.

 But foreign aid has began to arrive.  A US naval ship is being used  to  help send out supplies and an aircraft carrier is also on its way to   help.

 But millions remain without electricity, and there are growing fears   about the safety of the Fukushima nuclear plant where a state of   emergency is in force.

 All this leaves Japan facing its worst crisis since the second world war, according to the country's prime minister, Naoto Kan.

----------


## harrybarracuda

The Central Bank is injecting $180 Billion into the financial system to improve liquidity and help ensure people can borrow the money they need to rebuild.

----------


## Cujo

> SOMA, Japan — Rescue workers used chain  saws and hand picks Monday to dig out bodies in Japan's devastated  coastal towns, as Asia's richest nation faced a growing humanitarian,  nuclear and economic crisis in the aftermath of a massive earthquake and  tsunami.     
>       The death toll surged when some 2,000 bodies were found on two shores  in Miyagi Prefecture, the Kyodo News Agency reported on Monday.
>  About 1,000 bodies were found coming onshore on the Ojika Penninsula,  and other 1,000 were spotted in the town of Minamisanriku, where the  local government had been unable to locate about 10,000 people, or over  half the population, Kyodo said.
>  Millions of people spent a third night without water, food or heating  in near-freezing temperatures along the devastated northeastern coast.  Also, the containment building of a second nuclear reactor exploded  because of hydrogen buildup while the stock market plunged over the  likelihood of huge losses by Japanese industries including big names  such as Toyota and Honda. 
>  A reactor at                     the Fukushima Daiichi power plant exploded, Monday      . Japan's top government spokesman, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio  Edano, said the reactor's inner containment vessel was intact, but said  people within a 12-mile radius of the facility were ordered inside  following the blast. 
>  Edano said Tokyo Electric Power held off on imposing rolling  blackouts Monday, but called for all to try to limit electricity use.
>  He said that if necessary, the utility was prepared to go ahead with  the power rationing, which was supposed to begin Monday in eight  prefectures and cities, including parts of Tokyo. The decision to hold  off on the cuts reflected an understanding of the profound  inconveniences many would experience.
>    Many regional train lines were suspended or operating on a limited schedule Monday to help reduce the power load.
>  The planned blackouts of about three hours each were meant to help  make up for a severe shortfall after key nuclear plants were left  inoperable due to Friday's earthquake and tsunami.
> ...


Death toll surges in Japan quake aftermath - World news - Asia-Pacific - msnbc.com

----------


## misskit

What a nightmare.

----------


## Cujo

> Quite an incredible image.


That's something like 15KM out to sea as well I believe.
Looks like there's going to be a lot of rubbish in the ocean for a while.

----------


## Sailing into trouble

Just found out that a couple from Switzerland who spent a year on the North coast a year ago were in Northern japan. No contact. No difference from all the other victims but it brings it close to home. Could have been in transit, but unlikely this time of year.

The devastation seems even worse than Thailand in some ways, whole communities wiped off the map. Shit now just heard second reactor has blown. I'll never complain about 5 months of snow and ice again!

----------


## good2bhappy

problems with reactor no 2 being reported

----------


## harrybarracuda

Second Newsnow crawler opened specifically for Nuclear issues.

Quake:   Link
Nuclear: Link

----------


## Cujo



----------


## StrontiumDog

USGS: Aftershock of magnitude 6.1 felt in Sendai, northeastern Japan.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Not good news...




> While relief efforts continued Monday for survivors of the earthquake  and tsunami that devastated Japan's northeast, the country's  meteorological agency warned of the possibility of a 7.0 or higher  magnitude temblor in the coming days.
>   According to the agency, there is a 70 per cent chance of another  quake in the next three days and a 50 per cent chance of another hitting  three days after that because of high tectonic activity.

----------


## StrontiumDog

> problems with reactor no 2 being reported


Cooling function in reactor 2 at Fukushima has stopped. Water level dropping.

----------


## Jesus Jones

Also reports of  volcano erupting on Kyushu island.  Not yet clear if it's in connection with the earthquake.

----------


## HermantheGerman

(Reuters) - U.S. warships and planes helping Japan's  earthquake and tsunami relief efforts have moved away from the  country's Pacific coast temporarily because of low-level radiation from a  stricken nuclear power plant, the U.S. Navy said on Monday.
  The U.S. Seventh Fleet, in a statement, described the move as precautionary measure.




*Navy Says 17 Americans Were Treated for Contamination*
WASHINGTON — American Navy officials in Japan  said early Monday that 17 military personnel who had been aboard three  helicopters assisting in the earthquake relief effort had been exposed  to low levels of contamination.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Disaster in Japan: Live blog | Al Jazeera Blogs


A woman searches for her missing husband in Minami Sanriku, Miyagi [Photo: Reuters]

----------


## Cujo

> Disaster in Japan: Live blog | Al Jazeera Blogs
> 
> 
> A woman searches for her missing husband in Minami Sanriku, Miyagi [Photo: Reuters]


What a nightmare for these people.
Terrible.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://english.kyodonews.jp/news/201...medium=twitter
*
*Confusion from deadly quake spreading*

 TOKYO, March 14, Kyodo

 Confusion caused by the catastrophic  earthquake and massive tsunamis  spread in Japan on Monday, with a  quake-hit Fukushima nuclear power  plant seeing another hydrogen  explosion while train services in the  Kanto region surrounding Tokyo  were mostly paralyzed due to Tokyo  Electric Power Co.'s announcement it  was implementing power rationing.

 The number of those who have died or remain unaccounted for following   the magnitude 9.0 quake topped 4,500 after some 2,000 were found Monday   on two shores in Miyagi Prefecture, while police and firefighters   worked to recover another 200 to 300 bodies in Sendai, the capital of   Miyagi.

 Of the 2,000, about 1,000 were spotted in the town of Minamisanriku   where the prefectural government has been unable to contact about 10,000   people -- over half the local population.

 In Miyagi Prefecture alone, a total of 785 bodies had been recovered   as of noon Monday, the local police said, while the central government   continued to struggle to grasp the full extent of the disaster.

 In Otsuchi, Iwate Prefecture, the fate of some 8,000 residents remained unknown.

 About 450,000 people had evacuated by Sunday in Miyagi and five other   prefectures but water, food and fuel are in short supply in various   locations where they have taken refuge, prompting the government to   decide to airlift supplies by Self-Defense Forces helicopters.

 The Fire and Disaster Management Agency said the number of buildings   that were completely or partially destroyed reached 63,255 as of 3:30   p.m.

 On the Tokyo Stock Exchange, the Nikkei index closed at a four-month   low, while communication failures continued mainly in quake-hit Miyagi   and Iwate prefectures, with 561,000 phone lines and 221,400 fiber-optic   connections remaining out of service as of 6 a.m.

 Major automakers and department store chains decided to suspend their   operations. Among them, Toyota Motor Corp. will halt production at all   domestic plants through Wednesday, which will cut its production by   40,000 units, while Isetan Mitsukoshi Holdings Ltd. closed its seven   department stores in Tokyo and the vicinity.

 On the other hand, efforts to recover the unprecedented damage and to   secure the lives of surviving people were underway in various sectors.

 The Bank of Japan decided Monday to ease its monetary grip further by   expanding its asset buying fund to 40 trillion yen to help prevent the   quake from hindering an economic recovery, while Prime Minister Naoto   Kan said at a morning meeting of the government disaster headquarters   that emergency workers have so far rescued 15,000 survivors.

 Among foreign nationals staying in Japan, meanwhile, the first death   of a South Korean in the quake was confirmed by the South Korean Foreign   Ministry, while about 100 Chinese trainees in Ishinomaki, Miyagi, have   not been contacted.

 At the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, the hydrogen explosion   occurred Monday morning at its No. 3 reactor, prompting the Nuclear and   Industry Safety Agency to urge about 500 residents within a  20-kilometer  radius to take shelter inside buildings.

 While 11 people were injured in the explosion, the reactor's   containment vessel was not damaged, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano   told a press conference, ''We judge that the possibility of a large   amount of radioactive material being dispersed from there is low.''

 Some reactors at the plant have lost their cooling functions.

 ==Kyodo

----------


## StrontiumDog

Kyodo: No.1, No.2 reactors pull out of emergency: TEPCO

----------


## Bower

I am hearing on the news of a real shortage of food, water,energy and accomadation. Do we need an army of thousands of the worlds press there ?
There must be agency's that can keep all the news networks up to date. The UK tv stations alone must have over 100 staff in Japan giving constant  live reports from their own presenters/reporters.

----------


## StrontiumDog

6:07pm        

  Al Jazeera's Harry Fawcett, reporting from the town of  Rikuzentakata, says that at least 18,000 people are currently  unaccounted for in the area.

----------


## misskit

> I am hearing on the news of a real shortage of food, water,energy and accomadation.


When there were announcements by foreign governments that their citizens leave, I didn't think it was a bad idea at all. Same for the press.

If resources are short, people should get out of there if they can to make life easier for those who have no choice but to stay.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Tests detect radioactivity on 17 U.S. Navy crew members in Japan Tests detect radioactivity on 17 U.S. Navy crew members in Japan - CNN.com

----------


## Takeovers

> If resources are short, people should get out of there if they can to make life easier for those who have no choice but to stay.


Severe shortages would be in those areas most hit by the earthquake and tsunami. Not many of the journalists are there. Many reports we see are from foreigners who were living in the areas. 

Getting out may be as difficult as getting supplies in there. Those who can probably are leaving.

----------


## misskit

> Severe shortages would be in those areas most hit by the earthquake and tsunami.


They are rationing electricity in Tokyo and other areas of the Kanto Plain until April. Some residential areas of Tokyo are without water service. I just think less people could help.

There was a lot of farmland destroyed also. I wonder how big of a problem it will be in the coming months.

----------


## Moonraker

The bodies will begin decaying soon if they are not already. I suspect there could well be a few health issues as well.

----------


## Chairman Mao

> There was a lot of farmland destroyed also. I wonder how big of a problem it will be in the coming months.


Probably not that much. By all appearances, in a few months they'll be growing carrots the size of a bus.  :Smile: 

(sorry)

----------


## robuzo

At Asahi site: 燃料棒全体が露出- Fuel rods (at No. 2) completely exposed; and why? 注入に使うポンプの燃料が切れていた。Pump ran out of fuel How did that happen? What's next?

----------


## Loy Toy

> At Asahi site: 燃料棒全体が露出- Fuel rods completely exposed; and why? 注入に使うポンプの燃料が切れていた。Pump ran out of fuel How did that happen? What's next?


Obviously their 50 person purchasing officer meeting table got washed away in the tsunami and nobody could make a decision to order the fuel on their own.

That's the one thing that pisses me off with regard to the Japanese. Not one person can make a decision on his/ her own.

----------


## StrontiumDog

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             

            Japanese officials say the nuclear fuel rods appear to be melting inside all three of the most troubled nuclearreactors - AP

BBCWorld   BBC Global News                                             

       Fuel rods at the number two reactor at the Fukushima #nuclear plant in #Japan are 'fully exposed' again, from AFP

----------


## Thetyim

^
Links not working for me

----------


## Muadib

The Japanese are truly looking like a bunch of monkeys fucking footballs with the way they are handling this nuclear crisis... FFS, the one thing that must be prevented at all cause is to expose the core... Once, ok, put it down to unpreparedness, but 2 other reactors in the same facility with the same issue?

----------


## Loy Toy

^ I just watched a British Nuclear scientist say that he believes the Japanese probably have no real idea what's gong on but he also claimed that if the containment unit stays in tack we will not have another Chernobyl.

Whilst it is still very serious there is still hope that a radioactive cloud will not cover neighbouring countries.

----------


## Gerbil

Not surprising.

Their record on Nuclear safety is pretty bad, e.g:


Tokaimura nuclear accident

On 30 September 1999, three workers were preparing a small batch of fuel for the Jōyō experimental fast breeder reactor, using uranium enriched to 18.8% U-235. It was JCO's first batch of fuel for that reactor in three years, and no proper qualification and training requirements appear to have been established to prepare those workers for the job. At around 10:35, when the volume of solution in the precipitation tank reached about 40 litres, containing about 16 kg U, a critical mass was reached.

Criticality

When criticality was reached, the nuclear fission chain reaction became self-sustaining and began to emit intense gamma and neutron radiation, triggering alarms. There was no explosion, though fission products were progressively released inside the building. The significance of it being a wet process was that the water in the solution provided neutron moderation, expediting the reaction. (Most fuel preparation plants use dry processes).

The criticality continued intermittently for about 20 hours. As the solution boiled vigorously, voids formed and criticality ceased, but as it cooled and voids disappeared, the reaction resumed. The reaction was stopped when cooling water surrounding the precipitation tank was drained away, since this water provided a neutron reflector. Boric acid solution (neutron absorber) was finally added to the tank to ensure that the contents remained subcritical. These operations exposed 27 workers to radioactivity.

The direct cause of the criticality accident was workers putting uranyl nitrate solution containing about 16.6 kg of uranium, which exceeded the critical mass, into a precipitation tank. The tank was not designed to hold this type of solution and was not configured to prevent eventual criticality.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Another incredible tsunami video ...

----------


## StrontiumDog

> ^
> Links not working for me


Sorry mate, no links on these, just Tweets.

----------


## StrontiumDog

BBCBreaking   BBC Breaking News                                                                

#Japan officials say radiation may already have been released at Fukushima #nuclear plant BBC News - LIVE: Japan earthquake

----------


## StrontiumDog

Another tsunami video, this one showing the incredible speed of the surge

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://www.nationaljournal.com/energ...ctors-20110314
*
*Japanese Officials: Nuclear Fuel Rods Melting in 3 Reactors
* 
*Outlook grim following two explosions*

                                                       By  Katy O'Donnell
* 
Monday, March 14, 2011 | 12:18 p.m.                            * 

                                                                                   Japanese officials confirmed Monday that  nuclear fuel rods  appear to be melting inside three reactors compromised  by Friday’s  earthquake, though nuclear experts differ on whether the  outer chamber  of a reactor melting in fact constitutes a partial  “meltdown.”

 Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Monday that "although we cannot directly check it, it's highly likely happening."

 Unit 3 of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station in northeastern   Japan exploded earlier Monday, wounding 11 workers; it had been under   emergency watch for an explosion after a hydrogen blast at Unit 1 of the   plant on Saturday. Edano said the Unit 3 reactor’s inner containment   vessel was intact.

 More than 180,000 people have been evacuated from the area, and as many  as 1,500 have been examined for radiation, according to _USA Today_.

----------


## chitown

This whole thing is tragic. Some of the footage makes me ill. I just saw an aol video called - Wall of Water Slams Japanese Town. Absolutely sheer madness - cars, boats and trucks tossed about like they weigh nothing.  :Sad: 

http://news.yahoo.com/video/world-15...-town-24518186

----------


## Moonraker

> This whole thing is tragic. Some of the footage makes me ill. I just saw an aol video called - Wall of Water Slams Japanese Town. Absolutely sheer madness - cars, boats and trucks tossed about like they weigh nothing. 
> 
> Wall of Water Slams Japanese Town


I've seen a tsunami with my own eyes, I was lucky to get out of Phuket alive.

When watching the images on TV afterwards, you could tell that the camera just didn't do it justice. The videos we are seeing are catching only a fraction of the horror of actually being there.

Poor bastards.

----------


## SteveCM

Meanwhile on Wall Street.....

----------


## ItsRobsLife

Kesennuma.

----------


## Poo and Pee

*Whoah!! Big aftershock in Tokyo just now!!*

----------


## HermantheGerman

Israel recalls diplomats' families from Japan, says no connection to nuclear fears

Smart Jews !

----------


## blue

Apart from the wall street ,the  sickliest  scum are the western  journalists there , trying to stand in the most  dramatic place ,pointing out someones  personal belongings in the in the rubble , and then making with flowery language and cheap   metaphors and similes.
or filming queues of  disorientated people like they are objects 
I'd love it if one if the Japanese people picked up something nice and heavy and split open the journalists head .

----------


## Muadib

On the tele now, explosion at the Fukushima Daiichi #2 reactor just took place...

----------


## Butterfly

WSJ: New Blast Reported at Damaged Plant
Japan's unfolding nuclear-power crisis deepened, with reports that an explosion has been heard inside the No. 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex.

----------


## Jesus Jones

> Apart from the wall street ,the  sickliest  scum are the western  journalists there , trying to stand in the most  dramatic place ,pointing out someones  personal belongings in the in the rubble , and then making with flowery language and cheap   metaphors and similes.
> or filming queues of  disorientated people like they are objects 
> I'd love it if one if the Japanese people picked up something nice and heavy and split open the journalists head .


While i agree, the real sickos are the majority of the public that demand it.

----------


## bobo746

got to feel sorry for them

----------


## misskit

^If you don't feel sorry for them, you are not human.

----------


## bobo746

*New explosion at Japanese nuclear reactor as battle to stop meltdown goes on
* 
An explosion has been heard at No. 2 reactor at the Japanese nuclear  facility where scientists are battling to prevent a fuel rod meltdown  after two earlier explosions at neighbouring reactors.
              A spokesman for Japan's nuclear safety agency, speaking  on national television, said the  explosion was heard at 6.10am (8.10am  AEDT) today.

Following the explosion, the Deputy Cabinet Secretary of Public  Relations Noriyuki Shikata said on Twitter that while radiation levels  has risen around No.2, "the level is not judged to be immediately  harmful to the human bodies".
              Radiation levels in the air surrounding the  power plant  have risen four-fold after a fresh explosion at reactor No.2, the plant  operator said.
              The radiation reading at 08.31am local time climbed to  8217 microsieverts an hour from 1941 about 40 minutes earlier, Tokyo  Electric Power Company (TEPCO) said.

----------


## bobo746

*Small miracles amid the carnage*

*                             Despite a rapidly rising death toll and  worsening nuclear emergencies, Japan's stoic population have been  delighted by a precious few survival stories. John Garnaut  reports.                        *  
             INSIDE the unlit lobby of the Shin Tomi Tei Hotel, on a  safe hill above the once beautiful cove of Matsushima, holidaymakers  huddle around, waiting  for the latest news.
              ''There are no trains and no mobile reception because  there is no electricity,'' an emergency worker tells the crowd. ''And we  just don't know how long it will be until they can turn it on again.''
              The stranded hotel guests, consisting mainly of the  elderly, nod their heads respectfully, ask important questions and  receive detailed and respectful answers.

Everywhere, Japan's stoic resilience and its tightly woven community fabric are on display.
              Outside the hotel  a line of people wait  patiently, as perhaps only Japanese people can.
              ''We heard there was water here,'' says Makota Seki,  holding a bag of empty water bottles with his daughter.

----------


## socal

> Meanwhile on Wall Street.....


I owned this uranium stock a few months ago and I sold way early. Its about where I sold it now.

*Strathmore Minerals Corp.* 

(Public, TSE:STM)   Watch this stock 
Find more results for* STM* 




STM0.810-28.95%

All the uranium stocks on my watch list are down over 20%

----------


## socal

looks like she is in need of a white night in shining amour to pick her up.

----------


## koman

> I'd love it if one if the Japanese people picked up something nice and heavy and split open the journalists head .


The other journalists would tape that, and it would become the new "breaking news"  (no pun intended)

----------


## StrontiumDog

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             

            Officials: Latest blast at Fukushima plant may havedamaged reactor container, fear radiation leak - AP

----------


## Cujo

Don't post those ridiculous tweets, they are shallow and meaningless.

----------


## mobs00

^ I haver to agree. Tweets are usually at best gossip. It just adds to the overall confusion of whats actually going on.

I think you're doing a good job SD but if I find a tweet I think is newsworthy I try to find an actual article from a reputable source and post that instead.

----------


## misskit

TEPCO: 8,200 microsieverts recorded at plant
Tokyo Electric Power Company says radiation levels reached 8,217 microsieverts per hour near the front gate of the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power station at 8:31 AM Tuesday.

Anyone in this kind of environment would be exposed to more than 3 years' worth of naturally occurring radiation within a single hour.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 09:29 +0900 (JST)

NHK

----------


## Muadib

Japan prime minister says high risk radiation has leaked from Fukushima plant, urges calm 



It has just turned from bad to worse...

----------


## Butterfly

it's clear that they are having a meltdown but keep denying it

like Technorbyl,

it has been raining a lot here in Bangkok, I wonder if the radiation cloud made it that far yet

don't expect asian governments to be open about it or disclose that information to their population

----------


## The Gentleman Scamp

What should be do, buy lots of iodene and not go outside?

Nothing we can do, we want to live here so we'll have to breathe whatever's coming.

Might be a good idea to avoid rain but then again, who doesn't?

----------


## KAPPA

Iodine will only protect the thyroid from certain isotopes.  I understand cesium is being expelled, too. Nothing to do about that. 
I agree about the tweets... too much info, please  just verifiable news w links 

 Guardian has very good coverage on a minute to minute basis

----------


## socal

> Japan prime minister says high risk radiation has leaked from Fukushima plant, urges calm 
> 
> 
> 
> It has just turned from bad to worse...


that is not a new link

----------


## socal

> What should be do, buy lots of iodene and not go outside?
> 
> Nothing we can do, we want to live here so we'll have to breathe whatever's coming.
> 
> Might be a good idea to avoid rain but then again, who doesn't?


so you guys are all worried and you are in BKK ?

you are not nuclear experts..... doubt you have a clue what you are talking about

----------


## Butterfly

tweets are still good though as the mainstream media might hide certain info or are not willing to take risk to report certain things

so far the tweets have been correct, so why not use them ? in good measure of course,

----------


## misskit

Explosion heard at Fukushima No2. reactor
Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says an explosion was heard early Tuesday morning at the No.2 reactor of the disaster-hit Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant.

Agency officials told reporters that the blast was heard at 6:10 AM local time on Tuesday.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano earlier told a news conference that a reactor facility, called the suppression pool, has been damaged.

But agency officials said they have no detailed information yet about the report.

They said that depending on where the damage is done, either liquid or air could leak out of the suppression pool.

The suppression pool is linked to the reactor containment vessel and is designed to prevent radioactive material from leaking outside.

Experts say a breach to this crucial facility has raised the possibility of a radioactive leak.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency also said that nuclear fuel rods inside the No.2 reactor are exposed above water by about 2.7 meters. That's about half the length of the fuel rods.

Agency officials said that radiation levels around the nuclear power plant reached 965.5 microsieverts following the explosive sound.

They say the figure later dropped slightly to 882 microsieverts.

The officials said they believe the rise in radiation level is due to the breach in the suppression pool, but that they cannot say for sure. They said they are monitoring the situation closely.

The officials added that the monitored level of radiation would not immediately pose a health threat.

Tokyo Electric Power Company that operates the power station briefly evacuated workers from the facility following the sound of the blast.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 09:26 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English

----------


## drawp

> it's clear that they are having a meltdown but keep denying it
> 
> like Technorbyl,
> 
> it has been raining a lot here in Bangkok, I wonder if the radiation cloud made it that far yet
> 
> don't expect asian governments to be open about it or disclose that information to their population


 :smiley laughing:  you realize that all the jet stream is pushing it towards the west coast of the US right?  it'd have to travel pretty much around the world before it reaches Thailand, and by that time it would have dissipated..

----------


## KAPPA

"..fuel rods inside the No.2 reactor are exposed above water by about 2.7 meters. "


That is critical is it not, unbelievably critical ?





> so far the tweets have been correct, so why not use them ? in good measure of course.



Good point, I'm corrected.  (in good measure of course)

----------


## BobR

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> 
> it's clear that they are having a meltdown but keep denying it
> 
> like Technorbyl,
> 
> it has been raining a lot here in Bangkok, I wonder if the radiation cloud made it that far yet
> 
> ...


The reactors which are melting down were made and installed by General Electric (source: New York Times) so the radiation is just coming home.

----------


## KAPPA

^ And one could add by way of one of  another  consumeristic, exploiting, polluting nation. 
Is there KosmiK Karma 

OK we have  recent plate movement in the Carribean, South America, west Pacific  and south Indian oceans. About time for north America's plate to start releasing pressure ? Anyone for San Fran finally getting the big one. Or super volcano  in Yellowstone? That land has been rising steadily  over last decades indicating an eruption imminent.

----------


## Butterfly

it takes a few days for a reactor to cool off when power is on

apparently they have no power, so it's going to go in critical mass and meltdown,

Japan worst case scenario is happening,

----------


## socal

People don't want to be effected by this so i understand but.....

The US and Russian armies tested nuclear weapons in the air, in their own countries that equal more then any of these plants worst case scenario.  This bomb was equal to all the explosives in ww2 combined x 10.

----------


## Cujo

> SOMA, Japan — Radiation is spewing from  damaged reactors at a crippled nuclear power plant in tsunami-ravaged  northeastern Japan in a dramatic escalation of the 4-day-old  catastrophe. The prime minister has warned residents to stay inside or  risk getting radiation sickness.     Radiation is  spewing from damaged reactors at a crippled nuclear power plant in  tsunami-ravaged northeastern Japan in a dramatic escalation of the  4-day-old catastrophe. The prime minister has warned residents to stay  inside or risk getting radiation sickness. 
>  Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Tuesday that a fourth  reactor at the Fukushima Dai-ichi complex was on fire and that more  radiation was released.
>  Prime Minister Naoto Kan warned that there are dangers of more leaks  and told people living within 19 miles (30 kilometers) of the Fukushima  Dai-ichi complex stay indoors. 
>  A third explosion in four days rocked the earthquake-damaged plant early Tuesday.
>  Two sources told NBC News' Robert Bazell that the blast breached the containment structure and that radiation had leaked out.
>  The agency said the explosion may have damaged the reactor's  suppression chamber, a water-filled tube at the bottom of the container  that surrounds the nuclear core, said agency spokesman, Shinji Kinjo. He  said that chamber is part of the container wall.
>  The suppression chamber is used to turn steam back into water to cool  the reactor and also plays a role in removing radioactive particles  from the steam.
>  Radiation levels measured at the front gate of the Dai-ichi plant spiked following Tuesday's explosion, Kinjo said.
>  Detectors showed 11,900 microsieverts of radiation three hours after  the blast, up from just 73 microsieverts beforehand, Kinjo said. He said  there was no immediate health risk because the higher measurement was  less radiation that a person receives from an X-ray. He said experts  would worry about health risks if levels exceed 100,000 microsieverts.
> ...


Japan PM: Radiation leaking from damaged plant - World news - Asia-Pacific - msnbc.com

----------


## Gerbil

Four reactors fucked now???

----------


## Thormaturge

> OK we have  recent plate movement in the Carribean, South America, west Pacific  and south Indian oceans. About time for north America's plate to start releasing pressure ? Anyone for San Fran finally getting the big one. Or super volcano  in Yellowstone? That land has been rising steadily  over last decades indicating an eruption imminent.


I made this point on FB earlier today.  Take a look at this map and try to figure out where the next major movement is overdue.....





Magnitude 8 and Greater Earthquakes Since 1900

----------


## Muadib

Japanese stocks in free-fall amid nuclear fears; Nikkei Average down 12.5%


HONG KONG (MarketWatch) — Japanese equities plunged again Tuesday on a  massive selloff after Prime Minister Naoto Kan said a “substantial  amount” of radiation was leaking from a nuclear power plant affected by  Friday’s massive earthquake and tsunami.   								

The Nikkei is down 13% on the news... 

DIJA futures are off -255 at the time of this post... Been dropping since the NY close...

----------


## Muadib

> Originally Posted by Muadib
> 
> 
> Japan prime minister says high risk radiation has leaked from Fukushima plant, urges calm 
> 
> 
> 
> It has just turned from bad to worse...
> 
> ...


Really, show me another link to MarketWatch - Stock Market Quotes, Business News, Financial News on this thread...

----------


## mobs00

> Use this animation to model the jet stream for the coming days. If there is radio active mater in the atmosphere it will definitely be heading towards the west coast of the US.
> 
> Animation of Northern Hemisphere Jet Stream Analyses


Thought this is good for a re-post.

----------


## Muadib

Air China cancels flights to Tokyo: reports - MarketWatch

HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- China's national carrier Air China Ltd.   said Tuesday it would cancel flights to Tokyo from the  mainland cities of Beijing and Shanghai, according to newswire reports  that cited a statement on the airline's Website. Small amounts of  radiation from the stricken Fukushima Daiichi No.2 nuclear were detected  in Tokyo early afternoon on Tuesday, according to Japanese press  reports.

----------


## mobs00

> Here are the trade winds.



So would the cloud (if any) travel on the jet stream or the trade winds?

Anyone know?

----------


## Gerbil

^ Relatively heavy particles, so dont think they would rise into the jet stream

----------


## robuzo

According to Asahi, Americans, presumably Navy, are fighting the fire at No. 4. This begs a few questions. asahi.com (In Japanese)
For starters, is it because of a manpower shortage? Or do the US nuke techs/firefighters have some expertise that should have been exploited from the start?

----------


## mobs00

*Winds over stricken nuke plant blowing towards Tokyo*

Winds over stricken nuke plant blowing towards Tokyo | Reuters

By Junko Fujita
TOKYO | Tue Mar 15, 2011 3:26am GMT


(Reuters) - Winds over an earthquake-stricken nuclear power plant in Japan are blowing slowly in a southwesterly direction that includes Tokyo but will shift westerly later on Tuesday, a weather official said.

(click link for more)

----------


## mobs00

East Asian Monsoon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia




> The East Asian monsoon is a monsoonal flow that carries moist air from the Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean to East Asia. It affects approximately one-third of the global population, influencing the climate of Japan, the Koreas, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, and much of mainland China. It is driven by temperature differences between the Asian continent and the Pacific Ocean. The East Asian monsoon is divided into a warm and wet summer monsoon and a cold and dry winter monsoon. This cold and dry winter monsoon is responsible for the aeolian dust deposition and pedogenesis that resulted in the creation of the Loess Plateau.
> 
> In most years, the monsoonal flow shifts in a very predictable pattern, with winds being southwesterly in late June, bringing significant rainfall to the Korean peninsula and Japan. This leads to a reliable precipitation spike in July and August. However, this pattern occasionally fails, leading to drought and crop failure. In the winter, the winds are northeasterly and the monsoonal precipitation bands move back to the south, and intense precipitation occurs over southern China and Taiwan.

----------


## mobs00

Radiation prediction map from speigel.de

http://www.spiegel.de/images/image-1...eryV9-nhjp.gif

----------


## mobs00

Japan wind model forecast.

Japan Wind Forecast Chart | SURFLINE.COM

----------


## mobs00

For what it's worth.....




> Radiation Network
> 
> Welcome to RadiationNetwork.com, home of the National Radiation Map, depicting environmental radiation levels across the USA, updated in real time every 3 minutes.  This is the first web site where the average citizen (or anyone in the world) can see what radiation levels are anywhere in the USA at any time (see Disclaimer below).
> 
> Disclaimer: Mineralab, LLC, the operator of this web site, can not independently verify that the Radiation Levels, or any Radiation Alerts, that are displayed on this Radiation Map are correct and valid.  Among other possibilities, Geiger counter malfunctions or proximity of the counters to certain medical procedures or to radioactive items can cause high readings at a Monitoring Station.  If the Radiation Map appears to show elevated Radiation levels, contact Mineralab.

----------


## good2bhappy

It makes you wonder whether the public is having the wool pulled over its eyes

----------


## mobs00

Effects of radiation.






> For context, 1,000 microsieverts make one millisievert; (10 millisieverts equals 1 rem). The Nuclear Regulatory Commission recommends workers in the nuclear field limit radiation exposure to 10 millisieverts per year.

----------


## mobs00

*Spent Fuel Pool Threatened by New Fire at Fukushima Daichi Unit 4, Radiation Exceeds Healthy Levels*

Spent Fuel Pool Threatened by New Fire at Fukushima Daichi Unit 4, Radiation Exceeds Healthy Levels - Nuclear Power Industry News - Nuclear Power Industry News - Nuclear Street - Nuclear Power Portal

Nuclear Street News Team Tue, Mar 15 2011 12:38 AM

A fourth unit at the Fukushima Daichi Nuclear Power Plant now threatens to release radiation into the atmosphere, with officials reporting a fire near a spent fuel tank.

Although unit 4 was down for a routine inspection during Friday's magnitude 9 earthquake, backup power outages at the plant left its spent fuel tank without water circulation to remove decay heat. In a press conference, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said the spent fuel may have heated up enough to release hydrogen and start a fire.

The spent fuel stored at unit 3 is now a concern, as well. Naoto said a blast in the building housing that reactor left its spent fuel tank without a cover. Those spent fuel rods also were without a functioning cooling system, he said, and steam has been visible above the reactor building.

Since September, Unit 3 has used MOX fuel, a blend of spent uranium and plutonium sometimes produced by anti-proliferation programs. While the blending leaves makes the plutonium incapable of achieving the super-criticality required for a nuclear explosion, it also creates fuel with a lower melting point and greater toxicity.

(click link for more)

----------


## Looper

BBC News - How the quake has moved Japan

It says here that since Japan is now 4m to the right of where it was last week that GPS navigation systems will no longer be accurate and will need recalibrated.

----------


## misskit

People in 20-30km radius ordered to stay indoor
The government has newly ordered residents living within a 20 to 30 kilometer radius of the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant to stay indoors.

The previously-issued evacuation order for an area within 20 kilometers of the plant remains unchanged.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 11:35 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English

----------


## StrontiumDog

Higher than normal radiation detected in Tokyo —city gov’t Higher than normal radiation detected in Tokyo city govt - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos

----------


## robuzo

^Thanks for the wind charts, mobs. Looks really grim. Supposed to rain in Tokyo tonight.

----------


## StrontiumDog

#Japan’s benchmark Nikkei index slumps more than 14 per cent as radiation fears rise. Japan in crisis: Live blog | Al Jazeera Blogs

GRIEVING JAPAN Japanese suggested to stay indoors following radiation leak... http://fb.me/TISs7wB7

Thailand to test Japanese food imports for radiation #euters http://t.co/KpzLkE4

REUTERSFLASH: Japan atomic power says quake-hit Tokai Daini nuclear plant has safely cooled down.

----------


## misskit

PM Kan urges those remaining near plants to leave

Prime Minister Naoto Kan has urged all residents to evacuate from within 20 kilometers of the disaster-stricken Fukushima No.1 nuclear power station. He told people living within 20 to 30 kilometers to stay indoors.

NHK WORLD English

----------


## mobs00

By Channel NewsAsia, Updated: 14/03/2011

*S’pore unlikely to be affected by nuclear radiation: experts*





> SINGAPORE: It would take conditions like a complete meltdown of Japan’s reactors and a continuous fire for a radioactive cloud to reach Singapore, said nuclear experts to ease concerns about Singapore being affected by a radioactive fallout.
> 
> Singapore’s National Environment Agency had said on Sunday that the country is unlikely to be affected, as the incident is taking place some 5,000 kilometres away.

----------


## Butterfly

> Thanks for the wind charts, mobs. Looks really grim. Supposed to rain in Tokyo tonight.


black rain ?

----------


## socal

This is getting overblown.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Beware the Ides of March!

----------


## mobs00

*Nuke plant blasts raise radiation threat*

Nuke plant blasts raise radiation threat - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)




> The Japanese government says radiation levels near a quake-stricken nuclear power plant are now harmful to human health, after a further two explosions and a fire at the facility.
> 
> "There is no doubt that unlike in the past, the figures are the level at which human health can be affected," said chief government spokesman Yukio Edano.
> 
> He says radiation levels at the nuclear plant have reached as high as 400 milisieverts an hour, thousands of times higher than readings taken before the latest blasts.
> 
> Mr Edano says radiation levels as at 10.22am (local time) were 30 millisieverts between the No. 2 and the No. 3 reactors, 400 millisieverts near No. 3 and 100 millisieverts near No. 4.

----------


## StrontiumDog

^ Meltdown at Fukushima No. 2 reactor can't be ruled out; radiation 400 millisievert, 400x annual legal limit  Container damaged, radiation leak feared at Fukushima No. 2 reactor | The Japan Times Online [at]japantimes

----------


## misskit

All Fukushima No.2 plant reactors safely halted

The operation of all 4 reactors at the quake-stricken Fukushima No.2 nuclear power plant has been brought to a halt.

Tokyo Electric Power Company says the 4th reactor at the No.2 plant was safely brought to a stop at around 7:00 AM on Tuesday. It also says the reactor's temperature dropped below 100 degrees Celsius after its cooling function was restored. The reactor's cooling system was damaged in Friday's massive earthquake and ensuing tsunami.

The operation of the other 3 reactors at the Fukushima No.2 plant was earlier suspended. Two of the reactors were unable to cool down for some time due to tsunami damage.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 11:58 +0900 

NHK WORLD English

----------


## mobs00

> This is getting overblown.


 Your professional observations are noted..... :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## Poo and Pee

> ^Thanks for the wind charts, mobs. Looks really grim. Supposed to rain in Tokyo tonight.


hmmm ....... i have remained calm ever since the quake on friday, but i am now beginning to have some serious concerns. 

i have contacted my embassy and the red cross to offer my services as a volunteer, but with all of the reports on radiation, i am thinking the most sensible thing to do is to book a ticket to thailand asap.

the quakes and aftershocks are part of daily life here, and although 'the big one' was never predicted to happen in the sendai region, the japanese have been prepared for this for years. the situation with the nuclear plants is a diferent story - and like i said, it may be wisest to head for the airport..

----------


## harrybarracuda

StrontiumDog, I keep seeing post #5:




> It was the longest one I have ever felt- in 17 years!


Fnar Fnar. Snik Snik.


Anyway, back to the subject:




> SOMA, Japan  Anxious neighbors of a stricken nuclear plant accused  the government Tuesday of hiding the truth about possible radiation  risks, compounding the misery of a devastating earthquake and tsunami.
>                  "I don't think they are telling us the truth. Maybe  even they don't know," said Toshiaki Kiuchi, a 63-year-old innkeeper  whose business was flooded waist-deep by Friday's tsunami.
>                  Soma lies 30 miles (50 kilometers) north of the  crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Plant on Japan's northeastern coast,  where the quake and tsunami knocked out power, crippling cooling  systems. A series of explosions in the plant's generating units have  raised fears of radiation leaks.
>                  The disaster has fueled fallout fears in Japan, which  relies heavily on nuclear power but whose public is especially  sensitive to radiation due to the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and  Nagasaki.
>                  "We are really afraid, as if we didn't already have  enough to worry about. You can't see fallout so we are totally relying  on them for our lives," said Shinako Tachiya, 70. A lifelong resident of  Soma, she was cleaning up her lightly damaged house on high ground  overlooking the ravaged town.
>                  The tsunami swept houses off their foundations and  carpeted shores with the debris of shattered buildings, wrecked cars and  boats.
>                  The town lies 12 miles 20 (kilometers) outside the  evacuation zone the government threw up Tuesday around the Fukushima  plant but residents worry they could be threatened by further nuclear  problems.
>                  "I used to believe the nuclear power officials, but  not now. I think they are not being open with us. They aren't telling us  anything," said Tachiya.
>                  Kiuchi said: "The only information we get is what we  see on TV or hear on the radio. They don't tell us anything about our  safety, just technical jargon and warnings to stay out of the official  evacuation zone.
> ...


and




> *PanARMENIAN.Net* -  High levels of *radiation*  leaked from a crippled nuclear plant in tsunami-ravaged northeastern  Japan after a third reactor was rocked by an explosion Tuesday, March  15, and a fourth caught fire in a dramatic escalation of the 4-day-old  catastrophe. The government warned 140,000 people nearby to stay indoors  to avoid exposure.
>   Tokyo also reported slightly elevated  radiation levels, but officials said the increase was too small to  threaten the 39 million people in and around the capital, about 170  miles (270 kilometers) away.
>   In a nationally televised  statement, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said radiation has spread from four  reactors of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Fukushima state, one  of the hardest-hit in Friday's 9.0-magnitude earthquake and the ensuing  tsunami that has killed more than 10,000 people, plunged millions into  misery and pummeled the world's third-largest economy.
>   Officials  just south of Fukushima reported up to 100 times the normal levels of  radiation Tuesday morning, Kyodo News agency reported. While those  figures are worrying if there is prolonged exposure, they are far from  fatal.
>   Kan and other officials warned there is danger of more  leaks and told people living within 19 miles (30 kilometers) of the  Fukushima Dai-ichi complex to stay indoors to avoid exposure that could  make people sick.
>   "Please do not go outside. Please stay  indoors. Please close windows and make your homes airtight," Chief  Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told residents in the danger zone. "Don't  turn on ventilators. Please hang your laundry indoors."
>   "These are figures that potentially affect health. There is no mistake about that," he said, The Associated Press reports.

----------


## superman

After watching William Tucker being interviewed on BBC News this morning, I'd say that there were a lot of scaremongers spreading doom. Explanation Of A Nuclear Reactor Meltdown - Misunderstood Finance

----------


## mobs00

If anyone is in Japan without access to iodine Miso soup and seaweed may help.

Working Alchemy: The Miracle of Miso




> Miso and Radiation Sickness 
> 
> Thanks to nuclear accidents and leakage worldwide, we may be exposed to ionizing radiation as well. In the decades since the first atomic bombings, scientists have confirmed that miso (as well as sea vegetables) help protect the body from radiation by binding and discharging radioactive elements. Two weeks after the Chernobyl nuclear accident, all miso and seaweed disappeared from European store shelves. 
> 
> At the time of the world's first plutonium atomic bombing, on August 9, 1945, two hospitals were literally in the shadow of the blast, about one mile from the epicenter in Nagasaki. American scientists declared the area totally uninhabitable for 75 years. At University Hospital 3000 patients suffered greatly from leukemia and disfiguring radiation burns. This hospital served its patients a modern fare of sugar, white rice, and refined white flour products. Another hospital was St. Francis Hospital, under the direction of Shinichiro Akizuki, M.D. Although this hospital was located even closer to the blast's epicenter than the first, none of the workers or patients suffered from radiation sickness. Dr. Akizuki had been feeding his patients and workers brown rice, miso soup, vegetables and seaweed every day

----------


## harrybarracuda

It's only me, but I wonder if Californians are starting to think about this, San Andreas fault and all.....

Nuclear Energy in California

----------


## mobs00

> After watching William Tucker being interviewed on BBC News this morning, I'd say that there were a lot of scaremongers spreading doom. Explanation Of A Nuclear Reactor Meltdown - Misunderstood Finance


_What say you now superman?_

Japan Earthquake Update (15 March 2011, 06:15 CET) | Facebook

Japan Earthquake Update (15 March 2011, 06:15 CET)
by *International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)* on Tuesday, March 15, 2011 at 1:01pm


Japanese authorities informed the IAEA that there has been an explosion at the Unit 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. The explosion occurred at around 06:20 on 15 March local Japan time.

*Japanese authorities also today informed the IAEA at 04:50 CET that the spent fuel storage pond at the Unit 4 reactor of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant is on fire and radioactivity is being released directly into the atmosphere.*

Dose rates of up to 400 millisievert per hour have been reported at the site. The Japanese authorities are saying that there is a possibility that the fire was caused by a hydrogen explosion.

The IAEA is seeking further information on these developments. The IAEA continues to liaise with the Japanese authorities and is monitoring the situation as it evolves.

----------


## Butterfly

WSJ: Nuclear Crisis Feeds Regulation Doubts
As Japanese officials grapple with a growing crisis at a nuclear power plant, they also face a perception issue: that the nation has a weak nuclear regulatory system.

----------


## Cujo

That's a hell of a picture. Where did the top of that reactor building go?

----------


## harrybarracuda

> If anyone is in Japan without access to iodine Miso soup and seaweed may help.


You'd best tell the Aussies.




> Doctors warn on seaweed's iodine danger
> 
> Posted Sun Oct 3, 2010 1:51pm AEDT
> 
> The Australian Medical Association is warning consumers that products containing seaweed may have dangerously high levels of iodine.
> 
> Too much iodine in a diet can cause damage to the thyroid, leading to overactivity in the gland in adults, and an underactive thyroid in affected babies.


Can't bloody win, can you?

----------


## harrybarracuda

> That's a hell of a picture. Where did the top of that reactor building go?


Up in the air, if it's this one.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> *Nuclear expert concerned evacuation zone too small*
> 
>  Updated 11 minutes ago
> *Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan has warned of danger,  following four explosions at the plant since Friday's earthquake and  tsunami.*
>  The authorities say radiation levels are now high enough to affect  human health and people within 30km of the facility have been urged to  remain indoors.
>  Stephanie Cooke, who is also the editor of the publication _Nuclear Intelligence_, says that is probably not wide enough.
> *She says she is also concerned about reports that workers who have  been taking care of the cooling operation are evacuating the site.*


I think everyone should be concerned if that turns out to be true.

----------


## BobR

> After watching William Tucker being interviewed on BBC News this morning, I'd say that there were a lot of scaremongers spreading doom. Explanation Of A Nuclear Reactor Meltdown - Misunderstood Finance


I hope you are right.  Yes, it's quite predictable the anti-nuclear people will use this for everything they can get out of it,  but at this point it's also difficult to tell what is happening.

----------


## MakingALife

> it takes a few days for a reactor to cool off when power is on
> 
> apparently they have no power, so it's going to go in critical mass and meltdown,
> 
> Japan worst case scenario is happening,


Butterfly, I quoted you above, to add some commentary to your perception....  I don't watch TV, and havent looked at this site or net news since yesterday,  but now am very concerned and shocked to see more cascading developments.  

Particularly Core 2 with partial or perhaps full fuel rod exposed out of water, and experiencing (3) low water core events overnight and then a different style hydrogen explosion, combined with much much higher radiation releases, and un detailed statements that point to damage to the toroidal containment portion located below the reactor.

I want to address your comments about why cooling in the present moment appears to be taking much longer than a conventional power down process. To understand the current deviation in cooling time, one has to understand the interruption of the steam cycle and how it impacts the process.

Water as it boils, takes out a tremendous amount of heat (for the phase change - liquid to vapor).   Its about 550 times more energy than just changing the water temp 1 degree.  With a functioning steam cycle (that is to say - with steam allowed to be removed and either run through a turbine, or dumped to a condenser) - A large heat flow can be removed with this process.    But to make that work - you need raw water cooling pumps that cool the condenser in service.    That takes a lot of electric power, and it appears they have not restored their power supply to a station bus to be able to run those pumps.  It may well be that those pumps were totally submerged from the Tsunami, and are out of service till the motors are cleaned up.  I dont know the details, but obviously they cant restore this portion of they plant cycle as of yet.   Those condenser cooling pumps are called raw water pumps in conventional steam plants, and secondary cooling pumps in nuclear plants.  These particular pumps appear out of service, due to power loss issues.

So effectively they are experiencing a pretty large interruption of their steam cycle.  This means they can only try to hold water level's in the reactors and vent steam when pressures are high.   This process does not remove a lot of energy.    On balance, One has to recognize that reactor control rods are all inserted which ramps down the larger scale fission reaction, reducing significantly heat generation.  But with a working steam cycle process reactor cool down is faster and more efficient, because boil off is allowed to take place, and steam is dumped to the condenser.   

In the current moment, without a significantly working steam cycle available to them,  the cannot take out the heat by the normal process, of consuming steam or dumping it to a condenser.   

Sure they are running a few steam turbine driven pumps,  but the amount of steam usage is fairly small.   That small amount  steam flow into the large plant condenser is probably inconsequential.  If those turbines pumps presently in use, are operating off steam from untroubled reactor cores (which I believe is the case) - It contributes nothing to manageable heat removal from the troubled cores. 

Its not likely that they are running steam output from reactor cores boiling of sea water,  through their pump  turbines.  The "carry over" and potential "priming" of mineralization in such a case would impact those turbines, producing a lot of damage and potential rotating imbalances due to deposition of the mineral carryover.  The level of carry over potential in that contaminated steam, also would run a high probability of ripping out gaskets in the steam lines as well.   This happens fast with carry over conditions, I have seen it first hand.

The plant operators probably have little option but to try and hold water levels in the troubled reactor vessel, and vent pressure.   This removes less heat than moving water / steam through the core.  At this point it also matters little whether the cores contain freshwater (high quality feed water) or sea water -  Water is needed to cool the fuel rods.   

The issue of water level maintenance in the reactor vessels is a significant one.   For many reasons.  It is exactly why the problems continue to develop / cascade... 

How can water be allowed to drop below normal ??  With steam turbines now feeding sea water to trouble reactors ???   The issue revolves around the pump's themselves, the pressure they can generate, and the pressure they have to pump against.  

The pumps currently in use - have to be what is equivalent to "boiler feed pumps"in a conventional steam cycle.   In nuclear jargon the are sometimes called primary cooling or circulators.    They have to be able to pump at a pressure that is 200 to 300 PSI higher than what is contained inside the reactor - In order to move water into the vessel.   This part of the reactor cooling  cycle should not be confused with the secondary cooling, which is raw sea water that cools the condenser. 

For the sake of argument, lets say the reactors operate around 900 to 1000 PSI,  Feed pumps have to push 1200 to 1400 psi to get water into reactor.     When the reactor vessels pressure climbs (because of residual heat release, and because of some impacts from core damage) -  The pressure inside the reactor vessel is allowed to develop to a maximum safe level (and eventually a controlled venting is needed for the safety of the reactor pressure vessel).  

Typically for BWR - this upper pressure limit is around  2200 psi (if my memory is correct ).  Controlled vent releases - do release radiation, so they are avoided as much as possible.    It is well to understand that the ability of the feed pumps to drive water into the reactor falls off, when the pressure in the vessel is very high.     

This inability to get water flow in - contributes to a drop in water level.   That drop in water level - allows for some core exposure and significantly higher localized fuel temperatures to manifest themselves.   Its where more core damage takes place.  

Venting of excessive pressure (done for the safety of the pressure vessel itself) - has other consequences, besides the radiation release.... 

The relatively rapid pressure reduction (during venting operation) will cause a short term transient rise in the water level.  The term is called "Swell"in conventional boilers.  It is because the tiny steam bubbles in the water rapidly expand, artificially raising the water level.  The water level will drop again, as the venting is stopped and higher pressures return.   When pressure builds up again, the water level will be at a lower level than before - because some steam has been lost due to the venting.   This can be offset, provided that the water volume being pumped into the reactor can exceed the venting loss, and that the pumps are capable of exceeding the present reactor pressure.  

It should also be noted that pressure build up in the reactor causes a lowering of water level by "Shirk" which is due to collapse in the volume held by the steam bubbles in the hot water.  It is exactly the opposite to "Swell"    Shrink and swell over this range in of reactor core pressures is easily a 12 to 14 inches.   It should be clear that water levels in the core are in the range of exposing fuel - that pressure and level oscillations will be taking place, as part of the venting cycle in play.

It is a catch 22 kind of event.  The longer fuel is exposed without water the hotter it becomes.  When water levels are raised (either by the Swell phenomenon, during venting), or by pumping capability,  as the water hits the hotter portions of the fuel mass -  Significant steam is produces and significant pressure spiking takes place.   This results in the need to do more controlled releases...   Which can cause lower water to result.     

Its a balancing act.  To get stability in place.   Stability meaning to keep the fuel core covered and manage the venting process, and hold the water level after venting by having pumping pressure and capacity to exceed ambient reactor vessel conditions.

One has to look ahead as well - to the source of their steam that drives these turbine pumps.   It it is coming from "non impacted" reactors, and is serving their cooling management - eventually that steam pressure will drop down.  That reduces turbine RPM on the functioning pumps and limits their water discharge pressure.   So over time, as their good steam source reduces -  The operators will see a reduction in their capacity to manage water levels in the nuclear cores in trouble and which have undergone some melt down.

I read in brief - that Unit 2 problems resulted when a sensor was accidently turned off, which impacted the ability to pump water into Unit 2.   Buy the time that was determined / corrected - Fuel rods in 2 were either full or partially out of the water.   When the sensor issue was corrected and water reintroduced into Unit 2's reactor core.   It responded with the same high pressures developed and needs to vent.  Unit 2 went from being stably managed to become in trouble similar to its sister cores.   This resulted in venting, and repeated low water events, and an eventual explosion.

The different style of explosion that took place at Unit 2 to me is suggestive of a different hydrogen explosion mechanism taking place.    It was not an upper building hydrogen induced explosion, similar to the other two before it....    To this explosion event is suggestive of a internal reactor vessel explosion - and hence the reported damage to the toroidal ring below the reactor.    This would point to the thermal dissociation event that took place with the water as it hit very high fuel rod temperatures.   This disassociation would produce hydrogen and oxygen inside the reactor vessel - in sufficient quantity and mixture to allow a contained explosion.    The pressure resulting is likely significantly higher than the steam pressure events released by venting.  Hence the damage to the toroidal ring.  

Butterfly,  this chain of events related to Unit 2 is speculation on my part - but it is based on a reflection of the description of the amount of fuel rod exposure that took place during their "self induced" interruption of water feed to Unit 2 (by mistakenly powering down a sensor used by the system).    It is probably likely that Unit 2's water level had probably become lower than either Unit 1 or 3.   This open volume of area - and core temps developed , once hit with water again is ripe for the thermal disassociation event.  The available open volume would hold sufficient hydrogen and oxygen to become rapidly explosive.      This is not a low probability event, considering what happened to Unit 2 over night.   Information trickles out slowly, and for sure only general trends are revealed, not a blow by blow description of the issues at hand. 

The details of exactly how Japan is managing their attempts to hold water levels have not been made clear.   They are working a gray area, where steam reserves, feed pumping capacities, core damage present and its deteriorating cascade.   

What has become obvious is that their resources to manage water levels (or any alternative they can devise) must be sustainable beyond core heat generation / removal.   Without a full steam cycle - they are hampered badly.  With what appears to be an eventual decay in available steam pressure as their sources cool - they are likewise going to be limited in their ability to hold water levels in troubled cores.

The overall prognosis of avoiding a significant containment breach are deteriorating.  If a large scale breach take place -  It is likely their area will become unsafe for operators...  So they need to turn the corner here, or they risk eventual multiple reactor containment breaches.... 

I hope I have made is a little more clear, why cooling is taking much longer now, and the future risks that have to be managed out in time.    Into the future, that small detail - of accidental powering down a Unit 2 sensor  that caused Unit 2 core exposure... Is going to be viewed as a major mistake, with major consequence.

Thanks for bearing with my speculation about the different mechanism that produced unit 2's different type of explosion.   I just received an e mail, from my twin (from half way around the world)..  He has formed the very same conclusion I have made that thermal disassociation will be established as the event that precipitated Unit 2's different explosion event.

----------


## socal

> Originally Posted by socal
> 
> 
> This is getting overblown.
> 
> 
>  Your professional observations are noted.....


Thats the point. 

None of us are nuclear experts.

Look at all the nuclear bomb testing that went on during the 60s and 70s.

----------


## harrybarracuda

And the French think it's being understated.




> PARIS (Reuters) — France's ASN nuclear safety  authority said on Monday the nuclear accident in Japan could be classed  as level 5 or 6 on the international scale of 1 to 7, on a par with the  1979 Three Mile Island meltdown.
> The severity  estimate, based on ASN's assessment of data provided by Japan, is above  the rating of 4 that Japan's nuclear safety agency has given the  accident at Tokyo Electric Power Co's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power  plant.
> 	  	 	 	 	 		 	 	 	 		"Level four is a serious level," ASN President  Andre-Claude Lacoste told a news conference, but added: "We feel that we  are at least at level five or even at level six."
> Cooling  functions at the plant were damaged by Friday's massive earthquake and  tsunami that killed at least 10,000 people, forcing the operator to pump  sea water into the No.1, No.2 and No.3 reactors to reduce heat.
> The other three reactors at the plant were not in operation at the time of the quake due to scheduled maintenance.
> Japan's  Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency has given a rating of 4 to the  incidents at the No.1 and No.3 reactors, while it has not rated the  accident at the No. 2 reactor, where fuel rods were fully exposed after  water levels fell sharply.
> Tokyo Electric,  Japan's largest electric utility, on Tuesday opened valves on the No.2  reactor's pressure vessel and resumed supplying water into the unit.
> France,  the world's most nuclear-dependent country, has 58 nuclear reactors  that provide almost four-fifths of the country's power, but Lacoste said  it was extremely difficult to conceive of a similar disaster occurring  in France.
> The ASN's assessment of the accident in Japan also used information from foreign colleagues and "informal sources."
> ...

----------


## misskit

Edano: radiation high enough to affect health
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano says the level of radiation around the quake-damaged Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant is high enough to affect human health.

Edano told reporters on Tuesday morning that 400 millisieverts of radiation per hour had been detected around the plant's No.3 reactor building at 10:22 AM.

He cited reports claiming that it is highly likely the containment vessel at the No.2 reactor building had been damaged. He added that the No.1, No.2 and No.3 reactors are all releasing hazardous radioactive material.

The figure 400 millisieverts, or 400,000 microsieverts, is 4 times higher than the acceptable level of radiation for humans. Such levels could lead to a loss of white blood cells.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 15:02 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English

----------


## harrybarracuda

Even the Taiwanese are getting skittish, and you have to wonder about the two bits I've highlighted below! Doh!




> Taipei - Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou on Tuesday ordered  safety  checks on the island's three nuclear installations, following   explosions at power plants in Japan after last week's quake and   tsunami.  
>   The authorities should 'seriously consider' what  course of action  it would take in the event of a 'similar incident' in  Taiwan, he said  during a visit to the Atomic Energy Council (AEC).  
>    'There are many unpredictable factors, so we should make the best   preparation but be ready to face the worst-case scenario,' he said.  
>    Ma also ordered the AEC to improve the anti-disaster measures of  a  fourth nuclear power plant under construction, but dismissed calls  by  opposition lawmakers to halt the project, scheduled to go into   operation in 2012.  
>   Both the AEC and the plants' operator insist the three current  nuclear power plants are safe.  
>    'Our nuclear power plants were designed according to US standards  and  were built on solid rocks,' Hsu Ming-teh, an nuclear expert at  the AEC,  told the German Press Agency dpa.  
>   'T*hey are designed to  withstand a magnitude-6 earthquake*, and can  stand a 10-metre tsunami as  they are 12 to 15 metres above the sea  level,' he added.  
>   The  explosions at Japan's Fukushima nuclear power station in the   north-east of the country followed a power outage caused by the   tsunami, which damaged the cooling system.  
>   'If we have a power  outage, we can use diesel generators to  provide power, or use the  water stored in the open-air water tank at  each plant. Using river  water or sea water is the last resort,' Hsu  said.  
> ...

----------


## harrybarracuda

> He cited reports claiming that it is highly likely the containment  vessel at the No.2 reactor building had been damaged. He added that the  No.1, No.2 and No.3 reactors are all releasing hazardous radioactive  material.


Oh dear oh dear.

----------


## misskit

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Radiation levels shot up in Tokyo and its vicinity Tuesday following the nuclear accident at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant in northeastern Japan that was triggered by last week's massive earthquake and subsequent tsunami, local governments said.

But those levels did not pose immediate danger to human health, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology said.

In Tokyo, small amounts of radioactive substances, such as iodine and cesium, were detected, the metropolitan government said.

In Ibaraki Prefecture, adjacent to Fukushima Prefecture where the troubled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant is located, the amount of radiation at one stage reached 5 microsievert per hour, 100 times higher than usual, the Ibaraki prefectural government said.

In Kanagawa Prefecture, the radiation level shot up 10 times higher than usual.

In Saitama, capital of Saitama Prefecture, the amount of radiation reached 1,222 nanosievert per hour -- a figure about 40 times higher than usual.

In Ichihara, Chiba Prefecture, the amount of radiation showed a two- to four-fold increase, the Chiba prefectural government said.

The amount of radiation rose to 1.318 micro sievert per hour -- a figure 33 times bigger than usual -- in Tochigi Prefecture's capital of Utsunomiya, the Tochigi prefectural government said.

The science ministry said it had asked prefectural governments to observe radiation levels as frequently as possible.

Meanwhile, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said the radiation level reached 400 millisievert per hour near the No. 3 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 plant Tuesday morning. The amount is 400 times higher than the allowable limit for citizens in a year.

On Monday, the radiation level near the No. 3 reactor peaked at 3,130 microsievert or about 3 millisievert per hour.

Steam containing radioactive substances was released from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant as part of efforts to reduce pressures within the reactor container there.

Northerly winds brought radioactive substances from Fukushima Prefecture to Tokyo and its vicinity, nuclear experts said.

(Mainichi Japan) March 15, 2011

----------


## socal

> It's only me, but I wonder if Californians are starting to think about this, San Andreas fault and all.....
> 
> Nuclear Energy in California


where was everyone in the 60s and 70s when they where dropping this shit everywhere ?

I think this is slightly over blown, either that or these old bombs where safe.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Not exactly residential areas, are they? Well, not then, anyway.

----------


## misskit

> where was everyone in the 60s and 70s when they where dropping this shit everywhere ?


An American photographer named Richard Avedon took photos of people who live in Nevada around the time of those tests. I can't find any online to show you. It wasn't pretty.

----------


## socal

> Not exactly residential areas, are they? Well, not then, anyway.


what about the wind ?

I am not saying that this is not serious, not saying that at all. But I am just saying, I don't think people in BKK have anything to worry about.

----------


## socal

> Originally Posted by socal
> 
> where was everyone in the 60s and 70s when they where dropping this shit everywhere ?
> 
> 
> An American photographer named Richard Avedon took photos of people who live in Nevada around the time of those tests. I can't find any online to show you. It wasn't pretty.


i know, i seen some of that too.

but the bombs they where lighting off there are worse then this.

----------


## Ratchaburi

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> 
> It's only me, but I wonder if Californians are starting to think about this, San Andreas fault and all.....
> 
> Nuclear Energy in California
> 
> 
> where was everyone in the 60s and 70s when they where dropping this shit everywhere ?
> ...


 
Fuck me they bombed Christmas Island in the Pasific & now its in the Indian Ocean :smiley laughing:  :smiley laughing:

----------


## harrybarracuda

Socal I'm even further away than you are, I'm not concerned for myself, but the people in the firing line.

This is one of the Chernobyl firefighters.

----------


## MakingALife

This thread and information are moving very fast.  Now learning that Unit 4's fuel pool is boiling, and has gassed off enough to cause a hydrogen fire in the building.... 

It suggests that resources open to the Japanese are to scare, and their technical abilities to proactively manage a forward thinking view of potential complications is missing from the picture.  

At this point, I believe its going to require a deeper thinking international consortium to divide and conquer multiple issues and steer solutions in place.  It appears beyond the capability of the utility or Japan's NRC equivalent.   

Sadly this Unit 4 development casts a very negative perception for me about the level of management in place.

----------


## mobs00

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> 
> Not exactly residential areas, are they? Well, not then, anyway.
> 
> 
> what about the wind ?
> 
> I am not saying that this is not serious, not saying that at all. But I am just saying, I don't think people in BKK have anything to worry about.


Depends. The jet stream flows across the pacific. Closer to ground level the trade winds take it across China and SE Asia.

----------


## harrybarracuda

> At this point, I believe its going to require a deeper thinking  international consortium to divide and conquer multiple issues and steer  solutions in place.  It appears beyond the capability of the utility or  Japan's NRC equivalent.


As you say that, America is sending another four or more specialists to assist, in addition to the two already there, but they aren't expected to arrive until tomorrow.

----------


## mobs00

*Dr. Jeff Masters' WunderBlog*

Wunder Blog : Weather Underground



Posted by: JeffMasters, 12:53 PM GMT on March 14, 2011
Radiation from Japan's stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has been detected 100 miles to the northeast, over the Pacific Ocean, by the U.S. military. Westerly to southwesterly winds have predominated over Japan the past few days, carrying most of the radiation eastwards out to sea. The latest forecast for Sendai, Japan, located about 40 miles north of the Fukushima nuclear plant, calls for winds with a westerly component to dominate for the remainder of the week, with the exception of a 6-hour period on Tuesday. Thus, any radiation released by the nuclear plant will primarily affect Japan or blow out to sea. A good tool to predict the radiation cloud's path is NOAA's HYSPLIT trajectory model. The model uses the GFS model's winds to track the movement of a hypothetical release of a substance into the atmosphere. One can specify the altitude of the release as well as the location, and follow the trajectory for up to two weeks. However, given the highly chaotic nature of the atmosphere's winds, trajectories beyond about 3 days have huge uncertainties.One can get only a general idea of where a plume is headed beyond 3 days. I've been performing a number of runs of HYSPLIT over past few days, and so far great majority of these runs have taken plumes of radioactivity emitted from Japan's east coast eastwards over the Pacific, with the plumes staying over water for at least 5 days. Some of the plumes move over eastern Siberia, Alaska, Canada, the U.S., and Mexico in 5 - 7 days. Such a long time spent over water will mean that the vast majority of the radioactive particles will settle out of the atmosphere or get caught up in precipitation and rained out. It is highly unlikely that any radiation capable of causing harm to people will be left in atmosphere after seven days and 2000+ miles of travel distance. Even the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, which had a far more serious release of radioactivity, was unable to spread significant contamination more than about 1000 miles.


Figure 1. Forecast 7-day movement of a plume of radioactive plume of air emitted at 12 UTC Saturday, March 12, 2011 from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Radioactivity emitted at 2 levels is tracked: 100 meters (red) and 300 meters (blue). Images created using NOAA's HYSPLIT trajectory model.



Figure 2. Forecast 7-day movement of a plume of radioactive plume of air emitted at 12 UTC Sunday, March 13, 2011 from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Radioactivity emitted at 2 levels is tracked: 100 meters (red) and 300 meters (blue). Images created using NOAA's HYSPLIT trajectory model.



Figure 3. Forecast 7-day movement of a plume of radioactive plume of air emitted at 12 UTC Monday, March 14, 2011 from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Radioactivity emitted at 2 levels is tracked: 100 meters (red) and 300 meters (blue). Images created using NOAA's HYSPLIT trajectory model.

I'll have an update Tuesday morning.

Jeff Masters

----------


## StrontiumDog

BBCBreaking #Japan tells #nuclear watchdog, of fire at #Fukushima plant & that radioactivity is being released directly into atmosphere

----------


## StrontiumDog

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             

            Radiation levels rise in Russian city of  Vladivostok, 500 miles northwest of Japanese nuclear plant, but stay  within normal levels - Reuters

----------


## StrontiumDog

channel4news   C4 Newsroom blogger                                             

#Japan: explosion at 3rd reactor and fire overnight at #Fukushima. Authorities warn radiation nearby high enough to hit human health

----------


## misskit

Fire at No.4 reactor put down
Tokyo Electric Power Company says the fire has been extinguished at the No.4 reactor at the quake-hit nuclear power plant in Fukushima prefecture.

Company officials said that the fire had started at 9:38 AM local time on Tuesday near the northwestern part of the 4th floor of the building that houses the reactor at the Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant.

The officials said before the fire, an explosion was heard and that an area near the roof of that building was found to have been damaged.

TEPCO is confirming reports that the temperature of the pool which contains spent nuclear fuel had risen from its usual 40 degrees Celsius to 84 degrees.

A company official says a hydrogen explosion is thought to have occurred at the No.4 reactor, but details including its relation to the fire are unknown.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters shortly after 11:00 AM on Tuesday that a fire had broken out at the No.4 reactor.

He said the reactor has not been operating after the earthquake, but hydrogen is being produced because spent fuel creates its own heat.

He said so it can be inferred that a hydrogen explosion similar to those that took place at the No. 1 and 3 reactors occurred.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 13:48 +0900 (JST

NHK

----------


## StrontiumDog

So, radiation now leaking directly into the atmosphere, levels rising hundreds of miles away....human health now being affected. 

This goes from bad to worse.

----------


## StrontiumDog

IAEA press release

*Japanese Earthquake Update (15 March 06:15 CET)*

  15 March 2011

Japanese authorities informed the IAEA that there has been an  explosion  at the Unit 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. The  explosion  occurred at around 06:20 on 15 March local Japan time.

 Japanese authorities also today informed the IAEA at 04:50 CET that   the spent fuel storage pond at the Unit 4 reactor of the Fukushima   Daiichi nuclear power plant is on fire and radioactivity is being   released directly into the atmosphere.

 Dose rates of up to 400 millisievert per hour have been reported at   the site. Japanese authorities are saying that there is a possibility   that the fire was caused by a hydrogen explosion.

 The IAEA is seeking further information on these developments.

 The IAEA continues to liaise with the Japanese authorities and is monitoring the situation as it evolves.

----------


## MakingALife

Great stuff mobs00

It is well for folks to consider to consider fall out pathways, given the current development trend for Japan's crisis.  Your forecaster is quick to cite and impact zone limit of perhaps 1000 miles, based on atomic particle weights, precipitation levels etc.  

I think he fails to recognize that the level of contamination release could be higher that the Chrenyoble - if the Japan site ends up abandoned because of radiation levels, eventually allowing multiple large scale melt downs to take place.  Korea / China, and those in the mid range wind belts will suffer the highest potential impact from a continued cascading group of Japan reactor failures.

----------


## StrontiumDog

TimeOutTokyo   TimeOutTokyo        

Edano is live: 'The radiation level at the plant gate 9am was 11,930 micro sieverts, but dropped to 496.4 by 3pm.'

To sum up Edano's 4.30pm press conference (March 15): At number 1 & 3  reactors, water supply is stable. 

At number 2, water is being supplied.  

At the plant front gate, as of 3.30pm, a level of 596.4 micro sieverts  was measured, a level harmless to humans. 

The fire is out at reactor 4.  For reactors 5 & 6, they are taking preventative measures.

----------


## koman

> Even the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, which had a far more serious release of radioactivity, was unable to spread significant contamination more than about 1000 miles.


In Chernobyl, the container ruptured, the core melted down and then followed up with a massive graphite fire which poured huge amounts of highly radio active matter into the atmosphere.  (The housing contained about 100 metric tons of graphite)   The prevaling winds distributed the fallout over a very wide and populated area.   There was of course the standard Soviet denials for quite some time before the rest of us got to know what was really happening.  There is no real comparison with the current situation.

Most experts seem to believe that even with a worst case scenario the high radiation levels will be fairly localized and will drop quite quickly after the initial spikes.  There will be a some radiation blown across the pacific but the distances are so great that it will become harmless by the time it reaches any other landmass.   I think it's Ok not to rush out and stock up on NBC suits and Iodine pills just yet.   China is scheduled to fire up another 40 reactors by 2015 and they don't seem to have blinked over this "inconvenience" while all the Western leaders are making suitable anti-nuclear speeches and promising to inspect everything and beef up security etc.  China may increase the allocation of fire buckets at each reactor site;  one has to keep up appearances.

----------


## koman

> Even the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, which had a far more serious release of radioactivity, was unable to spread significant contamination more than about 1000 miles.


In Chernobyl, the container ruptured, the core melted down and then followed up with a massive graphite fire which poured huge amounts of highly radio active matter into the atmosphere.  (The housing contained about 100 metric tons of graphite)   The prevaling winds distributed the fallout over a very wide and populated area.   There was of course the standard Soviet denials for quite some time before the rest of us got to know what was really happening.  There is no real comparison with the current situation.

Most experts seem to believe that even with a worst case scenario the high radiation levels will be fairly localized and will drop quite quickly after the initial spikes.  There will be a some radiation blown across the pacific but the distances are so great that it will become harmless by the time it reaches any other landmass.   I think it's Ok not to rush out and stock up on NBC suits and Iodine pills just yet.   China is scheduled to fire up another 40 reactors by 2015 and they don't seem to have blinked over this "inconvenience" while all the Western leaders are making suitable anti-nuclear speeches and promising to inspect everything and beef up security etc.  China may increase the allocation of fire buckets at each reactor site;  one has to keep up appearances.

----------


## socal

> Great stuff mobs00
> 
> It is well for folks to consider to consider fall out pathways, given the current development trend for Japan's crisis.  Your forecaster is quick to cite and impact zone limit of perhaps 1000 miles, based on atomic particle weights, precipitation levels etc.  
> 
> I think he fails to recognize that the level of contamination release could be higher that the Chrenyoble - if the Japan site ends up abandoned because of radiation levels, eventually allowing multiple large scale melt downs to take place.  Korea / China, and those in the mid range wind belts will suffer the highest potential impact from a continued cascading group of Japan reactor failures.


Its impossible for this to get anywhere close to Chrenyoble. i was listening to a radio show about it an hour ago.

But I still figure it is safe to put on a huge short position, which i just did.

----------


## Mid

> Effects of radiation.


https://addons.mozilla.org/en-us/fir.../rehost-image/  :Smile:

----------


## BobR

> Originally Posted by mobs00
> 
>  Even the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, which had a far more serious release of radioactivity, was unable to spread significant contamination more than about 1000 miles.
> 
> 
> In Chernobyl, the container ruptured, the core melted down and then followed up with a massive graphite fire which poured huge amounts of highly radio active matter into the atmosphere.  (The housing contained about 100 metric tons of graphite)   The prevaling winds distributed the fallout over a very wide and populated area.   There was of course the standard Soviet denials for quite some time before the rest of us got to know what was really happening.  There is no real comparison with the current situation.
> 
> Most experts seem to believe that even with a worst case scenario the high radiation levels will be fairly localized and will drop quite quickly after the initial spikes.  There will be a some radiation blown across the pacific but the distances are so great that it will become harmless by the time it reaches any other landmass.   I think it's Ok not to rush out and stock up on NBC suits and Iodine pills just yet.   China is scheduled to fire up another 40 reactors by 2015 and they don't seem to have blinked over this "inconvenience" while all the Western leaders are making suitable anti-nuclear speeches and promising to inspect everything and beef up security etc.  China may increase the allocation of fire buckets at each reactor site;  one has to keep up appearances.


And that is just one of the many reasons why China has grown the way it has and will soon be the dominant Country on Earth.   Abandoning nuclear power just because of this rare event is just another example of politicians pandering to idiots. Everything comes with a price, and risk is part of life.

----------


## Sabai Prai

Where's Godzilla when you really need him?

----------


## harrybarracuda

> And that is just one of the many reasons why China has grown the way it has and will soon be the dominant Country on Earth.


Nothing to do with an endless supply of cheap slave labour and a complete lack of any useful environmental legislation then? Yes, I can imagine the build quality of Chinese nuclear reactors, no thank you.

On a side note, I'm not sure if this has been posted, but I found it quite fascinating.

----------


## Sabai Prai

> And that is just one of the many reasons why China has grown the way it has and will soon be the dominant Country on Earth. Abandoning nuclear power just because of this rare event is just another example of politicians pandering to idiots. Everything comes with a price, and risk is part of life.


And what gives the right to politicians to gamble with other peoples lives?

----------


## Sabai Prai

> In Chernobyl, the container ruptured, the core melted down and then  followed up with a massive graphite fire which poured huge amounts of  highly radio active matter into the atmosphere.


That's why you should never buy a pair of Russian underpants. Chernobyl fallout.

----------


## harrybarracuda

They found a 70-year old lady alive after four days. Her entire house was swept away intact in Itawe prefecture.

----------


## Bower

What is the status of the Chernobyl reactor now, is it burning its way through the earths crust ?

What is happening to the cooling water the Japanese are using, is it in a loop or is it being pumped back into the sea ?

----------


## harrybarracuda

> What is the status of the Chernobyl reactor now, is it burning its way through the earths crust ?


Swathed in concrete isn't it? And large areas around it are still uninhabitable, except for the three headed sparrows.




> What is happening to the cooling water the Japanese are using, is it in a loop or is it being pumped back into the sea ?



What cooling water may be a better question.

Google People Finder now has 183,000+ records.

And Google seem to be thinking on their feet:




> To help those in affected areas who cannot register names on Google Person Finder,                 we are accepting photos of shelter resident lists. We encourage those who are at a                 shelter or evacuation center to take photos of lists of people who are currently                 there and email them to tohoku.anpi.google[at]picasaweb.com with                 the shelters name in the subject line.               
>                                   Once sent, the photos will be automatically uploaded to a public Picasa Web Album                 (goo.gl/ganbare), so those who are unsure of                 their loved ones whereabouts can check.               
>                                   Share a shelter resident                 list
> View shelter resident lists

----------


## StrontiumDog

Reuters   Reuters Top News                                             

            FLASH: Japan nuclear safety agency: Two 8-metre holes in wall of Fukushima No.4 outer building after blast

----------


## Sabai Prai

> What is the status of the Chernobyl reactor now, is it burning its way through the earths crust ?


From December 2010

*Chernobyl: now open to tourists*



                                   Workers remove radioactive debris from third reactor's roof at Chernobyl nuclear power plant in 1986. Photograph: Reuters                                                        Already been to North Korea? Hiking in Afghanistan a little bit  too last year? Fear not. Tourism has a new frontier: the site of the  world's biggest civilian nuclear disaster.
From next year the  heavily contaminated area around the Chernobyl power plant will be  officially open to tourists with an interest in post-apocalyptic vistas,  late-period Soviet history, or both.
Ukraine's  emergency situations ministry said today that visitors would be offered  tours inside the 30-mile exclusion zone set up after reactor four at  the plant exploded on 26 April 1986, showering northern Europe in radioactive fallout.
The  disaster killed an unknown number of people – estimates for deaths from  radiation exposure range from dozens to thousands – and forced around  350,000 people to leave their homes forever.
While the area  remains heavily contaminated, a ministry spokeswoman said, tourism  routes had been drawn up which would cover the main sights while  steering clear of the dangerous spots.
Wandering would not be  encouraged, Yulia Yershova said: "There are things to see there if one  follows the official route and doesn't stray away from the group."
It  is already possible to visit the area with private tour firms, usually  operating from Ukraine's capital, Kiev, 60 miles south. The country's  government, however, says these are illegal and tourists' safety cannot  be guaranteed.
The itinerary of one such tour, which takes in the  nuclear plant and even the remains of the number four reactor, contains  elements as lunch (food is delivered from outside of the Chernobyl  zone), passage through the Dytyatky control point and measuring of  radiation.
Apart from seeing the remnants of one of the late 20th  century's most dramatic events, trips to the exclusion zone offer  visitors a peek into a macabre, Mary Celeste world where tens of  thousands of homes were abandoned. Particularly chilling is Prypyat,  once a 50,000-strong city but now a ghost town, where books still sit on  school desks and May Day decorations flutter in the streets.
The  plant itself, which kept generating power until 2000, still has 2,500  staff making the site safe, working in strict shifts to minimise  radiation exposure.
Ukraine's government said that it hoped to  complete a new sarcophagus for the exploded reactor by 2015. The  existing concrete structure is cracking and leaks radiation.

----------


## harrybarracuda

I won't post the entire article but here's a link at the Beeb:

Health Risks from Radiation Poisoning

Last para puts it into perspective:




> *How does Fukushima compare to Chernobyl?*
>       Professor  Gerry Thomas, who has studied the aftermath of the Chernobyl disaster,  said: "It is very unlikely that this will turn into anything that  resembles Chernobyl."
>          "In Chernobyl you had a steam explosion which exposed the  reactor core, which meant you had a lot of radiation shooting up into  the atmosphere."
>          Professor Thomas said although the Chernobyl disaster had led  to a rise in thyroid cancer cases, the only people affected were those  living in the immediate area of the explosion and who were young at the  time.

----------


## Chairman Mao

'Radiation 10 times more than normal 100km North of Tokyo' scrolling across Aljazeera's screen at the moment.  :Sad:

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Apart from seeing the remnants of one of the late 20th  century's most  dramatic events, trips to the exclusion zone offer  visitors a peek into  a macabre, Mary Celeste world where tens of  thousands of homes were  abandoned. Particularly chilling is Prypyat,  once a 50,000-strong city  but now a ghost town, where books still sit on  school desks and May Day  decorations flutter in the streets.
> The  plant itself, which kept generating power until 2000, still has  2,500  staff making the site safe, working in strict shifts to minimise   radiation exposure.


Didn't some TV chef make a cookery programme there recently?

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by koman
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by mobs00
> ...


It is why Soviet Union still is greatest country on Earth. Not pandering to idiots in false democracy.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Background on the GE design from the Washington Post




> Since General Electric supplied the design four decades ago for all six nuclear reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant in northeastern Japan, some regulators and critics have questioned whether the system - which was supposed to be smaller and less expensive than others - can withstand a nightmare scenario.
> 
> Their concerns focused on the reactor's containment system that is the final line of defense against a wide release of radiation. Now GE's technology is facing the ultimate test: Can the structure enclosing the reactor keep the hot, radioactive stew bottled up inside? And can the spent fuel pools withstand a combination of explosions and equipment failure?
> 
> There is no sign so far that GE's design is to blame for any of the plant's problems, which mainly have been the result of power failures after the earthquake and tsunami that slammed the area Friday. The containment structure is holding up.
> 
> Some experts said that if the situation deteriorates at the nuclear plant, GE's design - known as the Boiling Water Reactor Mark 1 - may not withstand the massive amount of hydrogen gas that could be released.
> 
> "We're not at that point yet," said Paul Gunter, director of the Reactor Oversight Project at Beyond Nuclear. "But these vessels are brittle. They were going to retire Fukushima Daiichi in just a few more months, and so this particular Mark 1 with its substandard design was reaching its endlife, and so it raises a lot of concerns."
> ...

----------


## harrybarracuda

This article speaks for itself




> Past cover-ups at Japan's nuke plant 									  																			London, March 15, (IANS): 									   									 																		 									
> _Falsified safety data has been used at Japan's Fukushima  nuclear plant that suffered explosions at three of its reactors  following a major earthquake, a media report said Tuesday._ 
>  									 										The Telegraph reported that five years back the plant operator  was asked to check its data after it admitted that temperature readings  for coolant materials had been falsified way back in 1985.
> 
> Radiation  levels spiked Tuesday after blasts and a fire at reactors in the  quake-damaged nuclear plant in northeastern Japan. A government  spokesman said the radiation was high enough to affect human health.
> 
> The  plant's operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), said it feared  the reactor containment vessel had been damaged in an explosion in  reactor number 2 at Fukushima, home to six nuclear reactors.
> 
> A  fire was reported Tuesday in reactor 4. Hydrogen explosions rocked  reactors 1 and 3 Saturday and Monday, sparking fears of reactor  meltdowns.
> ...

----------


## Mid

got to be some folks in those nuclear plants who wonder what sleep is , don't envy them .

----------


## harrybarracuda

Telegraph Q&A 

Japan crisis Q&A: What might happen next? - Telegraph

----------


## harrybarracuda

> got to be some folks in those nuclear plants who wonder what sleep is , don't envy them .


At least one is dead; I'm sure I read more died in one of the explosions, but it seems to have disappeared.

They really are fucking heroes though. Respect.

----------


## MakingALife

When speaking about Chenyobal, one should recognize it wasnt the normal combustion of a graphite moderated core that took place.  It was a very violent burning that was induced by the thermal disassociation of water, applied to the environment.  It caused a rapid explosion, and fuel and oxidation products from the disasociation to create wildfire event.   This went a long way towards not just softening, but liquifying, boiling, and gassifying the UF fuels present.  The strong thermals of the wild fire and the gassed off radioactive isotopes gained a degree of travel freedom that they would not have had, if the graphite combustion were normal.  The thermal disassociation of the water applied for cooling process backfired and dramatically changed the fall out pattern that would have otherwise been created.

While the Japan plants dont have the graphite moderators, at or after a major containment breach, they will be subject to a water disassociation wild fire event that will scatter the gassified radioisotopes strongly upward into the atmosphere.  

Heat rises, its universal.   This particular risk to a full Japan containment breach and melt down - is not being given its due discussion.  It is being downplayed on purpose to keep a lid on fears.  The event probably is low, but it exists.   Policy makers and planners need to articulate the risk factors not focus on fear lids.   When dealing with a situation with major life safety and life quality involved after its wake - Its time that responsible parties engage with both eyes open and articulate the risks so that correct defensive modeling can be put in play, and the public at large can be educated, more than the buzzing platitudes that say only minimum short term impact is a reasonable precidiction....   It cant get any where near as bad as Chenynoble...  Thats wishfull thinking and it ignores the fact's of what made Cheynoble as big as it was.

I am not an alarmist,  trying to be realistic at this point in the game.    God help Japan get through these next few management days ahead.  If they cannot finesse that path and major meltdowns take place -  It will be a pretty large re-write on the impact of a nuclear plant disaster.

----------


## harrybarracuda

From the Huffington Post.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Cold and raining now; God help anyone still trapped.

I assume that will also bring down any of the atmospheric radioactive gunk that may have leaked so far.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Apart from the knock on effect in the world's markets, Germany is the first to blink:




> BERLIN - German  Chancellor Angela Merkel announced on Tuesday the provisional shut-down  for three months of seven nuclear reactors pending a safety review in  light of events in Japan.
> 
> "We are launching a safety review of  all nuclear reactors... with all reactors in operation since the end of  1980 set to be idled for the period of the (three-month) moratorium,"  Merkel said.

----------


## Muadib

> Originally Posted by mobs00
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by socal
> ...


Perhaps we should arrange for you to be air dropped into the area of the Fukushima Daiichi #2 nuclear plant... Since you say there is nothing to worry about, you shouldn't object...

----------


## Moonraker

> Originally Posted by socal
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by mobs00
> ...


He'd probably just fix it.

----------


## ItsRobsLife

> None of us are nuclear experts.


MakingALife is by the sound of it, some really informative posts. 

I can't see there being any cover up as far as radioactive contamination is concerned, there are monitoring stations testing the atmosphere within range of any fallout as well as the US navy ships off the coast and any major leak would be known about very quickly. 

Lets just hope the Japs can keep the reactors under control long enough for them to start cooling themselves. I'm sure they are making every sacrifice to do so.

----------


## Mid

> the US navy ships off the coast


which have moved FURTHER off the coast ............................

----------


## misskit

Two rescued 90 hours after earthquake

An elderly man and woman have been rescued more than 90 hours after the devastating earthquake in northern Japan.

The man was rescued from a collapsed building in Ishinomaki City, Miyagi Prefecture, on Tuesday, 96 hours after a massive earthquake and tsunami devastated the city.

A 70-year-old woman was rescued in Otsuchi Town, Iwate Prefecture, 92 hours after the earthquake.

Rescuers found her on Tuesday in the wreckage of her house.

She is being treated at a hospital in Kamaishi City in the prefecture. Doctors say she's suffering from hypothermia but is in stable condition.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 19:55 +0900 (JST)

NHK

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## Takeovers

> Look at all the nuclear bomb testing that went on during the 60s and 70s.


I remember quite well. And I found it astonishing that the USSR and the USA agreed so quickly to a teststop back then. They found agreement on such a sensitive issue during the height of the Cold War in record time.

Always made me wonder if they knew something that was not public.

Also consider that the nuclear inventory of a power plant is much bigger than the contents of a bomb.

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## misskit

Efforts to cool Fukushima reactors continue

More problems hit the disaster-stricken Fukushima Number One power plant on Monday and Tuesday despite efforts to cool down the facility's overheated reactors.

Shortly after 6 AM on Tuesday, an explosion was heard at the plant's No. 2 reactor. The explosion is believed to have occurred near a facility known as a suppression pool, which adjusts the pressure of the reactor.

After the blast, pressure in the facility dropped rapidly. The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency suspects the facility was damaged and leaked radioactive materials.

*The water level in the reactor had dropped, and fuel rods are believed to have been fully exposed for 6 and a half hours from Monday evening.
*

remainder of story here
NHK WORLD English

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## crippen

Fifty TEPCO workers have remained at the station to manage the water injection process.
Heroes.

Nuclear Engineering International

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## Thetyim

They appear not to know what the pressure is in reactor #2

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## Poo and Pee

another HUGE aftershock just now. 


it's getting very stressful  :Sad: 

so much for my flight out to thailand - flights fully booked!!  :Sad:

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## harrybarracuda

Mother of God....

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## MakingALife

Great chart,  It gives a better understanding between power stations and reactor units - that is not really clear from a lot of the media descriptions.

Thanks for posting this

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## Butterfly

how are they going to take all those boats out ?

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## robuzo

A buddy in Tokyo told me there was just Mag 6 quake in Shizuoka.

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## Loy Toy

> so much for my flight out to thailand - flights fully booked!!


Give me a call when you arrive and we can meet up for some saki and Asashi beer.

Seriously mate keep your head low and take care.

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## MakingALife

Great chart,  It gives a better understanding between power stations and reactor units - that is not really clear from a lot of the media descriptions. Thanks for posting this.   

For "ItsRobsLife" -  I do not consider myself a nuclear expert, nor to I have Nuke plant experience.  I am a degreed engineer, who studied Nuclear concepts along with a lot of Nuclear physics as part of my original B.Engr program of study.  So I did study at length BWR and PWR plants, and graduated the year TMI went down.  My career has been in power and propulsion plants & systems, controls and components,  and as such I am familiar with alot of the major equipment and systems associated with power, propulsion, and utility systems.    I have read previously about TMI and Chrenyoble to sift for lessons learned.   Whats happening now in Japan will be begin a new chapter of study related to this significant event.

I am surprised by Germany's response.  However it suggests to me - they may have already examined and found serious concerns in plant recovery after black out that have raised their concern levels.   The fact that they are going to initiate a 3 month power down of all facilities suggests they plan to do some vigorous testing and perhaps undertake plant modification studies in conjunction some testing they may be planning.  The modifications may not be on the core nuclear portion, but it could include better hardening of back up power & emergency power & control systems.  None of which is really safely feasible with their units up and on line, if back up services have to be interrupted for modifications.

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## Takeovers

> I am surprised by Germany's response. However it suggests to me - they may have already examined and found serious concerns in plant recovery after black out that have raised their concern levels.


It is purely political. People here are in their majority simply hysteric about everything atom. If they knew their bodies are of atoms too they would probably go into shock.

But yes, I would be all in favor of shutting down old power plants and would replace them with modern safer designs. But zero chance for that in Germany.

----------


## DrB0b

Japan  is facing the world's biggest nuclear crisis for decades as engineers  struggle to regain control of the Fukushima plant following another  explosion and a fire that caused a spike in radiation to harmful levels.
Amid  growing fears that the situation is heading for catastrophe, 70  technicians are still battling to cool reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi  facility but non-essential personnel have been ordered to leave and the  Kyodo news agency reported that radiation levels have become too high  for staff to remain in control rooms. The government has already called  in international help in tackling the spiralling crisis.

Early on  Tuesday, the power plant in the country's stricken north-east was rocked  by an explosion at the No 2 reactor, the third blast at the site in  four days. That was followed by a fire that broke out at the No 4  reactor unit, which appeared to be the cause of today's radiation leaks.  That reactor was shut down for maintenance before the earthquake, but  its spent fuel rods are stored in a pool at the site. The fire was later  extinguished but Kyodo reported that the pool was subsequently boiling,  with the water level falling. If the water boils off there is a risk  that the fuel could catch fire, sending a plume of radiation directly  into the atmosphere...

Japanese nuclear plant hit by fire and third explosion | World news | guardian.co.uk

----------


## socal

> Originally Posted by BobR
> 
> And that is just one of the many reasons why China has grown the way it has and will soon be the dominant Country on Earth. Abandoning nuclear power just because of this rare event is just another example of politicians pandering to idiots. Everything comes with a price, and risk is part of life.
> 
> 
> And what gives the right to politicians to gamble with other peoples lives?


around 800,000 people have died over the last 40 years because of coal mining and coal burning radiation.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Latest IAEA statement...

*Japanese Earthquake Update (15 March 14:10 UTC)*

  15 March 2011


The IAEA Incident and  Emergency Centre (IEC) continues to monitor the status of the nuclear  power plants in Japan that were affected by the devastating earthquake  and consequent tsunami.

 All units at the Fukushima Daini,  Onagawa, and Tokai nuclear power plants are in a safe and stable  condition (i.e. cold shutdown).

 The IAEA remains concerned over  the status of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, where sea water  injections to cool the reactors in units 1, 2 and 3 are continuing.  Attempts to return power to the entire Daiichi site are also continuing.

 After explosions at both units 1  and 3, the primary containment vessels of both units are reported to be  intact. However, the explosion that occurred at 04:25 UTC on 14 March at  the Fukushima Daiichi unit 2 may have affected the integrity of its  primary containment vessel. All three explosions were due to an  accumulation of hydrogen gas.

 A fire at unit 4 occurred on 14  March 23:54 UTC and lasted two hours. The IAEA is seeking clarification  on the nature and consequences of the fire.

 The IAEA continues to seek details about the status of all workers, reactors and spent fuel at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.

 An evacuation of the population  from the 20-kilometre zone around Fukushima Daiichi is in effect. The  Japanese have advised that people within a 30-km radius shall take  shelter indoors. Iodine tablets have been distributed to evacuation  centres but no decision has yet been taken on their administration.

 A 30-kilometre no-fly zone has  been established around the Daiichi plant. Normal civil aviation beyond  this zone remains uninterrupted. The Japan Coast Guard established  evacuation warnings within 10 kilometres of Fukushima Daiichi and 3  kilometres of Fukushima Daini.

 The IAEA and several other UN  organizations held a meeting at 11:00 UTC today to discuss recent  developments and coordinate activities related to consequences of the  earthquake and tsunami. The meeting was called under the framework of  the Joint Radiation Emergency Management Plan of the International  Organizations, and this group expects to work closely together in the  days ahead.

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## StrontiumDog

AJELive   AJELive                                             

#Fukushima crisis rated 6 on #nuclear event scale. Chernobyl was a 7. Keep up to date with #AlJazeera: Japan in crisis: Live blog | Al Jazeera Blogs #Japan #tsunami

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## Loy Toy

The one problem that hasn't gone away, and has always been there is the disposal of by-residual and waste from even the reators that are operating normal.

I remember talk about blasting it up into outer space but I forsee a huge problem in the future with regard to safe disposal of this dangerous radioactive waste.

----------


## Takeovers

> I remember talk about blasting it up into outer space but I forsee a huge problem in the future with regard to safe disposal of this dangerous radioactive waste.


Couldn't agree more. Into space is no option. I would not want to take the risk with that kind of material. Sooner or later a launch must go wrong. Unless we have a beanstalk or something similar.
But as we already have a lot of material to deal with it is not too important if we add some more. We need long term storage anyway.

----------


## StrontiumDog

How a meltdown might occur...Al Jazeera report...

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## StrontiumDog

March 15, 2011 9:24 AM PDT 

*Japanese quake shortened day just a smidgen*

  by Stephen Shankland

 
Earth, as seen from space.
 (Credit: NASA) 

  Friday's magnitude 9.0 earthquake in Japan was big enough to shorten the length of Earth's day by 1.8 millionths of a second, a NASA scientist has calculated. 

 Richard Gross of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory projected the change   based on calculations of how the distribution of Earth's mass changed.   Moving mass toward the north or south poles, and thus closer to Earth's   axis of rotation, can make the planet spin faster in much the same way   an ice skater can spin faster by bringing arms and legs closer toward   the body. 

 Gross also calculated that Earth's figure axis shifted by about 17   centimeters, or 6.5 inches. The figure axis is the axis about which the   Earth's mass is balanced, and moving it changes how Earth wobbles as it   rotates. The north-south axis around which Earth rotates isn't changed   by internal forces such as earthquakes, and it's about 10 meters, or  33  feet, away from the figure axis. 

 Gross' figures are preliminary and likely will change as new measurements emerge, NASA said. 

 Although it takes a big earthquake to make such changes to Earth's   behavior--and last week's was the fifth largest since 1900--changing the   planet's rotational speed actually happens constantly through less   dramatic forces. Effects from the wind and ocean currents lengthen and   shorten the length of the day by a full millisecond from one year to the   next, an effect 550 times greater than the Japanese earthquake. 


Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-30685_3-20...#ixzz1Ggf3luHV

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## StrontiumDog

japantimes: 3,373 people confirmed dead, 6,746 missing; worst casualty toll since 1923 Kanto Hanshin Earthquake 3,373 people confirmed dead, 6,746 missing | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Muadib

> Japan  is facing the world's biggest nuclear crisis for decades as engineers  struggle to regain control of the Fukushima plant following another  explosion and a fire that caused a spike in radiation to harmful levels.


An immediate problem is that an estimated 25% of Japan's electricity production facilities are offline... They will have to find a way to bridge the gap between now and when they can replace those facilities... When they rebuild, it will be interesting to see if they replace the current plants with LNG or remain nuclear...

----------


## Takeovers

> An immediate problem is that an estimated 25% of Japan's electricity production facilities are offline... They will have to find a way to bridge the gap between now and when they can replace those facilities... When they rebuild, it will be interesting to see if they replace the current plants with LNG or remain nuclear...


They won't even consider to abandon nuclear power I am sure. Maybe they replace the old Fukushima style plants eventually by modern safer types.

It won't take too long to get those plants back online, with the exception of Fukushima. About Fukushima I have seen differering infos. It was supposed to be decommissioned but I am not sure if and how long that has been delayed.

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## StrontiumDog

March 15, 2011 	
*Japan - New Fears as the Tragedy Deepens*

 	Continued  aftershocks and new earthquakes bring new fears to the survivors of the  tragedy.  Residents prepare for radiation leaks as the Prime Minister  asks everyone to remain indoors - in their homes, their offices and  shelters.  Ninety one countries have offered help to Japan.  Search and  rescue and recovery continue in the devastated landscape.  The death  toll rises, but some hope is realized in the reunions of family and  friends.  -- _Paula Nelson_   (52 photos total)

Evacuees  are screened for radiation contamination at a testing center, March 15,  2011, in Koriyama city, Fukushima Prefecture, northern Japan. (Wally  Santana/Associated Press)


2
A  baby is tested for radiation in Nihonmatsu, Fukushima Prefecture, March  15, 2011. Panic swept Tokyo on Tuesday after a rise in radioactive  levels around an earthquake-hit nuclear power plant north of the city,  causing some to leave the capital or stock up on food and supplies.  (Reuters/Kyodo)  #


3
A  radiation detector marks 0.6 microsieverts, exceeding normal day data,  March 15, 2011, near Shibuya train station in Tokyo. (Associated  Press/Kyodo News)  #


4
An  official wearing a protective suit helps usher people through a  radiation emergency scanning center in Koriyama, Japan, March 15, 2011.  (Mark Baker/Associated Press) #


5
Officials,  wearing clothing to protect against radiation, direct people to a  center to scan residents who have been within 20 kilometers of the  Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant damaged by Friday's earthquake, March  15, 2011, in Koriyama, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. (Gregory  Bull/Associated Press) #


6
Evacuees  are screened for radiation exposure at a testing center, March 15,  2011, in Koriyama city, Fukushima prefecture, Japan, after a nuclear  power plant on the coast of the prefecture was damaged by Friday's  earthquake. (Wally Santana/Associated Press) #


7
People  queue up for buses at a station to get out of the city in Yamagata,  Yamagata prefecture on March 15, 2011. Explosions and a fire at Japan's  quake-hit nuclear plant in neighboring Fukushima prefecture unleashed  dangerous radiation on March 15.  (Mike Clarke/AFP/Getty Images) #


8
A  woman leaves a center to scan residents, who have been within 20  kilometers of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant damaged by Friday's  earthquake, carrying a metal heat blanket, March 15, 2011, in Koriyama,  Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. (Gregory Bull/Associated Press)  #


9
Japan  Ground Self-Defense Force soldiers, mobilized to wash away radioactive  material emitted from a nuclear power plant damaged by Friday's  earthquake, put on protective gear on their arrival in Nihonmatsu,  Fukushima Prefecture, March 15, 2011. (Associated Press/Kyodo News)  #


10
A  group of Chinese citizens at the City Hall await transport to leave the  tsunami devastated city of Sendai, Miyagi prefecture on March 15,   2011.  Japan's government on March 15 urged people against panic-buying  of food and supplies, as the country grapples with an earthquake and  tsunami and resulting nuclear crisis. (Mike Clarke/AFP/Getty Images) #


11
Evacuees  from radiation leaking from the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear  plant take a rest at a shelter in Fukushima, northern Japan, March 15,  2011.(The Yomiuri Shimbun, Shuhei Yokoyama/Associated Press)  #


12
A  woman reacts at the news of her relative's death in an evacuation  shelter for survivors of Friday's earthquake and tsunami, March 15,  2011, in Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture.  (Associated Press/Kyodo News) #


13
People  wait to receive medical treatment at a shelter for earthquake and  tsunami evacuees in Rikuzentakata in Iwate prefecture, northeast Japan,  March 15, 2011. (Lee Jae-Won/Reuters)  #


14
Survivors  listen about ongoing recovery operations at an evacuation center in  Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, March 15, 2011. (Shuji  Kajiyama/Associated Press)  #


15
Two elderly couples greet each other at a shelter as they reunite, March 15, 2011. (Lee Jae-Won/Reuters) #


16
Displaced  residents sit on mats at an evacuation center after leaving their  coastal homes in Sendai, Miyagi on March 15, 2011. (Mike Clarke/Getty  Images) #


17
A  woman reunites with her relatives at a shelter for the first time after  an earthquake and tsunami in Rikuzentakata in Iwate prefecture, March  15, 2011. (Lee Jae-Won/Reuters) #


18
People  receive emergency clothing aid at a makeshift shelter in Fukushima,  March 15, 2011. (Associated Press/The Yomiuri Shimbun, Shuhei Yokoyama) #


19
An  evacuee reacts after being reunited with her daughter and her brother  at a shelter in Rikuzentakata, Iwate, March 15, 2022. Masahiro  Ogawa/Associated Press)  #


20
Evacuees  exercise at a makeshift shelter in Minamisanriku, northern Japan, March  15, 2011.  (Associated/The Yomiuri Shimbun, Tsuyoshi Matsumoto) #


21
Residents  eat emergency rations in a candle-lit shelter after leaving their  tsunami devastated areas, in Minamisanriku, Miyagi prefecture on March  15, 2011. (Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty Images) #


22
A  man shops in a convenience store where shelves on food aisles are left  empty in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture, March 15, 2011. (Shizuo  Kambayashi/Associated Press) #


23
Evacuees  crowd a makeshift shelter in Fukushima, northern Japan, March 15, 2011.  Some 70,000 people have been evacuated from a 12-mile (20-kilometer)  radius from the Dai-ichi complex. (Associated Press/The Yomiuri Shimbun,  Koichi Nakamura) #


24
A  Japanese survivor of the earthquake and tsunami rides his bicycle  through the leveled city of Minamisanriku, in northeastern Japan, March  15, 2011. (David Guttenfelder/Associated Press) #


25
Rescue  workers spray water on a damaged building still smoldering after the  9.0 magnitude strong earthquake struck on March 11 off the coast of  north-eastern Japan, March 14, 2011 in Miyagi, Japan. The death toll  continues to rise with fears that the official death count could well  reach up to 10,000.  (ChinaFotoPress/Getty Images) #


26
Tsunami debris is scattered over a devastated area of Sendai, Miyagi prefecture. (March 14, 2011) (STR/AFP/Getty Images) #


27
Japanese  rescue workers pour over a map of Ofunato before beginning operations  in the devastated city on March 15, 2011. Rescue teams from the US,  Britain and China began assisting in the search for survivors. (Nocholas  Kamm/AFP/Getty Images) #


28
Members  of the Chinese International Search and Rescue Team (CISAR) search for  victims inside a ruined house at the quake-shaken Ofunato city in Iwate  prefecture, March 15, 2011. (Associated Press/Xinhua, Lui Siu Wai) #


29
Rescuers  end the day's search operation in the area hard hit by  earthquake-triggered tsunami in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan, March  15, 2011. (Associated Press/Junji Kurokawa) #


30
British  search and rescue team member Rob Furniss and his search dog Byron try  to find any trapped people still alive in a building in Ofunato, Japan,  March 15, 2011.  Two search and rescue teams from the U.S. and a team  from the U.K. with combined numbers of around 220 personnel, searched  damaged areas of the town of Ofunato for trapped survivors in the  aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami. (Matt Dunham/Associated Press) #


31
A  mother and her daughter leave a devastated area in Otsuchi, northern  Japan, March 15, 2011. They said there was nothing left where their home  used to be. (Associated Press/The Yomiuri Shimbun, Yoichi Hayashi) #


32
  Soldiers and a rescue worker carry the body of a resident through  Kesennuma City on March 15, 2011, days after the area was devastated by a  magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami.  (Adrees Latif/Reuters) #


33
  The Sasaki family carry some of their personal belongings from their  home that was destroyed after the devastating earthquake and tsunami,  March 15, 2011 in Rikuzentakata,  Miyagi province.   (Paula Bronstein  /Getty Images) #


34
Neena  Sasaki, 5, carries some of the family belongings from her home that was  destroyed after the devastating earthquake and tsunami on March 15,  2011 in Rikuzentakata,  Miyagi province.   (Paula Bronstein /Getty  Images) #


35
Japanese  military walk by a body lying in the rubble of a village destroyed,  March 15, 2011 in Rikuzentakata,  Miyagi province. (Paula Bronstein  /Getty Images)  #


36
Family  photo albums lie in the ruins of the devastated residential area of  tsunami hit Otsuchi March 15, 2011. (Damir Sagolj/Reuters) #


37
Rescue  workers search through ruins of the devastated residential area of  tsunami hit Otsuchi March 15, 2011. (Aly Song/Reuters) #


38
A  young Japanese survivor of the earthquake and tsunami searches her  family home for any belongings she can find in the leveled city of  Minamisanriku, in northeastern Japan, March 15, 2011. (David  Guttenfelder/Associated Press) #


39
Tsunami debris is scattered over a devastated area of Sendai, Miyagi prefecture. (STR/AFP/Getty Images)  #


40
Keijo  Nakamura and his wife, Haruka, react as they stand on the remains of a  dead relative's home after the house was washed away by the tsunami in  Ofunato, March 15, 2011.  Two search and rescue teams from the U.S. and a  team from the U.K. with combined numbers of around 220 personnel,  searched damaged areas of the town of Ofunato for trapped survivors  Tuesday in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami. (Matt  Dunham/Associated Press) #


41
Japanese  recovery officials search through the ruins of the leveled city of  Minamisanriku, in northeastern Japan, March 15, 2011. (David  Guttenfelder/Associated Press) #


42
British  search and rescue workers search under a roof removed from a house for  survivors of the tsunami in Ofunato, Japan, March 15, 2011. (Matt  Dunham/Associated Press) #


43
A  man stands amidst the destruction in Kesennuma City on March 15, 2011,  days after the area was devastated by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and  tsunami.  (Adrees Latif/Reuters) #


44
A  woman who lost her mother and her three-year-old son reacts after she  confirmed their bodies under the rubble of her house in Miyako.  (March  14, 2011) (Associated Press/Mainichi Shimbun, Daisuke Wada) #


45
Members  of Japan's Self Defense Force walk past the body of a woman at an area  hit by an earthquake and tsunami in Rikuzentakata, Iwate prefecture,  March 15, 2011. (Toru Hanai/Reuters) #


46
Japanese  survivors of Friday's earthquake and tsunami walk under umbrellas  through the leveled city of Minamisanriku, in northeastern Japan, March  15, 2011. David Guttenfelder/Associated Press) #


47
Soldiers and a rescue worker carry the body of a victim through Kesennuma City on March 15, 2011.  (Adrees Latif/Reuters)  #


48
Soldiers  carry the body of a victim as others prepare to retrieve more in  Kesennuma City on March 15, 2011. (Adrees Latif/Retuers) #


49
The  bodies of victims are covered by blankets at a village destroyed by the  earthquake and tsunami in Rikuzentakata in Iwate prefecture, northeast  Japan, March 15, 2011.   (Lee Jae-Won/Reuters) #


50
Two  women walk in a tsunami devastated street in Hishonomaki, Miyagi  prefecture on March 15, 2011.  (Philippe LopezAFP/Getty Images) #


51
Local  residents pass through a devastated street in Ishinomaki in Miyagi  prefecture after the recent tsunami and earthquake, on March 15, 2011.  (Kim Jae-Hwan/AFP/Getty Images) #


52
Members  of the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force walk in a deployment line as  they search tsunami damaged parts of Ofunato, Japan, March 15, 2011. Two  search and rescue teams from the U.S. and a team from the U.K. with  combined numbers of around 220 personnel, searched damaged areas of the  town of Ofunato for trapped survivors Tuesday in the aftermath of the  earthquake and tsunami. (Matt Dunham/Associated Press) #

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## Moonraker

In Phuket, the buildings were mostly still standing.

There seems  to be a lot of wood laying around. It seems as though the Jap buildings were made of wood and not as strong as the Phuket buildings? (made from concrete).

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## Moonraker

Fuck me.

The place has been levelled.

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## blue

nice people though -still have  their  dignity and grace
 no photos of people fighting each other to get aid   etc
like in many nations,

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## bobo746

on the news this morning their saying the death toll has hit 10000 with a lot more to come this could take them years to recover from.
i went through the floods here a couple of months ago that was bad enough i can't even begin to comprehend what it's like there.

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## ItsRobsLife

* Meltdown fears at Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan* 

  									Updated:  									15 March 2011 										Channel 4 News



Dangerous levels of radiation are leaking directly into the atmosphere  after a third reactor exploded and a fourth briefly caught fire at a  damaged nuclear plant in tsunami-ravaged north east Japan.

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## superman

> around 800,000 people have died over the last 40 years because of coal mining and coal burning radiation.


I go along with Socal. Too many doom forecasters on this forum. Forget reading newspaper reports, they make thing look worse than how it actually is. It sells papers. Do your own Google-ing.



> There is widespread misunderstanding of the consequences of a fuel meltdown. We often hear that it would kill tens of thousands of people and contaminate a whole state, but such statements are grossly misleading. The containment building would ordinarily contain the radioactive dust inside long enough (about a day) to clean it out of the air. For example, investigators of the Three Mile Island accident12 all agree that even if there had been a complete meltdown, there would have been little harm to the public, because there is not reason to believe that the integrity of the containment would have been compromised. In most meltdown, no fatalities are to be expected.


The Hazards of Nuclear Power

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## mobs00

^ You're right. And as someone else said, why don't you and socal go down there and have a closer look. It probably ain't that bad.  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

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## superman

^ You are funny

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## misskit

> Forget reading newspaper reports, they make thing look worse than how it actually is.


I can't bear to watch any foreign television or news reports because they are too hyped up and also later with their news than NHK. Makes me sick with anxiety.

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## mobs00

*White smoke seen after latest fire at damaged Fukushima nuclear reactor under control*

Hiroshi Hiyama From: AFP March 16, 2011 11:29AM

White smoke seen after latest fire at damaged Fukushima nuclear reactor under control | Courier Mail




> WHITE smoke has been seen coming from the No. 4 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant after officials said earlier that a fire at the reactor was extinguished, NHK reported.



*White smoke seen billowing from Japan power plant*

http://www.straitstimes.com/Breaking...ry_645618.html




> TOKYO - JAPANESE television pictures showed white smoke billowing from a quake-crippled nuclear power plant in north-eastern Japan on Wednesday.
> 
> Japan was trying to avert a catastrophe after fire broke out at the plant that has sent low levels of radiation wafting into Tokyo, prompting some people to flee the capital and triggering growing international alarm. Fire crews were fighting a new blaze at reactor number four at the quake-hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, operator Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) said.
> 
> 'We are battling the fire now,' a spokesman said. The government later said the fire was under control. Explosions and an earlier fire at the plant had unleashed dangerous levels of radiation on Tuesday, sparking a collapse on the stock market and panic buying in supermarkets.

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## mobs00

_The bravery of the workers that stayed behind is undeniable_


Tue Mar 15, 12:54 pm ET

*Japanese nuclear plant workers emerging as heroic figures in tragedy*

By Brett Michael Dykes

Japanese nuclear plant workers emerging as heroic figures in tragedy - Yahoo! News





> Amid the horror and devastation of the nuclear crisis in Japan, it can be easy to miss the heroism of the 50 emergency workers trying to prevent the full meltdown of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility. It's not exaggeration to say that the safety of thousands of Japanese citizens hinges on the efforts of the crew of cleanup workers left behind after the remainder of the facility's roughly 800 employees have been evacuated amid hazardous levels of radiation. Even in a culture that places a premium on self-sacrifice, these ordinary workers are being extraordinarily selfless -- and could conceivably make the ultimate sacrifice for their fellow citizens' well-being.
> Who these 50 workers are remains something of a mystery. Their employer, the Tokyo Electric Company, has not provided their details. But after a new explosion at the plant this morning, their fate may be becoming more perilous by the minute. As nuclear power consultant Arnold Gundersen told the New York Times, it's likely the company has approached older plant retirees with a sobering invitation to reinforce the plant safety crew. Plant managers "may also be asking for people to volunteer to receive additional exposure,"  Gundersen told the Times' Henry Fountain.

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## Butterfly

white smoke ? nothing to worry about, only radioactive vapor from the reactor

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## mobs00

Press Release &#124; Embassy of the United States Tokyo, Japan




> A Message to American Citizens from Ambassador John V. Roos
> 
> March 16, 2011
> 
> Today our hearts remain with our Japanese friends who, after suffering this devastating tragedy just four days ago, have to undertake recovery and reconstruction and address the ongoing nuclear emergency.
> 
> We understand that many of you are anxious and have questions in the shadow of the Fukushima emergency, since we are in the midst of a complex, constantly changing, and unpredictable situation. In this fluid situation, our commitment to our citizens is to accumulate accurate information and assess it sufficiently in order to make important judgments.
> 
> Since the first reports of trouble with the reactors, American nuclear experts have worked around the clock to analyze data, monitor developments, and provide clear assessments on the potential dangers. While at times we have had only limited access to information, I am personally committed to assuring that our experts have as much access and information as possible, and the necessary resources to understand the situation. I have personally been deeply engaged in these efforts.
> ...

----------


## mobs00

^^ This is supposedly a current picture of the smoke.

----------


## mobs00

*URGENT: Smoke rising near troubled Fukushima nuke plant*

TOKYO, March 16, Kyodo

URGENT: Smoke rising near troubled Fukushima nuke plant | Kyodo News

White smoke has been seen rising from around the No. 3 reactor of the quake-hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant since around 10 a.m. Wednesday, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said, noting it may be steam.

The development came after TEPCO, the operator of the plant, reported that a fire broke out again earlier in the day at the plant's troubled No. 4 reactor but that flames were no longer visible about 30 minutes later.

==Kyodo

----------


## mobs00

Now smoke from #3 and #4 reactors.

----------


## mobs00

Here is a live webcam of the smoke and the nuclear plant. Just keep hitting refresh for a new image.

http://cs2.town.yanaizu.fukushima.jp...01-/GetOneShot

----------


## mobs00

NHK english live

Watch NHK World Live TV from Japan.

NHK janpanese

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nhk-gtv

----------


## mobs00

*Tokyo Electric Says 2 Nuclear Reactor Cores May Be Damaged*

March 15, 2011, 9:38 PM EDT

By Tsuyoshi Inajima and Shigeru Sato

Tokyo Electric Says 2 Nuclear Reactor Cores May Be Damaged - Businessweek




> March 16 (Bloomberg) -- Tokyo Electric Power Co. can’t rule out the possibility of damage to the cores of the No. 1 and No. 2 reactors at its crippled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power complex, company spokesman Daisuke Hirose said.
> 
> White smoke could be seen rising from the reactor buildings starting at 10:15 a.m. Seventy percent of the uranium-plutonium fuel rods at the plant’s No. 1 reactor may be damaged as of 3:30 p.m. yesterday. About one-third of the No. 2 reactor’s fuel may have been damaged, Hirose said.

----------


## mobs00

Looks like it may be snowing in Fukushima now.

Fukushima Weather Forecast and Conditions

http://cs2.town.yanaizu.fukushima.jp...01-/GetOneShot

----------


## mobs00

Edano speaking at press conference now.

Watch NHK World Live TV from Japan.

----------


## misskit

19,000 rescued by SDF, over 23,000 still stranded

Japan's Self-Defense Force rescued about 19,000 people between Friday and Tuesday, mainly from coastal regions battered by the massive earthquake and tsunami.

The Defense Ministry says a total of 25,460 people have been rescued by the SDF, police, firefighters, and the Coast Guard.

SDF members are now scrambling to rescue 23,300 people who are believed to be stranded.

Some of them are marooned on islets near the coast.
Wednesday, March 16, 2011 08:55 +0900 (JST)

NHK

----------


## mobs00

Edano says radiation levels too high to continue fire-fighting at Fukushima reactor #1 and all workers evacuated now.

----------


## koman

> Edano says radiation levels too high to continue fire-fighting at Fukushima reactor #1 and all workers evacuated now.


So now there is nobody to keep the spend fuel rods under water. Looks like the whole place is going tits up... :Confused:

----------


## mobs00

_From NHK_

BREAKING NEWS　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

Tokyo Electric Power Company has released a photograph of the No.4 reactor building at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant showing an 8-meter-square hole on the outer wall of the building, from the 4th floor to the 5th, near where the storage pool is for spent nuclear rods.

Can anyone read japanese? Is this the picture of the hole at #4?

----------


## Muadib

Japan's PM to TEPCO officials: "What the hell is going on?" - International Business Times

*Japan's PM to TEPCO officials: "What the hell is going on?"*

Japanese  Prime Minister Naoto Kan lost his cool when it emerged that he was kept  in the dark for one hour about an explosion in the Fukushima No 1  nuclear plant.
Kan blasted the officials of the Tokyo Electric Power Company  (TEPCO), which runs the plant, at a meeting on Tuesday, according to  Kyodo News agency.        

                                           "The TV reported an explosion. But nothing was said to the premier's  office for about an hour ... "What the hell is going on?", asked Kan,  the report said.
 Kyodo said a reporter overheard the prime minister while he was speaking with TEPCO officials.

----------


## robuzo

> Japan's PM to TEPCO officials: "What the hell is going on?" - International Business Times
> 
> *Japan's PM to TEPCO officials: "What the hell is going on?"*
> 
> Japanese  Prime Minister Naoto Kan lost his cool when it emerged that he was kept  in the dark for one hour about an explosion in the Fukushima No 1  nuclear plant.
> Kan blasted the officials of the Tokyo Electric Power Company  (TEPCO), which runs the plant, at a meeting on Tuesday, according to  Kyodo News agency.        
> 
>                                            "The TV reported an explosion. But nothing was said to the premier's  office for about an hour ... "What the hell is going on?", asked Kan,  the report said.
>  Kyodo said a reporter overheard the prime minister while he was speaking with TEPCO officials.


The way the aftermath of the Hanshin (Kobe) quake was handled was the political death of the then PM Maruyama. Kan was already weak when this happened, and he is going to do all he can to take charge. He is much more assertive than the scholarly (and bizarrely-eyebrowed) Maruyama was.

----------


## Muadib

Just reported on CNN that the final 50 TEPCO employees have been evacuated from the Fukushima #1 nuclear facility... No one left minding the store... 

Some of the talking heads are now opening accusing TEPCO of being inept in this situation...

----------


## drawp

right, let the blame game begin

----------


## misskit

mobs00, I can't read kanji but I am trying to find out if this is the hole in #4 also. Can't seem to find that photo anywhere else.

----------


## robuzo

> _From NHK_
> 
> BREAKING NEWS　　　　　　　　　　　　　　
> 
> Tokyo Electric Power Company has released a photograph of the No.4 reactor building at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant showing an 8-meter-square hole on the outer wall of the building, from the 4th floor to the 5th, near where the storage pool is for spent nuclear rods.
> 
> Can anyone read japanese? Is this the picture of the hole at #4?


The caption says "Fukushima Reactor No. 1," the rest is about transport information and the press conference. Nothing about a hole or No. 4.

----------


## misskit

That is the photo of #4, it is on NHK World site now.

Tokyo Electric Power Company has released a photograph of the No.4 reactor building at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant where fires were reported on Tuesday and Wednesday.

It shows that a large portion of the building's outer wall has collapsed.

The company produced the photo at a news conference on Wednesday.

The photo, shot the day before from the northwestern side of the reactor, shows that a large portion of the building's outer wall has collapsed. There is an 8-meter hole on the 4th floor, and the interior is visible.

Another 8-meter square hole was also confirmed on the outer wall of the building. Both appeared after an explosion early on Tuesday.

An ensuing fire near the 4th floor reportedly later went out on its own.

Flames were also found spewing from the building early Wednesday, but the utility company said they were no longer visible half-an-hour later.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 11:57 +0900 (JST)

----------


## mobs00

^ You're right

NHK WORLD English

----------


## robuzo

> ^ You're right
> 
> NHK WORLD English


I just reported what the caption says 福島第一原発. For future reference, 第一 = No. 1, 第二= No. 2, 第三= No. 3, 第四= (wait for it) No. 4. 福島 is Fukushima, and 原発 (short for 原子力発電所) is "nuclear power plant."

----------


## Butterfly

so it's going to explode, I think the meltdown was already happening but they couldn't tell us

so we have 4 reactors sitting next to each other with 2 ready to blow,

holly fucking shit,

----------


## misskit

And now this.....

Radioactivity forecast system down

A computer system that forecasts the spread of radioactivity has not been working due to malfunctioning monitoring posts around a troubled nuclear power plant in quake-hit Fukushima Prefecture.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says it does not know when the system will be back in operation.

The system, called SPEEDI, predicts how radioactive substances will spread in case of radiation leakage from nuclear power plants, based on measurements taken at various locations, prevailing winds and other weather conditions.

SPEEDI data are intended to be used to draw up evacuation plans for residents around power plants in case of accidents.

The system is monitored at government offices, including the industry ministry and the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency in Tokyo.

Friday's earthquake caused power outages around the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The agency says it cannot expect the SPEEDI system to function fully, since many monitoring posts are not operating due to power outages.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 10:25 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English

----------


## Cujo

> so it's going to explode, I think the meltdown was already happening but they couldn't tell us
> 
> so we have 4 reactors sitting next to each other with 2 ready to blow,
> 
> holly fucking shit,


They won't 'explode', as in a nuclear explosion taking out the rest with them.

----------


## mobs00

> Originally Posted by mobs00
> 
> 
> ^ You're right
> 
> NHK WORLD English
> 
> 
> I just reported what the caption says 福島第一原発. For future reference, 第一 = No. 1, 第二= No. 2, 第三= No. 3, 第四= (wait for it) No. 4. 福島 is Fukushima, and 原発 (short for 原子力発電所) is "nuclear power plant."


And we all appreciate your translation as you are probably one of the only people here who can translate Japanese.

Apologies if I offended.

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by robuzo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by mobs00
> ...


No, not at all. I don't understand why they put, or seemed to have put, 福島第一原発 over that photo. Anyway, you can get idea yourself(-ves) about what you are looking at by comparing the kanji above with the photo captions.

----------


## mobs00

_WTF_

Fears grow of Japanese reactor spewing radiation | The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram




> This morning, the Japanese government raised the permitted radiation exposure for plant workers by 2.5 times to allow them to work longer, according to NHK TV.

----------


## StrontiumDog

TimeOutTokyo:  Prof Miyazaki, Kyoto Uni: Ojika Peninsula, Miyagi, moved 5.2 metres  east & sunk 1.1 metres in2 the sea following the quake.

----------


## mobs00

There is no way to know how accurate wind models will be a over 3 days out but the winds and jet stream both move across the Pacific.

----------


## misskit

Radiation level briefly rises at Fukushima plant

Japan's top government spokesperson says the radiation level at the quake-hit nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture, north of Tokyo, rose briefly on Wednesday morning.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters on Wednesday the level of radiation near the front gate of the Daiichi plant started to rise around 10:00 AM, but was falling as of 10:54 AM.

Edano said workers at the plant evacuated just after the level rose.

He said what appeared to be white smoke was detected near the Number Three reactor at around 8:30 AM, but it's not clear if there's a link between the smoke and the increased radiation.

Edano said the temporary rise could have been due to radioactive vapor in the smoke.

Edano also revealed that the reading was over 1,000 microsieverts at one time on Tuesday night, and around 600 to 800 microsieverts before it showed a drastic increase.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 12:42 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

1.6 mil. households still without water

Japan's health ministry says at least 1.6 million households are still without water after Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami.

As of Wednesday, the water was still off in 320,000 households in Fukushima Prefecture, 290,000 households in Miyagi, 110,000 households in Iwate, and 670,000 households in Ibaraki.

The water shortages may increase, as communication lines are still down in some of the devastated areas.

The health ministry has dispatched 309 water trucks to areas where large numbers of people are without water.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 12:17 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English

----------


## HermantheGerman

> Originally Posted by socal
> 
> around 800,000 people have died over the last 40 years because of coal mining and coal burning radiation.
> 
> 
> I go along with Socal. Too many doom forecasters on this forum. Forget reading newspaper reports, they make thing look worse than how it actually is. It sells papers. Do your own Google-ing.
> 
> 
> 
> ...



Any idea of what Chernobyl costs the Ukrain per year? I don't think so !
Any idea how much 3 Mile Island Cost? I don't think so !

----------


## mobs00

*Fukushima: Mark 1 Nuclear Reactor Design Caused GE Scientist To Quit In Protest*

Damaged Japanese Nuclear Plant Has Five Mark 1 Reactors

*By MATTHEW MOSK*

 					 					March 15, 2011  					


Fukushima: Mark 1 Nuclear Reactor Design Caused GE Scientist To Quit In Protest - ABC News




> Thirty-five years ago, Dale G. Bridenbaugh and two of his colleagues at  General Electric resigned from their jobs after becoming increasingly  convinced that the nuclear reactor design they were reviewing -- the  Mark 1 -- was so flawed it could lead to a devastating accident. 
> 
> Questions persisted for decades about the ability of the Mark 1 to  handle the immense pressures that would result if the reactor lost  cooling power, and today that design is being put to the ultimate test  in Japan. Five of the six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, which  has been wracked since Friday's earthquake with explosions and  radiation leaks, are Mark 1s.

----------


## mobs00

From the WHO

----------


## mobs00



----------


## Humbert

Japanese restaurants in Thailand temporarily suspending imports from Japan due to fears of possible radiation contamination of food.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/business/economics/226905/japanese-eateries-quell-fears

----------


## mobs00

Another chart.

----------


## Takeovers

> Any idea of what Chernobyl costs the Ukrain per year? I don't think so !


Just heard that in some report on local TV. Not in actual numbers  but it is a staggering 5% of the Ukraine GDP. But I do wonder what is included there. Probably lost productivity of the abandoned area is a big part of that calculation. But no matter what the cost is huge.

----------


## mobs00

95 km from Tokyo a 6.0 earthquake at 10:52:05 AM Bangkok time

Magnitude 6.0 - NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN

----------


## HermantheGerman

> Japanese restaurants in Thailand temporarily suspending imports from Japan due to fears of possible radiation contamination of food.
> 
> http://www.bangkokpost.com/business/economics/226905/japanese-eateries-quell-fears



My wife read this news to me yesterday.
Thais do seem to have a strange sense of humour.  :Confused: 
Japan has an imense surplus of food right now, and those heartless Thais are not willing to import. Crippling the Japanese economy the Thaiway.

----------


## koman

> From the WHO


Good advise I'm sure but does WHO understand that "plenty of natural, fresh, organic unprocessed food" just might be a bit hard to come by when the whole frigging country is virtually shut down and your house has been turned into pulp.  Lots of people in Japan have no water, heat, food or anything else right now.

I notice too that the guy is lounging on the sofa watching TV while the wife is running around making sure everything is sealed up and secure.
Very appropriate.....the natural order of things... :Smile:

----------


## HermantheGerman

> Originally Posted by HermantheGerman
> 
> Any idea of what Chernobyl costs the Ukrain per year? I don't think so !
> 
> 
> Just heard that in some report on local TV. Not in actual numbers  but it is a staggering 5% of the Ukraine GDP. But I do wonder what is included there. Probably lost productivity of the abandoned area is a big part of that calculation. But no matter what the cost is huge.


Not including the BIG financial support they received from the west...and still do.

----------


## mobs00

_I am assuming this is a picture of the #3 and #4 reactors?_

http://www.xxx.xxx.xx/news/stories/2...16/3165601.htm

----------


## mobs00

Sat image of reactors 1,2,3,4

*image taken 9:35 am local time (0035 GMT) on March 16, 2011. REUTERS/DigitalGlobe/Handout*






All reactors

----------


## HermantheGerman

*Are you sure Mr. President ?
*



*Obama: Japan Radiation Won't Reach Hawaii*

                                     President Barack Obama told a Pittsburgh television  station Tuesday that he's not worried about radiation from the damaged  Japanese nuclear power plant reaching Hawaii.
 KDKA Political Editor Jon Delano asked: "Are you at all worried about radiation from japan reaching American shores?"
 Obama replied: "No. I've been assured that it...any nuclear release  dissipates by the time it gets even to Hawaii, much less to the mainland  of the United States."

----------


## mobs00



----------


## mobs00

^ Levels away from the plant still seem to be quite low.

----------


## mobs00

realtime radiation levels map. 

Japan map of Japan Radiation Maximum by Prefecture by Do,Ken,To,Fu - TargetMap



Information collected from Disaster Prevention and Nuclear Safety Network for Nuclear Environment/ English Top Page

----------


## misskit

Akihito, the Japanese emperor just made his first appearance on television since the disasters started. 

He was on televised NHK a few minutes ago.

----------


## mobs00

*Japan emperor "deeply worried" by nuclear crisis* 

Japan emperor deeply worried by nuclear crisis | Reuters


(Reuters) - Japanese Emperor Akihito said on Wednesday problems at Japan's nuclear-power reactors were unpredictable and he was "deeply worried" following an earthquake he described as "unprecedented in scale".    

   It was an extraordinarily rare appearance by the emperor and his first public comments since last week's devastating earthquake and tsunami that killed thousands of people.

----------


## StrontiumDog

SkyNewsBreak   Sky News Newsdesk                                             



            Tokyo Electric Power says highest radiation levels recorded so far in reactor 3 at Fukushima nuclear plant

----------


## misskit

GE to send power generators to Japan

The US-based General Electric Company, or GE, will send 10 gas turbine generators to Japan to help replace power generating capacity lost when nuclear reactors were damaged in Friday's mega-quake.

GE said on Tuesday it was sending the generators on request from Tokyo Electric Power Company, which is struggling with a nuclear crisis at its Daiichi plant in Fukushima Prefecture. GE manufactured 2 of the plant's 6 reactors.

GE said 3 of the 10 gas turbine generators have been moved to Florida ahead of being flown to Japan.

The company said it is also offering technological assistance to Japan through a joint venture set up with Japanese electronics-maker Hitachi.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 15:09 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English


Think GE will feel sufficiently guilty to donate or at least give them a break on the price?

----------


## MakingALife

Stopped in for lunch break to check the news...  Worked on a post, but managed to lose it, so will try to re-write it again.

Positives in this moment...
1. Despite loss of a larger radiation monitoring system, on scene monitoring is good and in play - as shown by their ability to pull teams from the site and reinsert them.
2. Local sit reps and sit man's are discussing with US military to see what strategy and options they can provide.   Talk of flying air drops of Boron, out in time if needed.
3.  Korea sending over a large part of their boron supplies to augment Japan's dwindling reserves
4.  Japan gov. has raised legal exposure limits, to maximize time for plant workers available on site, without legal ramifications.   Next step is to draft older knowledgable workers willing to endure lethal exposure for the sake of their country.  That is not a likely going to be a big turn out, if it comes to pass.
5. Road building is under way to allow fire truck access for shooting water up and into the fuel pool building areas that have at times been unable to be approached by staff.

Negatives.
1.  Fuel storage pools are becoming the bigger issue, as temps have, doubled in 24 hours and are 15 C below boil off (as of late yesterday).   This risks stored fuel from becoming dry, resulting in heating,  chemical reactions that have been shown to produce hydrogen, and potential for fuel high heating, deterioration, and eventual gas off.   With hydrogen fires taking place before that outcome....  Effectively a smaller Chrenoble style release without the atmosherics created by a wild fire.
2.  Process of filling all voids in reactor building between pressure containment vessel and building walls, is going to take a long time.  Some would say this process has been a source for some of the recent white plumes.  
3.  Concurrent with the new white plumes has been a stark radiation rise and then a flattening at a higher levels.   This suggest the source is not from Item 3 above,  but rather it is from containment's or fuel pools.
4. Overall radiation levels are significantly higher now, than when the first cooling and venting operations were undertaken days ago.  This is suggestive that the cooling & ability to maintain immersion in water of core fuels is a slow losing battle.

Taken together as a group, the negative items suggest that the strategists have to recognize the trend and develop secondary strategies.

Their only effective weapons of choice have been to add sea cooling and boron to the cores, and applied cooling water elsewhere (such as fuel pools).  But they are losing that battle due to complications on site,  they remain in the game, as long as they have the local option, and could prevail if they can manage site complications.   

Leaving this strategy solely in the hands of a local field labor option, is leaving out other options.  Things open, but which have not made it into discussions.  

Japan and their managment team must recognize, and not be naive that...
1.  There is a high probability that the site is going to become too hot for a "local" water pumping operation to continue.
2.  The need to put second string (remote cooling / pumping strategies in play) - while the on the ground options exist.   this could include
      a.  Running in from a safe location,  a temporary 
           light water line, such as bond strand pipe. 
           which is light weigh, quick lay, quick couple, 
            and superior pressure ratings.   To give off 
           scene pumping capacity - to keep fuel pools
           filled and cool, and to suppliment water  added
            to the reactors.   
        b.  Consider the option of setting up ROV's to 
            move on site and connect up to direct water 
            up to 4th story fuel pool areas.   This tech. is 
             available in Japan, or it could be flown in.
3.  Fuel pools are now the highest priority, because they represent higher potential release points for nuclear products and isotopes,  because zero containment is in play.   
4) There is a strong probability that the reactor containment layers (pressure vessel,  toroid ring, steel /concrete containment) will ultimately be tested to their engineering limits - if the cooling / fuel immersion / boron injection strategy falls on its sword. 


Being forward thinking Japan's  long term site management strategy must be more developed than boron air drops and other small steps.  

It is going to require thinking outside the big box, because the scale of failure potentials is much larger than any previous nuclear incidents.   They have a limited time to get projections together, of exactly what are the highest mode's of potential containment failures of those existing reactors with hot core problems.   Take the top 3 or 4 failure modes, and project a strategy and game plan to address mitigation of such events.   

For the fuel pool issues - if no second string capacity for cooling is achievable -  similar modeling for the fuel pools at risk must be developed.   To include the failure modes the pools will display, step by step, as the go from boiling water, to melting fuels with cladding hydrogen releases,  to empty pools with boiling UF gassing off on the pool floors.   The containment capacity of those floors must be evaluated.  Most likely this is very limited, based on the UF temperatures that will be achieved.

These kind of projected strategies for second string, and final serious outcomes - if site cooling and site control is lost.   It will take higher intellectual resources and a large team to tackle these multiple questions and examine solutions.   

The situation now is a pure waste to point fingers politically with PM and company operators.  The imporance levels have to shift based on the todays events and must become rapidly much more forward thinking, second string focused, and third string management based on all high probable failure modes displayed.    Its too large for Japan NRC, TEPCO, in house, or even adding in IAEA resources.  It has to included GE and other stake holders whos collective intelligence and historical understanding of such facilities are paramount to projecting faiure modes accurately.

----------


## Mid

> 4. Japan gov. has raised legal exposure limits, to maximize time for plant workers available on site, without legal ramifications. Next step is to draft older knowledgable workers willing to endure lethal exposure for the sake of their country. That is not a likely going to be a big turn out, if it comes to pass.


Let me state from the beginning that I appreciate your expertise ,

BUT the above is not a positive in my eyes .

----------


## mobs00

*Radioactivity forecast system down*


NHK WORLD English


 			A computer system that forecasts the spread of radioactivity has  not been working due to malfunctioning monitoring posts around a  troubled nuclear power plant in quake-hit Fukushima Prefecture.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says it does not know when the system will be back in operation.

The system, called SPEEDI, predicts how radioactive substances will  spread in case of radiation leakage from nuclear power plants, based on  measurements taken at various locations, prevailing winds and other  weather conditions.

SPEEDI data are intended to be used to draw up evacuation plans for residents around power plants in case of accidents.

The system is monitored at government offices, including the industry  ministry and the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency in Tokyo.

Friday's earthquake caused power outages around the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The agency says it cannot expect the SPEEDI system to function fully,  since many monitoring posts are not operating due to power outages.
 			Wednesday, March 16, 2011 10:25 +0900 (JST)

----------


## mobs00

ç¦å³¶å¸‚ã®æ°´é“æ°´ã‹ã‚‰å¾®é‡ã‚»ã‚·ã‚¦ãƒ[at]ã€€ç¬¬ï¼‘åŽŸç™ºç‚‰å¿ƒã‹ã‚‰æ”¾å‡ºã‹ - 47NEWSï¼ˆã‚ˆã‚“ãªãªãƒ‹ãƒ¥ãƒ¼ã‚¹ï¼‰




> *福島市の水道水から微量セシウム　第１原発炉心から放出か*
> 
> 
>                  　福島県によると、福島市の水道水から１６日、放射性ヨウ素とセシウムが検出された。福島県は福島第１原発  の炉心から放出されたとみている。国の安全基準を下回り、健康には影響ないレベル。
>                2011/03/16 16:36





> google translate:
> 
> The first nuclear reactor core or cesium released from the small amount of tap water Fukushima
> 
>  According to Fukushima, Fukushima City, 16 from tap water, were detected radioactive iodine and cesium. Fukushima believes that nuclear power was first released from the core of Fukushima. Below the national safety standards, no health effect levels.
>  2011/03/16 16:36


radioactive iodine and cesium in the tap water. Is this correct translation Robuzo?

----------


## misskit

*Radiation in Kanto area rises up to 110 times normal levels, but officials downplay threat*

Based on data compiled by the Mainichi Shimbun, atmospheric radiation levels across Tokyo and the six prefectures of the Kanto region rose sharply on March 15 to reach 7 to 110 times their normal levels, although local governments stressed that the values were not dangerous to humans.

"On the 15th, winds were blowing toward inland areas, including Kanto," explained the Japan Meteorological Agency. It is thought that these winds carried radioactive matter released from the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant and dispersed it over Kanto.

Remainder of article here:
Radiation in Kanto area rises up to 110 times normal levels, but officials downplay threat - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 4. Japan gov. has raised legal exposure limits, to maximize time for plant workers available on site, without legal ramifications. Next step is to draft older knowledgable workers willing to endure lethal exposure for the sake of their country. That is not a likely going to be a big turn out, if it comes to pass.
> 
> 
> Let me state from the beginning that I appreciate your expertise ,
> 
> BUT the above is not a positive in my eyes .


I agree.  It's not really a positive, not for the individuals.   I lost my first post that I spent time a lot of time writing, so I had to shorten it all up and try to hit the high points, so the labeling of changing exposure limits is not a positive.

Without lifting exposure limits,  Companies would have long term legal culpability at the hands of workers, their heirs, and as well as becoming subject to violation of government safe work practices.  Its positive in the sense that the government removed a road block, that will impact the ability to field work teams and extend the "local"option being fought at the plant now.

----------


## Mid

fair enough and again thanxs for the effort / input .

I admit to jumping on the point rather quickly as it jumped out at me .

----------


## koman

> Originally Posted by Mid
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by MakingALife
> ...


Desperate measures for a desperate situation by the sound of it.. When you have done all the possible things and nothing has worked, it's time to start doing the impossible things... just change the rules so legal liability for death and injury transfers from the company to the government....??

----------


## StrontiumDog

Some Tweets from Russia Today, from one of their journalists... some might be scaremongering....might not...

RT_com   RT                                             

            Efforts made to manage temperature, risk at No.5, 6 reactors - Edano #news #japan

            RT's Irina Galushko in Tokyo: 5th and 6th reactors are giving out, reportedly. All wonder what's going to happen to all of us.

            RT's Irina Galushko in Tokyo: info from various journos in the city says by Thursday all reactors will give out at Fukushima

            RT Irina Galushko in Tokyo: latest news -- Radiation of 1,500 microsievert per hour as of 4 p.m. near nuke plant.

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## StrontiumDog

Oh crap....

RT_com   RT                                             

            Reports: Helicopters unable to drop water on crippled Fukushima nuke reactor due to radiation #japan #tsunami #fukushima

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## misskit

Japan's science ministry has observed radiation levels of up to 0.33 millisieverts per hour in areas about 20 km northwest of the quake-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.　　

　NHK WORLD English

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## Mid

_BANGKOK - THAILAND'S public health ministry said on Wednesday that it  would hand out free iodine tablets to passengers at airports where jets  are departing for disaster-stricken Japan.

_Thailand to give iodine pills to Japan-bound flyers

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## MakingALife

NO problem.  You are correct to point out it is not a positive development.  Its not.  The feedback is appreciated.   

The shit is really hitting the fan there, and the only really positive outcome would be to achieve a stable cool down without major releases or major contamination.  

Long after issues are mitigated, the economic costs not only from clean up, but as well from power  infrastructure replacement costs, will be a long term fiscal hardship, passed on to rate payers in Japan.   Global assistance should be provided, which should include financial assistance - because of the human scale of these events, and a well because Japan's economy and production of products are key resources, in many other world economies.   

The impact of this event will rightly sew seeds, which will mature into full engineering re-evaluations for the related risk / reliability exposures of other existing and new build nuclear facilities, world wide.    So many facilities are build on the coastlines and river systems, what has happened in Japan,  could happen elsewhere about as easily, with some variations.   Blacked out nuclear sites with loss of emergency power - is the nature of this event, regardless of what created that circumstance.    It's what designers dismissed because of redundancy's built into systems.  Its the unthinkable that has developed here.  The security of plant back up power design based on redundancy / impact survivability failed to pass the real world test, given significantly larger event  scope.   

Focusing on this occurrence now, makes it a set of constraints that can be solved for.  Plant back up power will have to be solved and hardened into the future, by different thinking and risk evaluations.    

The parallel of risk modelers and lending protocols that failed to meet a real world test when asset valued declined and triggered the fiscal crisis -is pretty uncanny.  What looked good on paper, fell on its sword, amid events deemed way outside the box.     

Japan's Nuclear event will also impact important decisions related utility strategy for life extension of existing Nuclear plants that are beginning to touch their original 20 year safety and economic life cycle design. Japan's  event will make it more likely that life extensions will be deemed not appropriate,  and new builds with more modern designs will be the only nuclear path forward (for countries who have strong nuclear safety programs).

Such a future trajectory (OF securing old Nukes, scaled back and delayed New Nukes) - will greatly raise power costs world wide.  Many conventional fossil fuel generation assets in most of the G 8, and a large part of the G-20 are reaching for life cycle extensions for facilities nearing economic end of life operation.   The only new plant generational additions to the grid have been  Nat Gas / Cogen cycles or waste to energy.  There are plans to roll out alternatives, but as a percentage of generation capacity its still small.  

On a global scale - humanity is rapidly approaching passing the peak of current oil production.   Soon to be passing this PEAK OIL period, along with the economic shuffling that will occur post PEAK OIL.   There are no "easy" choices looking ahead towards meeting future power requirements.   

Sustainable Fusion power - was once a bright spot, when I left college in 79.  It was thought to be 15 years out at best.  Unlike fission, it fuses Deuterium into Helium, exploiting a different binding energy curve than fission uses.  No heavy nuclides, no Nuclear waste, minimal hazards.  But here we are 30 years later and Fusion still has not been worked out on a sustainable reliable basis with current technologies.

Nuclear has always been a reasonable current technology bright spot, as the beast of burden to supply power, along with the rest of the alternative energies (wind, solar, hydro, tidal, geothermal, hydrogen, and deep ocean thermals).  A proven technology designed to keep humanity from having to return to a low energy existence, stiffing progress that began with the machine age. Nuclear paired with hydro pumped storage, being the best symbiotic synergy of any paired future energy system combination, with current technologies. 

What is happening with Japans Nuclear facilities is a game changer.  The overall outcome will define how large of a game changer this event becomes. No one is comfortable accepting disaster.  Where that risk exists, it must be eliminated, regardless of cost, because the peril is high.   

Like many people,  I believe human intelligence, expressed through technology and engineering, have an innate ability and capacity to sift problems, develop solutions, and drive progress for humanity - respecting important resource and environmental constraints that underpin quality in life.   

What happens over the current Nuclear crisis, will kick a hole in people wallets, and many will put on thinking caps and debate risk vs social benefit. 

Governments and international bodies will as well be forced to question their role in accountability and regulation  as well.  At some point every operating nuclear plant gets rubber stamped before the first footer is dug, or first KW is extracted.  

Across the board everyone will carry a piece of this burden forward,  but for now -  The eyes of the world are upon Japan and all resources that can be brought to bear to minimized the potential downside that is rolling forward in time.

Not to worry about what is labeled positive.  The whole process is rife with positive and negative aspects, but the feedback has been appreciated.

----------


## OhOh

ZAMG - Aktuelle Informationen





Computer modelling of Radiation Plume in Japan and across the pacific. Its a german web site.

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## misskit

*SDF gives up on dousing No.3 reactor*

Japan's Self-Defense Forces have postponed a mission to dump water by helicopter on the No.3 reactor at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, because radiation above the facility has climbed too high for such work.

White plumes started rising from the reactor on Wednesday morning. Tokyo Electric Power Company says the vapor was steam caused by water evaporating from the reactor's storage pool for spent fuel rods, which is heating up.

In an effort to avert the fuel rods' exposure, a Self Defense Force CH47 helicopter took off from the Sendai base hauling a large container of water on Wednesday afternoon.

But the plan was aborted after radiation levels above the plant were found to have largely exceeded 50 millisieverts -- the maximum permissible for SDF personnel on a mission.

The Self-Defense Forces say it is ready to recommence work when radiation levels and other conditions allow.

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 19:06 +0900 
NHK WORLD English

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## Mid

just caught a news break on TV where it was reported that they are using a helicopter to drop water on the reactor in an effort to cool it ,

in the next breath the announcer spoke of icy weather hampering recovery efforts .

sounds to me like it's past time to get well away from it .

edit : see from misskits post #756 that this is already old news .

----------


## koman

> NO problem.  You are correct to point out it is not a positive development.  Its not.  The feedback is appreciated.   
> 
> The shit is really hitting the fan there, and the only really positive outcome would be to achieve a stable cool down without major releases or major contamination.  
> 
> Long after issues are mitigated, the economic costs not only from clean up, but as well from power  infrastructure replacement costs, will be a long term fiscal hardship, passed on to rate payers in Japan.   Global assistance should be provided, which should include financial assistance - because of the human scale of these events, and a well because Japan's economy and production of products are key resources, in many other world economies.   
> 
> The impact of this event will rightly sew seeds, which will mature into full engineering re-evaluations for the related risk / reliability exposures of other existing and new build nuclear facilities, world wide.    So many facilities are build on the coastlines and river systems, what has happened in Japan,  could happen elsewhere about as easily, with some variations.   Blacked out nuclear sites with loss of emergency power - is the nature of this event, regardless of what created that circumstance.    It's what designers dismissed because of redundancy's built into systems.  Its the unthinkable that has developed here.  The security of plant back up power design based on redundancy / impact survivability failed to pass the real world test, given significantly larger event  scope.   
> 
> Focusing on this occurrence now, makes it a set of constraints that can be solved for.  Plant back up power will have to be solved and hardened into the future, by different thinking and risk evaluations.    
> ...


Lots of good stuff in your posts, but there is one thing which keeps sticking in my mind.  This is a "nuclear event" caused by failure of some very "non nuclear equipment.   The weak link in this power station appears to be a backup power source which failed because of an earthquake/tsunami of unusual magnitude..and compounded by very old technology...which was due to be retired within months of the current event. 

 The fact that thirteen diesel generators all failed at precisely the same moment seems odd to me, even with the extraordinary circumstances of a major tsunami.   The maximum wave height recorded was 7.3 meters, (and I don't think the water  at the power station reached anywhere that level) so if the source of backup power had been positioned above the water level (whatever it was), I assume that it would not have failed?   None of the buildings appeared to be damaged by the earthquake shock wave so we have to assume it was the water that caused the failure.  

Surely it would not be that difficult to install a backup power system that would survive a tsunami just by installing the equipment well above ground level.... .....realizing that it's like closing the stable door when the horses ass is disappearing over the horizon....but very manageable for other stations around the world where a threat of EQ and tsunami exists.   I know for example that several nuclear stations are positioned in front of the Cascadia subduction zone off the Pacific NW coast in US...which has potential for a 9+ EQ and a very big tsunami to hit BC, WA and Oregon. I do hope they are reading this..... :mid:

----------


## misskit

*Quake deaths, missing exceed 11,000* 

The number of dead and missing from Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan has exceeded 11,000. This is the first time since World War Two that Japan has recorded so many victims in a natural disaster.

Police say 3,676 deaths have been confirmed so far, and 7,558 people remain unaccounted for.

In Miyagi Prefecture, 1,816 deaths have been confirmed, and 2,011 people remain missing. In Minami-sanriku Town, roughly 1,000 bodies have been discovered. Around 8,000 people, or nearly half the town's population, are missing.

Police have found several hundred bodies on the beaches of the Oshika Peninsula.

In Onagawa Town on the peninsula, about 5,000 people, or half the population, remain unaccounted for.

Iwate Prefecture has 1,296 confirmed deaths and 3,318 missing. A total of 373 deaths have been confirmed in the cities of Rikuzen-takata and Ofunato. Rikuzen-takata has 1,282 missing.

Fukushima Prefecture has confirmed 509 deaths and 2,220 missing. In Namie Town, the whereabouts of around 900 residents remain unknown.

_Over 440,000 people are in 2,400 shelters in northeastern and central prefectures. Some shelters have yet to receive food and water and other essential supplies.

Relief efforts are being hampered by a shortage of fuel for trucks and ambulances._

Wednesday, March 16, 2011 08:11 +0900 NHK WORLD English


Nearly half a million people in shelters and can't get supplies to them all. That is horrible.

----------


## Frankenstein

> [...] Sustainable Fusion power - was once a bright spot, when I left college in 79.  It was thought to be 15 years out at best.  Unlike fission, it fuses Deuterium into Helium, exploiting a different binding energy curve than fission uses.  No heavy nuclides, no Nuclear waste, minimal hazards.  But here we are 30 years later and Fusion still has not been worked out on a sustainable reliable basis with current technologies. [...]


  There is no reliable, usable fusion power as yet, but I think the final breakthrough may be very close. There have been many dubious claims and scams, but a 60 Minutes special on cold fusion ( 

 .   If he is wrong, or a scammer, it'll just fizzle out like the others, but if he's right we may well be in for one of the most interesting periods since, say, the invention of fire. And if Rossi's project doesn't prove to be viable for some reason, others will follow soon.

----------


## ceburat

> From the WHO



How long can 140,000 people stay holded up at home? What happens to them if there is a complete melt down?

----------


## Chairman Mao

So radiation is hitting main land USA then, according to OhOh's map.

Hawaii might be down a few future holiday makers too by the looks of things.

Poor ol Japan is totally fuked. Who's going to be importing their food or taking their family on holiday there anytime soon. And that's in it's current state, if something close to the worse actually happens then it's sayonara.

----------


## koman

> Nearly half a million people in shelters and can't get supplies to them all. That is horrible. misskit is online now Add to misskit's Reputation Report Post   	 Digg this Post!Add Post to del.icio.usBookmark Post in TechnoratiFurl this Post!


Just watched an item on NHK.  A nursing home full of old people just inside the 30km zone has no heat, and running very low on food and water. (They have cut the calorie intake by 70% to stretch the food supply).  Apparently they could not get anyone to drive a truck full of supplies into the zone! but at last someone volunteered an supplies are on the way.   People in shelters with no food or heat...and its snowing outside..     We do take a lot for granted in our daily lives.

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## Loy Toy

> People in shelters with no food or heat...and its snowing outside.. We do take a lot for granted in our daily lives.


So very sad for these fellow human beings. 

I just hope they can get these reactors under control and can safely get help to these poor souls.

----------


## BobR

> NO problem.  You are correct to point out it is not a positive development.  Its not.  The feedback is appreciated.   
> 
> The shit is really hitting the fan there, and the only really positive outcome would be to achieve a stable cool down without major releases or major contamination.  
> 
> Long after issues are mitigated, the economic costs not only from clean up, but as well from power  infrastructure replacement costs, will be a long term fiscal hardship, passed on to rate payers in Japan.   Global assistance should be provided, which should include financial assistance - because of the human scale of these events, and a well because Japan's economy and production of products are key resources, in many other world economies.   
> 
> The impact of this event will rightly sew seeds, which will mature into full engineering re-evaluations for the related risk / reliability exposures of other existing and new build nuclear facilities, world wide.    So many facilities are build on the coastlines and river systems, what has happened in Japan,  could happen elsewhere about as easily, with some variations.   Blacked out nuclear sites with loss of emergency power - is the nature of this event, regardless of what created that circumstance.    It's what designers dismissed because of redundancy's built into systems.  Its the unthinkable that has developed here.  The security of plant back up power design based on redundancy / impact survivability failed to pass the real world test, given significantly larger event  scope.   
> 
> Focusing on this occurrence now, makes it a set of constraints that can be solved for.  Plant back up power will have to be solved and hardened into the future, by different thinking and risk evaluations.    
> ...



I regretfully think this is the end of nuclear power.  It would be politically impossible to put any new nuclear plants into most any Country now.  China may still build some, but they don't seem to worry about what people there think.  
When this happened in Russia, that was easy to dismiss, because it was Russia. If this incident had happened in some 3rd World country, it might be easier to blame it on shoddy conditions, but Japan?  It would seem if they cannot do it right, no one can.  
Hopefully solar power is doable, of course the decision in most countries will be influenced by whom the money will flow to.  Certainly in America the lobbyists for alternative energy companies, oil and gas companies will be out in force.
One way or another, Joe Littleguy is going to pay a price for this.

----------


## Frankenstein

Solar will be doable in the long perspective but like Ray Kurzweil, I think we have a couple of decades to go before it can become our main source of energy.   It's a good thing that a reasonable amount of money has been invested in alternative energy lately, hopefully the trend will continue so the process can be sped up.

----------


## OhOh

> So radiation is hitting main land USA then, according to OhOh's map


Alaska appears to be getting hot. All the Chinese in Vancouver ain't going to be happy.

The map has been produced by this guy,

Dr. Gerhard Wotawa 
Office of Data / methods / models
Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics
Hohe Warte 38, 1190 Vienna

he may be reached at this email if you want to verify the accuracy.

gerhard.wotawa [at] zamg.ac.at

I am just sitting on a planet speeding through space

----------


## MakingALife

c


> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 
> NO problem......  The feedback is appreciated.   
> 
> ....  The impact of this event will rightly sew seeds, which will mature into full engineering re-evaluations for the related risk / reliability exposures of other existing and new build nuclear facilities, world wide.    So many facilities are build on the coastlines and river systems, what has happened in Japan,  could happen elsewhere about as easily, with some variations....
> 
> Blacked out nuclear sites with loss of emergency power - is the nature of this event, regardless of what created that circumstance.    It's what designers dismissed because of redundancy's built into systems.  Its the unthinkable that has developed here.  The security of plant back up power design based on redundancy / impact survivability failed to pass the real world test, given significantly larger event  scope......
> 
> ...


Koman,  You are indeed correct we would be unlikely to be looking at these major Nuclear issues, had it not been for the black out of electrical power, with reserve power failure.    To my knowledge, from info shared - there was no direct infrastructure damage to the physical nuclear units themselves.   No piping failures, no leaks, no condenser or cooling system damage, no loss of control automation, or telemetry at the facility.  The installation survived a major EQ without significant damage.   Same for the Tsunami aspects -  No reports of intake bay damage, cooling or condenser rupture from the wave impact or energy.    There wasn't even a report of cooling interruption based on water disruption such as a tidal egress in advance of a Tsunami hit.

From all descriptions,  these events tumble directly from the Reactor Unit T/G's going off line, and failure of standby power systems to recover power in the plant.  Without a station bus - little can be run.  They have opened crossovers and used turbine feed pumps to charge in sea water..... But doing all that takes time, and economics play into that choice as SW will damage components often can not be cleaned up.  So damage was done to the reactors, as these fall back plans were being executed.   No reserve / emergency power - Almost nothing normal can take place.  A lot of protection is lost.

Nobody at TEPCO is saying much about any details related to this issue.  All are quick to say the unit tripped off due to the earthquake event, and the Tsunami, with impacted their standby power systems. Sadly it is this specific issue (failure of standby/emergency power systems) to resupply the plant bus -  That is the root cause, from which these other issues tumbled.   

Often there is a reason for silence.  Usually because something is being covered up or not disclosed.  Speaking principally about other items (also important ones) deflects discussion away from this root cause.   You are correct its basically not even nuclear technology that has hamstrung the plant into disaster mode.

If I had a detailed site map, or even a one line drawing of their bus configurations..... It would be easy to shed light on some of the details important, that figured principally into this matter.   

Koman,  It could be so many things related to that EDG and back up power, It is hard to speculate.  

Chrenyoble as an event began from a test that was designed to see if sufficient momentum was present in the spool down of Main generators, so as to provide enough reserve power to run cooling pumps - for the 45 second duration needed before EDG's were able to take full load.   But they made a lot of mistakes on that track that precipitated their disaster.

Returning to the Japan EDG / Standby failure.  The probably of 13 EDGs failing on start up is ZERO.  I have many years experience with Marine diesels, and back up power systems.  Mostly Diesel engines are very hearty, once started, it takes a significant and big event to stop them - typically the will run till they self destruct.  IF the EDG's failed catasthrophically a few pictures would be worth a 1000 words.  No pictures, no story, no failure to show.....  These EDG's  are likely distributed on the site, so it is doubtful that a Tsunami could take them all down at once or nearly at once.     But TEPC0 fails to speak at all about any cascading back up power failures.  WHY ???

Failure of fuel system valves to be open or remain open - would fairly quickly stop an engine.   Inability to recognize that problem being the case and doing something about it quickly...  That is human error.....    
Failure to change over to a DC fuel booster pumps (battery back up driven) - if fitted to the system could impact starting and load acceptance.   If the failure of all EDGs was from this kind of occurance - Again its HUMAN error and TEPCO isnt going to flash this to the public, after they site is in major decay.   It would demoralize those that remain on the front line, and who rightly deserve KUDO's for their sacrifices.   

Just as TMI was caused by human error for failing to have (2) manual operated emergency cooling valves properly aligned....   This was not disclosed up front during the management of the crisis.

Failure of reserve power automation system on black out, would delay starting, but the station should have an emergency console with the ability to bring those EDG diesels up, in an override mode.   Even if this were down,  Every engine will have a set of local controls mounted near it (used for maintenance testing), and often these engines will have emergency starting / run controls mounted directly on the engines themselves.  So there are multiple avenues bring up diesels, even if the automation sequence fails to operate.

These emergency diesel engines of this size are normally started by AIR,  and pneumatic systems store energy in large high pressure air receivers.   These  EDG's do not need electric power to start.   Its proven technology as far as diesels go.   Understanding these simple things - Its possible for a good plant crew to overcome automation, fuel, or starting issues manually to get emergency diesels into service quickly -  If they fail to do so automatically.   This should be something well trained for plant personnel.....    If this is the weak link TEPCO will not talk or show that hand to anyone,  because they bare significant culpability if this is an issue that contributed to lack of emergency power.

EDG's running, but unable to generate power is as well unlikely.  Most generators depend on residual magnetism in the rotor iron, to immediately start building voltage as the machine is turned.   Voltage regulators take over as the electrical end reaches 1/4 to 1/2 speed.   Many emergency diesels will employ a manual field flash circuit, which will impress a DC voltage across the field for a brief period of time, as the machine starts.  This field flash comes from station batteries.   This item is normally included in diesels generators that function as emergency power - because with longer idle cycles it is possible that residual magnetism can be lost.   Again, none of this is new technology.  Used all over the world and very reliable.   Any EDG that starts should be capable of delivering power - because of the heartiness of the circuits that regulate the generator end.

LIkewise the automation to drive the start up sequence for these EDG's has full battery back up employed.   These sequences generally need to be tested at least monthly - even if they inhibit diesel starting.  Proving the functional of the standby automation - for such a key resource as emergency power   has to be a regulated and often tested function.   If TEPCO "gun deck's" (fakes and logs) these tests...   They should fry.   But they have not disclosed any failure of the standy by starting function.


So getting EDG's running (at worst could have been a manual event).   Generating voltage would be automatic (and often a manual field flash can be performed by Push button as well).   

The Emergency power supply issue is more likely going to be related to how these EDG's feed power the plant bus.   Its normally done through connections to an external bus usually located in the plants switch yard.   That plant bus gets normal power from stepping down of the Main Grid voltage.   The bus as well can accept emergency power from the EDG's.  That station bus then interconnects with plant equipment (through plant power lines that connect to motor controllers) for things like their cooling pumps etc.  

Given loss of Main GRID  (tripped off plant and blacked out grid).   The plant bus should be ready to easily accept power from the EDG's   All the breakers that interact to do that are automated, and as well are triggered by battery backed up controls. 

There are a whole host of other items items that could impact the EDG;s and emergency power delivery.  Stuff I could write about, but which would lose the audience here.... So what went wrong with this critical back up power system, has not been made very clear, by TEPCO.    TEPCO could easily make a remark's like.

"All emergency diesel generators shutdown shortly after start up, because of salt water intrusion grounding out the generators, activating EDG shutdowns... or tripping EDG's on GFault.... or tripping EDG's on over current, or tripping EDG's on differential fault protection."

or "Emergency power systems failed to supply power because of Tsunami damage and grounding of the station power bus in the switch yard area.  The bus was incapable of being safely energized because of salt water and the danger of arc flashover to ground"  

or "Emergency power systems failed to properly come on line because of Tsunami damage to the control relaying responsible for sequence starting and paralleling of EDGs to the station bus. By the time the issue identified and corrected back up battery banks for this operation were discharged "  

You get the picture... The description is easy.  Lack of description - imply's a cover up.     

The fact that the station bus was never able to be re-energized over a span of days suggest that some substantial damage was sustained to the external bus or swamping of the generator electrical ends.   Those two items are difficult to quickly correct.   However getting a diesel back in service after a little water problem or a fuel problem is a pretty quick fix....

Any major failures in the EDG or emergency power delivery systems significant failure issue,  should be easily photographed and shown.  Because emergency power loss put them on this disaster track,  It should be displayed in a photo / description what happened.   
But if it failure were actually easily preventable (Tsunami or not) by simple measures.... Such a disclosure reveals to the world that TEPCO has a competency issue for not properly managing a risk that was easy to mitigate.  

You get the idea.....  Lack of discussion and not transparency implys a responsibility level they do not want to accept...

it is well that you have revived this issue, which places responsibility for mitigation of overall plant vulnerabilities as a principal responsibility of a diligent owner / operator.    TEPCO  may not have designed the nuclear portion,  but they likely had a big hand in the rest of the station configuration aspects.

Changing topics a bit....  Even the issue of these nuclear storage pools....   They have cooling that probably consists of  water circulation pumps that move water through heat exchangers to cool the pool, or cycle the water through the condenser system.   equipment as well should be on the station bus.   The pump sizes and power requirements shouldn't be that large that alternative mobile generators could feed the pumps needed to cool those pools enough to keep them from boiling over.    They have had days to ponder and act on that question,  before ending up down to critical skeleton crews executing critical functions...  

Nuclear plant personnel and engineers are trained to make careful observation of trends and conditions, and follow established protocol.  They are not often taught to think outside of the box.   Its an environment where most outside the box undertakings result in sanctions and disciplinary action.   So the people who have made careers there - will not the most free thinking or innovative.   They march to protocols.  Japan itself has a rigid culture, build upon following customs with little deviance.    Under that context - they have done exceptionally well to hang on to the tail of this wild tiger.

----------


## Poo and Pee

> ZAMG - Aktuelle Informationen
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Computer modelling of Radiation Plume in Japan and across the pacific. Its a german web site.


this site is blocked from japan




> *Forbidden*
> 
>  You don't have permission to access /aktuell/index.php on this server.

----------


## Poo and Pee

> Solar will be doable in the long perspective but like Ray Kurzweil, I think we have a couple of decades to go before it can become our main source of energy. .


and japan will lead the way..

----------


## Loy Toy

> I regretfully think this is the end of nuclear power.


I don't think this will happen mate.

Like anything that has been constructed over the last 50 years nothing lasts and they will have to shut down and replace units with updated safer (if possible) technology.

Yes, an expensive exercise but to win back the consumers confidence they will have to make this step.

Fossil fuel as we know it will not last and nuclear power is the future.

----------


## Takeovers

> Fossil fuel as we know it will not last and nuclear power is the future.


No it won't unless fusion comes up. Uranium is limited, might last a few hundred years only if fast breeders are used.

----------


## StrontiumDog

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-b...0110317b1.html

Thursday, March 17, 2011

*Shizuoka 6.4 temblor unwelcome harbinger?*

  Kyodo News

    A 6.4-magnitude temblor jolted Shizuoka Prefecture and  its  vicinity, including Tokyo, on Tuesday evening, serving notice that   Friday's unfolding tragedy in the Tohoku region may not be over.

    No tsunami warning was issued and no major damage was  reported at  the Hamaoka nuclear plant in Omaezaki, Shizuoka Prefecture,  or at  Shizuoka Airport, according to Chubu Electric Power Co. and local   police.

     A total of 29 people were taken to hospitals by  ambulance  following the quake at 10:31 p.m. Two were seriously hurt and  27 had  suffered minor injuries, local authorities said.

     More than 21,000 households in Fujinomiya, a city in  the north of  the prefecture, suffered a power outage, and the water  supply was cut  off for 42 households, they said.

     The quake registered upper 6 on the Japanese seismic  intensity  scale of 7 in the eastern part of Shizuoka, and upper 5 in the  eastern  part of neighboring Yamanashi Prefecture, according to the   Meteorological Agency.

     Tokyo Electric Power Co. said its power stations are continuing to operate.

     Tokaido Shinkansen Line service was temporarily  suspended between  Shinagawa and Hamamatsu stations, while sections of  the Tomei and Chuo  expressways were closed.

     A blackout affecting around 22,000 households occurred in Fujinomiya, police said.

     The meteorological agency said the focus of the quake  was in the  eastern part of Shizuoka at a depth of 14 km. The agency  initially  estimated the quake's magnitude at 6.0 but later revised it to  6.4.

     The quake was not related to the massive Tokai  earthquakes that  occur every 100 to 150 years in the central Tokai  region, the agency  said.

     'Pluthermal' nixed

     The mayor of Omaezaki, Shizuoka Prefecture, said he  won't  authorize planned plutonium-thermal power generation at the city's   Hamaoka nuclear plant in the wake of the crisis at the Fukushima No. 1   facility.

     "It would be difficult to implement (the plan) from the standpoint  of citizens' feelings," Mayor Shigeo Ishihara told reporters.

     Chubu Electric Power Co. has been planning to start the   "pluthermal" power generation at the No. 4 reactor of the Hamaoka plant   after completing the central government's safety assessment on its   earthquake resistance and winning approval from Omaezaki and nearby   cities.

----------


## StrontiumDog

cnnbrk   CNN Breaking News                                             

            Japan #quake death toll stands at 4,314, with at least 8,606 missing, police say. Japan quake tsunamiThis Just In - CNN.com Blogs

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## StrontiumDog

*Japan Earthquake Swarm Google Earth Animation  * 

Quick video showing earthquakes in Japan between 9 March and 14 March. 1 hour ~ 1 second. Big one is around 1.17

----------


## StrontiumDog

Reuters: FLASH: IAEA head says core damage at units 1-3 of Japan's quake-hit nuclear plant confirmed, situation very serious #Fukushima

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## Muadib

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/wo...er=rss&emc=rss

*China Slows Nuclear Power Plans*

*By SHARON LaFRANIERE*

*Published: March 16, 2011   * 

           BEIJING  China  suspended approval on Wednesday of 28 planned nuclear power plants  while it revised safety standards, making the surprise announcement  after Premier Wen Jiabao met with top advisers to discuss Japans nuclear crisis.        

The government said it was also requiring safety checks at all existing plants.        
 We must fully grasp the importance and urgency of nuclear safety, and  development of nuclear power must make safety the top priority, the  government said on its Web site.        

The government also said that levels of radiation remained normal in  China and that experts had concluded that the wind would scatter the  radiation from Japans stricken Daiichi nuclear complex to the east over  the Pacific Ocean, away from China. This will not affect the health of  our public, the statement aid.        

Three days ago, before the gravity of the nuclear disaster in Japan was  clear, a top Chinese official restated Chinas commitment to nuclear  power.        
 Some lessons we learn from Japan will be considered in the making of  Chinas nuclear power plans, Liu Tienan, chief of Chinas National  Energy Bureau, said over the weekend. But China will not change its  determination and plan for developing nuclear power.        

China has been aggressively pursuing nuclear power as an alternative to oil and its main energy source, coal.  Officials have said that 28 new nuclear plants had been approved, which  would amount to roughly 40 percent of the plants now planned worldwide.         

Construction has begun on 20 to 25 of the Chinese plants, according to  industry experts and the World Nuclear Association, an international  group that promotes nuclear energy. Thirteen plants are already in operation, according to the associations Web site.

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 
>  [...] Sustainable Fusion power - was once a bright spot, when I left college in 79.  It was thought to be 15 years out at best.  Unlike fission, it fuses Deuterium into Helium, exploiting a different binding energy curve than fission uses.  No heavy nuclides, no Nuclear waste, minimal hazards.  But here we are 30 years later and Fusion still has not been worked out on a sustainable reliable basis with current technologies. [...]
> 
> 
>   There is no reliable, usable fusion power as yet, but I think the final breakthrough may be very close. There have been many dubious claims and scams, but a 60 Minutes special on cold fusion ( 
> 
>  .   If he is wrong, or a scammer, it'll just fizzle out like the others, but if he's right we may well be in for one of the most interesting periods since, say, the invention of fire. And if Rossi's project doesn't prove to be viable for some reason, others will follow soon.


Frankenstein,

I had a college friend, with the same program/degree who pulled a 4.0 average across 4 years, who left for MIT for pursuit of a Masters.  I ran into him 1 year later, and he was ablaze with excitement, because he had gotten sucked up into the Fusion research ongoing there.  It was all he could talk about, and I was hoping to hear stories about being balls deep in ivy league split tail...   But he had a strong vision solving fusion would materially change life and the standards of living for the plant.   I never really kept in touch with him, but he was on fire about it.

I looked a little at the Cold fusion question when it first gained notoriety, fascinating and somewhat unexplainable, but in may ways discredited because experiments were not easily repeatable.   Things that can be repeated independently by different groups in different locations, under similar conditions...  It gives credibility to the scientific method and gains acceptance.  Things that do not meet that test end up often discredited.    

In the case of cold fusion -  The science is still not clearly understood.  That does not mean the observations or data are false either.   There are aspects about matter and sub atomic particles that are still very far from being understood.   Science rolls forward, but earning knowledge in those areas are very costly,  because it takes very high energies to pry apart matter to see in side below the building blocks we know as protons, neutrons, electrons.    I remember attending a lecture at Brookhaven labs - talking about a new super collider that was under consideration for the mid west.    They were talking about trying to build it to operate using super conducting magnets, instead of conventional....   I raised my hand and suggested that they consider the idea of constructing (2) super collider rings, one atop the other,  spinning particles in opposite directions.   Effectively creating collisions of significantly higher energy's than striking stationary targets....    The moderators laughed a bit, and though it wasn't quite possible to do that yet.    It is my understanding that Europe now has a super collider that is built with counter rotating rings.    

At any rate -  It takes very high energies to split off sub atomic particles, and it is a very special field of physics.   At this point there is somewhere above 200 identified sub atomic particles are known to exist.... That is components that make up what we assume to be finite things (protons, neutrons, electrons).  They are not finite things.   These particles exist for very short durations, and the overall mapping of what has been discovered displays a very unique symmetry.  Folks who research this field, say that the research and what is uncovered runs a close parallel to eastern mysticism world view.   They say symmetry at this minute level of existence challenges philosophical dialogue, because it points more towards divine creation and mystic influence than any philosophical deduction is able to justify.  Randomness at that level would have been easy to accept,  but well defined symmetry in blows researchers away.  

Back in 79, when I attended that lecture about the super collider, we were invited to see collision experiment run.   It was in an aircraft loft like building, which had a structure built up that had a channel connection that led off a collider ring.    A target was positioned in an area this pipe like structure.  It was a few steps up on scaffolding. Surrounding this are was about 900 or so Geiger tubes, arranged in a 360 degree spatial array.   All had patch cords that were bundled up into large bands and disappeared into trunk openings in the floor.    I asked the guy....  Is that where you measure the reaction.   Yep He said.   Where do those cables go ??  -  They lead to detectors that feed data -  into that building across the street.   What do the do with that data ?   They run it through simulations.    How long does it take to get an idea of the results ??   Well he said.  We will be running the experiment in a few minutes.  You will hear it,  The experiment takes 1 nano second to run (10 -9 seconds).   He said getting well understood results, will take about 3 years of data manipulation through computer programs - to get a good appraisal of exactly what was detected here.    He said not only is the spacial array note orientation, and quantity of scatter, but energy and velocity like measurements are taken as well.   The set up yields a lot of data,  all of it is important to understand exactly what sub atomic particles were glimpsed or liberated in this process.

1 nano second to run - 3 years of computer simulation to understand.   That was 1979, when subatomic studies were still in relative infancy.   Having stood there, asked questions, and watched a test - It still blows me away to think about how hard won that kind of research involves.

Cold fusion -  I guess I have to look back into it, but I haven't in a long while.

MIT recently announced a potential new break through technique for their HOT Fusion process.   The issue has always been one of getting sustainable reactions, and containing the energy that care reach 30 M degree K.   Formerly they had resulted to encasing the reaction by strong magnetic fields, and working the process to create the hot fusion from there.    The break through (in the last year or so) involves the use of high energy lasers as the energizing medium that is being used with the fusion process.  It is a departure, that may bear fruit.   I skimmed an article,  when I was on chance looking to see if my friends name was still associated with the Fusion program he was engaged in in 1980.  On chance.    No luck.

I believe cold fusion is possible,  because matter and its properties while understood, are far from a complete picture.   Material sciences are now looking at developing programmable matter, through the manipulation of the outer valence electron configurations.  It is decades away, but it has been demonstrated on a nano level.   Same can be said for the development of Qbits, which are nano sized semi conductor gates, that can function like a transistor, but instead of a base 2 digital value (on or off) -  they can hold up to 2 to the 5th power of states, that are able to be multiplexed.  These are being built up into very small computer circuits.  Qbit computers.   It is cutting edge material science at its best,  but major computer laboratories are working in this direction.   Something like 9 or 10 have been made to function together at this point.   They have determined that every Q bit element added will double the computing power.   A goal of a 1000 Q bit processor has been on the drawing boards, and it's processing power has no unit of measure.   It has been suggested that the unit of measure be named an EM.  with 1 EM being equal to all the computer power in the world for the year 2000.  I don't have a good imagination, these are documented directional trends and areas of open research.  Firms in the Pacific NW hold patents of some of the processed they have developed to make these arrays and cycle the effectively.   The spin offs from such processing will have (3) principal areas of use.... 
1) For solving / developing complex algorithms
2) For cryptology pursuits -  1024 bit security encryption will be solvable in real time.   256 bit encryption will be solvable in a few clock cycles on the chip.
3) for solving the Schrodinger equation for the molecular energy and degrees of bonding freedom in complex compounds.  The spin off will be used in drug development, because complex organic chemistry combination will be solvable to reflect the ability of compounds to be uptake or influenced in physiology.  This will be a blunt instrument to rapidly birth drugs most likely to meet clinical trial needs, without all the research time involved before hand.    

Cold fusion, Hot fusion, Advanced high energy physics & material sciences and future impacts of developments in these areas, all sit on the same doorstep, but remain still slightly out of reach.  I am a believer in future developments, only because I know great minds with discipline and lab accumin are squarely on the trail of such extensions of human knowledge.  These topics are all worthy of some time spent surveying the landscape of research.  I've kind of gotten lazy in the cold fusion / hot fusion area,  but now you have made me curious to read about progress.      Sometimes the reading is a big stretch to grasp, and it only resonates for someone who has studies that connect before, or who are good self learners. 

I should find some links to the readings I have done before and post them for folks, as you have done here regarding the latest front runner in Cold Fusion.

Sorry to have strayed off topic here....

----------


## socal

*US Energy Chief Says Partial Meltdown Has Occurred At Fukushima, Urges All Us Citizens Within 80 KM To Evacuate*


         Submitted by Tyler Durden on  03/16/2011 13:38 -0400

Meltdown

_Update: Britain follows US in recommending all nationals in Tokyo and north of Tokyo evacuate_
More on the earlier news that  Steven Chu "thought" a partial meltdown may have occurred, the just  released news escalates the verbiage, which is now a definitive: "US  Energy Chief says 'partial meltdown' occurred at the Fukushima Plant."  The next step is his urgent recommendation for all US citizens who live  within 80 kilometers of Fukushima to evacuate or take shelter indoors.  Oddly enough, for the Japanese the evacuation radius is a fraction of  this, but it is probably due to the government's recent arbitrary decision to pick a  number of 250 millisieverts as the maximum safe threshold for NPP  workers. Somehow we assume this means Japanese DNA is about 2.5 times  more resilient to damaging alpha, beta and gamma radiation, than that  extracted from the US and all other countries. 
We urge Japanese  readers who have not already done so, to follow Chu's advice and to get  the hell away from Dodge, and evacuate to a minimum 50 mile safe  distance.

----------


## blue

i remember the chernobyl disaster in 1986  , most Nothern European banned the sale of dairy products , Britain did not ,i eat a lot of dairy and felt ill.

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## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 
> NO problem.    
> 
> The impact of this event will rightly sew seeds, which will mature into full engineering re-evaluations for the related risk / reliability exposures of other existing and new build nuclear facilities, world wide.    So many facilities are build on the coastlines and river systems, what has happened in Japan,  could happen elsewhere about as easily, with some variations.   Blacked out nuclear sites with loss of emergency power - is the nature of this event, regardless of what created that circumstance.
> 
> 
> I regretfully think this is the end of nuclear power.  It would be politically impossible to put any new nuclear plants into most any Country now.  China may still build some, but they don't seem to worry about what people there think.   
> ...


BobR;  Nuclear power is still the big crutch needed to get humanity through the next 30 or so years, till something better presents itself with the same kind of capacity.   To achieve this, the nuclear industry will have to be cleaned up, overlay-ed for higher reliability, regulated with greater transparency, and re-spoon fed to the public at large, to remain viable.  All tall orders to execute on.   The gravity you attach a sentiment people will hold about a  "Japan Nuclear Disaster" is pretty accurate.  People's first response will label Nuclear as unsafe, if Japan cannot handle it safely.    Remember the disaster origin will be traced to non nuclear origin -  being emergency power and black out recovery that triggered disaster events.  And the Nuclear parts of the plant were essentially not impacted from the EQ or Tsunami, only by the loss of station power.   




> Solar will be doable in the long perspective but like Ray Kurzweil, I think we have a couple of decades to go before it can become our main source of energy.   It's a good thing that a reasonable amount of money has been invested in alternative energy lately, hopefully the trend will continue so the process can be sped up.


Solar is a good geographic solution for some area's of the world, It isnt for all areas.  But like any alternative energy source - It will be used where its most easily implemented.  Solar remains well underutilized at this point.  Solar electric requires some storage capacity for resident small scale use.  Panel cost and storage, are rapidly falling, and with $100 oil -  Lots of alternative energy has economic room to flourish.  They only get more attractive over time.  Out in time,  Hydrogen will be the fossil fuel of choice, where it may be needed.  Fuel cells have been envisioned to become a family's self contained personal power grid.   Utilities will exist to meet industrial power needs, more so than residential needs.  These is the future landscape for first world countries energy users.   That will change again if Fusion is perfected.     2nd / 3rd world countries  will remain more grid centric for power needs, and clean fuels and clean fuel technology will arrive here last.

----------


## harrybarracuda

As an aside, while researching some of this stuff, I can across a BBC Horizon programme called "Inside the Chernobyl Sarcophagus". Fascinating stuff and well worth a watch if you can find it.

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## MakingALife

> As an aside, while researching some of this stuff, I can across a BBC Horizon programme called "Inside the Chernobyl Sarcophagus". Fascinating stuff and well worth a watch if you can find it.


My brother and I have talked about it a little, and i seems that that concrete structure is in danger of multiple failure.  in part from the cracking on the top surfaces, or from leaking rain water impacting fuel and core issues below in the damaged area.   Not good and stable like it once was...

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## Gerbil

2035: US officials have concluded that the Japanese warnings have been insufficient, and that, deliberately or not, they have understated the potential threat of what is taking place inside the nuclear facility, according to the New York Times. Gregory Jaczko, the chairman of the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, earlier said he believed that all the water in the spent fuel pool at reactor 4 had boiled dry, leaving fuel rods stored there exposed. "We believe that radiation levels are extremely high, which could possibly impact the ability to take corrective measures," he told a Congressional committee.

(from BBC)

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## MakingALife

I just read on a Japan news wire that a new power line is nearing completion that will bring electric power into the troubled power plant.  They hope to complete testing of this line soon and restoring plant power.   If this happens, it will allow restoration of a lot of plant services and coollng function.   It could stabilize the chaos, and allow a slow return to stable management of the cooling down of the reactors, and perhaps save the fuel pools from releasing material as well.    I hope what I read was true,  because it will be the only really good news related to this potential Nuclear crisis that has come in days of agony watching the train wreck in slow motion.  The world better keep their fingers crossed the new line delivers as expected and that they phase it in correctly to the plant bus.  So pumps and equipment revolve in the correct direction.   Being in the power business = correct phasing is a small detail for them.
 :cmn:

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## MakingALife

Duplicate post... sorry

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## Muadib

US Nuclear Regulatory Commissions recommends that US citizens evacuate the area of Fukushima #1 plant up to 50 miles away... 




> U.S., Japan set different evacuation standards around nuclear plant - Political Hotsheet - CBS News
> 
> *U.S., Japan set different evacuation standards around nuclear plant*
> 
> 
> Here's the question: how many miles do you need to be from the  Fukushima reactors to be safe? Here's the answer: Apparently it depends  on whether you're American or Japanese. Yes, an absurd answer -- but  that's the state of play in Japan right now.
> 
>  How did we arrive at this strange situation? 
> 
>  Before  today both Japan and the U.S. government agreed that people within 20  miles of the damaged reactors should evacuate. Today, America's Nuclear Regulatory Commission changed that to 50 miles. Japan for the present is sticking with 20 miles.

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## Muadib

A team from the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission arrived in Tokyo earlier today to assist the Japanese with crisis management... After evaluating the available information, it became apparent that the Japanese government is relying solely on information provided to them by TEPCO... Further examination have caused the US team to change their stance in the situation, describing it as "dire"... 




> http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/wo...17nuclear.html
> 
> *U.S. Calls Radiation ‘Extremely High’ and Urges Deeper Caution in Japan*
> 
> snip:
> 
> WASHINGTON — The chairman of the United States Nuclear Regulatory  Commission gave a significantly bleaker appraisal of the threat posed by  Japan’s nuclear crisis than the Japanese government, saying on  Wednesday that the damage at one crippled reactor was much more serious  than Japanese officials had acknowledged and advising Americans to  evacuate a wider area around the plant than the perimeter established by  Japan.        
> 
> The announcement marked a new and ominous chapter in the five-day long  effort by Japanese engineers to bring four side-by-side reactors under  control after their cooling systems were knocked out by an earthquake  and tsunami last Friday. It also suggested a serious  split between  Washington and Tokyo, after American officials concluded that the  Japanese warnings were insufficient, and that, deliberately or not, they  had understated the potential threat of what is taking place inside the  nuclear facility.        
> ...

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## Butterfly

> Folks who research this field, say that the research and what is uncovered runs a close parallel to eastern mysticism world view. They say symmetry at this minute level of existence challenges philosophical dialogue, because it points more towards divine creation and mystic influence than any philosophical deduction is able to justify. Randomness at that level would have been easy to accept, but well defined symmetry in blows researchers away.


interesting angle, yes it's hard not to believe in some kind of God the deeper we go in those fields as our understanding becomes more and more challenged by the strange dynamics of certain discoveries.

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## Butterfly

> it became apparent that the Japanese government is relying solely on information provided to them by TEPCO


so in short they don't have an independent government agency to turn to for that kind of catastrophe

it becomes more clear now where the responsibilities lies, not so much on the earthquake and tsunami but poor Japanese management, once more

This has been noted already by some in the early days of the catastrophe, now it's being confirmed independently by different sources

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## mobs00

Todays report

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## mobs00

for comparison - this was yesterdays report

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## mobs00

*White House Says US Citizens in Japan Should Listen to US, Not Japan, on Evacuation, but Refuses to Judge*

March 16, 2011 3:16 PM

White House Says US Citizens in Japan Should Listen to US, Not Japan, on Evacuation, but Refuses to Judge - Political Punch




> Armed  with new independent data, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Committee  Wednesday recommended that all American citizens evacuate the 50 mile  radius surrounding the Fukushima nuclear reactors.

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## mobs00

NHK live

Watch NHK World Live TV from Japan.


Showing water spraying and water drops from helicopters now.

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## mobs00

Japanese Earthquake Update (17 March 01:15 UTC)

by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Thursday, March 17, 2011 at 8:13am

https://www.facebook.com/notes/inter...02364423126685

Injuries or Contamination at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant

Based on a press release from the Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary dated 16 March 2011, the IAEA can confirm the following information about human injuries or contamination at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Please note that this list provides a snapshot of the latest information made available to the IAEA by Japanese authorities. Given the fluid situation at the plant, this information is subject to change.

Injuries

    * 2 TEPCO employees have minor injuries
    * 2 subcontractor employees are injured, one person suffered broken legs and one person whose condition is unknown was transported to the hospital
    * 2 people are missing
    * 2 people were ‘suddenly taken ill’
    * 2 TEPCO employees were transported to hospital during the time of donning respiratory protection in the control centre
    * 4 people (2 TEPCO employees, 2 subcontractor employees) sustained minor injuries due to the explosion at unit 1 on 11 March and were transported to the hospital
    * 11 people (4 TEPCO employees, 3 subcontractor employees and 4 Japanese civil defense workers) were injured due to the explosion at unit 3 on 14 March


Radiological Contamination

    * 17 people (9 TEPCO employees, 8 subcontractor employees) suffered from deposition of radioactive material to their faces, but were not taken to the hospital because of low levels of exposure
    * One worker suffered from significant exposure during ‘vent work,’ and was transported to an offsite center
    * 2 policemen who were exposed to radiation were decontaminated
    * Firemen who were exposed to radiation are under investigation


The IAEA continues to seek information from Japanese authorities about all aspects of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

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## socal

*All Mizuho ATMs In Japan Have Stopped Working*





Mizuho, the second-largest financial services company in Japan, has  just locked out its customers from accessing their cash. Whether or not  this is related to Zero Hedge reports from yesterday that the same bank  is unable to complete ¥570 billion in transactions in unclear. What is  clear is that we can only hope that those who need cash are calm and  collected enough not to start a physical run on whatever bank deposit  branches are open. From Reuters:  "Mizuho Bank said on Thursday that all of its automatic teller machines  (ATM) throughout Japan have stopped working. The bank did not  immediately give a reason for the outage." One can only hope that the  most recent ¥5 trillion injection was sufficient to keep the liquidity  in the banking system online. Alas, should the Mizuho situation not be  promptly fixed, we anticipate more injections from the BOJ before the  night is out. 
          Select ratingCancel ratingPoorOkayGoodGreatAwesome

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## robuzo

> *All Mizuho ATMs In Japan Have Stopped Working*
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Mizuho, the second-largest financial services company in Japan, has  just locked out its customers from accessing their cash. Whether or not  this is related to Zero Hedge reports from yesterday that the same bank  is unable to complete ¥570 billion in transactions in unclear. What is  clear is that we can only hope that those who need cash are calm and  collected enough not to start a physical run on whatever bank deposit  branches are open. From Reuters:  "Mizuho Bank said on Thursday that all of its automatic teller machines  (ATM) throughout Japan have stopped working. The bank did not  immediately give a reason for the outage." One can only hope that the  most recent ¥5 trillion injection was sufficient to keep the liquidity  in the banking system online. Alas, should the Mizuho situation not be  promptly fixed, we anticipate more injections from the BOJ before the  night is out. 
>           Select ratingCancel ratingPoorOkayGoodGreatAwesome


That is true, at least as reported in the Asahi this morning. I mean, the ATMs aren't working.

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## mobs00

'I Hope I'm Wrong': US Nuclear Chief Repeats That 'No Water' Left In Spent Fuel Pool In Japan

March 16, 2011 7:43 PM

'I Hope I'm Wrong': US Nuclear Chief Repeats That 'No Water' Left In Spent Fuel Pool In Japan - Political Punch

ABC News’ Matthew Jaffe reports: 




> U.S. nuclear energy agency chief Gregory Jaczko repeated to ABC News Wednesday evening that there is “no water” in spent fuel pool number 4 at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in the wake of last week’s disaster there.




*Pools Storing Spent Fuel May Present Biggest Risk at Fukushima*

By Kari Lundgren and Mehul Srivastava - Mar 17, 2011 1:08 AM GMT+0700

Pools Storing Spent Fuel May Present Biggest Risk at Fukushima - Bloomberg

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## mobs00

> *All Mizuho ATMs In Japan Have Stopped Working*
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Mizuho, the second-largest financial services company in Japan, has  just locked out its customers from accessing their cash. Whether or not  this is related to Zero Hedge reports from yesterday that the same bank  is unable to complete ¥570 billion in transactions in unclear. What is  clear is that we can only hope that those who need cash are calm and  collected enough not to start a physical run on whatever bank deposit  branches are open. From Reuters:  "Mizuho Bank said on Thursday that all of its automatic teller machines  (ATM) throughout Japan have stopped working. The bank did not  immediately give a reason for the outage." One can only hope that the  most recent ¥5 trillion injection was sufficient to keep the liquidity  in the banking system online. Alas, should the Mizuho situation not be  promptly fixed, we anticipate more injections from the BOJ before the  night is out. 
>           Select ratingCancel ratingPoorOkayGoodGreatAwesome



UPDATE 1-Mizuho Bank says its ATMs in Japan stopped working | Reuters


Mizuho Bank Computer Problems Disrupt Transactions - WSJ.com

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## mobs00

*Canada to advise 80-km Japan evacuation zone*

Laura Payton, CBC News Posted: Mar 16, 2011 9:24 PM ET

Canada to advise 80-km Japan evacuation zone - Canada - CBC News




> Canadian citizens are going to be advised to evacuate farther from the site of a potential nuclear meltdown in Japan, CBC News has learned.
> 
> The Canadian government is poised to follow the United States in recommending anyone within 80 kilometres of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant evacuate to a safer location.
> 
> Japanese officials have ordered the evacuation of everyone within a 20-km radius of the plant in the country's northeast, which was badly damaged in last week's earthquake and tsunami and is leaking radiation. They're also asking anyone within a 30-km radius to keep their windows closed.
> 
> The Americans took the tougher line on Wednesday, with the top official of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission warning at least one of the reactors in the plant is nearing meltdown.



Other countries are saying "holy shit! get as far aways as you can!"

Japan says, "don't worry, stay indoors, you'll be fine and make sure your wife shuts the windows."

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## mobs00



----------


## misskit

> "holy shit! get as far aways as you can!"


Self preservation instincts should have kicked in without this being said. 

Japanese trust their government and corporations too much. 

(That being said, their government/corporation are no less trustworthy than others.)

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## misskit

*SDF begins efforts to cool down nuclear plant*

Two helicopters from Japan's Self-Defense Forces are dropping water on the Number Three building at the quake-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The helicopters began dousing the damaged reactor-housing building at 9:48 AM on Thursday.

The SDF has dispatched two CH-47 helicopters equipped with a device for dropping 7.5 tons of water.

They're being accompanied by another helicopter that is measuring radiation levels above the plant. The first water-dropping operation was completed at around 10:15 AM.

Fears of radiation leaks are rising for the plant's two reactors, where water in the pool for spent nuclear fuel is believed to be vaporizing due to the failure of the cooling system.

This could expose the fuel rods, possibly causing them to melt and discharge radioactive material into the air. The government's emergency task force has asked the SDF and the police to cool down the reactor buildings by refilling the pool.

The SDF is also sending 11 high-pressure fire trucks from their bases across Japan to spray water on the reactor buildings.

A high-pressure fire truck from the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department is also set to begin spraying water onto the Number Four reactor building.

Thursday, March 17, 2011 10:34 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English



There is video of this also on the above address but I don't know how to link the video portion.

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## robuzo

> Japanese trust their government and corporations too much.


No, they don't. TEPCO has a particularly bad reputation. People won't be surprised at all to learn they weren't getting the straight story, they will have expected it.

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## Cujo

wouldn't water that isn't vapourized but exposed to the fuel rods and surrounds become radioactive itself? Where's that water running off to?

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## mobs00

*Scientists Project Path of Radiation Plume*

By WILLIAM J. BROAD
Published: March 16, 2011

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/17/sc...lume.html?_r=1





> A United Nations forecast of the possible movement of the radioactive plume coming from crippled Japanese reactors shows it churning across the Pacific, and touching the Aleutian Islands on Thursday before hitting Southern California late Friday.


This could devastate the west coast agricultural industry. Even if the the effects from Japan aren't that bad public perception could cause people to avoid agricultural products, including wine and fruit grown in the region.


Here is a forecast for the path across the pacific.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2...ml?ref=science

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## Butterfly

so TEPCO basically lied and try to "manage" the story, what a surprise, a dishonest "power" company

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## mobs00

> wouldn't water that isn't vapourized but exposed to the fuel rods and surrounds become radioactive itself? Where's that water running off to?





^^^ The ocean

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## misskit

> TEPCO has a particularly bad reputation. People won't be surprised at all to learn they weren't getting the straight story, they will have expected it.


Very true about TEPCO. 

The only news article I have seen in any of the Japanese papers questioning what they have been told about radiation spreading is Mainichi Shimbun.

This morning Japan Times carries this article:

*Angry public demands more info*
Angry public demands more info | The Japan Times Online

----------


## chitown

Japan’s nuclear crisis: Where things stand - Yahoo! News
*Japans nuclear crisis: Where things stand*

The ongoing crisis at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has  turned into what one analyst calls "a slow-moving nightmare," with  fires, leaks of poisonous radiation, and mass evacuations.
                 With events shifting quickly, and a sometimes  confusing succession of announcements coming from authorities, it can be  hard to get a clear sense of exactly what's happening, and of what to  expect going forward. So here's a rundown, based on several recent news reports, on where things stand five days in

*What's at the root of the problem?*
                 Friday's earthquake and tsunami caused power outages  across northern Japan -- including at the Daiichi plant, which comprises  six separate reactors. That in turn caused a failure of the reactors'  cooling systems, which are needed to keep the nuclear fuel from  overheating and melting down and/or triggering an explosion, releasing  poisonous radiation into the atmosphere.
*What's the current situation at the plant?*
                 Yesterday, an explosion caused the containment vessel  covering the Number 2 reactor to crack, releasing into the air a surge  of radiation 800 times more intense than the recommended hourly exposure  limit in Japan. One third of the fuel rods at the reactor were  reportedly damaged. In addition, another powerful explosion blew a  26-foot wide hole in the side of Number 4 reactor, causing fires to  break out and a pool containing spent fuel rods to begin dangerously  overheating.
                 The Japanese military tried to use helicopters to  dump water from the air to cool the Number 4 reactor, but that plan was  abandoned after a third explosion -- this one damaging the roof and  cooling system of the Number 3 reactor -- because it would have meant  flying a helicopter into radioactive steam. Gregory Jaczko, the top U.S.  nuclear official, said today that all the water was gone from the pool  containing the fuel rods at the Number 4 reactor -- an assertion denied  by a spokesman for the Japanese power company that runs the plant. If  Jaczko is correct, it would mean there is nothing to stop the fuel from  melting down, spewing radiation.
                 Water was also poured into the Numbers 5 and 6  reactors, suggesting that essentially the entire plant could be at risk  of overheating.
                 In what appears to have been an understatement, the  plant operator described the situation at the Number 4 reactor as "not  so good." But in some ways the rupture at the Number 3 reactor is  especially troubling, because it's the only reactor that uses plutonium  as part of its fuel mix. If absorbed into the bloodstream, plutonium can  stay in the liver or bone marrow and cause cancer.
                 Japanese officials said early Thursday they're close  to completing a new power line which would restore the cooling systems  for the reactors, but it's unclear when the line will be up and running.
*How much of the surrounding area is likely to be affected by the radiation?*
                 The government has told the roughly 140,000 people  who live within 18 miles of the plant to stay indoors, but has said that  people outside that zone can safely go outside. However, some experts  have accused the Japanese authorities of underplaying the severity of  the crisis. The U.S. embassy has recommended that Americans within 50  miles of the plant evacuate the area or stay indoors.
                 Tokyo, 180 miles south of the plant, has recorded  radiation levels only slightly above normal. Still, both France and  Australia have urged their nationals throughout the country to leave,  and many Tokyo residents have been staying indoors. One American couple  living in Tokyo told family they don't yet see a need to leave, but are  monitoring the situation closely.
*What other ideas are being considered?*
                 In what experts describe as a last-ditch effort,  police are hoping to use a water cannon -- usually used to quell riots  -- to cool the nuclear fuel. Officials have also proposed using boric  acid, which can help slow nuclear reactions by absorbing neutrons.
                 On Monday, 750 workers were withdrawn from the  facility, leaving a core of 50 to battle the crisis alone while exposing  themselves to potentially deadly levels of radiation. But even those  workers appeared to have been withdrawn today after a surge in radiation  caused by new explosions made the area too dangerous. 
*What are the best- and worst-case scenarios?* 
 The best case scenario is that efforts to cool the fuel rods succeed,  and damage to the surrounding environment is limited to an area within  about 15 miles of the plant. The worst is a full-scale meltdown of the  reactors caused by overheating, which would release much larger amounts  of radiation into the air than has yet occurred.  In that case, the  damage could potentially approach the level of the Soviet Union's 1986  Chernobyl disaster, for which estimates of deaths vary from 4000 to  close to one million. 
*How does the crisis rank, in terms of nuclear plant accidents?* 
 On Saturday, Japanese authorities ranked the incident a Level Four on a  one-to-seven scale used to rank nuclear accidents. but things have  worsened since then, and yesterday France's nuclear authority said it  should be classified as a Level Six. Chernobyl is the only Level 7  accident ever to have occurred.

----------


## Muadib

I would not be surprised if criminal charges are eventually be brought against TEPCO... Perhaps the CEO will commit ritual seppuku on the steps of the Imperial Palace...

----------


## mobs00

*30,000 people to be moved out of Fukushima Pref.*

NHK WORLD English

A city near the quake-damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant is preparing to move about 30,000 people out of the prefecture.

A part of Minami Soma falls within the plant's 20-kilometer zone, where residents have been told to evacuate.

Another part of the city is in the 20 to 30 kilometer zone, where people are being urged to stay indoors. The city says many of the estimated 50,000 people in the zone have moved out, but about 30,000 remain.

The city is preparing to shift those people out of Fukushima Prefecture, as shelters within the prefecture are already full.
Thursday, March 17, 2011 11:22 +0900 (JST)

----------


## mobs00

*US military restricts activity within 90km*

NHK WORLD English

The US Defense Department says it has provisionally suspended activities of US forces engaging in rescue operations in northeast Japan within 90-kilometers of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Pentagon spokesman David Lapan announced the decision on Wednesday.

The US military has dispatched 15 ships including the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan to aid Japan's disaster response efforts.

The spokesman says the measures are meant to prevent troops from being exposed to nuclear radiation.

Lapan also says in an exceptional case if troops were to operate within 90 kilometers of the stricken power plant, they would be given potassium iodine tablets to guard against possible acute radiation symptoms.

The US Navy revealed on Monday that low-level radioactive materials were detected on some of the helicopter crewmembers carrying out relief operations in northern Japan.

The US military has so far dispatched 2 fire engines to help Japan cope with a series of troubles at the plant, and it also says preparations are under way to send other equipment such as hoses and pumps to the plant.
Thursday, March 17, 2011 10:14 +0900 (JST)

----------


## mobs00

Kyodo News

NEWS ADVISORY: Cooling efforts not yet started at No. 5, 6 reactors: Edano (11:46)

----------


## misskit

*Yen surges to record 76-yen range against dollar*

NHK WORLD English

wow

----------


## mobs00

This French report is from yesterday and it seems things have not gotten any better since then.





> *UPDATE 1-French nuclear agency now rates Japan accident at 6*
> 
> UPDATE 1-French nuclear agency now rates Japan accident at 6 | Reuters
> 
> Tue Mar 15, 2011 4:30pm EDT
> * Situation clearly a catastrophe -- French safety authority
> 
> * U.S. think tank says disaster may reach level seven
> 
> ...








> International Nuclear Event Scale - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> 
> Level 7: Major Accident
> 
> Impact on People and Environment
>     Major release of radioactive material with widespread health and environmental effects requiring implementation of planned and extended countermeasures
> 
>     * Chernobyl disaster, 26 April 1986. A power surge during a test procedure resulted in a criticality accident, leading to a powerful steam explosion and fire that released a significant fraction of core material into the environment, resulting in a death toll of 56 as well as estimated 4,000 additional cancer fatalities among people exposed to elevated doses of radiation. As a result, the city of Chernobyl (pop. 14,000) was largely abandoned, the larger city of Pripyat (pop. 49,400) was completely abandoned, and a 30km exclusion zone was established. The Chernobyl disaster is the only Level 7 Event that has ever occurred.
> 
> ...



Japan still rates Fukushima at level 4




> Level 4: Accident with local consequences
> 
> Impact on People and the Environment
>     Minor release of radioactive material unlikely to result in implementation of planned countermeasures other than local food controls.
>     At least one death from radiation.
> 
> Impact on Radiological Barriers and Control
>     Fuel melt or damage to fuel resulting in more than 0.1% release of core inventory.
>     Release of significant quantities of radioactive material within an installation with a high [at]probability of significant public exposure.

----------


## robuzo

> I would not be surprised if criminal charges are eventually be brought against TEPCO... Perhaps the CEO will commit ritual seppuku on the steps of the Imperial Palace...


No, if he kills himself to make amends he'll likely hang himself.

----------


## robuzo

Mizuho ATMs are working again, Asahi says they came back online at 11 am and my mate told me he went and withdrew most of his money. Which I expect a lot of people are going to do because the fucking ATMs keep going offline, and not just Mizu-ho.

----------


## koman

> *Yen surges to record 76-yen range against dollar*
> 
> NHK WORLD English
> 
> wow


Speculators will always try to cash in on stuff like this..... like vultures sitting on the dead trees watching the cattle die.

"The time to buy is when blood is running in the streets"  Baron Nathan Rothchild.

----------


## koman

Just been watching TV footage of the CH47's dropping water on the spent fuel pools.  They are dumping from 300ft+ because of the crew exposure to the radiation.  Most of the water seems to be missing the target and just blowing all over the place, but I suppose they have to give it their best shot.   There's something a  bit surreal about it all.....with all the technology in the world and we are down to dumping buckets of water on it.... :Confused:     Same technique as putting out a camp fire... some camp fire.

----------


## Butterfly

> *Yen surges to record 76-yen range against dollar*
> 
> NHK WORLD English
> 
> wow


kind of strange, should be the other way around, unless they are trying to force it to crash afterwards

or unless they are run out of YEN, according to the ATM story

quite interesting reaction,

----------


## Butterfly

> Just been watching TV footage of the CH47's dropping water on the spent fuel pools. They are dumping from 300ft+ because of the crew exposure to the radiation. Most of the water seems to be missing the target and just blowing all over the place, but I suppose they have to give it their best shot. There's something a bit surreal about it all.....with all the technology in the world and we are down to dumping buckets of water on it.... Same technique as putting out a camp fire... some camp fire


I remember when this was happening over Chernobyl, everyone was commenting how the damn commies were incompetent and couldn't handle their nuclear reactor

I guess the well organized and capitalist Japanese are no different at the end,

----------


## koman

> Originally Posted by koman
> 
> Just been watching TV footage of the CH47's dropping water on the spent fuel pools. They are dumping from 300ft+ because of the crew exposure to the radiation. Most of the water seems to be missing the target and just blowing all over the place, but I suppose they have to give it their best shot. There's something a bit surreal about it all.....with all the technology in the world and we are down to dumping buckets of water on it.... Same technique as putting out a camp fire... some camp fire
> 
> 
> I remember when this was happening over Chernobyl, everyone was commenting how the damn commies were incompetent and couldn't handle their nuclear reactor
> 
> I guess the well organized and capitalist Japanese are no different at the end,


Well these are excellent 7.5 ton Japanese capitalist buckets carried by excellent American built helicopters.  In each case vastly superior to cheap nasty commie buckets carried by Russian helicopters of questionable airworthiness.... :Smile:

----------


## hazz

^^I think you will find that their is a massive difference. The former was fundamentally cased by carrying out unnecessary experiments on a production reactor that were already know to be very dangerous. The latter was fundamentally caused by not preparing for the sea defences be breached, knocking out all your generators.

Cooling is the fundamental fault in all current and planned commercial reactors. I cannot thing of a single major nuclear incident which was not fundamentally down to inadequate cooling of the core. I cannot see how anyone can claim that a reactor with cooling as a single point of catastrophic failure as ever being safe; for no other reason that there numerous examples where multiple redundant systems that should never fail together, as they have in japan, do fail together.

There are designs out there which can withstand the permanent removal of all cooling. But they have only ever been prototyped, these designs do have their own serious problems, but on the whole they are about the commercial life of the reactor than the thing blowing up. These all add up to financial risk, its much cheaper to build upon known designs, originally optimised for the production of weapons grade plutonium rather than safety.

----------


## crippen

Japan nuclear plant: Just 48 hours to avoid 'another Chernobyl'
Japan has 48 hours to bring its rapidly escalating nuclear crisis under control before it faces a catastrophe worse than Chernobyl, it was claimed last night.

Japan nuclear plant: Just 48 hours to avoid 'another Chernobyl' - Telegraph

. :Confused:

----------


## Butterfly

oh wait, I thought it couldn't be worse than Chernobyl,

guess the experts got it wrong once more,

----------


## crippen

Get out of Tokyo: Foreign Office tells all Britons to leave toxic radiation zone as Japanese 'lose control' of stricken reactor
By JASON GROVES


Read more: Japan earthquake and tsunami: French claim full scale of nuclear disaster being hidden | Mail Online  .
 :Confused:

----------


## Finney64

Good live updates here

Japan nuclear crisis and tsunami aftermath - live updates | World news | guardian.co.uk

----------


## HermantheGerman

Yesterday I listened to a radio report from a guy living in Japan. He runs some kind of restaurant hotel there. He said the truth has to be known about how the Japanese handle this crisis. Its a scandal. 
His restaurant is being visited every night  by foreigners (Experts), send there to help this nuclear crisis. In the evening they let out there frustration about how they are not allowed to help. In the beginning of this crisis, these experts wanted to go to work in the morning ....only to be send back in the evening.

----------


## hazz

^I don't think this is a surprise to anyone. After all the Japanese like to have long discussions and numerous meeting to make sure there is a management censuses of what to do before doing anything. Us westerner's are just a disruptive element with our constant bitching that there no more time for meetings, we need to do something now... its gona blow.

----------


## koman

> oh wait, I thought it couldn't be worse than Chernobyl,
> 
> guess the experts got it wrong once more,


Yes but if you read the Daily Telegraph article, one "expert" is saying "could be worse than Chernobyl" and another "expert" is saying "no it could not"   We can safely assume that both these experts are responding to the mass of conflicting reports and information coming out of the stricken area and neither of them have first hand information, so we are no further ahead.  

This story has completely overtaken the EQ/tsunami just because it has the word nuclear involved; yet even Chernobyl which so far has been by far the worst nuclear accident in history was only blamed for 57 deaths directly (with another 4000 or so from various types of cancers spread over many years)  That is terrible for sure, but tsunami's have killed hundreds of thousands of people between 2004 and today...including as yet an unknown number in Japan--but now  likely to be well over 10,000. 

 If we took all of the deaths caused by nuclear accidents, including those caused indirectly, the number would not come close to what we can expect from this single tsunami.  In fact the EQ/tsunami is the real culprit even in the nuclear event; as has been discussed in previous posts.  This has not been a nuclear accident in the ordinary sense...it is the result of a natural disaster which triggered a series of other events which may or may not have been avoidable....time will tell. 

 We need to know the real story behind the backup power failure. My own guess (and it's a totally unqualified one) is that something was seriously amiss  with the backup power setup and TEPCO is not telling....until it is dragged out them.

----------


## misskit

*Higher radiation levels continue around Fukushima*

Radiation levels at municipalities around the quake-damaged nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture continue to be higher than normal. But authorities say the detected levels pose no harm to human health.

As of 9 AM Thursday, at Fukushima City, 65 kilometers northwest of the Fukushima Daiichi plant, radiation level was 13.9 microsieverts per hour. This is more than 340 times the usual background level.

At Koriyama City located west of the plant, the reading was 2.71 microseiverts, 45 times the normal level.

South of the plant, in Iwaki City, radiation levels were as high as 20 times the usual level at 1.25 microseiverts.

At the Onagawa nuclear power plant 120 kilometers northeast of the Fukushima plant, radiation levels measured 3.2 microseiverts, 32 times the usual amount.

In Kitaibaraki City south of the Fukushima plant, radiation found to be 1.19 microseiverts, 23 times the normal figure.

But health authorities say one-hour of exposure to radiation at any of the observed levels would range between one 500th to one 40th of the amount of radiation the body would receive in a single stomach X-ray.

Thursday, March 17, 2011 13:57 +0900 

NHK WORLD English

----------


## Thetyim

From the BBC

"UK rescue workers say they had to leave quake-hit Japan because they could not secure the necessary paperwork from the British embassy in Tokyo.

The International Rescue Corps said they were not given permission to work in Japan because it would have made the embassy legally responsible for them.

A spokesman for the team said it was "gut-wrenching" to be stopped from helping by "your own country".

----------


## hazz

^I suppose the foreign office were thinking about the liabilities. The last time were were helpful like that to foreigners, we were rescuing hostages from the iran embassy. They thanked us by giving us a 4 million pound bill for the repairs.

Still its not acceptable behaviour, on the part of the embassy or the Japanese government

----------


## MakingALife

Sorry to say, as more independent experts are able to gain more information -  The picture for avoiding a major nuclear release is becoming bleaker by the moment.  

USNRC reporting No.4 fuel pool boiled dry. 
Other reports of higher radiation levels now present.
The window of opportunity is closing for bringing stability to an unstable situation.  

France  Nuclear experts have now put a rough 48 hour window, when its expected the facility will be too hot for local intervention.   

Regardless of what ever comes from this catastrophy, Japan is going to take it in the shorts - and will be judged to have adopted a "reactive posture" to events, instead of a "proactive posture" when the full forensic analysis is performed by IAEA and other groups.    Japan had days of opportunity to address the fuel pool issues, but didnt pick up that ball, till the pools were gassing off and rad levels were climbing.   The cooling requirements for these pools are much lower than dealing with the overheated reactor cores.   A divide and conquer startegy  (dealing with the core's and the pools early)  - could have gotten them out of the empty fuel pools and expanding hot zone.     These added risk factors and future developments from these pools are going to close off the "local" remediation option with site workers.     There has been no talk or discussions to put remote cooling capacity in play as well.   Something that would give continued cooling, even if the "local" manned option had to be withdrawn. At a minimum -  A three pronged attack would have put them ahead of the game.    

Instead Japan "reacted" serially to these cascading events,  with out any pro-active anticipation.   Sorry but they will be judged poorly in strategy, despite the heroic efforts of people on the ground.

----------


## Gerbil

> International Rescue Corps


Isn't that this mob?

----------


## misskit

*TEPCO struggles to get crucial data needed to help cool nuclear reactors*

excerpts

The Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) has been struggling unsuccessfully to secure crucial data needed to deal with overheating reactors as key indicators at its quake-stricken nuclear power plant have stopped functioning.The first trouble came when tsunami waves hit and submerged the emergency power generator, shutting off power for the nuclear plant completely. Although temporary batteries were brought into the central control room, they do not produce enough power.

"As the batteries do not generate enough power, we cannot properly control the measuring instruments. We don't know how much we can trust the data obtained from the measuring instruments we are using now," said a TEPCO official.

In addition, many of the manometers and water gauges that could be used to monitor the status of the reactors indirectly appear to have broken down.

Fire engines have been used to pump water into the No. 1, 2, and 3 reactors, but there are no sings of water levels rising. A government official said: "The water gauge may not be showing accurate figures."

While all key devices have broken down, the radiation levels within the central control room are so high that workers cannot stay there all the time to check the measuring instruments.

TEPCO struggles to get crucial data needed to help cool nuclear reactors - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## mobs00

*S. Korea urges nationals within 80 km of crippled-reactors to evacuate*

SEOUL, March 17, Kyodo

S. Korea urges nationals within 80 km of crippled-reactors to evacuate | Kyodo News

The South Korean government on Thursday urged its citizens living within an 80-kilometer radius of the earthquake-crippled nuclear reactors in Fukushima Prefecture to evacuate.

The U.S. Embassy in Japan has asked American citizens living within an 80-km radius of the Fukushima No. 1 power station to evacuate as a precautionary measure.

South Korea's Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Kim Sung Hwan said the South Korean government has issued a similar advice to its citizens.

==Kyodo

----------


## misskit

*Frustrated with TEPCO, Kan turns to SDF in nuclear crisis*

excerpts

"In the worst case scenario, we have to assume that all of eastern Japan would be wrecked. The Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) has almost no sense of urgency whatsoever."

So said Prime Minister Naoto Kan at a meeting with special advisor to the Cabinet Kiyoshi Sasamori on the night of March 16. Handling of the crisis had been entrusted to the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency and plant operator TEPCO. However, with the reactors' immediate surroundings now being bombarded with high radiation levels and the "worst case scenario" just on the horizon, the prime minister has turned the dangerous mission over to the Self-Defense Forces (SDF).

The SDF used Chinook heavy transport helicopters to dump water primarily on reactor No. 3, which may have a damaged reactor vessel.

"This is a battle against radioactivity," a senior Defense Ministry official stated. "Unfortunately, with the pass-over method, the water dissipates and there isn't much of a cooling effect," he added with concern.

The same staff officer added that "if it's nuclear power know-how that's needed, then there's no-one to turn to but the U.S. military," hoping U.S. forces would join the SDF in dealing with the overheating reactors.

However, the U.S. military -- which has nine navy vessels in the area including the aircraft carrier USS Ronald Reagan assisting with quake relief and search and rescue operations -- is openly worried over radiation exposure. The U.S. military contributed two pumper trucks to TEPCO for use in the cooling effort, but has not joined the operation on the ground. Furthermore, the U.S. Navy is shifting the position of its fleet off the east coast of the disaster zone to avoid fallout carried by wind.

"We can't ask the U.S. military to take on the most dangerous duty before the SDF even tries," said one SDF staff officer.


Frustrated with TEPCO, Kan turns to SDF in nuclear crisis - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## mobs00

*Bungling, cover-ups define Japanese nuclear power*

The Associated Press: Bungling, cover-ups define Japanese nuclear power

(AP) – 30 minutes ago




> TOKYO (AP) — Behind Japan's escalating nuclear crisis sits a scandal-ridden energy industry in a comfy relationship with government regulators often willing to overlook safety lapses.



(much more at the link)

----------


## Takeovers

> i remember the chernobyl disaster in 1986 , most Nothern European banned the sale of dairy products , Britain did not ,i eat a lot of dairy and felt ill.


That would be radiation sickness. For radiation sickness you need many orders of magnitude higher doses than experienced in Central Europe. The only ones who had actual radiation sickness were those working on site at the reactor itself to contain the damage.

The dairy ban was for limiting long term effects that might cause cancer decades on.

----------


## Mid

_Arriving passengers from Japan are getting a screening for possible  radiation and outgoing passengers are getting iodine (inset) as Asia is  rivetted on the battle to contain the nuclear reactors._

bangkokpost.com

----------


## Thaihome

As MakingALife has said, it seems like the Japanese did not try to anticipate what was going to happen and only reacted to each crisis as it occurred.

The only proactive action they seem to have taken is to try and get a new power line in and get the plant's pumps going.  

That sure appears to be an all or nothing gamble.
TH


*New Power Lines Could Help Ease Fukushima Nuke Crisis*

*By: Christy Choi* 


 
(AP / Koji Sasahara)


Japanese officials said Thursday local time that new power lines could restore electricity to the Fukushima plant, potentially easing the ongoing nuclear crisis.

The line could revive the electric-powered water pumps needed to lower temperatures and pressure that have led to partial meltdowns in three reactors. Workers are currently manually pumping in seawater.  Japanese military helicopters also dumped seawater on Unit 3 of the Fukushima plant, but videos of the maneuver appear show much of the water being dispersed by the wind.

Tokyo Electric Power Company spokesman Naoki Tsunoda said the power line is almost complete and plans are in place to try to restore power "as soon as possible," but could not say exactly when this would be. The company is also trying to repair an existing power line.

While measures are under way to cool reactor 3, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Gregory Jaczko warned that all the water was gone from a separate spent fuel pool at the plant's Unit 4. Japanese officials expressed similar worries, but added that it was impossible to be sure of its status because monitoring equipment was down.They've requested that special police to bring in water cannons to spray into the spent fuel storage pool at unit 4. (Via AP)

----------


## misskit

*Radiation fears hamper delivery of goods to areas near troubled nuclear* 

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/...na016000c.html


Not enough fuel to cremate bodies. The little fuel they have is being used for heating in evacuation centers.

----------


## hazz

> Sorry to say, as more independent experts are able to gain more information -  The picture for avoiding a major nuclear release is becoming bleaker by the moment.  
> 
> USNRC reporting No.4 fuel pool boiled dry. 
> Other reports of higher radiation levels now present.
> The window of opportunity is closing for bringing stability to an unstable situation.  
> 
> France  Nuclear experts have now put a rough 48 hour window, when its expected the facility will be too hot for local intervention.   
> 
> 
> Instead Japan "reacted" serially to these cascading events,  with out any pro-active anticipation.   Sorry but they will be judged poorly in strategy, despite the heroic efforts of people on the ground.


Fundamentally this whole situation is the result of having no plan or infrastructure to deal with a wave breaching the sea defences and breaking the generators. I have no idea about the power requirements or voltages involved in the pumps; You would have thought they could have created a collection of portable generators in a collection of shipping creates that they could helicopter in. I've seen this done with 8MW requirements.

----------


## Butterfly

indeed, the management of the crisis in typical Asian style, that is denial of a problem, might be the real reason we are here

if they had said from the beginning it wasn't working, I am sure an international effort to bring portable water pump on site would have been found

----------


## misskit

*Radiation level unchanged despite choppers dousing reactor*

Radiation level unchanged despite choppers dousing reactor - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## misskit

*Gov't warns of massive blackout in Tokyo area*

Kyodo News

The government warned that an unpredictable massive blackout could occur in the Tokyo area from the evening through the night Thursday as power demand in the region has increased overnight due to cold temperatures.

Gov't warns of massive blackout in Tokyo area | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Moonraker

Well it's not _that_ unpredictable though, is it?

----------


## mobs00

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-573238




> iReport —
> I am roughly sixty to seventy kilometers due west  from the nuclear plants that the Japanese authorities are struggling so hard to control. I witnessed two military helicopters fly over. Now, I am watching those same helicopters dropping water and attempting to cool those plants on the in-dash television of my car. This is as close as I am able to get to the plant. The video shows the needle of my Bicron PGM slamming the right side of the meter. I was taught in specialized training for this trip that, if this happened, I was to flee the area.
> 
> Sorry for any spelling typos or grammar mistakes. It's hard to edit while fleeing and, simultaneously, using CNN APP.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Latest Al Jazeera blog .... includes some stuff from previous posts..

Disaster in Japan: March 17 Live Blog | Al Jazeera Blogs


A cyclist passes a mound of rubble - topped by a boat - in Kesennuma [Photo: GALLO/GETTY]

*11:28pm       * 

  BBC film-maker Adam Curtis has posted a worrying blog about boiling water reactors, the design used at Fukushima Daiichi. 

According  to a documentary he made previously, the potential dangers of  these  models - namely in the cooling systems  - were known about  decades ago 

You can watch the film here.

*10:10pm       * 

Andrew Thomas, our correspondent in Osaka, just tweeted:Two big aftershocks in the space of the last half hour - and both close to the original 'Big One's' epicentre*10:00pm       * 

 The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi power plant has said that   electricity could be connected to the plant on Thursday, the Reuters   news agency has reported.

Tokyo Electric Power Co has said it  hopes to connect outside power  cables to two of the plant's six reactor  units in a bid to restart  cooling pumps knocked out last Friday. 

*8:14pm       * 

  The rescue effort in Japan  continues despite bad weather in northeast  of the country. Below a  recent photo of a rescue worker standing on  top of a burned vehicle  looking for more bodies hidden amongst the  rubble of in the town of  Kesennuma, in Miyagi province. [Getty]


*7:48pm       * 

  Emergency crews temporarily withdrew a water cannon from the   Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex because of high radiation levels,   broadcaster NHK says.  

The water cannon had been called in to  spray the Fukushima Daiichi  complex's number 3 reactor, which contains  plutonium fuel and has been  the top priority for authorities.

*6:44pm       * 

  Israel’s main newspaper Yediot Ahronot highlights a different concern following Japan's disaster: Israel fears sushi shortage after quake

*6:28pm       * 

  South Korean officials detected unusually high levels of  radiation on  three passengers arriving from Japan on the first day of  such checks  at the country's main Incheon airport, news reports say.

A  Japanese man in his 50s who is believed to have lived in the  Fukushima  prefecture had a reading exceeding 1 microsieverts from his  hat and  coat, which is several times the normal reading, South Korea's  Yonhap  news agency says.

The level poses no public health risk and  officials will release the  three passengers, according to YTN  television. South Korea's nuclear  safety agency has said it considered  300 nanosieverts per hour as the  ceiling of normal level of radiation in  atmosphere. One microsievert  translates to 1,000 nanosieverts. The  checks at the airport were  voluntary, a Reuters photographer at the  airport says.

*6:17pm       * 

  The British Foreign and Commonwealth Office advises against all   non-essential travel to Tokyo and the North East of Japan. British   nationals in these areas should consider leaving, reads a statement on its web site.

*4:55pm       * 

  This interactive map shows the extent of the devastation after Friday's 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami: Tracking Japan's disaster

*4:55pm       * 

 Three of the six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant are now relatively stable, officials say. 

"The  first unit is relatively stable, for now," Hidehiko Nishiyama, a  senior  official at the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Administration. 

He said reactors 5 and 6 were being powered by a shared diesel generator.

----------


## Takeovers

Just in the news here. The landmass has not only shifted a few meters. It is also lower now than before. The coming full moon will cause some of the highest tides this year and will cause flooding of coastal areas that have never been flooded in the past.

The only disaster missing in the scenario is now a meteor strike.

----------


## Muadib

^ You forgot locusts and the plague...

----------


## Thormaturge

> indeed, the management of the crisis in typical Asian style, that is denial of a problem, might be the real reason we are her


The chief problem in all of this is designing the sites for these reactors in the belief that the maximum intensity earthquake would be no more than 7.5.

California is working to the same criteria.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://www.nationmultimedia.com/2011...-30151176.html
*
*Travellers from Japan tested for radiation*

                            By Pongphon Sarnsamak
The Nation
                                             Published on March 18, 2011                


*People coming from Japan  are being scanned for  radiation contamination at Suvarnabhumi Airport  as a precautionary  measure, while initial tests show that food products  imported from the  disasterstricken country are safe for consumption,  Thai health  authorities said yesterday.*

                                                            Public  Health Minister Jurin Laksanawisit said  passengers from Fukushima  Daiichi and areas close to the nuclear reactor  explosions are advised  to seek medical treatment immediately if they  develop a skin rash,  nausea, severe diarrhoea or become unnaturally pale  - a symptom of  radiation affecting the digestive or circulatory system.  

Treatment for radiation will be provided at Rajavithi Hospital and Nopparat Rajathanee Hospital. 

Jurin,  who visited the health checkpoint at the airport yesterday, said  that  as of 6pm yesterday, 1,842 passengers from Japan had arrived in  Thailand  since Wednesday. Of this number, 550 passengers were Thai  nationals and  so far, only 10 people have sought medical advice at the  airport. 

"There have been no reports about radiation contamination in humans," he said.  

Two  health checkpoints have been set up at the airport. The first one  is at  the arrivals gate, where arriving tourists are offered medical  advice,  and the second has been set up at the departure gate, where  people  travelling to Sendai or other affected areas are provided with  potassium  iodide, which is believed to help protect the thyroid gland.  The  ministry has prepared 15,000 of these tablets. The dose for  children is  half a tablet per day, while adults should take a full  tablet.

People  with skin disease and iodine allergy as well as pregnant women,  and  those with hyperthyroidism are advised against taking potassium  iodide,  as it would have an adverse effect.  

"This is a precautionary measure to take care of travellers from Thailand," Jurin said.

The  ministry's permanent secretary Dr Paijit Warachit said they were   monitoring the situation in Japan and had learned that areas within a   30kilometre radius of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant were not safe.   

However, six Thai people living in Sendai were found free of contamination. 

"So far, there have been no reports about radiation contamination in Japan, and people should not panic," Paijit advised. 

Meanwhile,  the Food and Drug Administration's secretarygeneral Dr Pipat  Yingseri  said tests on food products imported from Japan, so far, have  turned up  negative on radiation. The agency is testing fish and  strawberries  imported from Japan, and the results will be revealed  today.

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by misskit
> 
> 
> *Yen surges to record 76-yen range against dollar*
> 
> NHK WORLD English
> 
> wow
> 
> ...


Butterfly, the Yen is trending up, is based on currency traders expectation that Japan will repatriate some of her currency holding out side japan back into Japan as Yen.  These transactions involve selling foreign curre ncy holdings and purchasing Yen for repatriation.  This activity naturally puts Yen in demand, and the currencies sold off in lower demand.    This is net positive for Yen valuation.   The very same effect took place shortly after the KOBE EQ event.  

Your are correct, that it makes no logical sense, as overall value in Japan has dropped as a result of the devastation.   But all currencies like any commodity are subject to supply and demand influences.  Repatriating currency for the anticipated expenses that will be involved in Japan, will drive up Yen valuation because these transactions result in Yen purchase and selling off of other currencies.

----------


## MakingALife

> *TEPCO struggles to get crucial data needed to help cool nuclear reactors*
> 
> TEPCO struggles to get crucial data needed to help cool nuclear reactors - The Mainichi Daily News


I missed your post earlier,  however reading it and the link material, is very troubling.   Lost of key manometers and pressure gauges, as well as dubious level readings,  and suggestions that some remote readings give very questionable data....   It make any situation easily prone to being mis-read.   

This point has obviously been picked up by others, and is perhaps part of the basis why France and others are saying that the ability to manage the control of the situation appears lost.   The amount of pressure in the reactor vessels - that ultimately required emergency venting - is likely high enough to damage some of these sensitive instruments.   The post is correct to report that with smaller crews, and the current radiation levels - it is simply not possible to make significant correction of these indicators, across multiple reactors with the small group of workers in the plant.   Obviously their priorities are higher as well.   

What's been pointed out here in this post - IS another very important consideration, which should be addressed across other Nuke plants..  The hardiness of the instrumentation to withstand emergency venting and higher backgound radiation levels.   Two conditions which should be rare in a functioning Nuclear plant,  but which are common to plants undergoing cooling impacted complications.  This is no small point, and observations of instrumentation failure (in the wake of emergency vetting and high background radiation levels)...

----------


## StrontiumDog

12:13am        

  An employee of Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), which operates the   nuclear power plant at Fukushima Daiichi, is said to have taken this video showing the damage at the six reactors from a military helicopter circling the site. 

It  was broadcast on News23, the 11 o'clock news programme on  broadcaster  TBS. According to the presenter, water is able to be seen  inside one of  the buildings.

----------


## misskit

*TEPCO hopes to cool No.2 reactor on Friday*

Tokyo Electric Power Company hopes to activate the cooling system of the No.2 reactor at its Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant as early as Friday night after restoring power to the system.

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*Victims' health growing concern*

The Yomiuri Shimbun

Medical support is desperately needed at the shelters in the quake zone as the threat of influenza and other infectious diseases grows.

Conditions appear to be worsening in the Tohoku region due to the lack of sufficient food, water, medicine and heating supplies. This is especially true in the shelters along the Pacific coast--including in the Kanto region--which was ravaged by the earthquake and ensuing tsunami last Friday.

There also has been growing concern about the victims' health in the difficult living environment. In fact, there have been reports of deaths caused by quake-induced shock and the stress of day-to-day life.

remainder of article here:
Victims' health growing concern : National : DAILY YOMIURI ONLINE (The Daily Yomiuri)

----------


## misskit

*6 days on, govt still looking for aid supply plan*

6 days on, govt still looking for aid supply plan : National : DAILY YOMIURI ONLINE (The Daily Yomiuri)

----------


## Butterfly

> Butterfly, the Yen is trending up, is based on currency traders expectation that Japan will repatriate some of her currency holding out side japan back into Japan as Yen. These transactions involve selling foreign curre ncy holdings and purchasing Yen for repatriation. This activity naturally puts Yen in demand, and the currencies sold off in lower demand. This is net positive for Yen valuation. The very same effect took place shortly after the KOBE EQ event.


yep, the only explanation. That and overseas help to fund the "relief" operations might be putting short term pressure on the existing supply of YEN.




> Your are correct, that it makes no logical sense, as overall value in Japan has dropped as a result of the devastation. But all currencies like any commodity are subject to supply and demand influences. Repatriating currency for the anticipated expenses that will be involved in Japan, will drive up Yen valuation because these transactions result in Yen purchase and selling off of other currencies.


it's all short term though unless the needed capital takes forever to repatriate. Could explain why the BoJ was so quick to inject cash into the system, like cooling water in a nuclear reactor  :Razz:

----------


## Butterfly

> An employee of Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), which operates the nuclear power plant at Fukushima Daiichi, is said to have taken this video showing the damage at the six reactors from a military helicopter circling the site.


it does look like the Chernobyl accident, except we don't get to see the reactor split open with the red hot nuclear fuel inside

----------


## Gerbil

^

...... yet!  :Sad:

----------


## Butterfly

another reason why Asians, or Americans for that matter, shouldn't run a nuclear operation

their management are too greedy or live too much in denial for them to be reliable operators of such complex system

They should leave all the nuclear operations to the only true leaders in that field, the French  :Smile:

----------


## Rural Surin

> another reason why Asians, or Americans for that matter, shouldn't run a nuclear operation
> 
> their management are too greedy or live too much in denial for them to be reliable operators of such complex system
> 
> They should leave all the nuclear operations to the only true leaders in that field, the French


Naturally. :tosser1:

----------


## Butterfly

^ what's wrong jeff ? jealous ? 

did you know that Cambodia was a small paradise and a better place when it was run by the French ? look at it now  :Smile:

----------


## Butterfly

> ^
> 
> ...... yet!


it's probably leaking from below, directly into the earth crust, contaminating the whole water source

----------


## koman

A pearl of wisdom from NHK just now.  "Defense forces will be sending 3 helicopters out to 10 shelters today to ask people what they need"    

These people have been stuck out in freezing buildings and tents for a week with little food, water, medicine or heat and then need to send helicopters out to ask them what they need???    How did these people come to make such bloody good cameras???

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> did you know that Cambodia was a small paradise and a better place when it was run by the French ?


For a select few. The French were terrible 'overlords', and in general only contributed a few fancy buildings and a baguette or two. Remember, the French are remarkably Thai-like except for the fact that they know to distinguish good food from pig swill.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan toll update: Police say official number of dead and missing has topped 16,600 - Jakarta Post Japan quake: live report | The Jakarta Globe

----------


## MakingALife

> another reason why Asians, or Americans for that matter, shouldn't run a nuclear operation
> 
> their management are too greedy or live too much in denial for them to be reliable operators of such complex system
> 
> They should leave all the nuclear operations to the only true leaders in that field, the French


Interesting reflection....   I have to agree in many respects about French technical abilities.   

From a long standing experience with 1980's  and 1990's French Marine propulsion designs - Their automation systems were sophisticated and advanced - enough to pass muster to run vessel's safely without engineering personnel in the enginerooms from 1700 till 0700.   

The French  monitoring (alarm) and aspects of system automation - covered more abnormal situation's than most other nations did in their vessel design work.   Their "restoration" after black out events - included pretty sophisticated protections for equipment scrambled into service, and they provided sophisticated "priority" logic for sequencing plant systems back into operation.  

What the french were robustly designing into monitoring and control systems aspects even at that vintage era, were well ahead of curve.   Even something as simple as indicators for equipment running status -  Red / Green is the typical designation that most nations use.  Green in service, Red out of service.    The French design illuminated the equipment status (in white) - any time the equipment condition did not agree with desired status. So at first quick glance at a large plant status board - anything illuminated reflected an important status issue.  Any control point not illuminated - revealed no abnormal status condition.    It's a system that lends much quicker recognition for and operator - than waking into a sea of red / green lights.   Illuminatated items brings the eye immediately to issues.  The French design in this area is clearly superior.

LIkewise I have turned to French resources for their reconditioning expertise of complex components.   Service's that on a world wide basis (across many maritime regions) others cannot execute with nearly the same repair quality or attention to detail.   I am not going to bore with stories, but my experiences have been extensive.

There is little question in my mind that the French are capable of building robust systems, well though out back up powers system, with high levels of monitoring and automation logic, and superior presentation from plant control prospective.       

As far as greed, impacting operational focus, on the part of other's.  It is a hard question to answer.   

But since Nuclear facilities are large investments, involving major utility stock and bond offerings to finance...  Nuclear station mis-management is a large negative impact for investors.   Bad practices brought to light impact investor sentiment.  Bad practices are extermely costly as well.  Nuclear incidents always become major Red Ink on a utilities balance sheet.  So a level of Denial involved related to incident disclosure,  has ties to this negative economic bias of investors.

Greater transparency in reporting of incident details needs to become a larger part of Nuclear operations.  While its covered under IAEA protocols, which have been subscribed to by many nations - There is little that can force compliance for full and timely incident reporting transparency.   

In many case's its the partnership between utilities and their national regulators, who are responsible for correct reporting of incident and health risk advisorys / strategies.   The bias and some reduced transparency displayed by TEPCO - is hard to dial out of the equation.    

They are on the front line - battling an issue that in many ways represents a learning curve.  But it shouldnt be a difficult or steep learning curve for people in that business, with all the expertise they should have - to be trusted operators.   Establishing correct priorities and plans of actions should flow from the engineering side with little restriction.  

On research of  TEPCO.... They have a badly tarnished operational record for safety and truth, as well as they have a very cozy relationship to national regulators.   These private / public cozy relationships are part of the way Japan does business.   

In the US -  Energy regulators, sit on the other side of the fence and hold operators accountable.    I have my share of conflicts with regulating bodies in the utility sector and elsewhere and "cozy" does not fit the  relationship connection.

----------


## mobs00

'We're not running away': Fukushima worker

Mar 17, 2011
WEB EXCLUSIVE

'We're not running away': Fukushima worker




> ONE lone voice has emerged from the group of heroic workers at Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), which runs the quake-stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, where workers are scrambling to cool the nuclear plant and avoid a meltdown.
> 
> Michiko Otsuki - a female worker at Tepco - has written on her blog, speaking up for her 'silent' colleagues who remained behind at the plant.
> 
> She had been quoted a little in some overseas English reports but The Straits Times Online tracked and translated her blog to find out her full story when she first posted on popular Japanese social networking site Mixi.
> 
> By Thursday however, her post had been taken down, but the entry had already been reproduced by several online blogs and in Japanese language forums.

----------


## Butterfly

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> did you know that Cambodia was a small paradise and a better place when it was run by the French ?
> 
> 
> For a select few. The French were terrible 'overlords', and in general only contributed a few fancy buildings and a baguette or two. Remember, the French are remarkably Thai-like except for the fact that they know to distinguish good food from pig swill.


rubbish, yet we sell to you Rosbeef nuclear power plants and facility because you are so fucking inept, you can't do anything without someone holding up your hand

and how is India doing btw ? still the same shithole when you guys when running it,

 :kma:

----------


## misskit

> 'We're not running away': Fukushima worker


That woman and her co-workers are a brave lot. They have my respect.

----------


## Butterfly

yeah, and I bet management is in a cozy safe place, far away from all that mess

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Japan: Continuing crisis*

 	As if conditions for  survivors and emergency workers weren't bad enough after the massive  earthquake and tsunami, snow fell today in chilly Northern Japan.  The  dire situation prompted the first-ever televised address to the nation  from Emperor Akihito, who made no such speech even after the Kobe  earthquake in 1995.  As aid and personnel poured into Japan, the nuclear  crisis prompted neighboring countries to step up inspections of  Japanese foods, and prompted governments worldwide to study their own  nuclear energy policies.  Meanwhile the grim work of recovery continued.  -- _Lane Turner_  (28 photos total)

Vehicle  headlamps illuminate the disaster area of Yamada town in Iwate  prefecture on March 16. The official toll of the dead and missing  following a devastating earthquake and tsunami that flattened Japan's  northeast coast has topped 11,000, with 3,676 confirmed dead.   (STR/AFP/Getty Images) 


2
Yukie  Ito (left), tries to comfort her daughter Hana, 8, with grandmother  Tamiyo at a cold refugee center for the homeless March 16 in Kesennuma,  Miyagi province.  (Paula Bronstein/Getty Images)  #


3
Rishiko  reacts after visiting her home in the rubble of a village destroyed by  the devastating earthquake and tsunami March 16 in Kesennuma, Miyagi  province.  (Paula Bronstein/Getty Images)  #


4
In  this handout image provided by the U.S. Air Force, a house is seen  adrift off the coast of northeastern Japan from a HH-60G helicopter  surveying the damage stricken area as part of Japan's earthquake and  tsunami recovery effort March 14.  (U.S. Air Force via Getty Images) #


5
Elderly people drink hot tea at a shelter at Yamada town in Iwate prefecture on March 16.  (STR/AFP/Getty Images) #


6
The  4,724-ton freighter M.V. Asia Symphony lies on a pier after being hit  by the tsunami at the port in Kamaishi city, Iwate prefecture on March  16.  All 17 Filipino crew (next picture) are safe and living at an  emergency shelter near the port.  (Toshifumi Kitamura/AFP/Getty Images) #


7
A  Filipino freighter crew sits in a shelter in Kamaishi city, Iwate  prefecture on March 16.  Their ship M.V. Asia Symphony (previous  picture) was carried onto the pier after being hit by the tsunami.   (Toshifumi Kitamura/AFP/Getty Images) #


8
Japanese  Defense Force members load tsunami relief goods at the port in Kamaishi  city, Iwate prefecture on March 16.  (Toshifumi Kitamura/AFP/Getty  Images) #


9
Survivors  of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that devastated the eastern  coast of Japan rest in the Miyako Shogako school sports hall, used as a  shelter for evacuees, in Miyako town on March 16.  (Roslan  Rahman/AFP/Getty Images) #


10
Policemen  carry the bodies of victims retrieved from the debris in Rikuzentakata,  Iwate Prefecture, days after the area was devastated by a magnitude 9.0  earthquake and tsunami  on March 16.  (Adrees Latif/Reuters) #


11
Damage  caused by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami is seen from a hill  overlooking the city of Kesennuma on March 16.  (Philippe  Lopez/AFP/Getty Images) #


12
Japanese  Self Defence Force soldiers search for people missing from the March 11  earthquake and tsunami in a river bed in Miyako in Iwate prefecture on  March 16.  (Takashi Noguchi/AFP/Getty Images) #


13
A  survivor warms himself by a fire at an emergency shelter in Otsuchi  March 16.  In the fishing town of Otsuchi in Iwate prefecture, 12,000  out of a population of 15,000 have disappeared following Friday's  massive earthquake and tsunami.  (Damir Sagolj/Reuters) #


14
A  doll lies on the ground after the March 11 tsunami and earthquake in  Natori in Miyagi Prefecture on March 16.  (Toru Yamanaka/AFP/Getty  Images)  #


15
People  crowd a long-distance bus terminal in front of Sendai Railway Station  to leave the earthquake and tsunami-hit town of Sendai, Miyagi  Prefecture, on March 16.  Railway services have been cancelled since the  earthquakes around the area.  (Toru Yamanaka/AFP/Getty Images) #


16
People  watch a television broadcasting Japan's Emperor Akihito's televised  address to the nation at an electronics retail store in Tokyo March 16.   Japanese Emperor Akihito said on Wednesday that problems at Japan's  nuclear-power reactors were unpredictable and he was "deeply worried"  following an earthquake he described as "unprecedented in scale".   It  was an extraordinarily rare appearance by the emperor and his first  public comments since last week's devastating earthquake and tsunami  that killed thousands of people.  (Issei Kato/Reuters) #


17
A  man checks a list of evacuated people at a shelter in Rikuzentakada, in  Iwate prefecture, on March 16.  (STR/AFP/Getty Images) #


18
People stay close to the heater at a shelter at Yamada town in Iwate prefecture on March 16.  (STR/AFP/Getty Images) #


19
A  rescue worker wipes his forehead after carrying a body from the rubble  of a village destroyed by the devastating earthquake, fires and tsunami  March 16, 2011 in Kesennuma, Miyagi province.  (Paula Bronstein/Getty  Images) #


20
Chieko  Chiba walks through the rubble after going to see her destroyed home  March 16, 2011 in Kesennuma, Miyagi province.  (Paula Bronstein/Getty  Images) #


21
People  shop for food at a big-box supermarket in Tokyo March 16.  Public trust  in the Japanese government faces its biggest test since WWII over the  handling of the nation's nuclear crisis, raising concerns that a  breakdown in confidence could fuel panic and chaos if appeals for calm  go unheeded. Foreigners are leaving Tokyo, or shutting themselves  indoors, and supermarket shelves are running empty despite authorities  assuring citizens there is no need to panic from the crisis unfolding at  a quake-stricken nuclear power plant.  (Issei Kato/Reuters) #


22
An  official in a full radiation protection suit scans an evacuated woman  and her dog with a geiger counter in Koriyama city in Fukushima  prefecture, about 60km west from the crisis-hit Tokyo Electric Power Co  (TEPCO) Fukushima Nuclear plant, on March 16, 2011.  A fresh fire broke  out at the quake-hit Japanese atomic power plant in Fukushima early on  March 16.  (Ken Shimizu/AFP/Getty Images) #


23
Medical  staff use a Geiger counter to screen a woman for possible radiation  exposure at a public welfare center in Hitachi City, Ibaraki, March 16,  after she was evacuated from an area within a 12.4 mile radius of the  Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.  (Asahi Shimbun/Reuters) #


24
A  car lies among debris swept inland by the tsunami following the  earthquake in Minami Sanriku, Miyagi prefecture.  (Robert  Gilhooly/Bloomberg)  #


25
Rescue  workers search for a body after digging a car out of the debris in  Minamisanriku town, Miyagi Prefecture, March 16.  (Kim  Kyung-Hoon/Reuters) #


26
An  elderly man and woman push a cart carrying their salvaged belongings in  Miyako, in Iwate prefecture, on March 16.  (Takashi Noguchi/AFP/Getty  Images) #


27
Japanese soldiers check for bodies in the water in Sendai, Miyagi prefecture, on March 16.  (Fred Dufour/AFP/Getty Images) #


28
Evacuees  read a newspaper carrying stories on the massive earthquake and tsunami  at a shelter in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, on March 15.  Japan's  government on March 15 urged people against panic-buying of food and  supplies, as the country grapples with an earthquake and tsunami and  resulting nuclear crisis.  (Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty Images) #

----------


## StrontiumDog

Just a few more from another collection, from the same site...


17
A stuffed toy is seen amidst rubble in Kesennuma March 17.  (Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters) #


18
An emergency worker cycles past debris in Yamada, Iwate Prefecture March 17.  (Aly Song/Reuters) #


19
A  family walk through the tsunami and earthquake damage under snowfall in  Kamaishi, Iwate prefecture on March 17.  Thick snow covered the  wreckage littering quake-hit Japan, all but extinguishing hopes of  finding anyone alive in the debris.  (JIJI PRESS/AFP/Getty Images) #


21
A  Japanese Self Defense Force soldier prays before removing the body of a  tsunami victim found in the debris in the town of Otsuchi in Iwate  prefecture on March 17.  (Takashi Noguchi/AFP) #


22
A  Japanese Self Defense Force soldier wades through water as he checks  for bodies in Kesennuma, Miyagi prefecture on March 17.  (Nicolas  Asfouri/AFP) #


24
Vehicle headlamps illuminated a disaster area in Yamada town in Iwate prefecture on March 16.  (STR/AFP/Getty Images)  #


25
A  couple cross a large intersection in front of blacked out light  displays in Tokyo's Ginza district March 17.  In the famous shopping  mecca - and elsewhere in the nation's capital - public apprehension over  a brewing nuclear disaster is draining the streets and stores of the  crowds that normally define this dynamic, densely packed city. (Gregory  Bull/AP) #

----------


## hazz

Butters when the brits educated the indian generation who lead their country they got gandi. when the french did the same you gave cambodia pol pot. Indian is a shit hole, but I think most cambodians would have preferred the fucked up late 20th century of india over the genocide the cambodians suffered.

who was it that said paris should be twinned with bangkok? they certainly drive the same

----------


## hazz

You have to admire how level headed the people in the affected areas are, especially when you compare it to the kartrina in the US. How many of us could say if what is happening in toyko happened in our own capital cities that we would not have chaos and violence?

I don't think that any there are any commercial reactor designs, apart from  the butters special under the sink reactor, that would cope with loss of coolant and/or power for a day let alone 6 days. And there in is the problem any design that requires the presence of operators who never fuckup spectacularly, the presence of coolant and active core cooling to prevent catastrophic failure is never going to be safe. Considering the lunacy carried out by the the nuclear engineers of the 1950's, even with this and chonobal we have been very lucky, and the more of these reacters we build the more we are pushing it.

What is needed is a decision of weather or not nuclear power his going to be part of the further for electricity generation. I suspect it is and in that case there is a desperate need to go back to first principles and design a nuclear system that is optimised for electricity generation, waste disposal and safety; rather than continue developing a technology with the manufacture of plutonium as the core design principle.

Saying that. When they do the post mortum on this event, i think the only thing thats going to come out well will be the reactors themselves, which even now seem to be doing remarkably well considering what they were designed for and what has been done to them. After reading the report about grid reconnection to the reaters, I am wondering why its taken 6 days to get 1km of cable laid and why has connecing the reator to this cable been left to the end of the process; given the obvious risk of the area becoming too radioactive to work in.

----------


## mobs00

March 18 report







> March 17 report

----------


## misskit

*Tokyo Electric releases new image of reactors*

Tokyo Electric Power released on Thursday an image of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant taken the previous day.

It says the image convinced them to prioritize the No.3 reactor, where the spent fuel pool appeared to be in greater trouble.

The utility firm says the aerial image was taken at 4 PM on Wednesday.

The image shows the exposed iron framework of the No. 4 reactor. It also shows part of a light-green crane designed to handle nuclear fuel.

The firm says it believes that the shining white object below the crane is the surface of the spent fuel cooling pool.

They concluded that the No.4 reactor's pool still contains water to cool down the nuclear material.

But the image shows white smoke billowing from the No. 3 reactor, and shows a serious damage to the roof and walls.

They could not confirm whether the No.3 reactor's cooling pool still contains water. This convinced them to make it a priority for water injection.

The outcome of the operations by Self-Defense Forces and the police is not yet clear.
Friday, March 18, 2011 02:56 +0900 


NHK WORLD English

*Video at this link.*

----------


## koman

> I am wondering why its taken 6 days to get 1km of cable laid and why has connecing the reator to this cable been left to the end of the process; given the obvious risk of the area becoming too radioactive to work in.


Indeed....and why has it taken the same period to figure out that you can use fire engines to pump water??   They are now using 7 fire engines in rotation and pumping tons of water on the overheated material.  Lots of steam observed.....which is kind of what you might expect when you pour water on anything really hot... :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> and how is India doing btw ? still the same shithole when you guys when running it,


India was great when we were running it. It was the Socialist path that they followed after 1947 that regressed them so much.

----------


## StrontiumDog

_Latest IAEA statement, released a few minutes ago_

*IAEA Update on Japan Earthquake
*
*Japan Earthquake Update (18 March 2011, 06:10 UTC)*

*Temperature of Spent Fuel Pools at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant - UPDATED*

  Spent fuel removed from a nuclear reactor is highly radioactive and  generates intense heat.  Nuclear plant operators typically store this  material in pools of water that cool the fuel and shield the  radioactivity. Water in a spent fuel pool is continuously cooled to  remove heat produced by spent fuel assemblies.  According to IAEA  experts, a typical spent fuel pool temperature is kept below 25 °C under  normal operating conditions. The temperature of a spent fuel pool is  maintained by constant cooling, which requires a constant power source. 

  Given the intense heat and radiation that spent fuel assemblies can  generate, spent fuel pools must be constantly checked for water level  and temperature. If fuel is no longer covered by water or temperatures  reach a boiling point, fuel can become exposed and create a risk of  radioactive release. The concern about the spent fuel pools at Fukushima  Daiichi is that sources of power to cool the pools have been  compromised.

  Concern about spent fuel storage conditions has led Japanese  officials to drop and spray water from helicopters and trucks onto Unit 3  at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant (See earlier update). 

  Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency has reported increasing  temperatures in the spent fuel ponds at Units 5 and 6 since 14 March.   An emergency diesel generator at Unit 6 is now powering water injection  into the ponds at those Units, according to NISA.

  The IAEA can confirm the following new information regarding the  temperatures of the spent nuclear fuel pools at Units 4, 5 and 6 at  Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant:

*Unit 4*                   13 March, 19:08 UTC:         84 °C                        
*Unit 5*                   17 March, 03:00 UTC:         64.2 °C                       17 March, 18:00 UTC:         65.5 °C                        *
Unit 6*                   17 March, 03:00 UTC:         62.5 °C                     17 March, 18:00 UTC:         62.0 °C       

The IAEA is continuing to seek further information about the water  levels, temperature and condition of all spent fuel pool facilities at  the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

----------


## lom

> India was great when we were running it.


Yes, great for the Brits. 
They all had more chaffeurs, gardeners, maids, and butlers than what they could afford back home.
A true paradise for the Brits, the jewel in the crown.  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## hazz

^It was for generations we had a dumping ground for all those self important fucks with their traffic warden personalities. When indian gained independence, they all came home and started screwing up the uk.

----------


## HermantheGerman

> another reason why Asians, or Americans for that matter, shouldn't run a nuclear operation
> 
> their management are too greedy or live too much in denial for them to be reliable operators of such complex system
> 
> They should leave all the nuclear operations to the only true leaders in that field, the French



That  :Smile:   means I'am suppose to smile and laugh...I certainly did. We need a bit of humour in a terrible situation like this. 
Thank You 
Butterfly

----------


## ceburat

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> 
> another reason why Asians, or Americans for that matter, shouldn't run a nuclear operation
> 
> their management are too greedy or live too much in denial for them to be reliable operators of such complex system
> 
> They should leave all the nuclear operations to the only true leaders in that field, the French 
> 
> ...



The German and The French - Two Peas In A Pod. :St George:

----------


## Butterfly

I think the Germans and the French make a lovely couple, 

these days they are truly the same country politically,

Vive L'allemagne, Vive La France

----------


## Mid

> these days they are truly the same country politically


 :mid: 

France was amongst the first to recognize the Libyan rebels whilst Germany abstained from the UNSC vote .

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> these days they are truly the same country politically,


That statement showed even more ignorance than one of your home maintenance threads.

----------


## misskit

Meanwhile, back in Japan.......


*Comparing Fukushima to Chernobyl*

asahi.com

----------


## Bower

I find myself tuning into this thread and watching newsreels like i am addicted to some tradic soap opera. I am begining to worry about my morbid interest. Is it genuine concern for others trauma ? Or just needing a fix through others demise.

----------


## Poo and Pee

> Originally Posted by Gerbil
> 
> 
> ^
> 
> ...... yet! 
> 
> 
> it's probably leaking from below, directly into the earth crust, contaminating the whole water source



it's silly statements like this that start uneeded hysteria in these kind of situations.

as the water 'springs' up from the ground *all over* japan, i can't see this theory even being scientifically possible.

provide a link, or keep your uneccessary panic enducing statements to yourself please.

----------


## mobs00

18 March 2011 Last updated at 09:42 GMT 

*Japan raises nuclear alert level*

BBC News - Japan earthquake: Fukushima nuclear alert level raised

Japan has raised the accident level at a stricken nuclear plant from four to five on a seven-point international danger scale for atomic accidents.

The move places the crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi site two levels below Ukraine's Chernobyl 1986 disaster.

----------


## mobs00

International Nuclear Event Scale - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia




> *Level 5: Accident with wider consequences*
> 
> Impact on People and Environment
> 
> Limited release of radioactive material likely to require implementation of some planned countermeasures.
> 
> Several deaths from radiation.
> 
> Impact on Radiological Barriers and Control
> ...

----------


## Finney64

{ Edit }

----------


## mobs00

The Evacuation Zones Around the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Plant

Map of Evacuation Zones Around Japan Nuclear Plant - Interactive Feature - NYTimes.com

----------


## mobs00

*Japan Nuclear Disaster Caps Decades of Faked Reports*

By Jason Clenfield - Mar 18, 2011 3:52 PM GMT+0700

Japan Nuclear Disaster Caps Decades of Faked Reports - Bloomberg




> The unfolding disaster at the Fukushima nuclear plant follows decades of falsified safety reports, fatal accidents and underestimated earthquake risk in Japan’s atomic power industry.
> 
> The destruction caused by last week’s 9.0 earthquake and tsunami comes less than four years after a 6.8 quake shut the world’s biggest atomic plant, also run by Tokyo Electric Power Co. In 2002 and 2007, revelations the utility had faked repair records forced the resignation of the company’s chairman and president, and a three-week shutdown of all 17 of its reactors.





> Basement Generator
> 
> Back-up diesel generators that might have averted the disaster were positioned in a basement, where they were overwhelmed by waves.
> 
> “This in the country that invented the word Tsunami,” said Brockman





> Botched Container?
> 
> Mitsuhiko Tanaka, 67, working as an engineer at Babcock Hitachi K.K., helped design and supervise the manufacture of a $250 million steel pressure vessel for Tokyo Electric in 1975. Today, that vessel holds the fuel rods in the core of the No. 4 reactor at Fukushima’s Dai-Ichi plant, hit by explosion and fire after the tsunami.
> 
> Tanaka says the vessel was damaged in the production process. He says he knows because he orchestrated the cover-up. When he brought his accusations to the government more than a decade later, he was ignored, he says.
> 
> The accident occurred when Tanaka and his team were strengthening the steel in the pressure vessel, heating it in a furnace to more than 600 degrees Celsius (1,112 degrees Fahrenheit), a temperature that melts metal. Braces that should have been inside the vessel during the blasting were either forgotten or fell over. After it cooled, Tanaka found that its walls had warped.
> 
> ‘Felt Like a Hero’
> ...

----------


## Mid

> Japan Nuclear Disaster Caps Decades of Faked Reports


and the word has been out there for years .......................

Nuclear doubts spread in wake of Niigata | The Japan Times Online
*Saturday, Sept. 1, 2007*

----------


## ItsRobsLife

> I find myself tuning into this thread and watching newsreels like i am addicted to some tradic soap opera. I am begining to worry about my morbid interest. Is it genuine concern for others trauma ? Or just needing a fix through others demise.


Yep, it's starting to get like watching F1, hoping a catastrophe will liven up the monotony. It's the 24 hr news-feeds that create this need for drama. 

Charlie Brooker on 10 o'clock Live last night was cracking me up about it, he said 
"I'm being taught nuclear physics by the same people that last week couldn't name the colour of Kate Middletons dress!"

----------


## Butterfly

any update ? I think a big nuclear explosion would be welcome at this stage

----------


## StrontiumDog

Dramatic tsunami rescue clip..

----------


## Muadib

> I think the Germans and the French make a lovely couple, 
> 
> these days they are truly the same country politically,
> 
> Vive L'allemagne, Vive La France


We obviously know who the bitch is in this relationship...

----------


## Butterfly

> We obviously know who the bitch is in this relationship...


Yes Germany has become our bitch, like after WW1

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Status of quake-stricken reactors at Fukushima nuclear power plants | Kyodo News
*
*Status of quake-stricken reactors at Fukushima nuclear power plants*

 TOKYO, March 18, Kyodo

 The following is the known status as of  Friday night of each of the six reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi  nuclear power plant and the four reactors at the Fukushima Daini plant,  both in Fukushima Prefecture, which were crippled by the magnitude 9.0  earthquake and the ensuing tsunami on March 11.

*Fukushima Daiichi plant*

 -- Reactor No. 1 - Operation suspended after quake, cooling failure,  partial melting of core, vapor vented, building housing reactor damaged  March 12 by hydrogen explosion, roof blown off, seawater being pumped  in.

 -- Reactor No. 2 - Operation suspended after quake, cooling failure,  seawater being pumped in, fuel rods fully exposed temporarily, vapor  vented, building housing reactor damaged Monday by blast at reactor No.  3, blast sound heard near suppression chamber of containment vessel on  Tuesday, damage to containment structure feared.

 -- Reactor No. 3 - Operation suspended after quake, cooling failure,  partial melting of core feared, vapor vented, seawater being pumped in,  building housing reactor badly damaged Monday by hydrogen explosion,  high-level radiation measured nearby on Tuesday, plume of smoke observed  Wednesday and presumed to have come from spent-fuel storage pool,  seawater dumped over pool by helicopter on Thursday, water sprayed at it  from ground on Thursday and Friday.

 -- Reactor No. 4 - Under maintenance when quake struck, no fuel rods  in reactor core, temperature in spent-fuel storage pool reached 84 C on  Monday, fire Tuesday possibly caused by hydrogen explosion at pool  holding spent fuel rods, fire observed Wednesday at building housing  reactor, pool water level feared receding, renewed nuclear chain  reaction feared, only frame remains of reactor building roof.

 -- Reactors No. 5, 6 - Under maintenance when quake struck, no fuel  rods in reactor cores, water temperatures in spent-fuel storage pools  increased to about 64 C on Thursday.

 -- Spent-fuel storage pools - Cooling functions lost at pools of all  reactors, water temperatures or levels unobservable at reactors No. 1 to  4, no immediate threat to water level at common spent fuel pool.
 Fukushima Daini plant

 -- Reactors No. 1, 2, 4 - Operation suspended after quake, cooling failure, then cold shutdown.

 -- Reactor No. 3 - Operation suspended after quake, cold shutdown.

 ==Kyodo

----------


## DrB0b

> 14 A doll lies on the ground after the March 11 tsunami and earthquake in Natori in Miyagi Prefecture on March 16. (Toru Yamanaka/AFP/Getty Images) #





> 17 A stuffed toy is seen amidst rubble in Kesennuma March 17. (Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters) #


Minor apologies for _my_ cynicism but this one is too generically cynical to resist commenting on;




> *Empathy Doll Shot    * 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Whenever a movie wants to add pathos to an evacuation or war  scene, expect a shot of an abandoned toy, usually a doll or stuffed  animal. Teddy bears and bunnies seem to be the most popular, and the  more worn and tattered the better. In evacuation scenes, the toy is supposed to represent the loss of innocence a child has suffered. In aftermath of war scenes, the doll is supposed to scream "KIDS DIED HERE!" without having to actually show a kid's corpse. When used well, can undermine the A Million Is A Statistic effect. See Also: Infant Immortality, Hide Your Children. A related (but gorier) trope is the Dead Hand Shot.


http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph...mpathyDollShot


Very popular with this type of journalist.


"... and in the rubble a child's teddy bear...."

----------


## misskit

Some good news.


*WHO: No radiation risk outside evacuation zone*


The World Health Organization has said radiation levels outside the evacuation zone in Japan are not harmful for human health.

WHO spokesperson Gregory Hartl made the remarks at a regular news conference in Geneva on Friday.

The Japanese government issued an advisory on Tuesday to evacuate from a 20-kilometer radius of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. It also told people living within a 30-kilometer radius to stay indoors.

He said the amount of radiation being reported outside of the evacuation zone continued to be below the levels considered a public health risk.

He said the WHO finds no public health reason to avoid travel to Japan, except to the affected areas, or to recommend that foreign nationals leave the country.

Some countries are encouraging their citizens to leave Japan or are moving their embassies from Tokyo to Osaka.

Referring to an examination of Japanese food imports by some countries, he said he cannot imagine that any food from the quake-damaged areas was able to have been delivered. He said he concludes there is no risk that exported Japanese foods are contaminated with radiation.
Saturday, March 19, 2011 08:04 +0900 

NHK WORLD English

----------


## mobs00

http://www.jaif.or.jp/english/

2011-03-19

----------


## MakingALife

[quote=DrB0b;1708221]


> 14 A doll lies on the ground after the March 11 tsunami and earthquake in Natori in Miyagi Prefecture on March 16. (Toru Yamanaka/AFP/Getty Images) #





> 17 A stuffed toy is seen amidst rubble in Kesennuma March 17. (Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters) #


Minor apologies for _my_ cynicism but this one is too generically cynical to resist commenting on;

[quote]

DrBob,

This thread has been a large emotional drain for many following the disaster in Japan.  Add a lot of the world trying to come to terms with the status of the nuclear plants at risk as well.   Like many - I have been in e mail dialogues with family and friend elsewhere over these concerns.

Media images often - short sheet the process, with strongly emotional images, as they try to put a human face on damage  and suffering endured.  At the core Media tries to communicate.   Images are one of their tools.  

Your post that decodes the drama amplification in the reporting is a good one.  It gives people an understanding  how mechanical and purposeful those in media see that style of image, added to a story line.  Anyone with children, or who have hearts for children, can't help but be moved by such images - which imply suffering - and the long felt loss of something left behind.    

At this point - given all the images that have come out of the Tsunami disaster (ignoring the nuclear crisis) - calling these doll shots as "over the top" - I have to agree with you 100 %.  Most people fully recognize the level of suffering in Japan, without having to have their hearts ripped out of their chests (over the injury to the innocents)..   Truth is NO ONE deserves to endure the kind of natural disaster consequence Japan is recovering from.

I am truely glad that the Nuclear crisis is trending towards a more quiet ending.   Even with remaining uncertainties - the ramping up of water delivery (* by better Japan based resources & outside delivered pumping equipment) - improve's cooling capabilities.  Add in the expected Plant electrical interconnection planned now for Sunday.  All positive trends

The prognosis for getting out of this event, without a wild and large unmanageable release has improved, provided they can hold status quo, till they restore site power.   Given the achieved stability, or  the slow rate of change due to heating issue's - It looks like they will turn the corner and achieve plant re-powering.    With that will come better restoration of cooling resources - and they are out of the woods.  Doing clean up management, not crisis management.

I am decidedly optimistic at this point, and for me - that's a whole lot better than the pretty negative head banging thoughts that kept popping up in my mind about the high risk events that loomed large, when their efforts appeared unsuccessful in preventing ongoing disaster - and ending with a site to hot to allow any further local intervention.   

Looking at the Nuclear disaster a few steps back,  They hit that point (of the plant becoming too hot for local efforts), but were able to recover, mostly by luck and the self change in radiation release that happened within the facility -  while they monitored radiation from a safer distance.   Sadly Nuclear crisis management should not hang on good luck events.   Sure they are not out of the woods yet, but the pathway in place now looks a whole lot brighter.   

The new information that reports "basement mounted" EDG's that were fully inundated.  This explains why they could not recover any EDG capabilities as an option.  WTF -  who decided to put the gens in basement locations, in a country that sits on the ring of fire in the pacific rim ???    

Perhaps with the nuclear focus waning - Tsunami recover efforts can become the highest focus for Japan and everyone willing to assist with aid.  

The humanitarian suffering, many have endured without violent outbursts, civil unrest - trumpet Japan stoicism, self control and dignity, and the honor for authority they hold high.   That kind of consciousness displayed deserves redouble efforts for relief.   The cold weather has added insult to injury for those homeless and perhaps still shelter less.   Someone should look at aid issue, define the "critical path" and take out the bottle neck's.    With a country trained in TQM and process analysis by Demming -  They ought to have hands raised and fingers pointed to where the aid distribution bottleneck can be corrected.   For sure progress will come on the aid side as well.

----------


## misskit

*Construction of temporary housing starts in quake-hit city*

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Construction of some 200 temporary housing units started Saturday in the coastal city of Rikuzentakata in Iwate Prefecture, which was severely damaged in the mega earthquake and tsunamis.

The 30-square-meter prefabricated houses capable of accommodating two to three people will be built on the grounds of a junior high school. A date for completing construction has yet to be set.

Construction of temporary housing starts in quake-hit city - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## misskit

*Repairs to infrastructure start but relocation urged*

Kyodo News
Vital infrastructure was gradually being restored Friday in devastated areas of the Tohoku region but the fate of tens of thousands of people remained unknown, and Miyagi's governor suggested survivors should relocate to other parts of Japan for now.

Repairs to infrastructure start but relocation urged | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Mid

*Fukushima workers on kamikaze mission*
Venetia Rainey
 MARCH 18, 2011


_Technicians battling to  avert nuclear disaster  like suicide fighters in a  war says radiation expert_

    It is becoming apparent that the small  band of technicians working inside the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant  to save Japan from a full-scale nuclear disaster are   embarked on a kamikaze mission. 

    In tweets and emails, family members have questioned whether they will  come out alive and, if they do, whether they will be permanently  harmed. Keiichi Nakagaw, a radiation expert at the University   of Tokyo Hospital, said: "I dont know any other way to say it - this  is like suicide fighters in a war." 

    All the technicians are said to have volunteered and some are rumoured  to be retirees who believe they will have died of natural causes before  any radiation-induced cancer sets in. 

    Their identities have so far been kept a closely guarded secret but as  family members discuss their predicament, it seems inevitable names  will emerge. 

    "My dad went to the nuclear plant, I never heard my mother cry so  hard," wrote one Twitter user. "People are struggling at the plant,  sacrificing themselves to protect you. Please dad come back   alive." 

    They have become known as the Fukushima 50 though actually they are a  team of around 180, working in shifts to prevent the nuclear power plant  from meltdown. While local people living within a   15-mile radius have been evacuated, the furthest these technicians  have been pulled back is about 500 yards, during a temporary radiation  spike on March 16. 

    So far, five of the workers are reported to have died since the  magnitude 9 earthquake and ensuing 10m-high tsunami hit the plant on  March 11. Two more are missing, and around 22 have been injured. 

    Reports suggest that they are mainly technicians who know the plant  inside-out. It is claimed that none of them were ordered by the nuclear  plants owners, Tepco, to stay: they all volunteered. 

    The risks are enormous. Two days ago, the Japanese government raised  the legal limit for radiation exposure to 100 millisieverts (mSv) an  hour, and 250 millisieverts a year. This new limit is more   than 12 times what is legal for nuclear workers to be exposed to in  Britain. 

    The highest level of radiation recorded at Fukushima so far is around 400 mSv. According to the World Nuclear   Association: "Above about 100 mSv, the probability of cancer  (rather than the severity of illness) increases with dose. 50 mSv is,  conservatively, the lowest dose at which there is any evidence   of cancer being caused in adults." 

    Wearing breathing apparatus, goggles and duct-taped protective white suits, the workers sleep and eat in   shifts in a small   decontaminated room. Working in shifts of 50, they are equipped with  devices to monitor how long they are exposed, but the flimsy suits are  poorly designed to block harmful gamma radiation.     "My father is still working at the plant," said a worker's daughter in  an e-mail. "They are running out of food... we think conditions are  really tough. He says hes accepted his fate, much like a   death sentence". 

    The situation is so grave that Tepco is now reportedly considering  encasing the reactorin concrete to contain radiation. The approach was  last used to deal with the exploded Chernobyl reactor in   Ukraine in 1986. 

    One of the Tepco personnel evacuated from the plant, Michiko Otsuki, wrote on her blog:  "The   machine that cools the reactor is just by the ocean, and it was  wrecked by the tsunami. Everyone worked desperately to try and restore  it. Fighting fatigue and empty stomachs, we dragged ourselves   back to work. 

    "There are many who haven't gotten in touch with their family members,  but are facing the present situation and working hard. Please remember  that. Everyone at the power plant is battling on,   without running away."

thefirstpost.co.uk


Brave Ladies and Gentlemen , I salute you .

.

----------


## nigelandjan

Whatever you say about the Japs they have an inbuilt work ethic and dedication which is second to none .

              This is as much as what this is about ,, not so much a kamikaze mission ,, they will see it as part of their job ,to do the best they can at ALL cost,s ,, and mabe just mabe the rest of us in the world should be gratefull for it now.

              Years ago a company I worked for ordered some computer / hi teckkie bits from Japan ,,, now not expecting perfection the order stipulated a failure tollerance of  no more than 6% ,,,,,,,,,,this must have confused the Japs a little as they boxed up 100 perfect working chips then 6 non working in a seperate package !

----------


## Thetyim

The article is exaggerating the situation.
It is not a suicide mission, indications are that the situation is improving.
With the soon to be restored electricity supply the chances are getting better.

It is not a Kamikaze mission unless there are more set backs

----------


## taxexile

..... and the boss of tepco ?

has he volunteered ?

----------


## harrybarracuda

I'm reminded of Chernobyl's "biorobots". The radiation was so high that it disabled robots they sent in to clear radioactive debris into the pit, so they used people.

----------


## nidhogg

> Wearing breathing apparatus, goggles and duct-taped protective white suits, the workers sleep and eat in shifts in a small decontaminated room. Working in shifts of 50, they are equipped with devices to monitor how long they are exposed, but the flimsy suits are poorly designed to block harmful gamma radiation. .


Well, call me Mr Fussy, but appropriate protective clothing would be pretty high on the list of things I would like to see on hand at a nuclear power  station.

Now, granted that there is not a lot of protective clothing thats gonna stop gamma radiation (except a couple of meters of lead), BUT, BUT when talking about Nuclear power stations "duct-tape" is just one of those phrases you don't want to see....

----------


## Mid

> It is not a Kamikaze mission unless there are more set backs


Radiation exposure

----------


## harrybarracuda

We don't know the exact situation, but it is churlish to say the least to deny that these men are risking their health or more to try and rectify the problems.

They deserve admiration, not sneering.

----------


## nidhogg

^ Is anyone sneering?

----------


## harrybarracuda

When you claim that the situation is exaggerated without any evidence to the contrary, I consider that demeaning, yes.

----------


## nidhogg

> When you claim that the situation is exaggerated without any evidence to the contrary, I consider that demeaning, yes.


Not sure where that "you" came from.  My point was that these people should have appropriate protective clothing on hand.

----------


## misskit

*Cooling function operable at 2 reactors*

The government says parts of the cooling systems at 2 of the 6 reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have been confirmed to be operable.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency told a news conference on Saturday that an emergency diesel generator at the No. 6 reactor has resumed operation.

The agency also said that a cooling pump, at the No. 5 reactor, has been confirmed to be usable, and that workers started cooling the spent fuel storage pool there at 5 AM on Saturday.

The agency said the radiation level at the west gate of the plant, located about 1.1 kilometers west of the No. 3 reactor, was relatively high at 830.8 microsieverts per hour at 8:10 AM. But it said the figure fell to 364.5 microsieverts at 9:00 AM.

Saturday, March 19, 2011 14:07 +0900 NHK WORLD English

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> 
> When you claim that the situation is exaggerated without any evidence to the contrary, I consider that demeaning, yes.
> 
> 
> Not sure where that "you" came from.  My point was that these people should have appropriate protective clothing on hand.


Sorry, I should have said "one", not "you".
 :Smile: 

But surely one of the problems is that they haven't got the equipment they need, and it would also seem one of the reasons is they have been ridiculously slow in asking other nuclear nations to assist.

News reports seem to be encouraging this morning, along the lines of that once the power is restored, cooling will start to be effective and the crisis may recede.

I hope they're right.

----------


## Butterfly

The Russians who did the immediate clean-up were also on a suicide mission

one of the plant operator actually jumped in the "pool" where the spent fuel were resting so they could "unblock" something to stop another meltdown

that guy died a few hours later,

----------


## nidhogg

> Originally Posted by nidhogg
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> ...


Slightly ironic I suppose that the need is to get power restored (to a power station).  However, despite this plant being 40 years old (or maybe because of it) they seem woefully unprepared for this disaster.  The quake was big indeed, but the damage was apparently by the tsunami -10 meters - you would have hoped it was constructed to withstand that.

Mother nature I suppose.  However smart we think we are, however well  we think we have designed it - however 'fail-safe" "foolproof" and "indestructable" we building it, something ALWAYS comes along and we are left saying, oops.  Did not think of that - but, back to my original point, its pretty damn sad when we have to revert to "duct-tape" to solve nuclear problems.

----------


## Butterfly

if they had let the French operate those plants, they would have covered all possibilities, but it would have been very expensive

----------


## Gerbil

> if they had let the French operate those plants, they would have covered all possibilities, but it would have been very expensive


Yeah, importing all those baguettes and cheese would have been pricey.

----------


## Thetyim

> When you claim that the situation is exaggerated without any evidence to the contrary,


"The government says parts of the cooling systems at 2 of the 6 reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have been confirmed to be operable.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency told a news conference on Saturday that an emergency diesel generator at the No. 6 reactor has resumed operation.

The agency also said that a cooling pump, at the No. 5 reactor, has been confirmed to be usable, and that workers started cooling the spent fuel storage pool there at 5 AM on Saturday."

My point was that the media is exaggerating.
It is not a Kamikaze mission.
Kamikaze means the expected survival rate is 0% and that is not the case here.

I am criticising the reports not the workers who are risking their lives to make the plant safe.

----------


## Bower

> if they had let the French operate those plants, they would have covered all possibilities, but it would have been very expensive


Would they have used the same designers and engineers as were engaged to build and run the nuclear powered aircraft carrier 'Charles de Gaulle' (le bateau maudit) ? you know the one built with a runway 4 meters too short for the planes to land and take off, decks treated with a substance that corroded the attest wires that slow the planes down on landing, the staff and crew exposed to unacceptable levels of radiation.....and on.......and ...on

----------


## nidhogg

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> 
> if they had let the French operate those plants, they would have covered all possibilities, but it would have been very expensive
> 
> 
> Would they have used the same designers and engineers as were engaged to build and run the nuclear powered aircraft carrier 'Charles de Gaulle' (le bateau maudit) ? you know the one built with a runway 4 meters too short for the planes to land and take off, decks treated with a substance that corroded the attest wires that slow the planes down on landing, the staff and crew exposed to unacceptable levels of radiation.....and on.......and ...on


yeah yeah.  But common, its a French _warship...._

..the only think that needs to work on it is the scuttling valve...

----------


## Butterfly

the carrier is for humanitarian purpose, so the planes are of no use, the purpose is not to fight, but to rescue  :Razz: 

we French are peace loving people, we don't like wars, that's why we keep losing them, like the Americans, except the Americans like wars, not sure why though, as they keep losing

----------


## KAPPA

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Gerbil
> ...


I would theorize it wouldn't possibly be water, but super heated, radioactive steam super injected into the atmosphere, which when depleted,  or when China Syndrome hole burns past water table- would  be followed by molten lava, also radioactive. 
 First man made volcano-spewing radioactivity.

----------


## Katana

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> When you claim that the situation is exaggerated without any evidence to the contrary,
> 
> 
> "The government says parts of the cooling systems at 2 of the 6 reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have been confirmed to be operable.
> 
> The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency told a news conference on Saturday that an emergency diesel generator at the No. 6 reactor has resumed operation.
> 
> ...


Yes but reactors 5 and 6 have not been the problem there are no fuel rods in reactors 4,5 and 6. Rector 4 the spent fuel rods which are stored above the reactor in a pool caught fire when the water level dropped. Reactor 1,2 and 3 have suffered partial meltdowns with 1 and 2 having explosive damage to the building above .... where the spent fuel rods are stored. One of the reactors (no2 ?) may have a damaged containment vessel.

Mark

----------


## StrontiumDog

One reactor at Japan nuke plant appears stable One reactor at Japan nuke plant appears stable - World news - Asia-Pacific - msnbc.com

----------


## misskit

*Radiation level at 30km spot from plant still high*

The government says the level of radiation in a town 30 kilometers from the damaged nuclear plant remains relatively high. It says those in the rest of the area are not immediately harmful to human health.

The science ministry released the data on levels of outdoor radiation monitored at 28 locations in a 30 to 60-kilometer radius of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant from 7 AM to 3 PM local time on Saturday.

It says the level at Namie Town, 30 kilometers northwest of the plant, marked the highest level of 136 microsieverts per hour around 10:20 AM.

But the figure is slightly lower than the 140 microsieverts per hour that was detected in the same place at noon on Friday.
Associate Professor Keiichi Nakagawa of the University of Tokyo's Medical School said that if a person is exposed to a level of outdoor radiation of 140 microsieverts per hour for one month, the accumulated dose of 100,000 microsieverts would be harmful.

But he said that people need not worry too much as long as they stay indoors and avoid outdoor exposure.

He also expressed concern that psychological stress may affect people's health.

He added that it is important to reduce the amount of radioactive substances released from the nuclear plants as soon as possible.

Saturday, March 19, 2011 18:56 +0900 NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*Kitazawa: Reactors surface temperatures below 100C*

NHK WORLD English

----------


## harrybarracuda

For those that haven't seen it, I recommended on the other thread that you download and watch "Indside Chernobyl's Sarcophagus", a BBC Horizon programme from the 90's.

You really get a feel for the people that work under such extreme conditions.

----------


## Gerbil

> the carrier is for humanitarian purpose, so the planes are of no use, the purpose is not to fight, but to run away


is that why they install the gear boxes backwards?  :bunny3:

----------


## Butterfly

> For those that haven't seen it, I recommended on the other thread that you download and watch "Indside Chernobyl's Sarcophagus", a BBC Horizon programme from the 90's.
> 
> You really get a feel for the people that work under such extreme conditions.


that must have been in mid 90s if I remember correctly,

yes put the link here please,

----------


## Butterfly

> is that why they install the gear boxes backwards?


when was the last time you Brits had won a war ?

----------


## harrybarracuda

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> 
> For those that haven't seen it, I recommended on the other thread that you download and watch "Indside Chernobyl's Sarcophagus", a BBC Horizon programme from the 90's.
> 
> You really get a feel for the people that work under such extreme conditions.
> 
> 
> that must have been in mid 90s if I remember correctly,
> ...


It's on Isohunt Butters, not a lot of seeders, so be patient.

----------


## Gerbil

> when was the last time you Brits had won a war ?


Falklands? Despite your dodgy Exocets.  :Smile:

----------


## Mid



----------


## nidhogg

> Falklands? Despite your dodgy Exocets.


I am slugging my way through a tedious history of the mediterranean at the time of the second world war. It is overall tedious, and not that well written (there was not a lot of choice at the book shop I was at), the only enlivening thing is that the author is fairly sure that all the french are complete cunts. The is an entire chapter about them and their behaviour, entitled "Worms", IIRC.

----------


## Butterfly

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> when was the last time you Brits had won a war ?
> 
> 
> Falklands? Despite your dodgy Exocets.


not really dodgy since they were hitting their intended targets, the Brits  :Smile:

----------


## harrybarracuda

Mid it's a lot longer than 10 minutes....

----------


## Mid

that's only part 1, search the rest yourself .

----------


## Gerbil

> not really dodgy since they were hitting their intended targets, the Brits


We thought the missiles were coming to surrender as usual.  :Smile:

----------


## Butterfly

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> not really dodgy since they were hitting their intended targets, the Brits
> 
> 
> We thought the missiles were coming to surrender as usual.


as usual, you brits are confused and take everything backward  :Smile:

----------


## harrybarracuda

> that's only part 1, search the rest yourself .



That's sort of why I suggested where the whole thing can be downloaded.

 :mid:

----------


## Mid

not that hard links are on the same page  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## hazz

> The Russians who did the immediate clean-up were also on a suicide mission
> 
> one of the plant operator actually jumped in the "pool" where the spent fuel were resting so they could "unblock" something to stop another meltdown
> 
> that guy died a few hours later,


He was diving to open a valve to drain flooded chambers under the reactor. The fear was that if reactor melted it's way through the concrete beneath the reactor that there would be a massive steam explosion and it would be game over for a lot of places. I believe in that horizon program they had footage showing large lava flows of reactor fuel and concrete in these chambers. So although he never knew it. He really did save our asses.

As for the staff  working at the reactor site. Whilst it's not clear wether they wil
 Die or not. The article makes it quite clear that they and their families do not have expectations that they will get out alive.

They my not be kamakasis, but they are without dought lions betrayed by sheep.

Sheep who have at every opitunity compromised safety created the conditions that have made this utterly avoidable sacrifice necessary, I hope these people get shredded when the time comes

----------


## robuzo

Article about yakuza relief efforts. Remarkably, they are even helping foreigners this time (their efforts after the Kobe quake are legendary- had supplies on the move while the government was still trying to pull its finger out of its ass)
Japanese Yakuza Aid Earthquake Relief Efforts - The Daily Beast

----------


## crippen

Tsunami at sea

----------


## MakingALife

Heres a quote taken from A recent CNBC interview about the dissaster...

Backup power systems at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant had been  improperly protected, said Hidehiko Nishiyama of Japan's Nuclear and  Industrial Safety Agency, leaving them vulnerable to the tsunami that  savaged the northeastern coast on March 11 and set off the nuclear  emergency. 

The failure of Fukushima's backup power systems, which were supposed  to keep cooling systems going in the aftermath of the massive  9.0-magnitude earthquake, let uranium fuel overheat and were a "main  cause" of the crisis, Nishiyama said. 


"I cannot say whether it was a human error, but we should examine the case closely," he told reporters. 

A spokesman for Tokyo Electric Power Co., which owns and runs the  plants, said that while the generators themselves were not directly  exposed to the waves, some of the electrical support equipment was  outside. 
The complex was designed to protect against tsunamis of up to 16  feet, he said. Media reports say the tsunami was at least 20 feet high  when it struck Fukushima. 

Still more infomation coming in about the back up failure.    So It appears that the comments offered earlier that the ED Generators were inundated with sea water appears incorrect.    TEPCO has come out to say that the EDG's were not touched by the waves at all.   They also suggested that some support equipment was outside the building and impacted.

Japan's NISA come out and speculated that human error may well prove responsible for that EDG failures.  So the finger pointing has begun, and perhaps some of the real truths will rise to the top.

New information and statements will all clarify exactly what happen to kill the reerve power.   I return to my sentiment of exactly what happened blow by blol next.

----------


## Mid

*Japan cites radiation in milk, spinach near plant*

_Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said checks of milk from  Fukushima prefecture, where the plant is located, and of spinach grown  in Ibaraki, a neighboring prefecture, surpassed limits set by the  government._

_It was the government's first report of food being contaminated  by radiation since the March 11 quake and tsunami unleashed the nuclear  crisis._

businessweek.com


*Radioactive iodine in Japan tap water

*_Traces of radioactive iodine have been detected in tap water in   Tokyo after the  emergency at a quake-hit Japanese nuclear power  plant._

_The  government says abnormal levels of radioactive iodine have  also been  found in the water supply in the central prefectures of  Gunma, Tochigi,   Saitama, Chiba and Niigata._

_But officials say the levels are far below Japan's legal limit._

bigpondnews.com

----------


## robuzo

^"But officials say the levels are far below Japan's legal limit."

But well above the amount usually found, which is none. Hoping this is not a harbinger of bad things to come.

----------


## Thormaturge

> Japan's NISA come out and speculated that human error may well prove responsible for that EDG failures.  So the finger pointing has begun, and perhaps some of the real truths will rise to the top.


I would be amazed if those who are working in the danger zone did not make mistakes.  They are under immense pressure and they are human.  The fact that these brave people are prepared to work in that environment at all is something we should all be grateful for.

If anyone thinks they have the right to judge them then they should take on the job themselves and show us how they would handle it.

----------


## Mid

> If anyone thinks they have the right to judge them then they should take on the job themselves and show us how they would handle it.


suspect you have the time line a mite confused  :Sad:

----------


## Thormaturge

^
Not at all Mid.

In any crisis there are those who rise to the occasion and step forward to deal with the situation.  They don't sit about analysing and forming committees and criticising, they get on with it and do the best they can.

There are others who, with the benefit of time and hindsight, happily tell us what those people did wrong.

If NISA officials think they could do better in the same circumstances then maybe they should don the necessary clothing and head down to the plants to make sure there are no more human errors.  Plenty of time to show us all what they are made of.   God help us that the same incompetent people are still on the ground trying to resolve the problem when NISA has people who are far more capable sitting in an office telling us how they can do the job better.

Whatever human errors may have been made I would expect officials to  give the workers on the ground as much support as they need rather than  sit about blaming them for trying to resolve shortfalls which may prove to be NISA's responsibility.


"The man who really  counts in the world is the doer, not the mere critic-the man who  actually does the work, even if roughly and imperfectly, not the man who  only talks or writes about how it ought to be done."


Theodore Roosevelt

----------


## Mid

> In any crisis there are those who rise to the occasion and step forward to deal with the situation. They don't sit about analysing and forming committees and criticising, they get on with it and do the best they can.  There are others who, with the benefit of time and hindsight, happily tell us what those people did wrong.


indeed , however isn't the finger pointing being aimed at those who designed and managed the facilities well before the current crisis ?

see post #895 , which in turn references post # 894

----------


## Thormaturge

If the generators were inadequate to begin with then maybe NISA should shut up before someone mentions who should have noticed.

----------


## robuzo

T-urge^All you have to do is look at TEPCO's record and almost utter lack of accountability over the past 30 years. What we are seeing here is at least in part an example of the results of moral hazard. Industry insiders are also reporting that inaction during the early phase of the crisis was indeed due to the desire of TEPCO to protect its assets (link below). That would be entirely consistent with the pattern of behavior they have exhibited for decades. Japan

----------


## misskit

*Minami-Sanrikucho a ghost town / No bodies, survivors found in tsunami-hit Miyagi Pref. community*

Junzo Ono / Yomiuri Shimbun Staff Writer

MINAMI-SANRIKUCHO, Miyagi--Despite intensified rescue operations, rescue workers have yet to find a single survivor or a body in tsunami-hit Minami-Sanrikucho, Miyagi Prefecture, following the massive March 11 earthquake.

While the search for bodies and missing people proceeds with difficulty in the disaster-stricken areas along the Pacific Ocean, the official toll of dead and missing from the quake and tsunami has now exceeded that of the Great Hanshin Earthquake in 1995.

Kobe fire department rescue team members, who also worked in areas affected by the Great Hanshin Earthquake, have been operating in Minami-Sanrikucho. But they do not have any idea of the whereabouts of the legions of missing people swept away after massive tsunami swallowed up houses. *In all, 8,000 town residents remain missing.*

Minami-Sanrikucho a ghost town / No bodies, survivors found in tsunami-hit Miyagi Pref. community : National : DAILY YOMIURI ONLINE (The Daily Yomiuri)

----------


## hazz

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 
> Japan's NISA come out and speculated that human error may well prove responsible for that EDG failures.  So the finger pointing has begun, and perhaps some of the real truths will rise to the top.
> 
> 
> I would be amazed if those who are working in the danger zone did not make mistakes.  They are under immense pressure and they are human.  The fact that these brave people are prepared to work in that environment at all is something we should all be grateful for.
> 
> If anyone thinks they have the right to judge them then they should take on the job themselves and show us how they would handle it.


The people working on the reactor site are heros as you point out; and everyone is grateful for there sacrifice. But this not the first time that the Japanese people have been saved by heroic acts of nuclear workers; workers who have often been part of the problem that created the circumstances for the disaster in the first place.

Japan has to be, environmentally, the most dangerous place to locate nuclear reactors on the planet and at the same time the Japanese nuclear industry has the worst safety record in the western world.  new scientist's summary of the most serious ones over the last 15 years. 

Look at its history,you can see that its attitude towards safety and the processes that ensure it and very similar to those of puket air; with similarly tragic results. again and again.

In this context its perfectly reasonable even at this stage to question past and present conduct of everyone involved. I am quite curious why when they planned reconnecting the reactors to the grid, the left the wiring work at the reactor site as the last task in the process, given that this had made it necessary to expose considerably more people to heroic levels of radiation. There might be a good reason it being done this way, but equally it could well be down to the inevitable tunnel vision of those dealing with the immediate problem. But I would like to think that someone, even if they were in a nice safe office miles away, questioned the wisdom of this; rather than just letting them get on with it.

----------


## Thormaturge

> Japan has to be, environmentally, the most dangerous place to locate nuclear reactors on the planet


I certainly agree with you on that.  Additionally seismologists were even expecting a major quake in exactly this spot, albeit a smaller one.

Makes you wonder who makes the decisions, and I suspect it is not the people currently risking their lives trying to cool down the reactors with little more than garden hoses and a few buckets.

----------


## hazz

In all seriousness given japans passion for manufacturing advanced robots, Ive been a little surprised that little has been done with them. Turns out that there is a reason:




> from new scientist
> A number of other robots were developed after the Tokaimura accident, but have not been adopted. Japan's leading expert on rescue robots, Satoshi Tadokoro, of International Rescue Systems Institute is quoted on the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue's site as saying this was because nuclear industry claimed that their plants were safe. More robots might reduce the need for human workers inthe danger area.

----------


## mobs00

2011-03-20



2011-03-19

----------


## mobs00

Wiki now has a good page dedicated to the Fukushima nuclear accident.

Fukushima I nuclear accidents - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

----------


## hazz

> Originally Posted by hazz
> 
> 
> Japan has to be, environmentally, the most dangerous place to locate nuclear reactors on the planet
> 
> 
> I certainly agree with you on that.  Additionally seismologists were even expecting a major quake in exactly this spot, albeit a smaller one.
> 
> Makes you wonder who makes the decisions, and I suspect it is not the people currently risking their lives trying to cool down the reactors with little more than garden hoses and a few buckets.


Unfortuanlty very true and given this is japan I suspect the worst anyone culpable for setting up the conditions for this disaster will have to do is make a half hearted public apology and bow a bit. Which is probably more than those responsible for setting chynobol in playm, ever had to face.

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by Thormaturge
> 
>  In any crisis there are those who rise to the occasion and step forward to deal with the situation. They don't sit about analysing and forming committees and criticising, they get on with it and do the best they can.  There are others who, with the benefit of time and hindsight, happily tell us what those people did wrong.
> 
> 
> indeed , however isn't the finger pointing being aimed at those who designed and managed the facilities well before the current crisis ?
> 
> see post #895 , which in turn references post # 894


Gentlemen,  I agree with both sets of commentary yuo are voicing related to the quotation I posted.   Again the original quote only gives partial information.   This leaves the specific issue's involved difficult to sort out.

NISA makes the casual remark, not saying human error was involved directly, but that the case needed to be followed closely.    To me - this is a pretty bold statement to have been made, by an Japanese industrial authority -  when one considers the "face saving" mentality always at work in Asia.    For NISA to make such a comment -  would imply they have some concern about this.    

The core issue is the impact of the internal back up power loss, its devastating impact, the risks carried, and the huge financial burden triggered from the situation.

TEPCO's pronouncement that the generators were not impacted by waves,  but that equipment outside was impacted...   Again it is vague disclosure, but an important one.   It is the first admission that the EDG's themselves were not impacted.    

But the nature of the "outside equipment" or the way it was impacted has not been made clear by TEPCO.   That information is key and very relevant to this loss of site emergency power.    TEPCO understates the specific issue with the outside equipment.

From the standpoint of Control room operators, in managing the impact of the natural disaster -  Their focus is to bring up what ever reserve power they can.  When the system functions only briefly, or not at all.  
That is the end of the game for control room personnel.  They cannot take action beyond what can be done from their command area.

The ball for recovery from "outside impacted equipment" would fall with other plant staffers, including maintenance and engineering.   This means a field level assessment and strategy formation.

If the "outside impacted equipment"  happens to be the external bus works,  transformers & XMFR safety circuits, or external switching components -  It would not be immediately correctable without a FW washdown and further repair to what ever portions were vulnerable.  Bypassing safety items - in the interest of getting the station bus back.   It must be recognized that it is very high risk to be standing in an external switchyard area that has been soaked down with sea water.   At the voltage's that would circulate (just from the EDGs - with everything else dead) - would be lethal for workers - because the salt water on everything would be a impressive conduction path.   Even gloved up and well booted - Standing there in a switch yard to manipulate some of the open open arc air gap disconnect switches would be high risk.  It could only safely be done, with all power sources off.    With "compromised " grid connections and other "damage buss portions" isolated by air gap switches.   There may have been opportunites to try and repower the EDG's...     TRUTHFULLY -  THE SUPPORT STAFFERS AT TEPCO - WOULD KNOW THIS WORK AROUND - WITHOUT ANY QUESTION..  IT THE IMPACTED EQUIPMENT WERE BUSS SECTIONS.   EXTERNAL BUSSES ARE DESIGNED TO BE SECTIONALIZED IN CASE OF PARTIAL FAULTS.  THIS IS STANDARD UTILITY PRACTICE.  

If the "outside impacted equipment" happen to be EDG controls only.  Then TEPCO would have to find the work around.  Disabling the impacted parts and getting start / run power up - even with control pieces missing.   

If the "outside impacted equipment" happened to be the EDG breakers themselves -  There are two basic work arounds.  

1) would be pulling the breakers out and swapping with a spare.  (Most large breakers are designed for easy removal and have tools and breaker carts to make these heavy items mobil)

 or 2) Rack the breakers out, wash them down with FW if contaminated with salt, dry them, and do quick field checks on what protection portions or control portions may be damage, and bypass them.   Typically most breakers have under voltage trips, control voltage trips, instantionous magnetic overloads, and longer duration magnetic overloads.  All these items operate mechanical items inside the breakers, and can be defeated with some know how.  If TEPCO has a good T&D technical department -  They will know these breakers inside and out.    

TEPCO doesnt make clear what the "outside impacted equipment" happens to be.    In any case - with EDG's NOT IMPACTED.    There are work arounds, that could have been driven hard to get EDG's delivering power (since they were not impacted).

Gentlemen - My electrical skills don't compare to a Electrical Engineer's or top T&D shop and field staffers. But I can read schematics and know how to trouble shoot with basis multimeters, meggors and related test gear.   I have done all these items, within my career - to get  a main power back - when black start capabilities were lost, and EDG's were no longer operable by any normal function.  Either because reserve batteries were lost, excitation systems lost, or other pieces of the power puzzle were lost.  In some cases - defeating electrical interlocks designed into the power system were part of that process to be able to EDG power on to main switchboards, not just EDG driven critical machinery.   Yes - It meant testing and finding work arounds, pulling breakers and manually latching UV trips, remote control trips, and other items that act through mechanical parts w/ nylon tie wraps.  Talking some safety risks, to get power restored.   Some risk taking and some trial and error are involved.  In the end, power was restored by the work arounds.   With power back up - Its amazing how quickly things normalize, and how the work arounds can be later removed by completing other repairs.  

In my work, There was no one else to turn to those loss of black start issues.  So there as no pathway out other than for me to identify the issue and do the work arounds.  I was in a principal role to drive a solution in those instances.   

A large robust utility such as TEPCO - should have the craft talent and engineering to do this stuff pretty rapidly.  At least to test and map the defects, to build the restoration pathwork needed.   Letting engineering brainstorm the work around's (reviewing schematics) in conjunction with the T&D tech's who have the hands on side mastered.   Because station power is a critical issue in this event -  Every EDG and its associated "outside impacted equipment" - should have been flow charted - like the nice charts TEPCO was fond of producing.  Each one was a road map out of the crisis, and worthy of as much focus - as the heroic efforts going on inside the plant.   

Outside of my vessel and marine engineering related  work,  I spent 2 years working for a private independent power producer.  It was a company of 30 people, 7 power projects and 7 operators. No other talent pool of craft field staff, no engineers.   Electrical maintenance was outsourced, as was mechanical.   When the power projects tumbled and  developed power or control issues -  I had to do the troubleshooting, make the work arounds, and stand the projects back up, and later make the repairs with spares and undoing the work arounds.  Before I came there,  that company outsourced that fuction as well, and they commonly had projects down for days at time - while getting outside support.  

Most consultants were industrial electricians, It is difficult to find freelance utility electricians - with the skill sets to be able cover all the bases, from trouble shooting, all the way down to  breaker mechanics. It is probably common that TEPCO - outsources their breaker service work as well.   Utilities lean model some capabilities, because its cheaper to outsource than keep the talent in house.     

Returning to the quote that was provided in my earlier post.  TEPCO's failure to disclose details -  Is why groups like NISA makes such questionable statements publicly.  

NISA reads TEPCO's statements of no water impact on the EDG's  and wonder why EDG back ups have taken more than 6 days to return to service.    

I dont think for a minute NISA's remarks were directed at the plant operations team, or their handling of the initial outage.   I think NISA's remarks were directed squarely at TEPCO - for their inability to get the station bus back in service.    

There is little question that the 6 or 7 days without station bus in service (but not having damaged EDG's) -  Resulted in all of the un needed risks and costly recovery that are part of the process ongoing now.   The cost of this 7 day plant station buss  outage is astronomical.   

All of Japans other Nuke plants, that were knocked down, but kept station buss powered by EDG's suffered minor damage, with no radiation release or high risk profiles.   Despite the EQ and Tsunami.

TEPCO - bears accountability for their actions with regard to the time delay in restoring plant station bus.  Now with 2 EDG running - in advance of the New Power line interconnection completion.   The issue of the long power outtage experienced  - will come into focus.  

It is a key issue.  It created the situation.  It is a very different issue from the heroic's the rest of TEPCO's team displayed to manage the cooling issues at great personal exposure.     Had TEPCO gotten EDG's back in service 6 or  12 hours post initial incident - the whole event would have been different.

The work to restore EDG power and station bus - Is not heroic's, nor is it key crisis intervention done on the reactor side.  It is a case of problem identification, developing work around for temporary power restorantion and then later full EDG restoration.    That process involves Craft talent, engineering judgment, and a top down pressure and focus by TEPCO - to vest activity in that area.  

What remains undefined, by brief and incomplete disclosures by TEPCO - Is the trajectory they followed with regard to restoration of EDG power.   Their admission of not having impacted EDG's.... Very much turns the heat up on their own response level toward restoring station bus via EDG's....         

Groups with some technical savvy, and understand the potential issues - are the groups that will be turning up the heat on TEPCO - for their action plan and managment process related to restoring this reserve power.

The dialogue is from from over.   When the dialogue is done,  It will not be centerd on finger pointing towards individual efforts.  It will instead be a major focus on managements initiative to prioritize focus in dealing with this crisis.   The beauty of an organization like TEPCO who have 800 + connected to this site - is that they should have the depth and expertise to handle anything efficiently focused.    It takes leadership to define the priorities and channel the efforts of 800 + skilled staffers.    

Yes fatigue and trauma diffuse efficiency, but the talent and culture within the organization should have been such that all with knowledge should have open voices to speak to the process at hand.   Management should listen and brain storm, and recognize what is solveable.

I suspect when this is all reviewed - top down cultural issues within TEPCO will be revealed, where the rank and file with tech level skills - where shelved to take orders and not deliver feedback to management much above those solution providers.   

My perceptions tell me that this cultural issue will be very similar to the why the Korean Airline's had the worst world wide airline crash and safety record.   It took a redefining of cock pit dialogues and protocols to bring safety to their pilot performance.   The leader / follower - dont question  mentality  between Pilot / Co pilot is what killed Korean airline safety.  

My suspession is that some of this kind of cultural bias will come to light, to reveal TEPCOs poor handling of plant bus restoration.  It will take a hard squeeze of the rank and file - to bring this to light.   TEPCO and japan protocols will likely not allow such a squeeze to happen to the rank and file.   Even the one TEPCO worker who blogged personal feelings had her site taken down and she gave an apology shortly after.   This speaks volumes about the mindset and lack of distention tolerated within the ranks.   TEPCO wants to control the statements, and control the media.  NO other voice will be tolerated.

The point of this post - is not to put feathers in anyone cap.  Its to define issues, in light of emerging disclosures.    A major nuclear event with perhaps world wide complications has just been side stepped.   It is important to look carefully at all factors that influenced the risks involved.... Not just the nuclear reactor design, or basic cooling designs.    

The plants overall safe design, the plants vulnerabilities, and the operating company's situation management and internal culture are all part causitive factors behind the risk assumed, and the resolution track that has emerged.   

Its a holisitic view that integrates all factors, which is what is going to improve Nuclear safety.   This is the bottom line view that must be at work here.   It goes well beyond TEPCO egos, NISA egos, or statements shrouded in partial disclosure.

----------


## misskit

*Radioactive air to be released from No.3 reactor*

Workers at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant will release air that contains radioactive substances to reduce pressure inside the Number 3 reactor.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency told a news conference on Sunday afternoon that air will be released directly from the container vessel later in the day.

Usually, air from the vessel is released through a suppression pool to reduce the amount of radioactive substances.

The agency says workers who are preparing to pour water into the reactor and installing power cables will first be evacuated.

It adds that more radioactive substances will be released, but that the agency and Tokyo Electric Power Company agreed that this has to be done.

Sunday, March 20, 2011 13:40 +0900 NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*6 workers exposed to excessive radiation at Fukushima plant*

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Six workers at the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant have been exposed to radiation levels beyond the limit applied to an emergency operation, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Saturday, without elaborating on the work that they were engaged in.



They are continuing to work on different tasks because they have not shown any abnormal signs since being exposed to over 100 millisieverts of radiation, the utility said. The limit has been raised to 250 millisieverts for the ongoing crisis, the worst in Japan's history, by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry.

The government's Fire and Disaster Management Agency said separately that readings of up to 27 millisieverts of radiation were detected as of noon on around 50 employees of the Tokyo Fire Department who were decontaminated after spraying water earlier in the day at the plant's highly dangerous No. 3 reactor.

(Mainichi Japan) 6 workers exposed to excessive radiation at Fukushima plant - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## Mid

just updating this thread with the following info from the main thread




> *6 workers exposed to excessive radiation at Fukushima plant*
> 
> TOKYO (Kyodo) -- Six workers at the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear  power plant have been exposed to radiation levels beyond the limit  applied to an emergency operation, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said  Saturday, without elaborating on the work that they were engaged in.
> 
> They are continuing to work on different tasks because they have not  shown any abnormal signs since being exposed to over 100 millisieverts  of radiation, the utility said. The limit has been raised to 250  millisieverts for the ongoing crisis, the worst in Japan's history, by  the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry.
> 
> The government's Fire and Disaster Management Agency said separately  that readings of up to 27 millisieverts of radiation were detected as of  noon on around 50 employees of the Tokyo Fire Department who were  decontaminated after spraying water earlier in the day at the plant's  highly dangerous No. 3 reactor.
> 
> (Mainichi Japan) 6 workers exposed to excessive radiation at Fukushima plant - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## BobR

> just updating this thread with the following info from the main thread
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by misskit
> 
> ...


At least in Japan they will receive the best medical care and workers compensation and be taken care of for the rest of their lives if that is needed.  Imagine Thailand?  Even if they had anyone who volunteered or obeyed orders to do life threatening work, as soon as the crisis was over they would become a nuisance to everyone involved, they would likely be fired or considered to have quit and nether the plant operator or the government would help them.

Some of the awards I've seen here for workers legitimately injured through their jobs have been more of an insult than a settlement.

----------


## nidhogg

> They are continuing to work on different tasks because they have not shown any abnormal signs since being exposed to over 100 millisieverts of radiation, the utility said. The limit has been raised to 250 millisieverts for the ongoing crisis, the worst in Japan's history, by the Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry.


Just to put some context on these numbers, I had a quick shufti at Wikki.  The dose limit they are talking about (250 millisieverts) is a newly raised yearly dose.  That can be compared to the following exposure levels:


Smoking1.5 packs/day: 13-60 mSv/year

Background radiation in parts of Iran, India and Europe: 50 mSv/year


The average (non-emergency) exposure allowed at powerstations is 20 millisieverts  (half what some people are exposed to naturally!).

The maximum single dose allowed under any circumstances (which is different);


International Commission on Radiological Protection recommended limit for volunteers rescuing lives or preventing serious injuries: 1000 mSv

So levels is japan that these workers are being exposed to are high, and have an associated risk, but we are not talking instant fry levels.  


Sievert - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by Mid
> 
> 
> just updating this thread with the following info from the main thread
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ...


You're right about that, but Japanese workers and victims of industrial disasters had to fight to get where they are now, through heavy litigation as well thanks to a political left which, while weak, never completely went away. But it was more through the former, and it was at times a hard slog. It was decades before the corporations responsible for massive mercury poisoning at Minamata and Niigata paid anything to the victims, and they fought tooth and nail to avoid doing so. It was even more decades before the Japanese government admitted to its own negligence in that case. If TEPCO could slip away without paying anything, it would do so. It has been getting away with lawbreaking for years, despite repeated attempts by whistleblowers. This time they are screwed, but had there been sufficient transparency in the past at least some of the current trouble could probably have been avoided.

The Japanese like order and respect authority, but they don't take kindly to being fucked, and don't accept it as the natural order of society. Thais are going to have to get over their serf mentality before workers and regular people will ever be able to get any justice here.

----------


## Mid

*Japan crisis: 'Theres no food, tell people there is no food*
Peter Foster, Ichinomaki              
19 Mar 2011                                  

*Japans survivors scavenge for food in aftermath of tsunami* 

 
_Kazuhiro Takahashi is another hungry victim of Japan's tsunami trying to find food for his family_ 
Photo: ADAM DEAN

 
Photo: ADAM DEAN

 
Photo: ADAM DEAN

 
Photo: ADAM DEAN

 The unshaven man in a tracksuit stops his bicycle on the roadside and glances    over his shoulder to check that he is unobserved. Satisfied, he reaches    quickly into the sludge-filled gutter, picks up a discarded ready-meal and    stuffs it into a plastic carrier bag. 

  In another time, another place, Kazuhiro Takahashi could be taken for a tramp,    out scavenging for food after a long night on the bottle. In fact, he is    just another hungry victim of Japans tsunami trying to find food for his    family. 

  I am so ashamed, says the 43-year-old construction worker after he realises    he has been spotted. But for three days we havent had enough food. I have    no money because my house was washed away by the tsunami and the cash    machine is not working.  

  If his haul wasnt so pitiful  his bag had two packets of defrosted prawn    dumplings and a handful of vacuum-packed seafood sticks inside  Mr    Takahashi might be taken for a looter. But in the port town of Ichinomaki,    200 miles north of Tokyo, his story is disturbingly common. 

  Japan might be a rich country, but a week after the tsunami struck it is    struggling to feed and house the victims adequately. 

I have a place in a rescue centre in the Akai Elementary School, but the    food they are giving us is not enough, Mr Takahashi says. My parents are    in their 70s and we receive a tiny bowl of plain rice twice a day, with    nothing else, just a pinch of salt. We are hungry, so have come to look for    food. 

  Mr Takahashi is not alone. Over his shoulder, a small legion of tramps,    their feet wrapped in plastic bags, can be seen trawling the muddy aisles of    a smashed-up supermarket, hoping to find other edible treasures that might    supplement rescue centre rations. 

  Dont take my photograph! barks a man in blue overalls with at least three    days stubble on his chin. This is so shaming, but I have given up on the    government. We cannot rely on them so we have to help ourselves.  

  Shame plays an important role in Japanese society, forcing people to    maintaining the outward norms of life even when faced with the most extreme    of circumstances, as the world has witnessed to its amazement this past week. 

  But in Ichinomaki, and countless other stricken towns along the countrys    northeast coast, raw necessity is starting to fray even Japans super-taut    social fabric. They are no longer Japanese, says one woman bystander with    a shiver of pity and disdain. I dont feel like this is Japan.  

  Natural disasters have a cruel power to strip the dignity from both the living    and dead, but in a country as polite and fastidious as Japan the process    seems all the more brutal. They are desperate, they have no other food to    eat, says a policeman guiding some emergency traffic at a nearby    intersection. You could call it stealing, but we understand that at these    times there is perhaps no other choice.  

  There are some signs of stealing in Ichinomaki  the supermarket cash-machine    has been smashed open and on one ruined street a locked safe, the size of    kitchen fridge, had been dragged out and fruitlessly vandalised  but    broadly it feels as if law and order still hold sway. 

  The frustration is that Ichinomaki does have at least one working supermarket,    opposite the towns police station, but shoppers must queue for two or three    hours, can buy only 10 items or fewer and must pay cash  not possible if    your house has been washed away. 

  Amazingly, many residents in Ichinomaki refuse to criticise the local or    national authorities, excusing any shortcomings by blaming them on the sheer    scale and breadth of the destruction that has made delivering aid such a    mammoth task. 

  Perhaps that too is hiding Japans shame, but they might be less sanguine if    they could see the empty highways that remain closed to all to but emergency    vehicles, yet still connect Tokyo to Ichinomaki in just four-and-a-half    hours drive and could, surely, be used to carry some emergency food and    fuel. 

  Finding petrol remains impossible, leading many to take to their bicycles,    slithering through the mud-caked streets until they have to stop, clear    their mudguards, and then slither on. 

  Down in the docks, which were almost obliterated by the tsunami, people could    be found climbing through the wreckage, trying pull out usable bicycles and    siphoning petrol from cars that had been picked up and dashed against houses    and harbour walls. 

  Theres no food, tell people there is no food, says a man filching petrol,    who declined to be named. They say on the television that aid is being    delivered, that food is coming, but you can see for yourself it is not. 

  I thought we were a wealthy country, but now I dont know what to think, he    adds, explaining that he is surviving on slowly defrosting food from his    home freezer. You must tell people what is happening here because the    Japanese media is too frightened to tell the truth.  

  It is true that coverage of the quake in Japan tends to show the brighter side    of the relief efforts, while in reality for many the experience is    humiliatingly grim. 

  In one of Ichinomakis rescue shelters, The Daily Telegraph meets Kinniko    Ishikawa, a deaf but indomitable 70-year-old who is bursting to tell how she    watched from her second-floor bedroom window as her neighbours house was    washed away. 

  They went right past my window  my neighbour, her husband and their daughter    still in their house, floating away on the wave  I waved at them as they    went, I said 'bye-bye, bye-bye and then they were gone, just like that.  

  She laughs out loud at the memory, at the apparently surreal comedy of the    moment and then just as suddenly becomes a tired and sad old woman again.    They are still missing, she says, using a word that increasingly has come    to mean only one thing. 

  Mrs Ishikawa and about 30 other pensioners sleep on the floor of a single room    in an old government building opposite Ichinomakis city hall. The place is    warm but has no water for the lavatories and is a far cry from the    brightly-lit sports halls that feature on Japans television news. 

  Yes, its true, there is no food from the government, she says. But we are    lucky ... we receive at least one bowl of rice each day from a local    charity, and yesterday they bought us some snacks.  

  Of course we feel hungry, but we must try to ignore it.

telegraph.co.uk

----------


## Takeovers

> International Commission on Radiological Protection recommended limit for volunteers rescuing lives or preventing serious injuries: 1000 mSv  So levels is japan that these workers are being exposed to are high, and have an associated risk, but we are not talking instant fry levels.


Thanks for putting things in perspective. Those people are risking their lifes and they deserve being tagged as heroes.

But the risk is more from another explosion and the risk of a total meltdown with suddenly hugely increased radiation levels than the present level. That is what they are working to avoid and right now it seems they can succeed.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan makes progress at nuclear plant FT.com / Asia-Pacific - Japan makes progress at nuclear plant

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Video, Japan Quake, Tsunami: Woman And Boy Rescued From Ruins Of House In City Of Ishinomaki | World News | Sky News
*
*Japan: Woman And Teen Found In Quake Ruins                    * 

                                                                                           Graham Fitzgerald, Sky News Online                     

*                                                                                           A woman of 80 and a teenage boy have  been rescued from the wreckage of a house - nine days after the  earthquake that has devastated northeastern Japan.                                                                              * 

                                                                                                                    Rescuers spotted the 16-year-old boy on the roof of his house in the city of Ishinomaki, calling out for help.

  He then led rescuers inside, where they found the elderly woman. It  is not known how badly they were hurt. They are now being treated in  hospital.

  The Japanese government has meanwhile said the nuclear plant damaged  by the tsunami will be closed once its overheating reactors are brought  under control.

  Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said the dumping of seawater on  Fukushima 1 to prevent a meltdown will render key parts of it unusable.

  Workers at the plant are attempting to partially restore electricity supplies to cool the reactors.

  Engineers have connected a cable through which they hope to supply power to part of the complex.

  The earthquake and tsunami that followed crippled the plant's cooling systems, leading to radiation leaks.

*tsunami continues to give up its dead*

  Police say the number killed in Japan's worst natural diasaster since 1923 has now risen above 20,000.

  Some 8,133 people have now been confirmed dead while another 12,272  are missing, feared lost in the tsunami or buried in the wreckage of  buildings.

  Half a million people have lost their homes and many are living in  shelters with limited supplies of food and water in freezing conditions.

*Holly Williams: People Seeking Escape Route*

*Radiation  has seeped into the food supply, with the government warning tests of  spinach and milk from areas as far as 75 miles (120 kilometres) away  exceeded safety limits.*

  Small amounts of radioactive iodine has also been found in the  capital Tokyo and other areas, although the government says they are  within safety limits.

  According to Save the Children, around 100,000 children were  displaced by the disaster and are suffering increasingly from the after  effects.

  "We found children in desperate conditions, huddling around kerosene  lamps and wrapped in blankets," said the charity's Ian Woolverton after  visiting as number of evacuation centres.

  "They told me about their anxieties, especially their fears about radiation," he added.

                   The cooling systems meant to protect the Fukushima plant's six  reactors from a potentially catastrophic meltdown were knocked out by  the tsunami.

  Engineers have been battling ever since to keep a lid on rising temperatures.

Crews in radiation suits are battling to partially power to the ageing  facility after extending a high-voltage cable into the site from the  national grid.

  There were hopes of completing the operation by the end of Sunday but plant operator Tepco says that is now unlikely.




      Spraying of water from high-pressure hoses to cool the reactors was  complicating the task, it said. Helicopters have also been dumping  seawater onto the plant.

Japan's nuclear safety agency has said pressure was rising in the  containment vessel in the no. 3 reactor and Tepco might have to open  valves, which could lead to the release of more radioactive material.

  However, it said there was no plan to extend a 12.5-mile (20-kilometre) evacuation area around Fukushima 1.

----------


## StrontiumDog

BBC News - Japan: Miyagi prefecture death toll 'may reach 15,000'

20 March 2011 Last updated at 11:06 GMT             *

Japan warns on quake deaths rise*

 
Hundreds of thousands of survivors are camped in basic shelters without heating or enough food   

                      Police  in Japan say 15,000 people may have been killed in a single prefecture,  Miyagi, by the huge quake and tsunami which struck nine days ago. 

         The announcement came as the official death toll rose to 8,133, with 12,272 people missing.

         But there was some good news after an 80-year-old woman and a  boy believed to be her grandson were found alive in the rubble of  Ishinomaki city.

         Attempts go on to stave off a meltdown at the Fukushima nuclear plant. 

         Engineers are still working to restore power supplies to the plant's cooling systems, which were knocked out by the tsunami. 

         But even when they do, there is no guarantee the cooling  systems in the plant will work, says the BBC's Rupert Wingfield-Hayes in  Toyko. 

         At reactor 3, pressure was reported to be rising again -  suggesting it may have to be vented, a procedure which leads to the  escape of radioactive material within the escaping steam.

         Experts say that an improvised spraying operation using fire trucks may have to continue for months, our correspondent says.

*Homeless   *  

The new figure of a possible 15,000 dead comes from police in  the worst-hit Miyagi prefecture, and does not include the thousands more  dead and missing in areas to the north and south. 

         It is looking increasingly clear that the death toll will top 20,000 people at least, our correspondent says.

         The disaster dwarfs anything Japan has seen since World War  II and people are beginning to talk of the disaster in similar terms, he  says. 

         In a rare story of survival, an elderly woman and a  16-year-old boy, believed to be her grandson, were found alive in a  house in Ishinomaki, Miyagi prefecture, nine days after the quake, said  Japanese media and police.

         Sumi and Jin Abe were trapped when their home collapsed in  the quake but were able to get food from the refrigerator. They are both  being treated in hospital.

         The authorities have begun building temporary homes for some  of the hundreds of thousands of people - including an estimated 100,000  children - still sheltering at emergency evacuation centres. 

         Many survivors have been enduring freezing temperatures without water, electricity, fuel or enough food. 

      The destruction of the mobile  phone network means people are queuing for hours to make their allocated  phone call of one minute. 

         And crippling fuel shortages mean long queues at some petrol stations. 

         Meanwhile, at the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant,  firefighters have continued to spray water at the dangerously overheated  reactors and fuel rods, in a desperate attempt to avert a meltdown.

         Engineers hope that restoring power will allow them to  restart pumps to continue the cooling process, and have attached power  lines to reactors 1 and 2, but it is unclear when they will attempt to  turn the power back on.

         Amid reports of rising pressure at reactor 3, Japan's nuclear  safety agency said radioactive gas might have to be vented to prevent a  dangerous build-up.

         But Kyodo news agency quoted Tokyo Electric Power Co as  saying that previously overheated spent-fuel storage pools at reactors 5  and 6 had been cooled by Sunday morning. 

         On Friday officials raised the alert level at the plant from  four to five on a seven-point international scale of atomic incidents.

         The crisis, previously rated as a local problem, is now regarded as having "wider consequences".

*Food ban mulled *  

Radiation levels have risen in the capital Tokyo, 240km (150  miles) to the south, but officials say the levels recorded are not  harmful. 

         Radioactive contamination has been found in some food products from the Fukushima prefecture, Japanese officials say.

         The iodine was found in milk and spinach tested between 16  and 18 March and could be harmful to human health if ingested, the  officials said. 

         International nuclear experts at the IAEA say that, although  radioactive iodine has a short half-life of about eight days, there is a  short-term risk to human health if it is ingested, and it can cause  damage to the thyroid.  

         On Sunday, chief cabinet secretary Yukio Edano said the  government would decide by Monday whether to restrict consumption and  shipments of food products from the area in the vicinity of the  Fukushima plant. 

         Traces of radioactive iodine have also been found in tap water in Tokyo and five other prefectures, officials said on Saturday.

         The traces are within government safety limits, but tests usually show no iodine.

         Meanwhile, radiation has been detected for the first time in  Japanese exports, with Taiwanese officials finding contamination in a  batch of fava beans, although they say the amount is too small to be  dangerous to humans.



*FUKUSHIMA UPDATE* 
 *Reactor 1:* Fuel rods damaged after explosion. Power lines attached *Reactor 2:* Damage to the core, prompted by a blast, helped trigger raising of the nuclear alert level. Power lines attached *Reactor 3:* Contains plutonium, core damaged by  explosion. Fuel ponds refilled with water in overnight operation, but  pressure said to be rising again *Reactor 4:* Hit by explosion and fire, temperature of spent fuel pond now said to have dropped after water spraying *Reactors 5 & 6:* Temperature of spent fuel pools now lowered after rising dangerously high. Diesel generators powering cooling systems

----------


## hazz

I am getting the impression that feeding and heating the survivors of the quake is not something the Japanese government is treating as a drop everything, except the reactors, and get what is needed to these people. Given just how much of the American army is based in Japan, you would have thought the would move heaven and dearth to help, if they are asked. It just looks that the japanise government is uttery unaware of the plight of these survivors.

----------


## foreigner

the best source I have found is here at da' door! many thanks to: 'life, 'dog, 'mob  .. et al  I'd read drudge, huff, google .. & then come here to find out what i needed know  maps, videos, charts & technical stuff not offered by any of the 'pros'!  hats off gentlemen!

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## Thaihome

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by nidhogg
> ...


The duct tape the article refers to is actually more like masking tape that is used to seal the protective clothing (PCs) at the wrist and ankles.  It is standard procedure all over the world and not some make shift solution.  PCs are used to protect the worker from contamination and cannot protect from radiation.   There is little a worker can wear to protect against radiation.  Even a lead lined vest that is sometimes worn offers little protection.  

There is nothing I have seen that says the workers are lacking any equipment, particularly personal protective equipment

At this point, time [of exposure) is the only factor that can be controlled and with limited numbers of people available, that is going to be hard to minimize.  No doubt these people will far exceed their lifetime exposure limits and will never be able to work in a radiation environment again.   They will likely have an increased chance of health problems in future.  

The article is indeed quite a bit sensationalist in its portrayal of the conditions the workers are operating in.  Working in PCs for extended periods of time is never pleasant and these people must be under tremendous strain and are indeed heroes.  

Nevertheless, the article could have done a much better job and not resorted to the cheap, easy sensationalism rather then a thoroughly researched and accurate report.   I dont think any of them will be exposed to levels that will cause them to die of acute radiation sickness such as what happened in Chernobyl and the article should have made that plain.
 TH

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## Mid

> The article is indeed quite a bit sensationalist in it’s portrayal of the conditions the workers are operating in. Working in PC’s for extended periods of time is never pleasant and these people must be under tremendous strain and are indeed heroes.


classic TH .

----------


## Thaihome

> Originally Posted by Thaihome
> 
> The article is indeed quite a bit sensationalist in its portrayal of the conditions the workers are operating in. Working in PCs for extended periods of time is never pleasant and these people must be under tremendous strain and are indeed heroes.
> 
> 
> classic TH .


 
Ignoring of course, as you are prone to do, the following:




> Nevertheless, the article could have done a much better job and not resorted to the cheap, easy sensationalism rather then a thoroughly researched and accurate report


But then you thrive on the cheap, easy sensationalism reporting.

The author has no knowledge of what radiation work and instead of taking the time to find out about it, wrote  something full of misleading information turning what could have been a interesting perspective into what the workers were going through into just another poorly researched piece full of clichés.

The workers there deserve better.

TH

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## Mid

> But then you thrive on the cheap, easy sensationalism reporting.


whilst your staple is messenger attacks  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

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## BobR

Protective clothing, personal computers and working under conditions of political correctness, yes PC's suck at work.

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## StrontiumDog

Reuters   Reuters Top News                                             

            FLASH: Workers at Japan nuclear plant have  connected power cables to no.3 & 4 reactors; all six reactors now  rigged to power cables

----------


## misskit

*No need to fear radioactive contamination of food, rain if proper steps taken: experts*

No need to fear radioactive contamination of food, rain if proper steps taken: experts - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## misskit

*Dead or missing from quake and tsunami tops 21,000*

Police say that more than 21,000 people are dead or missing in the aftermath of the massive earthquake and tsunami that hit northeastern Japan.

Of 8,649 confirmed deaths, 3,550 bodies have been identified. 12,877 people have been reported missing as of 9 AM, Monday.

5,244, or 60 percent of all deaths, have been reported in the northeastern prefecture of Miyagi, where coastal regions were devastated on March 11th.

2,650 deaths have been confirmed in Iwate and 699 in Fukushima.

Over a quarter of a million people are staying in about 2,300 shelters in the affected areas.

Many of the evacuees are suffering from shortages of food, water and other essential supplies.

Monday, March 21, 2011 11:31 +0900 

NHK WORLD English

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Workers train to spray reactor with concrete - CNN.com
*
*Workers train to spray reactor with concrete* 

  By *the CNN Wire Staff*
March 21, 2011 -- Updated 0712 GMT (1512 HKT)


Spraying the reactor with concrete recalls measures taken to contain the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl in 1986.

*STORY HIGHLIGHTS*Tests and training are being done on a concrete pumper that may be used on Unit 490 tons of water are sprayed Monday on that reactor, and 1,170 tons on unit No. 3Work continues to try to pump electricity to all the reactors to power cooling systemsConcerns remain high about radiation in certain foods and tap water
*Tokyo (CNN)*  -- Officials were training workers Monday to spray the Fukushima  Daiichi nuclear power plant's stricken reactors with concrete -- one of  several efforts underway to curb the release of more radioactive  material.

 A 9.0-magnitude earthquake and subsequent tsunami on  March 11 has devastated northeast Japan, with more than 8,600 dead and  13,000 missing. But most of the concern, and uncertainty, since then has  centered on the Daiichi plant, some 240 kilometers (150 miles) north of  Tokyo, as authorities rush to stave off a nuclear crisis over an 11-day  span marked by explosions and fears of meltdowns.

 Those efforts  include a move to possibly encase one or more of the reactors in  concrete, a last-ditch effort similar to what was done after the 1986  meltdown at the Chernobyl nuclear plant in the former Soviet Union --  considered the worst nuclear disaster at a plant. 

 On Monday, an  official with Japan's nuclear and industrial safety agency told  reporters that tests are expected to be conducted in the afternoon on  how to use what he called a "concrete pump engine."                                                      

The engine would pump a mix of mortar and  water into the reactor's spent nuclear fuel pool and containment vessel,  the official said. The pool contains nuclear fuel rods that could give  off radioactive material, if exposed and overheated, while the  containment vessel is a steel and concrete shell that insulates  radioactive material inside.

 While he did not indicate when or  even if the concrete pump would be used, the official did say the target  would be the plant's No. 4 reactor. In just over two hours on Monday  morning alone, 13 fire engines sprayed about 90 tons toward that reactor  in an attempt to cool it down.

 A Tokyo electric official told  CNN that six workers trying to restore electricity to that reactor have  been exposed to more than 100 millisieverts of radiation. For reference,  an individual in a developed country naturally is exposed to 3  millisieverts of radiation a year -- though Japan's health industry has  set a 250 millisievert limit for those trying to combat the crisis at  the Fukushima plant.

 The other five reactors, too, are in various  states of disrepair -- all subject to intense efforts to avert full or  partial meltdowns and the release of radioactive material.

 The  plant's No. 3 reactor has been a special concern, with a nuclear safety  official estimating 1,170 tons of water between sprayed between roughly 9  p.m. Sunday to 4 a.m. Monday alone.

 Earlier, officials said that  they were monitoring that reactor to determine whether to release gas  in order to reduce mounting pressure in the containment vessel. The  pressure buildup, specifically from excess hydrogen gas, had caused  explosions at that reactor and at the Nos. 1 and 2 reactors. Late last  week, three holes apiece were drilled into the Nos. 5 and 6 reactors in  order to alleviate pressure.

 Meanwhile, restoring power to the  facility has been a parallel priority throughout the nuclear facility.  The aim is to get cooling systems operating again that could lower  temperatures in the reactors, containment vessels and spent fuel pools  without the need for spraying, pumping in seawater or other means.



The nuclear and industrial official Monday  said that the groundwork of cables had been laid to restore electricity  to four of the six reactors.

 Setting up the electricity one  thing: Another issue is making sure that needed machinery, much of it  devastated by the disasters, are still working. To that end, the nuclear  safety official said that spare parts were being used or, if need be,  brought in to get all everything up in running.

 These efforts  came as concerns remained high about the impact that already emitted  radiation has had on food, water and people within range of the  Fukushima facility.

 Very small amounts -- far below the level of  concern -- of radioactive iodine have been detected in tap water in  Tokyo and most prefectures near the plant.

 The health ministry  said levels of radioactive iodine three times greater than the regulated  standard were found in drinking water in a village near the plant and  asked residents not to drink from the tap, Kyodo News reported Sunday.

 The  Japanese government has banned the sale of raw milk from Fukushima  Prefecture, where the plant is located, and prohibited the sale of  spinach from neighboring Ibaraki Prefecture after finding levels of  radioactive iodine and cesium higher than government standards, the  country's health ministry reported. And officials in Fukushima halted  the distribution of locally grown vegetables outside the prefecture.

 Edano said the contaminated milk detected in Fukushima Prefecture had not been distributed or sold.

 On  Saturday, officials said tainted milk was found 30 kilometers (18  miles) from the plant, and spinach was collected as far as 100  kilometers (65 miles) to the south, almost halfway to Tokyo.

 The  latest results accumulated and posted online by Japan's education,  science and technology ministry showed slight but notable upticks in  airborne radiation readings around Japan in recent days. But even the  highest readings, .11 millisieverts some 30 kilometers northwest of the  plant, were still considered significantly below what's considered  dangerous to humans.

 Nature has helped to minimize such airborne  exposure since the quake, as winds from the northwest have blown many  emissions from the plant out to sea.

 But the wind direction is  expected to change through Wednesday, potentially pushing more of the  material to the southwest and over land.

 "People  are watching," said Akira Shioi, who lives in Kawasaki. "And people  have greater concern than ever about the nuclear power plant incident."

----------


## StrontiumDog

Latest....

AP   The Associated Press                                             

            Japanese nuclear plant withdraws workers after troubled reactor emits gray smoke: Gray smoke rises at Japanese nuclear plant - Yahoo! News #earthquake #tsunami -JM

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## nidhogg

> The duct tape the article refers to is actually more like masking tape that is used to seal the protective clothing (PCs) at the wrist and ankles. It is standard procedure all over the world and not some make shift solution. PCs are used to protect the worker from contamination and cannot protect from radiation. There is little a worker can wear to protect against radiation. Even a lead lined vest that is sometimes worn offers little protection. 
> 
> (snip)
> 
> Nevertheless, the article could have done a much better job and not resorted to the cheap, easy sensationalism rather then a thoroughly researched and accurate report. I dont think any of them will be exposed to levels that will cause them to die of acute radiation sickness such as what happened in Chernobyl and the article should have made that plain.
> TH


Ok, about the tape for the PC, and agree about the article was a tad sensationalist - at least when put into the context of world wide radiation exposure limits.

Not in this line yourself by any chance are you?

 -

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## Thaihome

^
No longer, but spent close to 5 years a long time ago in a previous life as a craft radiation worker at two different sites, including a generating station. Only had two times we had to work in serious exposure environments. 

One was so high we were only allowed in for 5 minutes each. We lined up about 50 guys; all suited up and ran them in and out, two at time for 5 minutes. We had 5 left when we finally finished. As foreman, I got to be last to pick up the tools and do final check. Ended up in the PCs for 15 hours that day. Not a day I will ever forget. Very high stress level. 

For the people working in the plants now, it must be very, very tough, but I am sure they are professionals and they just think they are doing their job.
Th

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## Thaihome

Here are the people that are covering this story. They drove around for hours inhaling gasoline fumes thinking that was preferable to sucking in potentially irradiated air. 
TH

*Covering a Nuclear Disaster*

 
By HANNAH BEECH / TOKYO Hannah Beech / Tokyo  42 mins ago
One by one, they cracked. One European journalist abandoned his fuel-empty rental car in Fukushima, panicking at the prospect of staying a minute longer in the capital of the prefecture where the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was leaking radiation into the air. Another swathed himself in a raincoat and duct tape before fleeing the area a few hours later. Still another just started hurtling West in a car, even as the other journalists in the vehicle pleaded for him to stop and let them off so they could continue reporting. A couple hours later, he finally halted the car; by then, they were in another prefecture. Earlier that morning, woken by a loud siren, the skittish journalist had woken up yelling "air raid, air raid," startling the other members of the media squeezed into the hotel room with him. "I thought, wait, who's attacking Japan?" recalls a colleague. "It wasn't the Americans. Was it the Chinese? I was completely confused." The noise turned out to be a passing fire truck. 

Many of the foreign reporters covering the March 11 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami had seen plenty of death and destruction before coming to Japan. But what has so unnerved many journalists this time is an enemy that is odorless, colorless and tasteless. The sounds of mortar fire or precautions needed to avoid being kidnapped are things that some of us have been trained to understand. But radiation was an unknown threat to most of us, just as it was to many locals - even if Japan is the only country in the world that has suffered a nuclear attack. What exactly did a microsievert measure? What did a dosimeter do? How was it that we were supposed to take iodide pills but be worried about radioactive iodine? Could seaweed really counteract the effects of radiation, as one Japanese radio announcer had alleged? I had to supplement my Japanese with words that were not part of my normal vocabulary: radiation exposure, nuclear fuel rod, core cooling system. (See TIME's photos of the devastation in Japan.)

The rumors blew wild and unsubstantiated, especially in an area where phone and Internet services were limited by the natural disaster. A wire photographer, we heard, had been near the crippled plant area and was found with abnormal levels of radiation on his body. But was it three times or 30 times the normal amount? And what did that mean, anyway? Soon, news organizations and photo agencies began pulling their staff out of the area around Sendai, the earthquake and tsunami zone's biggest city that is around 100 km from the damaged reactor site. The evacuation of one media group catalyzed the next, emptying out hotels once so packed that journalists were sleeping in the lobby. 

TIME's editors were very cognizant of the potential health concerns. By phone and email they reiterated that the priority was our safety, not the story. Still, the TIME team in Sendai went around and around in logical loops trying to decide out whether we should stay or go. In the end, because levels of radiation detected in the air around where we were staying weren't high, we decided to stick around for a while. 

The winds were blowing south, which was good for those of us who were based north of the plant. When it started raining and snowing, we debated whether this was a good or a bad thing in terms of radiation exposure. (It was, we eventually agreed, a bad thing.) TIME's Tokyo reporter resorted to reading me over the phone information from the Centers for Disease Control about radiation poisoning. Basically the advice boiled down to 1) get out of the area and 2) take a long, soapy shower to get rid of surface radiation. But how to take a bath in an area where there was no running water because of the earthquake and tsunami? And the whole point as journalists was to be there. (Watch a doctor testing for radiation exposure.)

Add to that the constant shortage of fuel that made traveling anywhere difficult. (A fuel tuck filled with diesel gas for firetrucks was stuck in our hotel's parking lot because it, too, had run out of petrol.) We made a pact never to allow the car's gas meter to dip below half, the amount of fuel needed to make an escape to a transportation hub four hours away, in case radiation levels spiked. One day, we veered out of our way to rescue a fellow reporter stranded in a city that had become a ghost town because of radiation fears. (Comment on this story.)

To further protect ourselves, we traveled the decimated region with a jerry can filled with petrol squeezed in between the two front seats. The car air smelled like gas, but given that we were heading to an area not far from the Fukushima Daiichi plant, inhaling gas fumes seemed a better option than sucking in potentially irradiated air. As it turned out, when we got to one town flattened by the tsunami, a firefighter's Geiger counter showed the radiation level at 0.0. The firefighter, military and police squads were busy pulling bodies out of the tsunami wreckage. The threat of radiation was the last thing on most locals' minds. We cracked the car windows after that. 
When I eventually arrived in Tokyo, a city usually bathed in neon, the streets were eerily dark at night. But even though some residents, both local and foreign, have begun to flee Japan's capital because of radiation worries, many seem resigned to sticking it out. Over the weekend, news that small amounts of radiation had been found in spinach, milk and tap water largely elicited shrugs. "We have to drink water to survive, and the government says it's safe, so I'll keep drinking," says Tokyo lawyer Michi Hidano. "Maybe in 30 years' time there will be an increase in certain illnesses caused by radiation. But that's something we can't worry about now." Life must go on

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## Mid

> Covering a Nuclear Disaster


Covering a Nuclear Disaster - Yahoo! News

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## StrontiumDog

*New fault line stress could trigger Tokyo quake | The Jakarta Post
*

*New fault line stress could trigger Tokyo quake*

 		Robin McDowell, Associated Press, Jakarta | Mon, 03/21/2011 4:35 PM | World   		 		



Geologists say a powerful earthquake could strike near Tokyo  because the recent monster that hit northeastern Japan altered the  earth's surface, loading stress onto a segment of the fault line near  the capital.

The structure of the tectonic plates and fault lines  around the city makes it unlikely that Tokyo would be hit by a quake  anywhere near the intensity of March 11's magnitude-9.0 behemoth, said  Roger Musson of the British Geological Survey.

But given the vast  population - the capital and its surroundings are home to 39 million  people - any strong temblor could be devastating.

"Even if you've got, let's say, a 7.5, that would be serious," the seismologist said.

Japan  is located on the Ring of Fire, an arc of volcanos and fault lines  spanning the Pacific Basin, and is regularly hit by earthquakes.

But  before last week's quake - the largest to hit the country since it  started keeping records 130 years ago - few geologists considered Japan  to be a strong candidate for a 9-plus earthquake, said Andrew Moore, of  Earlham College in Richmond, Indiana.

There is mounting evidence,  however, that Japan has been struck by several severe quakes in the  last 3,500 years - most in the northern reaches of the country. Sand  deposits indicate that several quakes have spawned 30-foot-high  (9-meter-high) waves that slammed into the northern island of Hokkaido,  he said, the most recent in the 17th century.

Similar deposits  underlie the city of Sendai - the area rocked last week - with the most  recent from an 869 A.D. tsunami that killed 1,000 people and washed more  than 2.5 miles (three kilometers) inland.

And even weaker quakes that hit Tokyo in the past have caused significant damage.

But  last week's tremor changed the coastal landscape - and not just above  sea-level. It created a trench in the sea floor 240 miles long (380  kilometers long) and 120 miles wide (190 kilometers wide) as one  tectonic plate dove 30 feet (nine meters) beneath another, said Eric  Fielding of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

While that relieved  stress at the breaking point, it appears to have piled pressure onto  adjacent segments, said Brian Atwater, a geologist with the U.S.  Geological Survey.

That added strain could now trigger a strong, deadly aftershock on Tokyo's doorstep.

It's  a common occurrence after strong quakes and happened after the 2004  mega-earthquake and tsunami off Indonesia that killed 230,000 people in a  dozen nations.

Three months later, an 8.6-magnitude quake  erupted farther down the fault line, killing 1,000 people on sparsely  populated Nias island.

"But it's difficult to say," said Atwater.  "There are good examples of such stresses leading to other earthquakes,  big earthquakes, and there are good examples of that not happening."

Scientists are studying the March 11 quake and ongoing seismic activity to determine where new strains might be building.

"When  the main shock is this big, you get a football-shaped region where  aftershocks are fair game. It extends in all directions," including  toward Tokyo, USGS seismologist Susan Hough and other experts said.

But, they acknowledge, it's hard to keep up.

"We  are drinking from a fire hose here. The input data keeps changing and  augmenting," Ross Stein, of the USGS, wrote in an e-mail.

His  focus now is on the fragment of the Pacific tectonic plate lodged  beneath Tokyo - movement of which is believed to have caused a  7.3-magnitude quake in 1855 that killed an estimated 7,000 people.

"We believe ... the faults which bound the fragment were brought closer to failure by the magnitude-9 quake," Ross said.

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## robuzo

"It's a common occurrence after strong quakes and happened after the 2004 mega-earthquake " Yes, happened already- a 6.2 quake in Shizuoka on March 15. So maybe that got it out of the catfish's system  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic): 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Namazu_(Japanese_mythology)
Wake up, Kashima-sama.

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## StrontiumDog

*Smoke spews from two reactors at stricken Japanese nuclear plant - CNN.com
*
*Smoke spews from two reactors at stricken Japanese nuclear plant*

  By  *the CNN Wire Staff*
March 21, 2011 -- Updated 1254 GMT (2054 HKT)


Spraying the reactor with concrete recalls measures taken to contain the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl in 1986.

*STORY HIGHLIGHTS*NEW: A "very serious" crisis remains at the plant, the IAEA's director-general reportsNEW: WHO says there's no immediate health risk from contaminated foodSmoke emerged from two of the damaged reactors Monday evening, officials sayTests and training are being done on a concrete pumper that may be used on Unit 4
*Tokyo (CNN)*  -- Smoke spewed Monday from two adjacent reactors in the Fukushima  Daiichi nuclear power plant, a nuclear safety official said, setbacks  that came despite fervent efforts to prevent the further release of  radioactive materials at the stricken facility.

 After 6 p.m.,  white smoke was seen emanating from the facility's No. 2 reactor,  according to Hidehiko Nishiyama, an official with Japan's Nuclear and  Industrial Safety Agency. About two hours earlier, workers were  evacuated from the area around the No. 3 reactor after gray smoke began  to rise from the wreckage of its steel-and-concrete housing, which was  blown apart by a hydrogen explosion last week. 

 The No. 3 reactor  has been the top priority for authorities trying to contain damage to  the plant and stave off a possible meltdown. Its fuel includes a small  percentage of plutonium mixed with the uranium in its fuel rods, which  experts say could cause more harm than regular uranium fuels in the  event of a meltdown. 

 Nishiyama said there was no evident  explosion, spike in radiation or injuries at the No. 3 reactor. The  smoke was coming from the building's southeastern side, where the  reactor's spent nuclear fuel pool is located, but the origin of the  smoke at either reactor was unknown.

The coolant pools contain spent fuel rods  that still generate high amounts of heat, and authorities have been  working to keep them full to prevent the rods from being exposed. NISA  estimated that, between roughly 9 p.m. Sunday to 4 a.m. Monday, 1,170  tons of water were sprayed on the reactor and its fuel pool.

 In  Geneva, Switzerland, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency  warned that the plant "has been seriously damaged by flood water and is  littered with debris." 

 "The crisis has still not been resolved,  and the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant remains  very serious," Yukiya Amano, the director-general of the U.N. nuclear  watchdog agency, told its board of governors Monday after a visit to the  site.  

 "Buildings have been damaged by explosions," he said.  "There has, for the most part, been no electric power. Radiation levels  are elevated. It is no exaggeration to describe the work of the  emergency teams as heroic."

 The plant's owner, the Tokyo Electric  Power Company, is trying to restore electricity to the damaged plant  after it was hit by the massive earthquake and tsunami the struck  northern Japan on March 11. TEPCO told CNN on Monday that electrical  cables had been laid to connect the No. 3 reactor and the neighboring  No. 4 reactor with an outside power source. 

 That meant that  power could now be funneled to all six of the plant's reactors for its  cooling systems. But electricity was still not moving to units No. 1  through No. 4, because the quake and tsunami had damaged numerous pumps  and other gear. 

 A Tokyo Electric official said that spare parts were being brought in, so that everything could work again.

(lots more at the link, most of it already posted in earlier posts)

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## MakingALife

> I am getting the impression that feeding and heating the survivors of the quake is not something the Japanese government is treating as a drop everything, except the reactors, and get what is needed to these people. Given just how much of the American army is based in Japan, you would have thought the would move heaven and dearth to help, if they are asked. It just looks that the japanise government is uttery unaware of the plight of these survivors.


When people read some of the ground swell of candid investigative reports - citing locals undertaking scavenger hunts for food, with many saying -  No Food Deliveries despite goverment sponsored media campaignt to show the relief efforts are moving forward.  Temporary home construction is secondary.  Feeding folks, providing safe water, offering collective shelter and sanitary functions would seem like No. 1 priorities.   Yes there will be a housing shortage, but private micro houses dont keep people alive. Its meeting their very basic needs that does.  

Your point about US Army presence in Japan is a good one,  clearly the Army will have trucks, personnel, fuel in storage, and enough logistical planning capability to become a good right arm to the Japanese relief effort.  There is likely nothing in the Status of Forces Agreement that would prevent US participation on Japan soil for such relief efforts.    The Army also has all the gear needed to monitor  background radiation levels,  personal radiation exposure,  and has the gear to suit up for protection in against fall out hazards.   While the gear isnt the most comfortable,  the men and women are trained to use it.

Japan may have refused to ask for this help, or US Ground forces commanders do not want to place their troops at exposure risk and instead have them focused on exposure safety or a country exit plan.  With President Obama making statements about aiding Japan it would seem like a dialogue about using US ARMY to aid in delivery logistics would have been picked up and discussed.   It may well be that US ARMY support in this matter has come with a price tag associated with costs to replace NBC Gear, fuel use and other costs - packaged in.  

Something is amiss - for this resource to go unused. If its Japanese Pride - shame on them.  If its US Military Mission commanders say no - the risk is too high,  they are failing a real world opportunity to give real world low level NBC operational experience for their troops -  IN SUPPORT OF A MUCH LARGER HUMANITARIAN NEED.   Shame on their inhumane short sited view.   If its driven by bean counters and pricing involved -  That kind of analysis has no place on the scale of human suffering being endured by 100's of Thousands still without high aid levels.   Even it  US ARMY Logistical aid was only a small available effort -  One would expect cooperation and joint efforts to be underway.  

China's former leader Mao - authored a famous quote, which I dont have in front of me,   but it was something to the effect as.... "The difference between order and anarchy revolves around a man who has been unable to feed his family for five days"   

Japan risks their social order and cultural cohesion by slow aid responses, because of the stressful hardship condition of their survivors and the breach of the social contract - in leaving their basic needs unmet.  Trust lost will be replaced by contempt.

No question more could be done,  The real question is why its not happening,  What are the roadblocks ???

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## Thaihome

> ...
> Your point about US Army presence in Japan is a good one, clearly the Army will have trucks, personnel, fuel in storage, and enough logistical planning capability to become a good right arm to the Japanese relief effort. There is likely nothing in the Status of Forces Agreement that would prevent US participation on Japan soil for such relief efforts. The Army also has all the gear needed to monitor background radiation levels, personal radiation exposure, and has the gear to suit up for protection in against fall out hazards. While the gear isnt the most comfortable, the men and women are trained to use it.
> 
> Japan may have refused to ask for this help, or US Ground forces commanders do not want to place their troops at exposure risk and instead have them focused on exposure safety or a country exit plan. With President Obama making statements about aiding Japan it would seem like a dialogue about using US ARMY to aid in delivery logistics would have been picked up and discussed. It may well be that US ARMY support in this matter has come with a price tag associated with costs to replace NBC Gear, fuel use and other costs - packaged in. 
> 
> Something is amiss - for this resource to go unused. If its Japanese Pride - shame on them. If its US Military Mission commanders say no - the risk is too high, they are failing a real world opportunity to give real world low level NBC operational experience for their troops - IN SUPPORT OF A MUCH LARGER HUMANITARIAN NEED. Shame on their inhumane short sited view. If its driven by bean counters and pricing involved - That kind of analysis has no place on the scale of human suffering being endured by 100's of Thousands still without high aid levels. Even it US ARMY Logistical aid was only a small available effort - One would expect cooperation and joint efforts to be underway. 
> 
> China's former leader Mao - authored a famous quote, which I dont have in front of me, but it was something to the effect as.... "The difference between order and anarchy revolves around a man who has been unable to feed his family for five days" 
> 
> ...


 
What makes you think the this resources are going unused?
TH

From the US Forces Japan website:

Updated as of 5:21 a.m. HST March 19, 2011
*An Operations Update on the Relief Effort in Japan*
*U.S. Air Force*
35Th Fighter Wing executed the voluntary departure of family members processing line.  The wing  processed 370 PAX through the line as of 2230I 19 Mar.  Misawa continues voluntary departure of family members processing lines throughout this week (have not actually departed anyone  just processing).Yokota began Voluntary Authorized Departure of military dependentsthe first flight departed at 1700I and included 233 passengers and 9 dogs11 additional missions scheduled to depart over the next 8 days.Yokota also received 2 Royal Thai AF C-130s.Yokota continued receiving and delivering supplies vital to continuing humanitarian assistance and disaster relief operations throughout Japan to include delivering Marines and chemical suits to Yamagata, fuel to Sendai, medical supplies to Hanamaki and Sendai, a FARP mission to Yamagata, delivery of 5 pallets of Boron to Fukushima.USAF MC-130 delivered 72K  pounds of JP-8 to YamagataUSAF 5x C-130 delivered Boron to Hyakuri/blankets to Sendai/fuel to MisawaUSAF MC-130: 5 pallets of water from Atsugi to MatsushimaRoyal Australian Air Force C-17 transported Japan Ground Self Defense Force pax/supplies/trucks from Kadena to MisawaSendai Airport is now cleared, and expect to receive C-17s soon. USAF Spec Ops cleared the tsunami stricken airfield and brought it back on-line in less than one week.Yokota Aircraft (UH-1, C-12) are supporting DOE efforts to gather radiological data around the Fukushima nuclear plant.Yokota delivered fuel bladders and gasoline to sustain Misawa AB ops.*U.S. Marine Corps*
There are 554 III MEF/MCBJ personnel deployed in support of Operation Tomodachi.Marines are located at MCAS Iwakuni, Yokota Air Base, Naval Air Facility Atsugi, Camp Sendai, and Yamagata Air Field.To date, III MEF has flown 223 sorties in support of Operation Tomodachi.*U.S. Army*
458 U.S. Army Japan personnel are supporting Operation Tomodachi.USARJ deployed 2 Foreign Area Officers and 1 Operations NCO to join USFJ forward in Sendai. The foreign area officers speak Japanese and will be able to provide invaluable assistance to the JTF in coordinating relief efforts the North East Army of the Japan Ground Self Defense Force.Sendai airport open to C-130s2,500 blankets delivered to Northeast ArmyInitiating voluntary departures; guidelines issued for assembling and processing, to include luggage and pet information; pets will be evacuatedTwo UH-60s deployed to Yamagata Air Field 10th Support Group, Torii Station, has deployed 25 Personnel USARJ is coordinating with the Sagamihara City community and JFLCC to deliver additional supplies to the disaster area - the city has collected donations of kerosene and food, but the current gas shortage halted delivery plans to Sendai.*U.S. Navy*
Despite cold weather and aftershocks as strong as 6.1 in magnitude, 7th Fleet forces continued sustainment of life efforts in support of Operation Tomodachi.A total of 12,750 personnel,  20 ships, and 140 aircraft are participating in Operation Tomodachi.  Seventh Fleet forces have delivered a total of 110 tons of relief supplies to date.HSL-43 continued Humanitarian Aid and Disaster Relief efforts by delivering 29 tons of aid from ships of the Ronald Reagan Carrier Strike Group to locations ashore.  Helicopters rendered much needed materials to Hachinohe airport as well as landing zones that mark shelters for displaced persons.  Hachinohe serves as a staging point for further distribution of aid.Food, water, and warm clothing continue to top the list of delivery priorities.  As large shipments of perishable food like hotdogs and hamburgers arrive for distribution, helicopter crews work closely amongst one another and Japan Ground Self Defense Force to ensure delivery to larger, more populated sites in order to avoid spoilage.Helicopter crews reported that three sites visited today required no assistance - a positive sign that ground-based relief efforts are starting to meet the needs of displaced persons.  They also report an increased presence of Japan Ground Self Defense Force and medium to heavy equipment at such sites.USS Tortuga (LSD 46) is off the coast of Hachinohe serving as an afloat forward service base for helicopter operations.USS Essex (LHD 2), USS Harpers Ferry (LSD 49) and USS Germantown (LSD 42) remained off the coast of Akita prefecture this afternoon.Many families of Seventh Fleet Sailors in Yokosuka are making preparations to depart voluntarily as part of the Authorized Departure for Department of Defense personnel.The USS Ronald Reagan Carrier Strike Group to include the cruiser USS Chancellorsville (CG 62), the destroyer USS Preble (DDG 88), and the combat support ship USNS Bridge (T-AOE 10) along with the guided-missile destroyers USS Fitzgerald (DDG 62), USS John S. McCain (DDG 56), USS McCampbell (DDG 85), USS Mustin (DDG 89) and USS Curtis Wilbur (DDG 54) and cruiser USS Cowpens (CG-63)  continued operations off the east coast of Iwate Prefecture.Ships report sighting much less debris at sea now, unlike a week ago when large debris fields as far as 20 nautical miles offshore made navigating around houses, shipping containers, capsized boats, and trees difficult.Imagery analysts on USS Ronald Reagan carefully reviewed over 45,000 photographs taken by the Shared Reconnaissance Pod (SHARP) on F/A-18 aircraft, finding no "SOS" marks or other signals of distress, and no other groups of isolated people not already identified.USS Blue Ridge (LCC-19), flagship for the United States Seventh Fleet, remains in the vicinity of Okinawa to conduct transfers of supplies and personnel to augment the staff.All Seventh Fleet ships, including USS George Washington and USS Lassen which are currently conducting maintenance in Yokosuka, are increasing their readiness posture in order to be prepared to conduct any tasking ordered.  This includes the recall of personnel and the cancellation of leave.Two P-3 Orion aircraft from Patrol Squadron Four (VP-4) conducted two aerial survey missions along the east and west coasts of Honshu today.

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## MakingALife

> the best source I have found is here at da' door! many thanks to: 'life, 'dog, 'mob  .. et al  I'd read drudge, huff, google .. & then come here to find out what i needed know  maps, videos, charts & technical stuff not offered by any of the 'pros'!  hats off gentlemen!


I have to agree....  This thread is a good concise place to look, as many different folks contribute links, summaries, observations and perceptions.   Overall a condensation of valid points of view, in one discrete location.

My own views on the Nuclear risks have morphed from shock, to pessimism, to poking at unanswered questions, and towards optimistic.    

Given that temporary grid power feeders are now run in to all reactor facilities,  but (4) are still not using this resource as of yet...  It is turning my view pessimistic once again -  because leaving good resources  "on the table"  and "not in the fray" only lengthens the time line were risks are carried.   That only increases the probability of ruin and a catastrophic event transpiring.   

Yes- Its no picnic - to try and power up internal motor control centers inside a plants, which have been subjected to fire,  rampant steam releases,  and salt water spray from many sources.    These MCC's  (Motor Control Centers) are normally built to an electrical standard which can be summarized as "drip proof".   Meaning they are designed to handle and protect against water raining down on them.   They are not water tight, no one builds MCCs to that standard for power plant use.  Steam impingment, direct sea water sprays are going to contaminate the electrical components inside these motor control centers.  

The plant events have likely caused these MCC's to become risky to power up.   Powering up grounded, damage, or shorted MCC's would generate fault currents that would damage the main bus works or trip out the temporary feeder sources.   Uncontrollable arc flash imposed by wreckless power up - would be a major hazard to personnel nearby, and would set off any trace hydrogen gas in that vicinity.  

That said....  Again -  There is a track in place to restore critical cooling and not waste time with much else.    

Opening disconnects to all non essential MCC's to leave them de-energized, and focusing on the clean up of MCC's which directly control cooling pumps.   That means opening all MC's (motorcontrollers)  in the effected cooling  MCC's, FW wash down, dry up & use of electrical cleaners,  or  they could drop in replacement motor controller's - since most are built to be modular and removable, from the MCC centers.   Station and Electrical drawing and plans would allow replacement controllers to be built off site and brought in relative quick replacement.    

Since we are talking about cooling as a priority -  Perhaps there  may be as many as 10 to 20 cooling related cooling system pumps per reactor.   That's probably the extent of the new modular MC's that would be needed to restore cooling services.  Most of the rest of the station power up is relatively meaningless - because cooling remains the most critical requirement.  The rest can be left out of the equation and de-energized, because they will not make any difference to the cooling crisis.  Focusing on 100 % station power up X days later,  rather than Critical cooling only X hours later - would be a mistake if they are following such an all or nothing track.  Again it is not clear what strategy TEPCO is following with regard to power up. 

As far as fire damage to other plant cabling, which may or may not be involved in cooling functions.    Cleaning up the ends of internal cable runs, followed by lead to ground, and lead to lead - Megohm insulation tests would give a quick reveal if the internal cabling is fit for service or not.    

Nuclear standard protocols may require HI POT testing (which is an original proving test) for feeders and breakers - Tests that stress insulation at over voltage condition and monitor leakage currents.   They would be overkill at this point.   NO one subjects old feeders to HI POT testing.   If needed  Hi POT tests for confidence,  they could be quickly run on these feeders (at even 60% of rated voltage) to give confidence that the feeders would perform.    Passing the meggor testing would satisify most of the requirements if plant cabling that feeds the critical cooling pumps is safe or not.   It is important that TEPCO do only what is needed for safety, and not hold up too high of a standard in this moment.  Cooling remains critical - It should be on in Plants 1 to 4 by now...   

In prospective -  Meg ohm tests require about 6 minutes  to complete lead to lead, and lead to ground for a 3 phase feeder.      Hi POTTING of 3 conductors in a feeder can be done simultaneously in a matter of minutes.   One doeskin care if which conductor in a 3 phase feeder fails.  It is only if any one of the 3 fail that the feeder is condemned.   Best concrete results are obtained with both ends of cables unterminated.    These are the tests that could bless - fire exposed plant cabling and determine quickly if they are suitable for safe service to critical cooling pumps. 

These same basic Meg ohm tests will tell if a motor on a cooling pump is safe to power up or not.  There are minimum Meg values allowable and its controlled by simple equation that factors in service voltage and motor load.  If the cooling pump motors dont pass this min spec - then remediation efforts are needed.   Often supplying heat lamps, or re-powering the internal motor heaters (if fitted)  will lift the meg values in a matter of hours - without extensive remediation efforts required.

Replacement of MC's in MCC centers, with replacement built up spares -  Is about a 1 to 2 hour job to remove and make up all connections.   These replacement MC's could be outsourced fairly quickly from electrical manufacturers.   Most mid sized shops could built many units per hour.  So replacement MC's should not be an issue -  If they were ordered 3 or 4 days ago.     

So A time mapping to restore safe power to essential cooling pumps -  could be framed to be 20 to 40 hours at the extreme longest.   

Once these essential MCC's are cleaned up and made ready - they could be wrapped in plastic to prevent further contamination from plant environment factors.

Yes this all sounds simple,  but of course its not.  If the area is still to hostile to work in -  Its hard to do this work.   If TEPCO - has not anticipated this need, and gotten spare critical MC's coming in the pipe line - since they are the fastest replacement option, over remediation in place of MC's impacted.   They have missed part of the strategy to get cooling in service fast, and to be ready for the new plant feeder when it was finally run and connected.

I dont know the story.  But reacting serially....  Such as Hey lets run the feeder....  Now what do we have to do and test to safely re-power this critical cooling pumps.  It does not represent a complex response.  Someone could have factored in what is minimum coolling need and got 100 percent MC spares on expedited manufactur -  to put them in the fastest recovery position, when re-powering was ready.   It will only save time.    Time to restore cooling,  time that was available while - while the new plant power outside supply was being run in.  But it takes reasoning and insight to make such a call.   TEPCO should recognized this path back to restored cooling and should have put in place every concieveable short cut to speeed this process...

Sadly - IF all this water spraying and emergency cooling. and lack of  any dewatering efforts,  has caused a submergence of cooling water pumps  -  which are normally lower level items....  They have major issues to  solve to restore cooling.  Most cooling pumps are built to be drip proof, or totally  enclosed,  but not rate for submersion.   IF their cooling pumps are  under water -  They have already screwed the pooch.  

They should at least be up front in describing the situation,  not generic comments about installing spare parts to get everything 100 percent running.  Their statements are naive and devoid of details - as if written by someone who has no clue how to understand or describe their situation accurately.

Perhaps I am biased - with a long marine background.  Almost every crisis casualty event affecting vessels has a dewatering consideration -  that has to be pressed concurrent with managing the rest of the issue.  Concurrent with that, a stability factor must as well weight out.   Front line leadership professionals in that business are trained to view crisis management that always involves these multiple fronts.   The issues are team managed with leaders giving direction.  Team leadership residing in (4) core personnel,  (4 to 6) qualified subordinates, and a dozen others.  

TEPCO's response model -  measured by the work of many should at least be as robust -  to multi-track events to give minimum time lines needed to restore plant cooling.    The power's run in now,  but they are still not at a point of safety or a rapid stabilization.

They ought to be up front and speak specifically what their remaining issues are to restore cooling.  The road map provided already  in this post - is the one they have to march down - to get their plant cooling back in order.  Where are they are that track ?  Why no details ???

My jaded belief is because the details involved will be very unflattering.  It will expose lost time and serial thinking -  The very things that industrial knowledge groups will give Black eyes to TEPCO handling in this area....

I am sorry to report - my own view now is returning to negative, about the prospect of getting out of this nuclear situation without major hazard and peril.   

The concrete pumper, training, and possible solutions - used at Chrenoybal were effective - in containing what was left of the nuclear material that remained after the wildfire.    In the case of Japan's issues -  Most of the nuclear material remains in place,  with its ability to continue to overheat, over-pressurize, and melt down.    Encasing it all in concrete at this point - is unlikely to solve the issue.    A full core melt down, with most of the material available - could thermally breach that kind of arrangement.    

The concrete encapsulation, may remain a solution for the fuel pools however. Because it will be capable of being cooled by the surface area water application, and would possibly be capable of keeping temps low enough around the spent fuel to keep the fuel solid and separated.    That option is probably under consideration.   

But piling up concrete on the reactor containment vessel exterior - simply ignores what can still take place inside the core.   Only holding water levels and cooling that core will prevent the melt down sequence from continuing.    Concrete encapsulation may be an end point,  but it solve's little of the risks posed by the reactors them selves.   It is well to remember that UF liquifys at a high enough temperature to melt steel and concrete.  It boils at a much higher temperature.  Structures are difficult to contain this kind of concentrated thermal activity.   If they reach a point where reactor fuel mass is stabilized and cooling is in play -  Encapsulation would make sense to reduce release from containment breaches that may have taken place.    

It is well to understand the "fast cure" which would take place with cement applied at these much higher than normal concrete placement temperatures will produce a concrete with fast crystalline growth and considerably weaker than concrete that is properly cured.   Concrete that would also be placed without the reinforcement steel - common to most strong concrete formations.    With reactor external temps still near 100 C -  It will be equally hard to get the concrete to set without steam induced voids.   This is perhaps why they have elected to produce a gunned in variety...  akin to the way ferro cement pools are fabricated.   Pumping in bulk concrete - and hoping for a strong pour - is feasible when temperatures have been reduced.   that will probably be the outcome for facilities that have sea water injected into the reactor cores.

None of this information connects in the sound bites that come from TEPCO.   Its a god damn shame the world is kept at bay,  while they stumble through the process management involved in recovering to a point of safety.   

Clearly -  World wide nuclear bodies and plant professionals - have plenty of knowledge to be guiding hands to assist TEPCO.   They arent asking, and the risks continue to be carried longer than needed.

I have very mixed feelings if they are going to pull this off, in light of events in the last 24 hours,  because of continued delays to get full cooling back up where needed.   

Yes its well they should be working on end game strategies (such as encapsulation).  But recognize clearly where its suitable and where it is useless.

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 
>  
> ...
> Your point about US Army presence in Japan is a good one, clearly the Army will have trucks, personnel, fuel in storage, and enough logistical planning capability to become a good right arm to the Japanese relief effort. There is likely nothing in the Status of Forces Agreement that would prevent US participation on Japan soil for such relief efforts. The Army also has all the gear needed to monitor background radiation levels, personal radiation exposure, and has the gear to suit up for protection in against fall out hazards. While the gear isnt the most comfortable, the men and women are trained to use it.
> 
> Japan may have refused to ask for this help, or US Ground forces commanders do not want to place their troops at exposure risk and instead have them focused on exposure safety or a country exit plan. With President Obama making statements about aiding Japan it would seem like a dialogue about using US ARMY to aid in delivery logistics would have been picked up and discussed. It may well be that US ARMY support in this matter has come with a price tag associated with costs to replace NBC Gear, fuel use and other costs - packaged in. 
> 
> ...


Excellent information -  not really covered with this detail in mainstream media.    My initial response was directed at the ARMY's capability to intercede in direct relief distribution.   

From your excellent post - It becomes very clear that a tremendous behind the scene, military infrusture is pushing ahead to open the gateways for more aid to flow and be distributed.  Repositioning fuel by tankers boost ground logistic capabilities and enhance air support feasibliitly.  The Aussie's supplying trucks are a home run as well to increase aid distribution capability.  In the end it all has to all connect to get the aid into hands that need it most.    There remains a roll to be played in the end of chain distribution,  and based on your post -  It looks like that will be rapidly filled as the as resources stockpiled become ready for distribution. 

These efforts in play dont get the coverage they deserve.  The Japan public at large should be made aware of this coordinated assistance through their media - to understand that a life line is being built up to be be passed to them.   

There appears to be a gap in media coverage.  This information needs to be covered by more than Military detachment media - to get this message out.

I appreciate your posting this information.  It is a good breath of fresh air against the lack of quality news on the scope of aid activities.

----------


## crippen

The troubled past of Fukushima: How the stricken nuclear plant failed safety checks and crammed its buildings with more uranium than they could stand  
By DAILY MAIL REPORTER
Last updated at 12:43 AM on 22nd March 2011

Japan's stricken Fukushima nuclear plant had one of the country's worst safety records and was crammed with more uranium than it was designed to hold, it has emerged.
American engineers who masterminded the building had not intended for spent fuel to be housed inside the 'flimsy' shells of the reactor buildings that were rocked by the earthquake on March 11.
But the reactor buildings at the plant held the equivalent of almost six years of the highly radioactive uranium fuel rods produced by the plant when disaster struck.

Damaged: The Fukushima power plant had one of the worst safety records for nuclear facilities in Japan and was crammed with uranium rods when the quake struck, documents have revealed
Officials within the Japanese government, the power company and the nuclear watchdog are now likely to face tough questions about why the spent fuel roads were stored inside the building.
A much safer but more costly option would have been to build far stronger separate buildings designed specifically for nuclear storage but the plant has been subject to a cost-cutting drive under its chief executive Masataka Shimizu.
The crisis, which has seen more than 45,000 residents evacuated and a country filled with the fear of a nuclear Armageddon, has focused attention on the plant's safety procedures and its history of failed checks.

More than 18,000 people are believed to have been killed by the earthquake and tsunami tidal wave that swept through the country leaving a trail of destruction in its path.
Details of the fuel storage at the power plant emerged in the records a presentation by Tokyo Electric Power Co to a conference organized by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The cascade of safety-related failures at the Fukushima plant is already strengthening the hand of reformers who argue that Japan's nuclear power industry will have to see sweeping changes from the top.
Between 2005 to 2009 Fukushima had the highest accident rate of any big Japanese nuclear plant, according to data collected by the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization. The plant's workers were also exposed to more radiation than their peers at most other plants, the data shows.
'I've long thought that the whole system is rubbish,' said Taro Kono, a Liberal Democratic Party lawmaker and a long-time critic of nuclear power who sees the need for a government-directed reorganization of Tokyo Electric.
'We have to go through our whole nuclear strategy after this,'Kono said. 'Now no one is going to accept nuclear waste in their backyards. You can have an earthquake and have radioactive material under your house. We're going to have a real debate on this.'
On Sunday, Japan continued its battle to avoid large-scale nuclear disaster. Workers restored electrical power to parts of the plant and brought down radiation levels with a marathon water-spraying operation that, among other things, finally flooded Reactor 4's waste-fuel pool.
But the latest incidents add to a record of safety sanctions and misses at Tokyo Electric - more commonly known as TEPCO - that date back a decade and continued into the weeks before the quake.
Under two weeks before Fukushima Daichi was sent into partial meltdown, the power company had told safety regulators it had failed to inspect 33 pieces of equipment at the plant, including a backup power generator, according to a filing.

Cycle of destruction: A volunteer in a nuclear suit rides his bike to reach stranded residents in Fukushima



Family: A woman finds her relative's gravestone torn down in Fukushima while right, a young child sits on the lap of his mother while undergoing a screening test for signs of nuclear radiation in Fukushima


Nuclear industry analysts say an even more pressing question concerns the storage of fuel rods. It is said that Japan's safety regulations may have given the power company too much room to manoeuvre as it sought to contain costs.
When the quake hit, almost 4,000 uranium fuel assemblies were stored in deep pools of circulating water built into the highest floor of the Fukushima reactor buildings, according to company records. Each assembly stands about 3.5 meters high and even a decade after use emits enough radiation to kill a person standing nearby.
The spent radioactive fuel stored in the reactors represented more than three times the amount of radioactive material normally held in the active cores of the six reactors at the complex, according to Tokyo Electric briefings and its presentation to the IAEA.

When the tsunami wiped out the plant's emergency generators, the water in the spent-fuel pool adjacent to the No. 4 reactor could no longer circulate, and fresh water could not be pumped in. 
Rods in the pools began to overheat, causing the water to evaporate as steam and exposing parts of the radioactive rods to the aira critically dangerous situation. The heat spawned fires and the roof above the pool was partly destroyed, letting radiation out.
The build-up of used fuel rods in the Fukushima reactor buildings has complicated the response to the continuing crisis at the complex and deepened its severity, officials and experts have said.
That has been especially the case at the No. 4 reactor, which was out of service at the time of the quake and had some 548, still-hot fuel assemblies cooling in a pool of water on its upper floor.
There was also fresh nuclear fuel 'parked' in the reactor waiting to be used.
That reactor, which erupted into explosive flames twice last week, triggered a warning from U.S. officials last week about higher risks for radiation from the stricken plant than Japanese officials had disclosed.
David Lochbaum, a nuclear engineer with the U.S.-based Union of Concerned Scientists, said the spent fuel was vulnerable because it was protected only by the relatively 'flimsy' outer shell of the reactors and reliant on a single, pump-driven cooling system.
'It's a recipe for disaster and that disaster is now unfolding in Japan,' Lochbaum said. 
Storage of spent nuclear fuel is a controversial area. Many residents living close to sites proposed for storage facilities strongly object to the buildings amid fears of the radiation.
A medium-term storage facility for waste from Fukushima Daiichi being built in the small village of Mutsu in northern Japan is not scheduled to open until 2012. The plan had been for that facility to hold 20 years worth of spent fuel. 


Read more: Japan earthquake and tsunami: Fukushima power plant's poor safety record | Mail Online

----------


## Thaihome

> ....
> I have very mixed feelings if they are going to pull this off, in light of events in the last 24 hours, because of continued delays to get full cooling back up where needed. 
> 
> Yes its well they should be working on end game strategies (such as encapsulation). But recognize clearly where its suitable and where it is useless.


Perhaps you should quit reading just the mass media and try to find some more technical sources.  

This article pretty much addresses every issue you raised on the cooling. 

The encapsulation seems to me to nothing more the mass media hysteria and shows continued attempts to make this into a Chernobyl type incident.  The fact that people were testing methods to spray concrete only shows they are covering every base not that it is anything other then a last ditch effort, which appears at this point to be unnecessary.
TH

Work on Fukushima Daiichi power connections

Work on Fukushima Daiichi power connections 
21 March 2011 
FIRST PUBLISHED 4.35pm GMT

*Workers continued to restore external power to the stricken Fukushima Daiichi units, although work was briefly interrupted when smoke was seen coming from unit 3. Efforts at the plant have been helped by assistance from both domestic and foreign companies.*

Workers at the site have already successfully connected an external power cable to the distribution switchboard for units 1 and 2. The integrity of each of the unit's electrical systems is being investigated before they are connected. Efforts to restore an external source of electricity to units 3 and 4 are continuing. At unit 4, cabling has been completed from a temporary substation to the main power centre. External power for units 3 and 4 should be in place 'in a few days' time', according to Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco).

External power has already been connected to unit 5 and 6, allowing them to use their residual heat removal systems and transfer heat to the sea. This has been used to cool the fuel ponds and bring the units to cold shutdown status, meaning that water in the reactor system is at less than 100ºC. Tepco said that at 11.36am today, the service power supplied by emergency diesel generators in units 5 was partially restored through a transmission line using a power receiving facility of unit 6.

At around 3.55pm, light grey smoke was seen coming from the fifth floor of the reactor building of unit 3. Tepco said that employees working around the unit were temporarily evacuated to a safe location. Monitors in the reactor pressure vessel and the containment vessel showed no change in the temperature or pressure, while no increase in radiation levels was detected. The amount of smoke was seen to decrease as investigations into its cause took place.

The injection of seawater into the used fuel storage pond at unit 2 started yesterday. Tepco reported that a temporary water tank and a hose had been connected to the existing pool water clean-up system of unit 2 and seawater was now being pumped into the pond using a fire engine's pump. The company said that it is presumed that all the used fuel in the pond had been fully submerged before the seawater injection started. The water level is estimated to have since risen by some 30 centimetres thanks to the injection of 40 tonnes of seawater.

Tepco said that a total of 12 fire engines are now being used to spray water into the used fuel pools and for water injection to cool the reactors. In addition, the Self-Defense Force has sent two of its tanks to the Fukushima-Daiichi site. These will be used as bulldozers to remove debris at the plant, clearing a path for further vehicles and equipment to access facilities at site. The steel plating of the tanks will help provide radiation protection to the workers within them.

*Industry assistance*

Several nuclear industry companies, both in Japan and overseas, have offered assistance to help in the efforts to stabilize the Fukushima units.

Japan's Hitachi said that it established a 24-hour emergency response centre at its head office to assist in repair and recovery operations at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. The company said that engineers had been dispatched to work on joint teams formed in collaboration with Tepco and the Japanese government. Hitachi said it is also assisting in the procurement of materials required for on-site operations, and is providing support for work efforts.

Toshiba has assigned some 700 workers to help in the work to increase the stability of the Fukushima Daiichi reactors, according to a _Bloomberg_ report. The company was dispatching 100 workers to the Fukushima site today, a company spokesman said.

Meanwhile, France's Areva has chartered a plane to take 3000 activated charcoal protective masks, 10,000 overalls and 20,000 gloves to Japan. In addition, the aircraft will also carry 100 tonnes of boric acid  a neutron absorber  supplied by EDF. French rescue workers left for Japan last week with radioactivity detection equipment provided by Areva subsidiary Canberra. Areva said that equipment in its Tokyo offices had already been made available to Japanese security teams.

Groupe Intra owned by EDF, CEA and Areva  maintains a fleet of robotics machines which can be used in the event of a major nuclear accident. Groupe Intra was formed in 1988 and is based on the industrial site of EDF's Chinon nuclear power plant. Although intended to be used at facilities belonging to its owners, the company has announced that it will ship robots and specialised equipment to Japan to help efforts at the Fukushima plant. Some 130 tonnes of equipment left for Tokyo on a giant Russian-built Antonov-225 transporter plane at the weekend. The shipment includes equipment to respond to radiological emergencies in hostile environments, including sampling equipment and remotely operated equipment.

_Researched and written_
_by World Nuclear News_

----------


## Mid

> Perhaps you should quit reading just the mass media and try to find some more technical sources.




yep not going to find any bias there .

----------


## The Bold Rodney

Maybe some of the so called well informed armchair experts (see previous posts) who glowingly painted a picture of just how excellent the Japs safety record in the nuclear industry was / is...may care to re-think or delete their previous idiotic posts?  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## StrontiumDog

Smoke spews as crews try to restore power at Japanese nuclear plant As smoke billows, work continues to restore power at nuclear plant - CNN.com

----------


## Thaihome

> Originally Posted by Thaihome
> 
> Perhaps you should quit reading just the mass media and try to find some more technical sources.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> yep not going to find any bias there .


So what bias do you detect in the article?  
TH

----------


## Mid

> according to Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco).





> Tepco said





> Tepco said





> Tepco reported





> Tepco said


now see post # 923

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Smoke rising from Fukushima plant - RTÉ News
*
*Smoke rising from Fukushima plant*

           Updated: 07:34, Tuesday, 22 March 2011

           Reports from Japan say smoke and steam has again been seen rising from damaged reactors at the Fukushima nuclear plant.
 
                                                                                                                                Fukushima - Power cables attached to all six reactors                  

             Reports from Japan  say smoke and steam has again been seen rising from damaged reactors at  the Fukushima nuclear plant, where workers are continuing efforts to  prevent a meltdown following the earthquake and tsunami on 11 March.

 Away from the plant, evidence of radiation in vegetables, water and  milk has led to concern within Japan and abroad, despite official  assurances that the levels were not dangerous.

 The World Health Organisation is monitoring the situation regarding food radiation levels closely.

 WHO spokesman Gregory Haertl said the potential risk to health was  being taken seriously, but there was no undue cause for alarm at this  stage.

 Meanwhile, as work progresses at the plant, power cables are reported to have been reattached to all six reactors.

 However authorities say they are not in a position to get enough  power to them to restart cooling systems and monitoring equipment.

 More than 170,000 people have been moved out of the zone since the quake and tsunami struck.

 At a news briefing overnight, Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio  Edano said there was no need to expand the 20km radius evacuation area  at the moment.

 The International Atomic Agency warned that the situation was still  'very serious', but it also expressed confidence that the crisis would  be resolved.

 The Japanese government has renewed an invitation to main opposition  to form a grand coalition to deal with the disaster, but the opposition  continues to rejects it.

 A World Bank report has predicted that the earthquake and tsunami  will depress growth briefly before reconstruction kicks off and gives  the Japanese beleaguered economy a boost.

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by Mid
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by &quot;Thaihome&quot;
> ...


 Thaihome,  I have just finished reading your cited WNN article.  The article did not seem biased to me, at all.   Yes TEPCO was quoted often,  but the reporting seemed balanced and factual.    I read 3 or 4 other articles from WNN - which as were interesting and addressed more of the technical side and a bit more of the strategy in play.  

Indeed you are very correct - broading out my media viewing to more techical sources would give a better presentation for efforts and status at hand for these impacted plants. 

I have to say I am pleased to see the large industrial assistance from Hitachi and Toshiba coming into the on scene and a part of the picture to assist with field work, and as well to supply replacement components.  This is major support.  Both company's are major players in the electrical component and industrial power business.  What ever these company's can serve up (in terms of field technicians and manufacturing)  will go a long way to helping TEPCO catch up on items receiving more priority support in restoring power.   

It was also good to read that other very useful goods are inbound from France and specialty robotics are inbound as well.   These levels of assistance are very significant. They hedge the process, by providing more back up - Robotics in particular will provide reserve options if site radioactivity levels should become to hot to handle.      

I havent had a lot of time to stay on top of things, because of a project ongoing.  Its been long days roasting in the sun....  So I get to check this thread and skim a few links later at night, or mornings -  So I am less informed of current status than most.  I read this post and run down a few links and do a few googles and I'm pretty much DOA at the keyboard.  

You are right - broadening the sources would go along way towards reducing the frustration level,  that comes narrow news sources that serve sound bites.  Thank you for bringing this error to my attention.

----------


## Takeovers

> The fact that people were testing methods to spray concrete only shows they are covering every base not that it is anything other then a last ditch effort, which appears at this point to be unnecessary.


Are you sure this was a test for concrete spraying?

I know that a german company supplied a concrete sprayer with a very long arm that was designed to pump concrete up to great heights. But for Fukushima it was not intended for concrete but for water that can be applied from above with this pump more precisely than with other means to support the cooling effort.

BTW Thanks for your article which goes a long way compared to the media coverage.

----------


## HermantheGerman

*I think this commander is full of shit and has got a BIG problem on his hand. Hey GI Joe waiting... is not an option.
*



*Pacific commander says mandatory evacuation is unlikely*


YOKOSUKA NAVAL BASE, Japan  The U.S. military does not expect to  turn its voluntary departure for servicemembers families living in  Japan into a mandatory evacuation, the head of the U.S. Pacific Command  said Tuesday night.
The United States has contingency plans to  evacuate the roughly 87,000 servicemembers, families and Defense  Department civilians in Japan and Okinawa, but Adm. Robert Willard told  Stars and Stripes that he didnt anticipate putting them in motion.
We  absolutely dont expect it, Willard said. In fact, Im trying to see  if the reactor accidents stabilize, so that I can bring our forces and  the families back to Yokosuka.
Advertisement

But we certainly have the plan for the worst and consider those things you would expect of any senior command.
Willard  spoke briefly with Stars and Stripes following a town hall meeting with  residents at Yokosuka Naval Base, about 40 miles south of Tokyo.
Navy  officials forbade Stars and Stripes from attending the meeting, saying  that only the Defense Departments internal media would be allowed  inside.
Willard also said that military-assisted flights for  families voluntarily leaving Japan would leave at a pace similar to  those that left Tuesday.
Three flights had left Tuesday and two  more were on standby as of Tuesday night. As of Monday, only two flights  had left since the military announced it would begin the flights,  causing confusion for some of the roughly 9,000 family members signed up  to leave.
Remember this is occurring in a state of  non-emergency, Willard said. We can afford some pacing of this, and  thats whats been arranged by transportation command with the airlines  that are participating.
Families should discuss their personal  comfort levels before deciding whether to leave. If he were making the  decision for his family, Willard said they would remain in Japan.
Willard spent nearly three hours answering every last question from an audience that appeared to number more than 1,000 people.
His  main job was reassuring a community that has often heard conflicting  information about whether its members were truly in danger and when they  would be able to leave Japan.
Predictions of radiological plumes  headed for Yokosuka by Tuesday had circulated widely around the base  since last Thursday, according to several residents.
No major  agency has reported unhealthy levels of radiation in Yokosuka since the  March 11 earthquake and subsequent catastrophe at the Fukushima Dai-ichi  nuclear power plant, located about 200 miles north of Yokosuka.
Elevated  but still not harmful levels were found last week, and Navy officials  distributed potassium iodide pills Monday as a precaution against any  future danger, they said.
It shouldnt be creating panic or  chaos. said Lt. Constantine Diala, after attending the town hall  meeting. The radiation is still not dangerous.
Willard  reiterated that there was no radiological risk today, which comforted  but also reinforced frustrations among teachers who now say that  unnecessary precautions scared their students Tuesday.
Schools at  Yokosuka were instructed to keep all students inside, keep windows  closed and close all vents as a precaution against any potential  radiation blowing south.
Willard reportedly told attendees that there was no need for that, and that children should be allowed to play outside.
The  earlier instructions, combined with multiple aftershocks and a 25  percent attendance rate in some schools, left some children frightened  Tuesday, said Jean Kartchner, a teacher at Yokosuka Middle School
Kids were hiding under the table saying Oh my God, were going to die, Kartchner said.
Kartchner says the teachers tell the students that theyre going to be OK, but it can be difficult convincing them.
Several  people leaving the meeting said that fear is probably just as big, if  not a bigger problem, than any radiological concerns at Yokosuka.
I  honestly think people are freaking out too much, said Avery Berge,  after attending the town hall meeting. I understand everyones anxiety,  but at the same time, I think theyre doing a good job handling the  situation. This is unprecedented.


Pacific commander says mandatory evacuation is unlikely - News - Stripes

----------


## HermantheGerman

> Perhaps you should quit reading just the mass media and try to find some more technical sources.  
> 
> This article pretty much addresses every issue you raised on the cooling. 
> 
> The encapsulation seems to me to nothing more the mass media hysteria and shows continued attempts to make this into a Chernobyl type incident.  The fact that people were testing methods to spray concrete only shows they are covering every base not that it is anything other then a last ditch effort, which appears at this point to be unnecessary.
> TH
> 
> Work on Fukushima Daiichi power connections
> 
> ...


 


> So what bias do you detect in the article?  
> TH


Maybe they only wrote the sunny side of this accident. But not the Truth !!!!! How many of these workers (and U.S. soldiers) are there voluntary ? What do expect from the nuclear industry to write. Its like asking BP to write the truth about the oil spill. Nuclear is for Dead Heads.

OSAKA - Japan's Prime Minister Naoto Kan apologized Monday after one  of his ministers allegedly threatened firefighters into working at a  quake-crippled nuclear plant, press reports said.
Firefighters  from the Tokyo Fire Department and the Self-Defence Forces have been  pouring water over one of the six reactors at the Fukushima No.1 plant  to cool overheating fuel rods to prevent a catastrophic meltdown.
Tokyo's  outspoken governor Shintaro Ishihara told Japanese media that Kan  offered him the apology when he called on the premier to protest against  the unnamed minister.
Ishihara said the minister had ordered Tokyo firefighters to "work promptly otherwise they will be punished."
"He  didn't even know what the situation was for the workers on the spot,  what their capacity was or anything about the capacity of equipment they  used," the governor said.
"They kept pouring water for seven hours and their machine broke down," Ishihara said.
"I told the premier that he should not allow his minister to say such a thing."
When asked how Kan replied, Ishihara said: "He said he wanted to apologize. He was very sorry."
The  9.0-magnitude quake and ensuing tsunami on March 11 have devastated  Japan's northeastern coast, knocking out the plant, particularly its  crucial cooling systems.
Amid fears of radioactive  exposure, workers have been racing against the clock to cool fuel rods  in reactors and containment pools and restore the power supply to the  plant, some 250 kilometres (155 miles) northeast of Tokyo.

Read more: Japan PM 'apologizes over threat to firefighters'

----------


## HermantheGerman

*UPDATE 2-Tiny traces of Japan radiation spread to Iceland*



The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO), a Vienna-based U.N. body for monitoring possible breaches of the atom bomb test ban, has 63 stations worldwide for observing such particles, including one in Reykjavik, the Icelandic capital.
 The CTBTO continuously provides data to its member states, but does not make the details public.
 Another source said about 15 CTBTO stations had so far detected particles believed to originate from Fukushima.
 "Reykjavik is the first in Europe," the source added.

 NOWHERE NEAR CHERNOBYL LEVELS
 The U.S. Energy Department and the Environmental Protection Agency late last week confirmed "minuscule" amounts of radiation that appeared to have come from Japan's damaged reactors were detected in California, where the CTBTO also has a station.
 They said the radiation amounted to one-millionth of the dose rate that a person normally receives from natural sources such as rocks, bricks and the sun.
 France's nuclear safety authority ASN said tiny radiation concentrations, perhaps 1,000 or 10,000 times less than from the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, were set to reach the country on Wednesday.
 While only minor traces of radiation have been detected in countries outside Japan, the U.N. nuclear watchdog said on Monday "high levels of contamination" have been measured around the Fukushima plant itself.
 At the site on Tuesday, smoke and steam rose from two of the most threatening reactors at the quake-crippled nuclear plant, suggesting the battle to avert a disastrous meltdown and stop the spread of radiation was far from won.

UPDATE 2-Tiny traces of Japan radiation spread to Iceland | Reuters

----------


## Mr Gribbs

All the scare mongering about this being worse then Chernobyl seem to be finally dying down. You had talking heads on the news talking about the reactors like they actually knew what they were talking about. The Japanese response hasn't been the best, but what are you going to do, these things happen during a natural disaster. The only problem I have is they were faking the safety reports at the nuke plants for over a decade.

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## blue

well ,at least those guilty for faking  will pay

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## Mr Gribbs

Japan will probably have to increase the amount of oil they use now since they might be shutting down all their nuclear plants, that will increase the price of oil, and line my pockets in the long run. I just can't believe how many assholes bought into the scare tactics created by the media, you would think millions were going to die from the nuke fallout. You had knee-jerk reactionist evacuating their citizens, rethinking nuke energy, contemplating closing down their existing plants, etc. The days of allowing people to smoke indoors and led paint seem like they were a thousand years ago.

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## blue

think its gas they are going to buy

----------


## Takeovers

Think they will build better and larger Nuclear Power Plants.

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## robuzo

Found a porpoise in a rice field two kilometers from the sea near Sendai. No, nobody tried to eat it. They wrapped it in wet towels and cut it loose in the ocean. "He's a victim of the tsunami, too," said one of the rescuers. They wanted to take him to the aquarium but it is too damaged. Might serve to convince some people that the Japanese are not all heartless bastards (although from the looks of him the rescuer is a goddamned hippy :Smile: ; lots of those in Japan, too).

Story (in Japanese) asahi.com

----------


## Thaihome

> You are right - broadening the sources would go along way towards reducing the frustration level, that comes narrow news sources that serve sound bites. Thank you for bringing this error to my attention.


Another very good site the compiles information from several sources, including WNN, so Mid, don't read it, don't want you exposed to any bias.

It is updated daily and has an open comments section that has some very good discussion. Though at this point it is becoming much less technical and more of a pro versus anti nuclear forum. I expect the forum owner to cut it off soon. He does not put up with much.

Note that the concrete pump (that the mainstream press was sure was a sign they were going to fill the reactors with concrete) is being used to spray water with the 58 metre flexible boom that allows them to direct the spray more accurately.
TH

*10+ days of crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant  22 March 2010*

Posted on 23 March 2011 by Barry Brook 
_Yes, it really has been that long. So what happened during those 10+ days? For a long answer, look back over the daily posts on this blog, which also has plenty of links to more off-site information. For the short-hand version, I offer you this excellent graphic produced by the_ _Wall Street Journal__:_
___Credit: Wall Street Journal: Troubled Nuclear Plant Reconnected to Grid - WSJ.com_

_Things continue to develop slowly, but I think now towards an inevitable conclusion  barring any sudden turn of events, a cold shutdown (reactor temperature below 100C) should be achieved in units 1 to 3 within the next week (or two?). The other priority is to get the spent fuel storage sufficiently covered with water to make them approachable (and ideally to get AC power systems restored to these ponds, as has been the case already for units 5 and 6). The clean up, diagnostics, and ultimate decommissioning of Fukushima Daiichi, of course, will take months and years to complete._
_What is the latest news?_
_First, there is a new estimate of the tsunami damage._ _According to the NEI__:_


_TEPCO believes the tsunami that inundated the Fukushima Daiichi site was 14 meters high, the network said. The design basis tsunami for the site was 5.7 meters, and the reactors and backup power sources were located 10 to 13 meters above sea level. The company reported that the maximum earthquake for which the Fukushima Daiichi plants were designed was magnitude 8. The quake that struck March 11 was magnitude 9._

___Second, the_ _IAEA reports__ elevated levels of radioactivity in the sea water off the coast of these reactors. That is hardly surprising, given that contaminated cooling water would gradually drain off the site  and remember, it is very easy with modern instruments to detect radioactivity in even trace amounts. These reported amounts (see table) are clearly significantly elevated around the plant  but the ocean is rather large, and so the principle of disperse and dilute also applies._

_Im reminded of a quote from James Lovelock in __The Vanishing Face of Gaia__ (2008):_


_In July 2007 an earthquake in Japan shook a nuclear power station enough to cause an automatic shutdown ; the quake was of sufficient severity-over six on the Richter scale-to cause significant structural damage in an average town. The only nuclear consequence was the fall of a barrell from a stack of low-level waste that allowed the leak of about 90,000 becquerels of radioactivity. This made front page news in Australia, where it was said that the leak posed a radiation threat to the Sea of Japan.The truth is that about 90,000 becquerels is just twice the amount of natural radioactivity, mostly in the form of potassium, which you and I carry in our bodies. In other words, if we accept this hysterical conclusion, two swimmers in the Sea of Japan would make a radiation threat._
_For further details on radiation trends in Japan,_ _read this from WNN__. In short, levels are hovering at or just above background levels in most surrounding prefectures, but are elevated in some parts of Fukushima. However, the World Health Organisation:_
_ backed the Japanese authorities, saying These recommendations are in line with those based on accepted public health expertise._
_Below is a detailed situation summary of the Fukushima Daiichi site, passed to me by a colleague:_
_(1) Radioactivity was detected in the sea close to Fukushima-Daiichi. On March 21, TEPCO detected radioactivity in the nearby sea at Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power station (NPS). TEPCO notified this measurement result to NISA and Fukushima prefecture. TEPCO continues sampling survey at Fukushima-Daiichi NPS, and also at Fukushima-Daini NPS in order to evaluate diffusion from the Fukushima-Daiichi. Though people do not drink seawater directly, TEPCO thinks it important to see how far these radioactivity spread in the sea to assess impact to human body._

_Normal values of radioactivity are mostly below detection level, except for tritium. (detection level of Co-60 is 0.02Bq/ml) Also, samples of soil in the station have been sent to JAEA (Japan Atomic Energy Agency)._
_(2) Seawater injection to the spent fuel pool at Fukushima-Daiichi unit 2. This continues, with seawater injected through Fuel Pool Cooling and Cleanup System (FPC) piping. A temporary tank filled with seawater was connected to FPC, and a pump truck send seawater to the tank, then fire engine pump was used to inject seawater to the pool. Although the water level in the pool is not confirmed, judging from the total amount of injected seawater, 40 tons, it is assumed that the level increased about 30 cm after this operation._
_(3) Brown smoke was observed from unit 3 reactor building. At around 3:55 pm on March 21, a TEPCO employee confirmed light gray smoke arising from the southeast side of the rooftop of the Unit 3 building. Workers were told to evacuate. It is observed the smoke has decreased and died out at 6:02pm. TEPCO continues to monitor the sites immediate surroundings. There was no work and no explosive sound at the time of discovery._
_(4) Smoke from unit 2 reactor building (as of 9:00pm, March 21). TEPCOs unit operator found new smoke spewing from mountain side of unit 2 reactor building around 6:20 pm, which was different smoke from blow-out panel on the sea side. There was no explosive sound heard at the time. At 7:10 pm, TEPCO instructed workers at unit 1  4 to evacuate into the building. Evacuation was confirmed at 8:30 pm._
___(Note: Since there was another smoke found from unit 3 at 1:55pm and evacuation was completed at that time, no workers were remained at the units when smoke found at unit 2.)_
_TEPCO assumes the smoke is something like vapor, but are still investigating the cause of this smoke with monitoring plant parameters._
_Radiation level near the Gate of Fukushima-Daiichi NPS increased at the time of smoke, then decreased to prior level._
_5:40 pm 494 μSv/hr_
_6:10 pm 1,256 μSv/hr_
_6:20 pm 1,428 μSv/hr_
_6:30 pm 1,932 μSv/hr_
_8:00 pm 493.5 μSv/hr_
_As a result of smoke from unit 2 and 3, scheduled water cannon spraying operations for March 21 were postponed._
_(5) Power supply restoration at unit 2 (as of 5:00 pm, March 21). Power cables have been connected to the main power center (existing plant equipment) and confirmed as properly functioning. Presently, soundness tests of the equipment are underway. A pump motor, which is used to inject water to spent fuel pool, has been identified as needing to be replaced._
__
_Similar power connections have been made to reactors 5 and 6 and a diesel generator is providing power to a cooling pump for the used fuel pools. Power cable is being laid to reactor 4, and power is expected to be restored to reactors 3 and 4 by Tuesday._

_Kyodo News now reports that all 6 units are connected to external power, and control room power and lighting is about to be restored._


_The water-spraying mission for the No. 4 reactor, meanwhile, was joined by trucks with a concrete squeeze pump and a 50-meter arm confirmed to be capable of pouring water from a higher point after trial runs._

_With the new pump trucks arriving,_ _the pumping rates for water spraying has increased__ to 160 tonnes per hour through a 58 metre flexible boom via remote control_
_...._
Lots of other data follows.

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## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by Thaihome
> 
> 
>  Work on Fukushima Daiichi power connections
> 
> 
>  
> 
> 
> ...


Herman,  You raise a good point about the level of volunteerism involved, in these local personnel and local equipment sent in as resources.   

The  original article posted shows a unified increasing response level.   The second article you provided that shows some strong armed tactics were put in play to get firefighter's into action.   As a group firefighters are normally accustomed to facing peril and risk for the benefit of society.   In Japan - the social contract of a "Job for life" for dedicated workers - is long dead.   In light of the fact that public servants required threats to push them to assist -  I expect the private sector personnel dispatched had leverage exerted to get them to step up. Regardless of what takes place behind the scene's, or the the min spec situation comments from TEPCO.   There is no question that greater resources are deployed "working in the process" then were engaged even 4 days ago.   

You are correct to point out TEPCO's remarks will always be understated.   Their disclosures will always seek to minimize their potential exposure from all decisions they have made throughout the crisis.

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## robuzo

> You are correct to point out TEPCO's remarks will always be understated.   Their disclosures will always seek to minimize their potential exposure from all decisions they have made throughout the crisis.


They are very worried about liability- Japan is a much more litigious society than many foreigners realize. Of course, TEPCO is not afraid to be talking already about the trillion or so yen in financing they are going to need. . .

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## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 
> You are right - broadening the sources would go along way towards reducing the frustration level, that comes narrow news sources that serve sound bites. Thank you for bringing this error to my attention.
> 
> 
> Another very good site the compiles information from several sources, including WNN, so Mid, don't read it, don't want you exposed to any bias.
> 
> It is updated daily and has an open comments section that has some very good discussion. Though at this point it is becoming much less technical and more of a pro versus anti nuclear forum. I expect the forum owner to cut it off soon. He does not put up with much.
> ...


Thaihome,  Your assembled post is a great consolidation of source's and summaries.   It contains a good reflection about how easily "above normal" radiation levels (particularily in the sea) are easily portrayed as significant but are not.   The illustration about the heat exchanger arrangement & make shift pumping & power put in place to get some pool cooling working, without direct circulation into the ocean, makes clear that TEPCO is trying to drive better solutions that just over flowing or injection into pools alone.    

Your work to create this post, and provide further sources is appreciated.   It consolidates information and helps with a better prospective.    TEPCO and their teams seems on the trail to get pumping services restored, even as the process seems slow - to folks, with some knowledge, on the outside looking in.   Since I have dealt with sea water or steam impacted MCC's, inundated motors and pumps, damaged feeders, and other flooding issues, on many occasions  -  The investigation / remediation process seems like it should be moving faster.   It probably is moving faster,  but only the disclosures are being made more slowly.

In the end - regardless of the pace - progress is being made.   I agree you are probably correct the oldest reactors and the ones damaged beyond economic repair will be de-commissioned, and either de-fueled or encapsulated depending on risk / cost factors.   

Your WSJ article points out that future work on this site will be measure in years, not months.    This is a major set back for Nuclear power, because of the new risk issues identifed.  While the plant itself and much of the machinery survived the EQ without large issues -  The back up power & loss of cooling has been the cause of the major damage.  So to the storage of 6+ years of spent fuel - on site without a more permanent safe storage is an issue that will loom large.  My guess is that many nuclear plants have similar temporary storage of spent fuel stored.   These risks have to be more deeply assessed.    This is part of the plant design, and local regulatory control allowances  as such -  Lessons learned will raise the bar and cause world wide evaluations for similar risks.   This is part of the process to improve Nuclear safety, which can not be ignored.   

Again,  thank you for your complete post.

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## The Bold Rodney

Despite all the boring technical reports and supposedly "new neuclear experts" on TD...the fact remains that this is a very serious incident for the world and Japan and it was caused by poor regulation, poor industry controls, cost saving factors greedy corporate management and plain human error.


Whether there's a million volunteers trying to avert a complete  meltdown or cleaning the place up doesn't matter and nor does what they wear or arguements about fucking duct tape. 

What matters is that all of us learn from this disaster and kick the politicians and greedy corporates and greedy management in the bollocks until they learn something and that something is that us ordinary mortals have as much right to live on this earth in safety as those greedy corrupt fuckers have to make money!

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## koman

> These risks have to be more deeply assessed. This is part of the plant design, and local regulatory control allowances as such - Lessons learned will raise the bar and cause world wide evaluations for similar risks. This is part of the process to improve Nuclear safety, which can not be ignored.


You would certainly think so, but considering the many countries that have, or are planning Nuclear plants, I wonder how realistic it is.  Unless there was some kind of international body inspecting and monitoring all these plants, we rely on each country to enforce and uphold safety standards.  

There are many countries who will not subscribe to the idea of international busy bodies poking their noses into _their_ nuclear facilities....and they will continue to do whatever they like.  I doubt if regimes like  North Korea or Iran place nuclear safety concerns at the top of the agenda.   (apparently Japan did not, and it's supposed to be a first world advanced country)  There seems to be concerns about some facilities in the US as well now.   Some will say...it's greedy corporations...just cutting corners for profit, but Chernobyl was not operated by a corporation....nor was Windscale in England which had a meltdown in 1957....both state operated.   It's quite a problem and I don't think that nuclear power plants are going away; at least not for a very long time.

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## HermantheGerman

Scaremongers don't allow infants to drink tab water anymore.





March 23, 2011, 1:46 a.m. EDT 				
*Radiation found in Tokyo tap water: reports*





By  				Michael Kitchen 		    		           								  LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) -- Tokyo's government is advising families not  to let infants drink tap water after higher-than-allowed levels of  radioactive iodine were found in the city's water, according to reports  Wednesday. Water purifiers in the metro Tokyo area and five suburban  districts were affected by the problem, Reuters reported, while Dow  Jones Newswires said a total of 23 Tokyo wards were impacted. While the  city government said the water posed no immediate threat to infants or  adults, the radioactivity has nonetheless been above permissible levels  for infants for two days, according to Dow Jones Newswires. The level of  radioactive iodine allowed for infants is lower than that for adults,  CNBC reported

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## Thaihome

> ... it was caused by poor regulation, poor industry controls, cost saving factors greedy corporate management and plain human error.


 
The disaster was created by a 9.0 earthquake and the 14 meter tsunami it caused hitting a nuclear power station designed for an 8.0 earthquake and a 5.7 meter tsunami.

There are indeed issues with both the design and how TEPCO was managing the sites, but that had little to do with causing the disaster. 

You need to do a little bit of work on your cause and effect analysis skills.
TH

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## HermantheGerman

> _Im reminded of a quote from James Lovelock in __The Vanishing Face of Gaia__ (2008):_
> 
> _In July 2007 an earthquake in Japan shook a nuclear power station enough to cause an automatic shutdown ; the quake was of sufficient severity-over six on the Richter scale-to cause significant structural damage in an average town. The only nuclear consequence was the fall of a barrell from a stack of low-level waste that allowed the leak of about 90,000 becquerels of radioactivity. This made front page news in Australia, where it was said that the leak posed a radiation threat to the Sea of Japan.The truth is that about 90,000 becquerels is just twice the amount of natural radioactivity, mostly in the form of potassium, which you and I carry in our bodies. In other words, if we accept this hysterical conclusion, two swimmers in the Sea of Japan would make a radiation threat._





_Im reminded of a quote from _ *Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra* :

_It ain't over till it's over !_





P.S. Isn't Lovelock the guy who said: "We can't save the planet"

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## Thaihome

> Again, thank you for your complete post.


 
I am merely cutting and pasting from the link.  Thank  Professor Barry Brook of Brave New Climate.
TH

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## Thaihome

> _Im reminded of a quote from_ *Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra* :[/FONT]
> 
> _It ain't over till it's over !_


Worth noting that Yogi, then manager of the NY Mets, said that when asked about the Mets slim chance of wining the 1973 pennant race.  They did go on to win the pennant, so your context of using that quote would appear to be inappropriate.

 ::chitown:: 
TH

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## HermantheGerman

> Originally Posted by The Bold Rodney
> 
> 
> ... it was caused by poor regulation, poor industry controls, cost saving factors greedy corporate management and plain human error.
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
> ...



It doesn't take a scientist to figure out that building a Nuclear Plant in an earthquake/tsunami zone isn't the smartest thing to do.
So much about the anylysis/cause skills.

Now let me guess (if all goes well), where is all this radioactive garbage from the Fukushima plant is going to go. The ocean ?!
Where do the Japanese store their nuclear waste now ?

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## robuzo

My colleague in Japan found these beauties in TEPCO's 2010 Corporate Social Responsibility Report (a major part of our business is translating CSR Reports, although we don't do TEPCO's :Smile: :

p. 8
We will aim to produce "reliable nuclear power" as a
power supply that delivers the world's highest standard of
safety and quality _(oops)_, and contributes to ensuring energy
security, creating a low-carbon society, and increasing
economic efficiency to the greatest extent possible.
We will make ongoing efforts to secure the trust of local
communities _(oops)_ as the
foundation of promoting nuclear power generation.

p. 11
Overseas power generation projects that are based on
our achievement of the world's highest level of operational
performance _(oops)_ in power generation
in Japan, are the drivers of TEPCO Group's consolidated growth.
(_Rilly_？)

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## Chairman Mao

Workers evacuated from the plant as black smoke seen rising from reactor 4.

US halts imports of milk from areas of Japan.

Both on Aljazeera.

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## HermantheGerman

> Originally Posted by The Bold Rodney
> 
> 
> ... it was caused by poor regulation, poor industry controls, cost saving factors greedy corporate management and plain human error.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> You need to do a little bit of work on your _cause and effect_ analysis skills.
> TH


...is this O.K. ? Does this fall under cause the _cost and effect_ analysis ? Or does Mainstream media not count ?
 ::chitown:: 


Japan Ignored Warning of Nuclear Vulnerability 




  By NORIHIKO SHIROUZU And PETER LANDERS

  TOKYO—Japanese regulators discussed in recent months the use of new cooling technologies at nuclear plants that could have lessened or prevented the disaster that struck this month when a tsunami wiped out the electricity at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi power facility.
  The central control room of Unit 3 is pictured after lights went on at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant on Tuesday.
  However, they chose to ignore the vulnerability at existing reactors and instead focused on fixing the issue in future ones, government and corporate documents show. There was no serious discussion of retrofitting older plants with the alternative technology, known as "isolation condensers," government advisers said.
  Fukushima Daiichi, the plant at the heart of Japan's crisis, relied mainly on electrical systems to power the emergency cooling of its reactors—a design that failed in the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. When the main power went down and backup generators failed, cooling water couldn't get to the nuclear fuel. Overheating then led to explosions, fires and significant release of radiation in the early days after the quake. Isolation condensers, by contrast, don't require electric power.
  "There has been little to no talk about the need to retrofit existing reactors" with additional safety systems, said Muneo Morokuzu, a former Toshiba Corp. reactor designer who now studies industry policy at the University of Tokyo. "Mostly people thought there was no need to go that far."
  Japanese officials declined to say why retrofitting older plants wasn't discussed, while the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co.,or Tepco, said it would look into the matter. Experts said doing so was likely deemed too costly and cumbersome given what was seen as a small risk of total power outage. Even if a refit had been ordered in recent months, it wouldn't have been complete when the quake struck.
  On Tuesday, Tepco took another step toward recovery by reconnecting power to all six reactors and turning on the lights in reactor No. 3, the most visibly damaged of the six after a series of explosions. Tepco still needs to turn on cooling systems. Workers resumed spraying water on storage pools where radioactive rods are stowed, an effort to prevent overheating.
  Last October, the Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan, one of the nation's two main safety regulators, met to set its long-term agenda. Takanori Tanaka, head of the partly government-supported Nuclear Power Engineering Center, showed the commissioners a PowerPoint slide advocating new technologies that would reduce "residual risk concerning earthquakes and tsunamis," according to documents attached to the meeting minutes.
  His presentation focused on improving backup systems for future reactors, as part of a broader pitch to regulators for a new generation of safer plants."The Nuclear Safety Commission was just starting a basic discussion of the need to install more diverse safety cooling systems in future reactors," said
  Mr. Tanaka in a telephone interview Tuesday. A spokesman for the commission declined to comment.
  In January Hitachi Ltd., a top nuclear-plant maker, described the advantages of reactors with a backup cooling system not reliant on electricity. In a company journal, Hitachi said it was "gaining the cooperation of power companies and the government" in building a next-generation reactor that would "enable a response to long-term loss of electric power."
  WSJ's Peter Landers reports from Tokyo that the Fukushima Daiichi Reactor No. 4 has been reconnected to the power grid, but water is still being sprayed on several of the reactors to prevent overheating.
  Hitachi spokesman Yuichi Izumisawa said Tuesday: "We don't think there are safety problems" with reactors in use now, but the company is developing "something even better."
  The Hitachi article referred specifically to an old idea that has gained new attention in recent years, a clever but low-tech device called an isolation condenser.
  A condenser works this way: If the reactor core heats up, the condenser receives naturally rising steam and circulates it through a tank of cool water, with no need for electric power. The device relieves pressure in the core, although it works only for a few days because its pool heats up.
  Mr. Morokuzu, the former Toshiba reactor designer, said the condenser "is a way to fill the gap in an emergency, when the plant's external electricity gets knocked out somehow, either by an earthquake or for some other reason."
  Of Fukushima Daiichi's six reactors, only No. 1—the first reactor to be built, in 1971—had an isolation condenser. Tepco said the condenser, which dated from the plant's construction, worked after the quake but eventually stopped. A Tepco spokesman said he didn't have information about why it stopped working.
  Some experts say heat inside No. 1, which is smaller than modern reactors, may have overwhelmed the condenser's capacity. Design changes to new reactors with condensers may address this.
  Engineers say the field has seen philosophical shifts over the years. Early reactors, like No. 1 at Fukushima Daiichi, had an isolation condenser. It is known as a "passive" system: It works on its own, without requiring outside power. Later reactors adopted "active" systems that relied on electrical pumps and the like, often with redundant layers that engineers believed would provide more protection against overheating or breakdown.
  Today, passive systems are again in vogue. General Electric Co. and Hitachi, which have a global alliance in reactors, use isolation condensers in their latest designs. The condenser is part of GE's Economic Simplified Boiling Water Reactor, for which GE is trying to win certification at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
  Under the Japanese plans being discussed in recent months, new reactors wouldn't have both an active and a passive backup-cooling system, but rather just passive systems. According to the Hitachi article, the condenser would be used in place of the other backup method. The article says eliminating the active backup saves money and makes the reactor easier to maintain.
  On March 12, the day after the quake, the crisis worsened at reactor No. 1 as rising pressure and heat forced Tepco to open a vent and release radioactive steam. Later that day, there was an explosion at reactor No. 1.
  The other five reactors at Fukushima Daiichi, completed later in the 1970s, relied on a form of backup cooling that used electrical generators, which were knocked out by the tsunami.
  All six of the reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant were designed by GE and were built by GE, Hitachi and Toshiba Corp.
A GE spokesman said GE opted for the active backup-cooling system in Fukushima Daiichi units 2 to 6, and in other reactors, because it believed the system was safer than earlier condensers and was better suited to bigger reactors. Some new reactors that now use condensers have other design changes that make the condenser more appropriate, he said. Toshiba declined to comment.
  Akira Omoto, a member of a government advisory body helping to tame Fukushima Daiichi, said Friday the quake exposed a "lack of diversity" in emergency cooling mechanisms. The plant's reactors have two to three backup generators each, he said, but the tsunami knocked them out. "The problem was Fukushima Daiichi reactors had only one emergency way to cool their fuel vessels"—either the electrical generators, or in the case of reactor No. 1, the condenser.

Japan Ignored Warning of Nuclear Vulnerability - WSJ.com

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## HermantheGerman

> Note that the concrete pump (that the mainstream press was sure was a sign they were going to fill the reactors with concrete) is being used to spray water with the 58 metre flexible boom that allows them to direct the spray more accurately.
> TH


Note that the Putzmeister M28-4  is the same one that was used in Chernobyl to pour concrete, is now being used in Fukushima. Another one is on the way from Germany, Austria and similar one from China. Will they be pouring water or concrete ? 



http://www.pmw.de/cps/rde/xchg/SID-3..._DEU_HTML.htm#

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## Mr Gribbs

> think its gas they are going to buy


The company I work for refines crude oil into gasoline, heating oil, jet fuel, kerosene. Japan moving from nuclear energy to fossil fuels will increase the demand, resulting in increased profits.

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## misskit

*Towns near nuke plant empty as residents flee shortages, anxiety*

Residents near the crippled Fukushima No.1 Nuclear Power Plant told to stay indoors are fleeing their homes as shortages and anxiety set in, leaving ghost towns in their wake.

Those who remain in Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture -- a city within the "indoor standby zone" between 20 and 30 kilometer from the plant -- are becoming increasingly isolated.

"It would have been better if an evacuation order had been issued here," one said, a view shared by many residents still in their homes.

Towns near nuke plant empty as residents flee shortages, anxiety - The Mainichi Daily News

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## robuzo

^^So, let me get this straight- we will be saved by Der Putzmeister?

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## Poo and Pee



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## crippen

The Japanese road repaired SIX days after it was destroyed by quake
By MAIL FOREIGN SERVICE
Last updated at 12:14 AM on 24th March 2011

The picture of gaping chasms in a Japanese highway demonstrated the power of the March 11 earthquake.
Now the astonishing speed of reconstruction is being used to highlight the nations ability to get back on its feet.
Work began on March 17 and six days later the cratered section of the Great Kanto Highway in Naka was as good as new. It was ready to re-open to traffic last night.



Now you see it...: This stretch of the Great Kanto highway was wrecked by deep chasms in the March 11 earthquake - but was repaired in just six days
Many workers returned to their jobs the day after the quake and subsequent tsunami and some businesses in the worst-hit regions have already reopened.
The Japanese recovery has prompted some investors, including American Warren Buffett, one of the worlds richest men, to declare that the disaster which has left 23,000 dead or missing represents a buying opportunity in the money markets.
Meanwhile, mothers in Tokyo were warned yesterday not to give tap water to their babies.

More...
Where do I begin? Businessman sifts through wreckage of his office in the town wiped out by the tsunami
MICHAEL HANLON: The Japanese disaster PROVES the value and safety of nuclear power
U.S. bans Japanese food imports from regions closest to stricken nuclear plant as Tokyo tap water is ruled 'unfit for babies'
First pictures emerge of the Fukushima Fifty as they battle radiation poisoning to save Japan's stricken nuclear power plant
Cars with loudspeakers toured the streets of the capital after levels of radiation from the damaged nuclear plant at Fukushima, nearly 150 miles away, reached more than twice the safety level for children aged a year or less.
Supermarkets were quickly emptied of bottled water in many parts of the city. Parents were also told to ensure that milk was not from cows in the Fukushima district.
Tokyo residents said they had growing concerns about radiation.
If theyre saying its harmful for children because their bodies are smaller and dangerous iodine can accumulate in their thyroid glands, we can understand that, said 29-year-old department store worker Yasuke Harade.
But can we really believe it when they say that its OK for adults to drink the water? Can we cook our rice in tap water, can we drink tea, coffee? Theyre telling us we can, but what is the truth?
To add to the fears, two strong earthquakes shook the devastated east coast yesterday, and black smoke billowed once again from the crippled plant. The Fukushima Fifty, the team of courageous employees working inside the plant, and firemen spraying water on the complex were ordered to evacuate immediately.
It was not known when efforts to restore the plants cooling mechanism would be restarted.
The scare followed reports that small amounts of radiation had travelled as far as Iceland.



Read more: Japan tsunami and earthquake: Road repaired SIX days after it was destroyed | Mail Online

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## Thaihome

> ... Will they be pouring water or concrete ?

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## StrontiumDog

NYT: New problems at Japanese plant subdue optimism - World news - The New York Times - msnbc.com

*             New problems at Japanese plant subdue optimism        * 

*             Engineers say some of the most difficult and dangerous tasks are still ahead        * 

By KEITH BRADSHER                                
                           The New York Times                            
      updated      13 minutes ago     2011-03-24T01:45:32 

                          The Japanese electricians who bravely strung wires this week to  all six reactor buildings at a stricken nuclear power plant succeeded  despite waves of heat and blasts of radioactive steam.      

      The restoration of electricity at the plant, the Fukushima Daiichi  Nuclear Power Station, stirred hopes that the crisis was ebbing, but  nuclear engineers say some of the most difficult and dangerous tasks are  still ahead — and time is not necessarily on the side of the repair  teams. 

 The tasks include manually draining hundreds of gallons of  radioactive water and venting radioactive gas from the pumps and piping  of the emergency cooling systems, which are located diagonally  underneath the overheated reactor vessels. The health warning that  infants should not drink tap water — even in Tokyo, far from the  stricken plant — raised alarms about extensive contamination. 

“We’ve got at least 10 days to two weeks of potential drama before  you can declare the accident over,” said Michael Friedlander, who worked  as a nuclear plant operator for 13 years. 

 Western nuclear engineers have become increasingly concerned about a  separate problem that may be putting pressure on the Japanese  technicians to work faster: salt buildup inside the reactors, which  could cause them to heat up more and, in the worst case, cause the  uranium to melt, releasing a range of radioactive material. 

 Richard T. Lahey Jr., who was General Electric’s chief of safety  research for boiling-water reactors when the company installed them at  the Fukushima Daiichi plant, said that as seawater was pumped into the  reactors and boiled away, it left more and more salt behind. 

 He estimates that 57,000 pounds of salt have accumulated in Reactor  No. 1 and 99,000 pounds apiece in Reactors No. 2 and 3, which are  larger. 

  The big question is how much of that salt is still mixed with water  and how much now forms a crust on the reactors’ uranium fuel rods.  Chemical crusts on uranium fuel rods have been a problem for years at  nuclear plants. 

 Crusts insulate the rods from the water and allow them to heat up. If  the crusts are thick enough, they can block water from circulating  between the fuel rods. As the rods heat up, their zirconium cladding can  ignite, which may cause the uranium inside to melt and release  radioactive material. 

 Some of the salt might be settling to the bottom of the reactor  vessel rather than sticking to the fuel rods. But just as a heating  element repeatedly used to warm tea in a mug tends to become encrusted  in cities where the tap water is rich with minerals, boiling seawater is  likely to leave salt mainly on the fuel rods. 

 The Japanese have reported that some of the seawater used for cooling  has returned to the ocean, suggesting that some of the salt may have  flowed out again rather than remaining in the reactors. But clearly a  significant amount remains. 

A Japanese nuclear safety regulator said on Wednesday that plans were  under way to fix a piece of equipment that would allow freshwater  instead of seawater to be pumped in. 

 He said that an informal international group of experts on  boiling-water reactors was increasingly worried about salt accumulation  and was inclined to recommend that the Japanese try to flood each  reactor vessel’s containment building with cold water in an effort to  prevent the uranium from melting down. That approach might make it  harder to release steam from the reactors as part of the  “feed-and-bleed” process that was being used to cool them, but that was a  risk worth taking, he said. 

 Public alarm about the crisis increased on Wednesday after officials  announced that levels of radioactive iodine had been detected in Tokyo’s  tap water. 

 Recent rains might have washed radioactive particles into the water,  as the Japanese government suggested. But prevailing breezes for the  past two weeks should have been pushing the radiation mostly out to sea. And until Wednesday, some experts had predicted that radioactive iodine  would not be much of a problem, because the fission necessary to  produce iodine — which breaks down quickly, with a half-life of just  eight days — stopped within minutes of the earthquake on March 11. The  fear is that more radiation is being released than has been understood. 

 Preventing the reactors and storage pools from overheating through  radioactive decay would go a long way toward limiting radioactive  contamination. But that would require pumping a lot of cold freshwater  through them, which is not easily done. 

 The emergency cooling system pump and motor for a boiling-water  reactor are roughly the size and height of a compact hatchback car  standing on its back bumper. The powerful system has the capacity to  propel thousands of gallons of water a minute throughout a reactor  pressure vessel and storage pool. But that very power can also be the  system’s Achilles’ heel. 

 The pump and piping are designed to be kept full of water. But they  tend to leak and develop alternating pockets of air and water, Mr.  Friedlander said. 

 If the pump is turned on without venting the air and draining the  water, the water from the pump would hit the alternating pockets with  enough force to blow holes in the piping. Venting the air and draining  the water requires a technician to reach a dozen valves, sometimes using  a ladder. The water is removed through a hose to the nearest drain,  usually in the floor, that leads to machinery designed to remove  radiation from the water. 

  The process takes a full 12 hours in a reactor that is operating  normally, Mr. Friedlander said. But even then, the water in the pipes  tends to become radioactively contaminated because the valves that  separate it from the reactor are not entirely tight. 

 It is likely to be an even bigger problem when the water inside the  reactor is much more radioactive than usual and is under extremely high  pressure, as it has been in all three reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi  plant. 

 Japanese government and power company officials expressed optimism on  Wednesday morning that the crisis was close to being brought under  control, only to encounter two reminders in the afternoon of the  unpredictable difficulties that lie ahead. 

 Fukushima Daiichi’s Reactor No. 3 began belching black smoke for an  hour late in the afternoon, leading its operator, the Tokyo Electric  Power Company, to evacuate workers. No. 3 is considered one of the most  dangerous of the reactors because of its fuel — mixed oxides, or mox,  which contain a mixture of uranium and plutonium and can produce a more  dangerous radioactive plume if scattered by fire or explosions. 

 The cooling system at Reactor No. 5, which was shut down at the time  of the quake and has shown few problems, also abruptly stopped working  Wednesday afternoon, said Hiro Hasegawa, a spokesman for Tokyo Electric.  

 “When we switched from the temporary pump, it automatically switched  off,” Mr. Hasegawa said. “We’ll try again with a new pump in the  morning.”

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> You need to do a little bit of work on your cause and effect analysis skills.


Thanks very much for the tip and I'll try a little harder in the future.  :Smile: 

However, you need to look at the overall picture rather than the narrow and slanted views you so often take on many subjects. 

It's well known and recorded the Japanese safety record regarding their nuclear industry isn't good in fact some qualified industry experts who are NOT on TD consider the Japanese safety record to range between poor and appalling. 

So it's impossible to protect six reactors from a tsnunami? of course it's not but construction costs and the company bottom line forbade this from being done.

Even if the backup systems / generators had been proteccted adequately from the flooding effect that would have been something but they were not. Adequate protected external independent power supplies in an area prone to earthquakes isn't an unreasonable expectation.

How do you explain the excessive storage of spent fuel at the site? Does that not indicate a cavalier attitude to saftey by the management?

In my last post I was stating that greed, poor eregulation, lazy politicians, greedy corporate management and corruption has played a large part in this disaster and of course human error.

So before you comment re anyones "cause and effect analysis skills" take a hard look at some of the posts you've written in the past, improve your reading skills, think before you post or defend stupid comments that have been made and do attempt to take a wider view on all matters not just this one. :Smile:

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## Butterfly

it's time to call the French to the rescue so they can lead an International team of expert to solve that plant problem

The Japanese idiots seem to be out of their league, probably low paid engineers only capable of reading manuals for the operation of the plant.

They need specialists at this stage, not some low paid console operators

----------


## Butterfly

let's be honest, this plant is going to go Chernobyl out of greed and incompetence

just a question of days,

----------


## Thaihome

Actually your article does not have a single item in it that would have prevented the current crisis. I have corrected your selected out of context highlighting.




> Originally Posted by Thaihome
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by The Bold Rodney
> ...


 

I stand by my statement, the crisis was caused by an earthquake and tsunami that overwhelmed an design that at the time it was built was considered to be state of the art and sufficient. 
The Japaneses nuclear industries admittedly poor safety record was not the cause and nothing you have posted shows that.

----------


## Poo and Pee

> let's be honest, this plant is going to go Chernobyl out of greed and incompetence
> 
> just a question of days,


tottally different senario. Chernobyl was left burning for over a week before they even tried to do anything. there were no containment walls there also, whilst fukushima has 20ft thick walls.

Greed and incompetence? It's easy for you to play captain hindsight, and say what should have been done, but the fact is, international experts never believed a quake of such epic proportion was possible in the region. the 'big one' was always expected to happent south of tokyo. 

i would much rather have modern day japan taking care of the situation than cold war russia.

it sounds as though you want the whole thing to blow, and everyone and everthing to suffer radiation.

you nasty little frog  :Squintfinger:

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> These risks have to be more deeply assessed. This is part of the plant design, and local regulatory control allowances as such - Lessons learned will raise the bar and cause world wide evaluations for similar risks. This is part of the process to improve Nuclear safety, which can not be ignored.
> 
> 
> You would certainly think so, but considering the many countries that have, or are planning Nuclear plants, I wonder how realistic it is.  Unless there was some kind of international body inspecting and monitoring all these plants, we rely on each country to enforce and uphold safety standards.  
> 
> There are many countries who will not subscribe to the idea of international busy bodies poking their noses into _their_ nuclear facilities....and they will continue to do whatever they like.  I doubt if regimes like  North Korea or Iran place nuclear safety concerns at the top of the agenda.   (apparently Japan did not, and it's supposed to be a first world advanced country)  There seems to be concerns about some facilities in the US as well now.   Some will say...it's greedy corporations...just cutting corners for profit, but Chernobyl was not operated by a corporation....nor was Windscale in England which had a meltdown in 1957....both state operated.   It's quite a problem and I don't think that nuclear power plants are going away; at least not for a very long time.


Koman ...  You are correct on many fronts, and have implied some unstated burning question's of  important to Nuclear safety...   

Such as ...  How realist is it to expect that the lessons learned from the current Japan crisis, will propagate into the industry world wide and make a difference in Nuclear safety ?   What about the lack of a worldwide agency that regulates Nuclear Safety, Regulation, and Compliance ?   If such an international regulating organization could be created what would be the compliance mechanism's to ensure their mandates are followed ?

Reviewing Some of the International Nuclear Authority players....  

It looks like the IAEA is the principal international agency connected with assisting in the peaceful non - military usage of Nuclear technology.    They have a great web site that details their origin, mission, and limited authority with close affiliation with the UN.  On the site, They provide a governing framework document, which has been ratified by UN member states.  That document details the IAEA scope of operations.    A major function of the IAEA is to provide a clearing house exchange for nuclear science & technology and its cooperative sharing.     The mission most of us connect to the IAEA is their engagement  in monitoring countries nuclear programs to determine if the nuclear technology is being used for non peaceful military program developments.   This is a front line mission engaged in against non proliferation of nuclear weapons technology.   It is routed in the 190 + countries who have signed the Nuclear Non Prolifiration Treaty.  The IAEA obtains enforcement via the UN,  As they attempt to regulate nuclear material, and nuclear and non nuclear  technology which has high cross over for Nuclear weapon development.     The IAEA isn't per say in the business of inspecting nuclear safety, nor are they engaged in any approval process for nuclear plant design.    Work in those areas are left to sovereign governments, who's regulation agencies enforce safety strategies across many front.  

The task of regulating the host of Nuclear Safety issues such as the area's of Plant Designs, Plant licensing,  Safe operations, Nuclear waste management, Nuclear fuel stream development, and Environmental concerns all fall to national authorities.   These National authorities conduct their own scientific research, pool research together cooperatively, and come under the influence of  regional working groups.   These national regulators execute their mission, in accordance with the the rules they develope, and supported by National laws that provide them with enforcement jurisdiction.

As some examples of these national agencies and regional working groups can be found at:   

Regulation of Nuclear Power Plants Around the World

List of national regulators | European Nuclear Safety Regulators Group.   

There will always be countries who, through their own national aspirations, local political views, and world political views - detest international involvement or international regulation in their countries affairs. In fact most every country views attempts at international influence impacting their own decission through their own national lens of focus to see what they can and cant support.  It works this way across many spheres - trade, finance, and yes even in Nuclear usage.  Some states are seen as mis-behaving children, because they choose not follow logic or reason. Instead putting their specific interest ahead of  common world  concerns, voiced by others in the international community.  These misbehaving countries  - "Preferring unilateralism over cooperative participation".     Their claim that National Sovereignty and self determination is an inalienable right no country or group of countries can take away.   And that it is within their rights to pick and choose what international agreements they choose to accept and live with, or choose to reject and not support.   Some would argue - Countries charting this course are  expressing a principal that is a cornerstone of freedom.  No question they are expressing their own freedom of choice.    

Freedom however comes with responsibility.  No question that nuclear safety has large world wide implications.  The concepts behind National Sovereignty  needs to be updated - in the light of the nuclear power age.   The kind of Global risk posed by Global Nuclear power was well outside of the collective consciousness of any founding fathers (throughout history) as they developed the concept's that collectively underpin the doctrine of national sovereignty.     

All countries are Global citizens and must recognize their Global responsibilities for the safety of their actions / activities.   Global Nuclear consequences, are not the same thing as - trade violations, or non-transparent fiscal flows, or market collusion.   The damage tier and risk exposure are completely different. 

It is a common held public expectation  -  That national Nuclear industry regulators should be expected to be impartial independent experts, driven by a passion for responsible safety,  buoyed by research and information sharing, and from taking the posture of  vigilant adoptions of the best revised safe practices in light of lesson's learned from Nuclear incidents.   

To be effective in that role these national bodies must as well have an open dialogue in play with their national industrial consortium's pushing industrial power projects.   As well these national bodies must have  open dialogue with international industrial groups bringing outsourced nuclear designs on to their shores.   An open dialogue means and impartial open exchange.   Moving Nuclear power forward,  for the licensing and approval process for new projects - these groups must climb into bed together and come out smiling.   That does'nt mean a sell out, it means a dialogue driving project changes until these regulating authorities bless new projects as meeting compliance with their requirements.  Dialogue  is always a two way street.     

These National Regulation Authorities earn their public trust - by working in this fashion.   That is where the balance resides.   In theory these national regulation bodies are better keepers of their own countries geographical / environmental / climatological influences that pose risk to Nuclear safety.    This bonus, when it exists, should make these national regulating bodies qualified to better speak on specific sensitive issues constrain safe Nuclear development in their country.  

National regulating groups that fail in their safety regulation missions (for what ever reason), and dont deliver the best emerging safety practices, or show willingness to learn from events,  fail the public at large,  they breach this implicit trust.   

IF a large regulatory safety mission failure happens when these regulating bodies lose independence because their government has a very different agenda, and exerts undue influences on the body.   There is little that can remove such a bias.    Such a bias runs deeper than corruption because its rubber stamped at all levels, because of the larger over arching national influence in play.

If A larger regulatory safety mission failure happens because the national agencies lose independence due to the influence of the industrial conglomerates on the regulation process.   Greed and corruption factors become rooted from the regulatory landscape by greater transparency.  Those who operate for the public good, in an area of public trust, need to have unblemished records.  Their credibility depends upon this.    This kind of bias is easier to remove.   I suspect Japan is about to undergo such a purge.

Regardless of how one slices it -  National regulation bodies are all  that we have in place, to create mandates and produce enforcement capability for the safety in the nuclear power industry.  

Expectations of birthing a Global Nuclear Power Safety agency (with international enforcement powers) is  problematic.    Easy to see that the IAEA, even with a well toothed UN connection - struggles with inspection / enforcement in the area of Nuclear weapons programs.   Weapons designed for large destruction purposes, where safety is applied to the munition handler only.   It will be much harder to rapidly build an international group (with international jurisdiction) for peaceful use, when we are still struggling to get compliance over the dark side of nuclear technolog.    

Movements toward a safer Nuclear power industry,  will depend on the present national regulating bodies - Acting proactively against new risks displayed in real world events, and out of respect for trust placed in them by the public,  while honoring the principal that their objective independence (from any undue influence) is a cornerstone of their ability to address their tasking.
Ensuring these regulating agencies remain well funded and transparent in their research, and transparent in their industry related activities.    This is why transparency and independence is important.  

Korman, Even if say 95 % of National regulation organizations can be ignited with with this understanding of these basic foundations and keeping the public's trust,  along with local mandated increases in transparency,  It will move Nuclear safety 
one hell of a lot further forward and faster,  than the long lead challenge of birthing a new international agency dedicated to commercial nuclear power safety.    It will take years of rangling to get most countries to submit that authority to a new body, a body which at the start,  will have no track record or experience.  At this point there is enough concern about the Nuclear industry in the minds of many countries that no country is going to roll over and submit to any outside body, with out vetting it all internally with their own regulators first.   

The path forward for improved safety,  comes with better cooperation between National regulators - in the areas of risk analysis, design, and Nuclear science , with the expansion of regional working groups (such as the European Nuclear Safety Regulatig Group.  

Those regional working groups, who as third parties can speak with a measure of high independence as well.    The interplay between these groups (National regulators and regional working groups)  on an open and transparent basis will serve as a set of checks and balances.  Where the safety enhancements by national regulators can be examined by these regional working groups.   With new safety strategy formations  as concepts must pass the vigor of open analysis.      Where the best ideas are exchanged.     IN cases where the National regulatory  bodies elect to ignore the outside analysis and dialogue from regional work groups -    It shall be up to the political process to demand for public testimony and accountibility over the divergence between expert groups.     For Nuclear safety to improve (particularily from the design arena) - More collaboration and points of view must come into play.  

This framework as a forward moving collaborative process to manage advances in Nuclear safety....Is probably the a hopeful picture of where the best progress and practices will emerge.  How it they will come to light in dialogue, and find fertile ground for transparent analysis.   It stands the best chance of implementation,  it works based upon the "buy in" of the professionals and intellectuals within these groups.    It will go a lot further than the mandatory "push in"  by new authorities put on the landscape of a new International Commercial Nuclear Safety regulatory agencies.  Leadership comes from authority who's foundation is merit based, time tested, and which resonates from a successful historic record.    Any new international regulating group starts from scratch.

I don't claim to have the best answer here -  to these topics,  I can only point to where I see the best and most expeditious pathway forward to improving  Nuclear safety, in light of current events.  I think forward looking,  It is best to with what is in place in national regulatory boards, and build upon it - making adjustments and enhancements.  I see it as the fastest track to digest new safety lessons and give them traction into the industry.  

Folks on this thread who choose to want to label some participants as "new nuclear experts" - who should be duty bound to remove their posts.  And as others who frame the issues surround Japan's crisis as total fear mongering.    Maybe they are biased towards big oil,  I can't say,   However they miss the point of these discussions and the risk exposures still being grappled with in the resolution of this situation in Japan.     The evidence that the current minor leakage that has rendered produce, animal products, water, and even soils as contaminated to a point of human concern - should give everyone a reason enough to recognize the risks in play here.   

While it is unlikely - Fuel pool thermal deterioration or extensive containment releases remain significant hazards, those risks remain present until  stable cold shutdown conditions can be achieved and maintained.   

Even if someone puts a number on that risk of  say a 1 to  5% probability factor -  The down side of a major game changing incident, during stabilizing efforts at the site which could have serious health and life quality considerations in the region.    Discrediting these concerns, because we are not talking about an order of  millions of lives at risk of untimely un natural death.  Its ludicrous -  Its a weak argument being used to all concernts as fear mongering 

That realization of risk impacts is not fear mongering.  It is based upon reality and the established science that apply's to radioisotopes, their half lives, and distribution patterns and the impacts of those patterns.   Its a bit of a slap in the face - to dismiss risk because its probable assessment is low.   

Is'nt that the same sentiment that caused Japan to give low weighting to the decades of TEPCO volations and the poor safety record record displayed at the facility currently under challenge?

----------


## robuzo

^In no way defending B-fly's remarks, but you don't have to be "captain hindsight" to see how badly TEPCO has performed both since and prior to the earthquake. Hoocuddanode simply will not fly here- plenty of knowledgeable people were warning about what TEPCO was up to at Fukushima, and given their track record over the past 30+ years there is no way they should have been trusted to do the right thing. The methods and sheer volume of spent rod storage, which despite all the happy talk about getting power to the reactors is still the biggest problem that TEPCO and the J-gov't would rather not talk about, is itself a sign of criminal negligence which reeks of moral hazard. Read the final paragraph here asahi.com (in Japanese) and you might start to get the picture.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Nuke disaster hinders searches for missing in Fukushima | Kyodo News
*
*Nuke disaster hinders searches for missing in Fukushima*

 TOKYO, March 24, Kyodo

 The search for missing people following  the March 11 earthquake and tsunami has been hindered in Fukushima  Prefecture by the nuclear disaster there, rescue workers said Thursday.

 Self-Defense Forces personnel said it was possible many bodies had  been left behind in the disaster area in the prefecture, as they faced  difficulty entering areas placed under evacuation orders due to the  crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Fukushima Prefecture  currently accounts for around 8 percent of the death toll.

 People living in a 20-kilometer radius of the plant have been under  directives to evacuate and those within 20 km to 30 km have been advised  to stay indoors.

 SDF rescue workers deployed in Fukushima have thus focused on  supporting the evacuation of residents, including bed-ridden hospital  patients, rather than searching for the missing, they said.

 According to the National Police Agency, more than 26,000 people were  confirmed dead or remained unaccounted for following the quake and  tsunami as of noon -- 9,700 dead and 16,501 missing.

 In the city of Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, part of which is within  the area where people are advised to stay indoors, Yukio Ito, 55, said,  ''I have lost contact with my relatives who were caught up in the  tsunami. I'm irritated because not enough has been done to carry out  search activities.''

 At the nuclear plant, efforts to restore power and cooling functions  were disrupted Wednesday after black smoke was observed emanating from  the No. 3 reactor building and workers were evacuated. But Tokyo  Electric Power Co. resumed work Thursday morning after determining that  it was safe for workers to return.

 The turmoil caused by the nuclear crisis has deepened, with the Tokyo  metropolitan government distributing 240,000 bottles of water for  babies younger than 1 year old after radioactive iodine exceeding the  limit for infants was detected in water at a purification plant in  Tokyo.

 Also on Thursday, a strong earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of  4.9 jolted the Kanto region surrounding Tokyo, registering lower 5 on  the Japanese seismic intensity scale of 7 in the southern part of  Ibaraki Prefecture, another area severely damaged by the deadly quake.

 In Iwate Prefecture, meanwhile, construction of temporary housing  started in the coastal city of Kamaishi, while the municipal governments  of Ofunato and Miyako announced they would begin construction Friday.
 At least 8,800 units of temporary housing will be built in the prefecture.

 In severely-damaged Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures,  autopsies on some 9,260 bodies were completed, of which 6,140 were  identified and 5,700 were returned to their families.

 In a fresh sign of recovery, the Tohoku Expressway, closed following  the disaster, was fully reopened to ordinary traffic Thursday morning,  enabling full-fledged support for reconstruction.

 Highway use was previously restricted to authorized emergency  vehicles so as to give priority to transporting relief goods and  workers.

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## StrontiumDog

*Altruism in Action: Japanese Surfer Hero Rescues His Wife, Mother and Others*

By Maia Szalavitz Wednesday, March 23, 2011


Rick Westhead/The Toronto Star/ZUMAPRESS.com

In case you still had doubts about the way natural disasters can bring out the best in people, consider the heroic actions of Hideaki Akaiwa.

 On March 11, Akaiwa was several miles away at work when the tsunami  flooded his town — where his wife was — with up to 10 feet of water. The  43-year-old Japanese man, who met his wife of 20 years while surfing in  a local bay, wasn't about to lose her to any type of wave. Unwilling to  wait for authorities to act, Akaiwa put on a wetsuit and scuba gear,  dove into the freezing, cloudy water, and headed for the site of his  former home. 

 He swam amidst dangerous debris like shattered cars, downed  electrical lines and  collapsed buildings. "The  water felt very cold,  dark and scary," he told the Los Angeles _Times_. "I had to swim about 200 yards to  her, which was quite difficult with all the floating wreckage."

 Akaiwa located his wife in their destroyed house, saving her life.   But that's not all. Several days later, having been unable to find his  mother at local shelters, he went wading back into the water and made a  similar rescue, locating his mother trapped on the second floor of her  flooded house.

 And he didn't stop there:  Akaiwa continues to search for survivors who may need help, according to the Toronto _Star_. 

 Calamities and catastrophes bring many human tragedies, but research  shows that they are also the occasion for widespread acts of altruism  and heroism — much more so than for panicked, selfish behavior or chaos. A love like Akaiwa's is worth celebrating.

Read more: Altruism in Action: Japanese Surfer Hero Rescues His Wife, Mother and Others – TIME Healthland

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## StrontiumDog

^ Fantastic guy. Nice story.

----------


## Poo and Pee

> ^In no way defending B-fly's remarks, but you don't have to be "captain hindsight" to see how badly TEPCO has performed both since and prior to the earthquake. Hoocuddanode simply will not fly here- plenty of knowledgeable people were warning about what TEPCO was up to at Fukushima, and given their track record over the past 30+ years there is no way they should have been trusted to do the right thing. The methods and sheer volume of spent rod storage, which despite all the happy talk about getting power to the reactors is still the biggest problem that TEPCO and the J-gov't would rather not talk about, is itself a sign of criminal negligence which reeks of moral hazard. Read the final paragraph here asahi.com (in Japanese) and you might start to get the picture.


I agree that TEPCO fucked up big time, and their record shows they can't be trusted.

Once things cool down (litterally), heads will roll - it's the japanese way.

In the meantime, it's up to them to get the situation under control, and I'm quite sure they are trying their best to do that - if not just for their own good.

----------


## Mid

> I stand by my statement, the crisis was caused by an earthquake and tsunami that overwhelmed an design that at the time it was built was considered to be state of the art and sufficient. The Japaneses nuclear industries admittedly poor safety record was not the cause and nothing you have posted shows that.


_"We didn't take a tsunami into  account in planning for an emergency, says Okubo, who spent his career  with Toshiba, one of Japan's principal nuclear power constructors. Only  when he was near retirement, he says, did he hear some concerns being  raised about impact of a tsunami on nuclear plant safety._

Asia Sentinel - The Roots of Fukushima

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## The Bold Rodney

> it's time to call the French to the rescue so they can lead an International team of expert to solve that plant problem The Japanese idiots seem to be out of their league, probably low paid engineers only capable of reading manuals for the operation of the plant. They need specialists at this stage, not some low paid console operators


How the fuck are a bunch of table waiters from france going to fix a problem like this one? :kma:

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## Mid

_BANGKOK, March 24 (Bernama) -- Public Health Ministry's Food  and Drug  Administration on Thursday revealed that the agency has not  yet found  radioactive contamination in food imported from Japan,  reported Thai  News Agency.
_
BERNAMA - Thailand Finds Imported Japanese Food Still Safe

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> I stand by my statement, the crisis was caused by an earthquake and tsunami that overwhelmed a design that at the time it was built was considered to be state of the art and sufficient.


Come on TH admit for once...you're wrong...how can any design be considered to be "state of the art and sufficient" if it's built in an earthquake zone and NOT tsunami proof? Give it up son your digging yourself in deeper!




> The Japaneses nuclear industries admittedly poor safety record was not the cause and nothing you have posted shows that.


Not just their poor safety record, their poor safety designs as well otherwise they wouldn't have the Fukushima disaster to contend with!




> It's easy for you to play captain hindsight, and say what should have been done, but the fact is, international experts never believed a quake of such epic proportion was possible in the region. the 'big one' was always expected to happent south of tokyo.


And the designs of the reactors South of Tokyo are safe and better managed? I doubt that very much indeed! And expected, thought, might do, maybe when you're dealing with nuclear reactors aspects of safety isn't good enough!

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## robuzo

> _"We didn't take a tsunami into  account in planning for an emergency, says Okubo, who spent his career  with Toshiba, one of Japan's principal nuclear power constructors. Only  when he was near retirement, he says, did he hear some concerns being  raised about impact of a tsunami on nuclear plant safety._
> 
> Asia Sentinel - The Roots of Fukushima


It's not as if the Japanese invented the word "tsunami" or anything. . .oh, wait. . .

----------


## MakingALife

[quote=StrontiumDog;1712471]NYT: New problems at Japanese plant subdue optimism - World news - The New York Times - msnbc.com

*             New problems at Japanese plant subdue optimism        * 

*             Engineers say some of the most difficult and dangerous tasks are still ahead        * 

By KEITH BRADSHER                                
                           The New York Times                            
      updated      13 minutes ago     2011-03-24T01:45:32 

This article reflect the longer transient risk factors that emerge from  the inability to get cooling restored.   The 
salt question is a controversial one.  If sufficient cooling water level is achieved to keep fuel core immersed, and enough cooling flow is present to keep core temps below aggressive boiling the sodium & magnesium salt deposit rate is reduced.   

 The fill & vent cycles in the earlier phase of reactor water level and presure venting management definitely produced deposits, and cause remaing core water salinities to rise.    It is a tough call to speak about the deposit thickness and insulating effect they are producing.   It depends on hot the core's got, how much damaged they sustained, and how much cooling they were able to pass in the early phases.   The faster the feed rate -  the sooner the rapid boiling rate could be brought down...  

It would take experts, who had full data with sea water flow, steam pressure and steam venting flow data, and any S.W outflow rates to be able to put numbers together about the amount of salt retained in the reactors.    I dont think this information is available, because consoles and some data aquisition was lost fairly early in the management of the plant, as console batteries decayed.    So the numbers in the article are specuation at best -   by  using a fudge factor and approximating the sw flow injection that has been done.    Again - It doesnt say were that salinity resides, either in suspension in the remaining liquid or depositied on fuel rods.   There is no way of knowing.   

These in-determinants are why others have made comments that time delays in getting cooling in place and achieving a cold shutdown - simply increase many risk exposures.    Fuel overheating because it's no longer cool able (due to a heavy deposit layer) is exactly such a wild card issue.     It is well to recognize that injecting salt water is way outside the envelope of normal cooling practices...

Changing topics -  to the sensitivity of these emergency core cooling pumps  and systems and related gear -  described in the article.    They speak about adequate venting - to prevent pipe damage.   The damage they speak about is from a water hammer type of situation.    The complex venting process is all well and good,  but it's got a lot of radiation hazard risk for personnel.  Other processes could be performed.   If the pump has a positive water head at its suction, the cooling pump could be bumped, via very small controlled starts.  Vented briefly at the pump vent, and then allowed to fill the system slowly with continued bump starts.    Managed carefully - It would allow for a filling of the system - without  producing the large velocities  and air pocked induced line turbulence.  It may be hard on the motor controller,  but the sacrifice is a small one to make - IF it saves worker radiation exposure.  These "career" control room engineers and plant staffers - continue to think and work from their long drilled check lists and protocols,  without recognizing that there is a much simpler process to fill pipe voids and vent pumps.  These large volume pumps,  typically propeller type pumps are designed for high flow, and relatively low pressure.  Can be managed in alternative ways to than their station protocols.  Protocols which were designed for a different situation, than they are facing now.   

Again - whats at stake here is shortening the time window to get cooling established -  to get past the continued risk exposure of dealing with these reactors with continued cool down issues.

Getting powered pump machinery back up - to get fuel pond cooling in operation, rather than just topping and over topping with fire trucks, concrete pumper's  etc....   Its the same kind of strategy -   to replace a stop gap measure with one that is more effective.   

The plant continues to work two separate processes to manage their situation.   1) Managing cooling services with injection and what every else they have now, and 2) restoration of part of their emergency cooling systems and later all of the existing cooling systems.   

These processes must converge and end up driven through process 2).    This is what will get the plants ouf of the danger zone.   As long as reactors continue to remain hot enough to boil,  The internal situation in the core risks deterioration.   Most of current methods in place are done "on scene" with little "remote" capability.    One large release event - takes workers out of the picture,  and  stop gap events in play now -  effectively go to zero....  Till staff can return.   The longer the safety hinges on process 1)  the higher their long term risk remains.    

This theme has emerged over and over, on this thread, and as well echoed in statements made from various Nuclear power groups.   Main stream media - is now starting to draw down stories - to support what many foreign nuclear specialists have pointed out,  Time is not on their side, with these temporary measures.   Getting at least partial systems working will allow a major safety corner to be turned.   

Stories about potential water hammer damage, 12 hour venting protocols,  managing radioactive drain and vent flows etc.   Its losing sight of the picture that weighs in on risk increasing because of continued delays in system restoration.        

Again - lots of folks grasping for details, they perhaps do not understand.... Its OK and REASONABLE.   But The local Utility involved here - surely must understand these consequences and risk exposure carried.  When this event go into the record books, and log book of plant observations and daily progress records and other full information disclosures and time lines are open to the world nuclear bodies to  examine.   Focus will be brough to bear - about the road blocks and delays - that will be tied more to serial thinking than a larger focused parallel processing of items.    TEPCO will be on the carpet for failure to map the critical path for various issues involved in cooling restoration.   At this point - the longer it takes, the easier it is to believe mis-management and poor establishment of priorities is responsible.   

We are now almost a week past - where alternative power supply to the various reactor buildings was reported to be in the works....   It still amazes me that other than reactors 5 & 6,  the other units are still very crippled.    Restoring control room lights and AC - are steps forward.   With literally more than a  thousand Industrial technicians, engineers, and vendor support engineering in play -  Its time for TEPCO to make something happen and get this safety corner turned...

Getting off these make shift stop gap measures and a return to some functioning cooling and level control systems, and weaning off SW and on  to fresh water is the prize that they need to capture.

The world is waiting to exhale in relief over the current crisis.  Equally as well most of their countrymen are waiting for the assurance that cold shutdowns have been achieved, and the fuel pools remain stable and safely managed.   

I know this is beating a dead horse.   But seeing day upon day drag on, without the kind of progress that really counts is disheartening.  It's akin to coal miner's carrying out their dead canaries, while management is slow to react, and unable to multi-task with focus enough to expedite the process efficiently.

----------


## MakingALife

> ^In no way defending B-fly's remarks, but you don't have to be "captain hindsight" to see how badly TEPCO has performed both since and prior to the earthquake. Hoocuddanode simply will not fly here- plenty of knowledgeable people were warning about what TEPCO was up to at Fukushima, and given their track record over the past 30+ years there is no way they should have been trusted to do the right thing. The methods and sheer volume of spent rod storage, which despite all the happy talk about getting power to the reactors is still the biggest problem that TEPCO and the J-gov't would rather not talk about, is itself a sign of criminal negligence which reeks of moral hazard. Read the final paragraph here asahi.com (in Japanese) and you might start to get the picture.


You are spot on Robuzo.  And beating the right drum song about TEPCO,  where the situation is tumbling, and the un-needed risk issues that loom large.   Bitch slapping TEPCO's  "happy talk"  about repowering and turning the corner safety issue corner.   The sound bites are dated history now,  the slide of hand play was pure miss-direction.   Now approaching "connnection day + 5 -  They are not that much further ahead of the curve than last Sunday.     Its a damn shame.

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## Butterfly

low paid operators are no hero, they can't even run the plant with all the power back

again a team of specialist is needed, how in hell all this is happening is a mystery, is the rest of the world sleeping or are they being blocked again by Japanese bureaucracy

I am selling ALL my Japanese stock now,

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## crippen

:Smile: 


> I am selling ALL my Japanese stock now,



You mean all the Jap porn videos??

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## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> 
> 
> I am selling ALL my Japanese stock now,
> 
> 
> 
> You mean all the Jap porn videos??


Touche  :smiley laughing:  That's a funny come back !!! 2 points CRIPPEN !!!!

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## hazz

This is very nfortuantly like watching a train crash in slow motion. And it does looks as happish ending is far from certain. This has to have scuppered any chance of a nuclear renacance outside the usual police states.

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## MakingALife

I was just skim the WNN site (Thanks TH for this site recommendation)...    I just found the recent article (below) .  Surprising the article highlight the the kind of cooperation between National Regulatory bodies and the Regional working groups - that I wrote about in my earlier post today that I spent time writing my own perception were advances in Nuclear safety would likely take place....   Here is a clip of the article.

Ministers authorise nuclear 'stress tests'          
                        23 March 2011          
*European Union (EU) ministers have agreed to launch a safety  assessment of Europe's 143 nuclear power reactors, re-checking their  safety in the light of the Fukushima nuclear accident.* 

 _Energy commissioner Günter Oettinger 
warns that some plants may not pass 
the test_    Speaking after an emergency meeting of the EU Council of Ministers  (energy) on 21 March, the meeting's chair - Hungary's national  development minister Tamas Fellegi - said the assessment should be  underway before the end of the year, and would, it was hoped, cover  countries neighbouring the EU.   
 Fellegi said: "We should ensure the highest standards are in place in  the European Union. There is a shared willingness amongst us to launch a  process for defining a comprehensive safety and risk assessment," he  said, noting that final decisions on how this would be undertaken would  be discussed at a scheduled EU energy council in June. 

 "We should be transparent on the outcome of these assessments and  [national] measures," Fellegi promised. The EU executive the European  Commission will work with the European Nuclear Safety Regulators Group  (ENSREG) would "define the scope and modalities of such tests" drawing  lessons from the accidents in Japan, he said. 

 Experts would examine reactors' vulnerability to seismic events,  their exposure to flooding, as well as man-made disasters (such as power  cuts and terrorism), with special attention being paid to cooling and  back-up systems. Welcoming steps so far taken by national nuclear energy  authorities, Fellegi stressed that although the EU would closely  monitor global energy prices "the energy markets of member states have  so far been unaffected and able to cope well largely through market  mechanisms" The EC would also want to improve cooperation between  nuclear safety regulators and would draw on international organisation  assistance in these tests.

 The meeting was staged after weekend comments from Germany's  chancellor Angela Merkel calling for common EU nuclear security  standards  a significant shift from previous German government  positions. In a weekly podcast, she said: "We have standardised all  sorts of things in the European Union, from the size of apples to the  shape of bananas, and we could also really talk about common safety  measures for all the nuclear centres in Europe."........


Some European Parliament members have called for the tests to be wide in  scope  Swedish Green MEP Carl Schlyter hoped that "they include the  whole production chain, e.g. transport, waste treatment and plant  security."  
Click the link below for the full article
Ministers authorise nuclear &#39;stress tests&#39;

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## StrontiumDog

*Latest IAEA report
*
*Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update Log
*
*Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update Log*

*Updates of 24 March 2011*

 

*Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident Update (24 March, 15:00 UTC)*

   The IAEA today released updated summary slides on reactor conditions at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
  → View Table
*Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident Update (24 March 14:00 UTC)*

*Spent Fuel Pools at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant - Updated*

  Spent fuel removed from a nuclear reactor is highly radioactive and  generates heat.  This irradiated fuel needs to be stored for one to  three years in pools that cool the fuel, shield the radioactivity, and  keep the fuel in the proper position to avoid fission reactions. If the  cooling is lost, the water can boil and fuel rods can be exposed to the  air, possibly leading to severe damage and a large release of  radioactive materials.

  Nuclear power plants must replace fuel every one to two years, and  the Fukushima Daiichi reactors typically remove about 25 percent of the  reactor's fuel -- to be replaced with fresh, or unirradiated, fuel --  during each refuelling outage.  The spent fuel, which is hottest  immediately after it is removed from the reactor, is placed in the spent  fuel pool until it is cool enough to be moved to longer-term storage. 

  The concern about the spent fuel pools at Fukushima Daiichi is that  the capability to cool the pools has been compromised. See diagram below  for location of the pool in each reactor building.

 

Here is a summary of spent fuel conditions at Fukushima Daiichi  nuclear power plant, based on documents and confirmed by Japanese  officials *(new information in bold):*

*Unit 1*

 Unit 1 experienced an explosion on 12 March that destroyed the outer  shell of the building's upper floors.  No precise information has been  available on the status of the spent fuel pool. 

*Unit 2*

 Precise information on the status of the spent fuel pool was  unavailable in the days following the earthquake, but Japan's Nuclear  and Industrial Safety Agency began to release temperature data on 20  March:

   20 March, 23:00 UTC: 49 °C   
21 March, 05:25 UTC: 50 °C   
21 March, 21:20 UTC: 51 °C   
22 March, 02:20 UTC: 53 °C 
  22 March, 06:30 UTC: 50 °C   *
22 March, 19:20 UTC:* *51 °C* *
23 March, 00:00 UTC:* *51 °C* *
23 March, 06:00 UTC:* *51 °C* *
23 March, 16:00 UTC:* *52 °C* *
24 March, 00:00 UTC:* *47 °C* 

Workers conducted an operation to spray 40 tonnes of seawater to the spent fuel pool on 20 March, *and they added another 18 tonnes on 22 March.* 

*Unit 3*

 Unit 3 experienced an explosion on 14 March that destroyed the outer  shell of the building's upper floors.  The blast may have damaged the  primary containment vessel and the spent fuel pool.  To address these  concerns, authorities began spraying water into the building, first by  helicopter on 17 March and then by fire trucks and other vehicles  through 22 March. *Starting 23 March, seawater was injected into  the spent fuel using the cooling and purification line. By midday 24  March, 4-5 tonnes of seawater had been injected through this line.*

*Unit 4*

  This reactor was shut down 30 November 2010 for routine maintenance, and  all the fuel assemblies were transferred from the reactor to the spent  fuel pool, before the 11 March earthquake.  The heat load in this pool  is therefore larger than the others.

  On 14 March, the building's upper floors were severely damaged,  possibly causing a reduction of cooling capability in the spent fuel  pool.  Emergency workers began spraying water into the building on 20  March, and have continued daily since then.  On 22 March, workers began  using a concrete pump truck that can deliver water more effectively,  placing 150 tonnes of water on 22 March and *130 tonnes on 23 March.*

*Units 5 and 6*

 Instrumentation at these reactors began to indicate rising  temperatures at their spent fuel pools starting on 14 March.  Three days  later, Japanese technicians successfully started an emergency diesel  generator at Unit 6, which they used to provide power to basic cooling  and fresh-water replenishment systems.  Workers created holes in the  rooftops of both buildings to prevent any hydrogen accumulation, which  is suspected of causing earlier explosions at Units 1 and 3.

  A second diesel generator came online on 18 March, and the next day,  the higher-capability Residual Heat Removal (RHR) system recovered full  function. External power was restored to Units 5 and 6 on 22 March.  Temperatures in the spent fuel pools of Units 5 and 6 have gradually  returned to significantly lower temperatures, although *the Unit 5  pool temperature increased somewhat on 23 March after pumps for the RHR  system were stopped when the diesel generators were removed from  service.*

*Common Use Spent Fuel Pool*

 In addition to pools in each of the plant's reactor buildings, there  is another facility -- the Common Use Spent Fuel Pool -- where spent  fuel is stored after cooling at least 18 months in the reactor  buildings. This fuel is much cooler than the assemblies stored in the  reactor buildings. Japanese authorities confirmed as of 18 March that  fuel assemblies there were fully covered by water, and the temperature  was 57 °C as of 20 March, 00:00 UTC.* Workers sprayed water over  the pool on 21 March for nearly five hours, and the temperature on 23  March was reported to be 57 °C.*

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## Jesus Jones

TOKYO, March 23, Kyodo

Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Wednesday it has observed a neutron beam, a kind of radioactive ray, 13 times on the premises of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant after it was crippled by the massive March 11 quake-tsunami disaster.

TEPCO, the operator of the nuclear plant, said the neutron beam measured about 1.5 kilometers southwest of the plant's No. 1 and 2 reactors over three days from March 13 and is equivalent to 0.01 to 0.02 microsieverts per hour and that this is not a dangerous level.

The utility firm said it will measure uranium and plutonium, which could emit a neutron beam, as well.

In the 1999 criticality accident at a nuclear fuel processing plant run by JCO Co. in Tokaimura, Ibaraki Prefecture, uranium broke apart continually in nuclear fission, causing a massive amount of neutron beams.

In the latest case at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, such a criticality accident has yet to happen.

But the measured neutron beam may be evidence that uranium and plutonium leaked from the plant's nuclear reactors and spent nuclear fuels have discharged a small amount of neutron beams through nuclear fission.

Neutron beam observed 13 times at crippled Fukushima nuke plant | Kyodo News

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## Cujo

No one seems to be concerned about the massive amount of water being pored onto radioactive material to cool it.
One can only assume the water is now contaminated and radioactive and drains to the ocean contaminating the ocean.
What will this lead to? Radioactive fish?

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## Butterfly

like I said, they are letting amateurs doing the repair

like Chernobyl, we will find out later it was a succession of human failures

The Japanese shouldn't be let running those facilities,

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## robuzo

> No one seems to be concerned about the massive amount of water being pored onto radioactive material to cool it.
> One can only assume the water is now contaminated and radioactive and drains to the ocean contaminating the ocean.
> What will this lead to? Radioactive fish?


There is reporting about it, but I have it only in the Japanese press, for example here: asahi.com
(Headline) 被曝現場水たまり、通常の冷却水の１万倍濃度の放射能
Water is pooling at the radiation-contaminated site, 10,000X the radiation of normal cooling water- goes on to say that the water in question is probably leaking due to damage sustained by the storage pools (duh).

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## Thaihome

> _"We didn't take a tsunami into account in planning for an emergency, says Okubo, who spent his career with Toshiba, one of Japan's principal nuclear power constructors. Only when he was near retirement, he says, did he hear some concerns being raised about impact of a tsunami on nuclear plant safety._
> 
> Asia Sentinel - The Roots of Fukushima


The fact that there is (or was) a 5 meter tsunami wall built puts that statement in a somewhat suspect light dont you think?   The accident was caused by the fact that the tsunami was 14 meters high not because the tsunami was not incorporated into the design.  

Despite the earthquake being stronger then they were designed to withstand, the emergency generators worked for an hour until the tsunami struck.  Despite the tsunami being over twice what they were designed for, the battery backup for the cooling pumps continued to work for the rated 8 hours.  The problems arose because they could not get another source of power hooked up in time because there was no other source available.
TH

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## robuzo

> Originally Posted by Mid
> 
> 
> _"We didn't take a tsunami into account in planning for an emergency, says Okubo, who spent his career with Toshiba, one of Japan's principal nuclear power constructors. Only when he was near retirement, he says, did he hear some concerns being raised about impact of a tsunami on nuclear plant safety._
> 
> Asia Sentinel - The Roots of Fukushima
> 
> 
> The fact that there is (or was) a 5 meter tsunami wall built puts that statement in a somewhat suspect light dont you think?   The accident was caused by the fact that the tsunami was 14 meters high not because the tsunami was not incorporated into the design.  
> ...


Not sure why I am bothering to answer TH, but if you plan for a tsunami on the Eastern Honshu coast and you don't plan for a tsunami 14 meters high you don't know your history. Ever been to Kamakura? Know why this guy is sitting outside? He used to have a very large building around him.

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## Mid

Memo :

All Employees ,

Please don't stand in puddles

Thank-you

TEPCO

 :Sad:

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## crippen

> The Japanese road repaired SIX days after it was destroyed by quake
> By MAIL FOREIGN SERVICE
> Last updated at 12:14 AM on 24th March 2011
> 
> The picture of gaping chasms in a Japanese highway demonstrated the power of the March 11 earthquake.
> Now the astonishing speed of reconstruction is being used to highlight the nations ability to get back on its feet.
> Work began on March 17 and six days later the cratered section of the Great Kanto Highway in Naka was as good as new. It was ready to re-open to traffic last night.
> 
> 
> ...


Just been pointed out to me that between the first and second photos,the trees on the right in fall colours have changed to spring colours in the second photo.and the grass all  over seems to have grown smaller in the same space of time!   Are we being had?? :Confused:

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## Mid

> Are we being had??


Big tree has been removed and 6 days worth of construction would surely knock the grass back ?

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## Thaihome

> ...if you plan for a tsunami on the Eastern Honshu coast and you don't plan for a tsunami 14 meters high you don't know your history. Ever been to Kamakura? Know why this guy is sitting outside? He used to have a very large building around him.


Correct me if I'm wrong, but doesn't that guy sit in area a couple of hundred KM south of the Fukushima plants along the area south of Tokyo and known to more prone to tsunamis?  Can you show me where anyone in Japan has built a wall to withstand a 14 meter wave?

Again, nothing as been shown that TEPCO's previous safety record was the cause of the problems at the plant(s).  What I see is nothing more then the mass media trying to sensationalize the situation, capitalize on peoples desire to have someone to blame, right or wrong, whenever disaster strikes.
TH

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## robuzo

> Originally Posted by crippen
> 
>  Are we being had??
> 
> 
> Big tree has been removed and 6 days worth of construction would surely knock the grass back ?


I don't think so. The speed and efficiency of Japanese road crews almost has to be seen to be believed.

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## HermantheGerman

> The fact that there is (or was) a 5 meter tsunami wall built



 :smiley laughing: 

a 5 meter tsunami wall......


We have flood walls  :Wall:  in Germany about that height.

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## StrontiumDog

*Possible core breach halts Japan nuke plant work - CBS News
*
*Possible core breach halts Japan nuke plant work*

*Officials say core at heart of battered Unit 3 reactor "may have been damaged"; Work stops for radiation checks*


This  March 21, 2011 photo shows gray smoke rising from Unit 3 of the  tsunami-stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in Okumamachi,  Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. * (AP/Tepco)*

     (AP)  TOKYO  - Japanese nuclear safety officials said Friday that they suspect that  the reactor core at one unit of the troubled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear  power plant may have breached, raising the possibility of more severe  contamination to the environment.

"It is possible that  somewhere at the reactor may have been damaged," said Hidehiko  Nishiyama, a spokesman for the nuclear safety agency. But he added that  "our data suggest the reactor retains certain containment functions,"  implying that the damage may have occurred in Unit 3's reactor core but  that it was limited.

Officials say the damage could instead have happened in other equipment, including piping or the spent fuel pool.

Operators  have been struggling to keep cool water around radioactive fuel rods in  the reactor's core after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami cut off  power supply to the plant and its cooling system.

Damage could have been done to the core when a March 14 hydrogen explosion blew apart Unit 3's outer containment building.

This  reactor, perhaps the most troubled at the six-unit site, holds 170 tons  of radioactive fuel in its core. Previous radioactive emissions have  come from intentional efforts to vent small amounts of steam through  valves to prevent the core from bursting. However, releases from a  breach could allow uncontrolled quantities of radioactive contaminants  to escape into the surrounding ground or air.

Operators stopped work Friday at units 1 through 3 to check on radiation levels.

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## Gerbil

Radiation leakage nearing Chernobyl levels:

Japan's damaged nuclear plant in Fukushima has been emitting radioactive iodine and caesium at levels approaching those seen in the aftermath of the Chernobyl accident in 1986. 

Austrian researchers have used a worldwide network of radiation detectors – designed to spot clandestine nuclear bomb tests – to show that iodine-131 is being released at daily levels 73 per cent of those seen after the 1986 disaster. 

The daily amount of caesium-137 released from Fukushima Daiichi is around 60 per cent of the amount released from Chernobyl.

Fukushima radioactive fallout nears Chernobyl levels - health - 24 March 2011 - New Scientist

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## StrontiumDog

*Japan nuclear plant situation 
*
*Japan says people should leave 30 km nuke plan zone*

*Japan nuclear plant situation ‘unpredictable’: PM*

       Friday, 25 March 2011  

 
               Officials scan people for radiation, 60 km west of the nuclear power plant in Fukushima prefecture, in Koriyama                                           

OSAKA (Agencies)         Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan said on Friday that the  situation at a quake-damaged nuclear plant in northeast Japan remained  very precarious.

The situation at the Fukushima nuclear plant was not getting worse but  it was not a time for complacency, Kan told a news conference two weeks  after a deadly quake and tsunami devastated the northeast of the country  and killed more than 10,000 people.

Meanwhile, Japan's government on Friday asked people still living within  20-30 kilometers (12-18 miles) of the stricken Fukushima nuclear plant  to leave voluntarily, after it earlier told them to stay indoors.

Hundreds of thousands of residents were evacuated from within a 20 km  radius of the plant in the days after it was damaged by the March 11  earthquake and tsunami which disabled its crucial cooling systems.

As radioactive steam and smoke have wafted from the crippled site, and  as hundreds of workers have battled to stabilize it, several foreign  governments have urged their citizens to leave areas within 80 or even  100km of the plant.

                                                              Japan's top  government spokesman on Friday asked people remaining within the 30km  zone to leave voluntarily, urging them to do so both for their own  comfort and because radiation contamination may increase.

"It has become difficult for them to get daily necessities because the  distribution of goods has stagnated," said Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio  Edano.

"It is desirable that they voluntarily evacuate. I cannot rule out the  possibility that the government will issue an evacuation order for this  area if the radiation level goes up further."

                                                              The death  toll from a massive earthquake and tsunami that devastated Japan's  northeast coast topped 10,000 on Friday, two weeks after the disaster  struck, the National Police Agency said.

There are fears of a much higher toll from the disaster, which flattened  or erased entire towns along the Pacific coast of the country's main  island of Honshu.

The agency -- which collects data from the prefectures affected -- said  that 10,066 had been confirmed dead and 17,443 listed as missing as of  3:00 pm (0600 GMT) as a result of the March 11 catastrophe.

A total of 2,777 are listed as injured.

The quake has become Japan's deadliest natural disaster since the 1923  Great Kanto Earthquake, which killed more than 142,000 people.

Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced from their homes and have taken shelter in emergency facilities.

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## StrontiumDog

Another video, this time of a flyby of the reactors showing the damage to the buildings...

----------


## crippen

11 hours 15 mins ago
 Terril Yue Jones



Tons of relief goods have been delivered to victims of Japan's catastrophic earthquake and tsunami from a dark corner of society: the "yakuza" organised crime networks. Skip related content

Yakuza groups have been sending trucks from the Tokyo and Kobe regions to deliver food, water, blankets and toiletries to evacuation centres in northeast Japan, the area devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami which have left at least 27,000 dead and missing.

Yakuza are better known for making money from extortion, gambling, pornography and prostitution, as well as for the often-elaborate tattoos covering much of their bodies.

But disasters bring out another side of yakuza, who move swiftly and quietly to provide aid to those most in need.

As with the devastating 1995 Kobe earthquake, government workers were slow in reaching afflicted areas, and the 300,000 or so survivors, so yakuza groups stepped in quickly, and in many cases, were first on the ground.

Such actions stem from yakuza knowing what it's like to have to fend for yourself, without any government or community support, because they are considered outcasts.

Many gang members faced discrimination and come from minority populations such as ethnic Koreans or "burakumin" - those who work in businesses seen as related to death, such as butchers and leather tanners.

"Yakuza are dropouts from society," said Manabu Miyazaki, a prolific author who has written more than 100 books about yakuza and minorities.

"They've suffered, and they're just trying to help other people who are in trouble," said Miyazaki, himself the son of a former Kyoto yakuza boss.

Others see ulterior motives to the groups' charity.

"If they help citizens, it's hard for the police to say anything bad," said Tomohiko Suzuki, a journalist who has written several books on Japan's underworld.

"The yakuza are trying to position themselves to gain contracts for their construction companies for the massive rebuilding that will come."

One yakuza boss rejected such criticism.

"It takes too long for the arm of the government to reach out here so it's important to do it now," the Weekly Taishuu magazine, which specialises in yakuza affairs, quoted a top yakuza as saying.

"Our honest sentiment right now is to be of some use to people," said the boss, who declined to be identified.

GANGSTERS' CODE OF GIVING

Yakuza groups have so far dispatched at least 70 trucks to the quake zone loaded with supplies worth more than $500,000 (311,000 pounds), according to Jake Adelstein, an expert on yakuza who lives in Tokyo and is writing two books on the Japanese syndicates.

The gangs' charity is rooted in their "ninkyo" code, Adelstein says, which values justice and duty and forbids allowing others to suffer. "In times such as earthquakes, they put their money where their mouths are," he said.

Atsushi Mizoguchi a freelance writer and yakuza antagonizer who has written about organized crime for 40 years, also gives the yakuza the benefit of the doubt.

"Rather than a PR effort, I think it's actually good intentions," said Mizoguchi, who has angered the yakuza so much that he has been stabbed twice in attacks by gang members.

But yakuza shun the spotlight regarding their relief work.

Adelstein explains that there is an informal understanding between yakuza and police who tolerate the gangs carrying out such charitable work, but not seeking publicity for it.

"What they seek most is self-satisfaction," said Miyazaki, the son of the former yakuza boss. "It's not for pay, but for pride."

There are an estimated 80,000 yakuza in Japan. The Sumiyoshi-kai and Inakawa-kai, the second and third biggest organized crime syndicates, are believed to be the most active in the earthquake-tsunami disaster relief.

In a phone call to the Inakawai-kai headquarters in Tokyo, a man from the gang's "general affairs division" brusquely told Reuters: "We don't talk." A faxed request to speak with the Inakawa-kai's No.2 leader went unanswered.

Part of the reason for the yakuzas' reluctance to receive attention stems from stepped-up enforcement after a 1992 anti-gang law and increased crackdowns by the National Police Agency over the past year, which have heightened anti-yakuza sentiment among the public.

But there have been no reports of donations being refused -- perhaps because there is no indication who supplied them.

And, says author Suzuki, this is not the time to nitpick over the origins of emergency goods.

"When it's life or death, you don't care where your food comes from," he said.

(Editing by Miral Fahmy)

From society's shadows, yakuza among first with relief supplies[at] - Yahoo! News UK

----------


## misskit

*Japan nuclear plant remains precarious, but not as serious as Chernobyl: experts*

Japan nuclear plant remains precarious, but not as serious as Chernobyl: experts - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## misskit

*2 Nucelar plant workers hospitalized*

*Challenge to remove water from reactors*

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*Radiation from Fukushima exceeds Three Mile Island*

Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, crippled by the Great East Japan Earthquake of March 11, has discharged more radiation than the infamous Three Mile Island nuclear plant in the United States, according to calculations by the central government.

It has already reached a level 6 serious accident on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES).

Separately, calculations made by experts place the level of soil contamination in some locations at levels comparable to those found after the Chernobyl accident in 1986.

_With the Fukushima plant continuing to release radiation, there is the danger that the contaminated land will be unusable for many years._

remainder of article here:
asahi.com


Land is already in such short supply in Japan. It is sickening that this could happen.

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## Butterfly

to think this will not be as big as chernobyl is beyond naive

that whole area will need to be abandonned eventually

once more human stupidity and greed in true American style is once more responsible for this

----------


## Mid

> Originally Posted by Koojo
> 
> 
> No one seems to be concerned about the massive amount of water being pored onto radioactive material to cool it.
> One can only assume the water is now contaminated and radioactive and drains to the ocean contaminating the ocean.
> What will this lead to? Radioactive fish?
> 
> 
> There is reporting about it, but I have it only in the Japanese press, for example here: asahi.com
> ...





*Radioactive iodine 1,250 times limit in sea* 
Mar 26, 2011

_
A young evacuee is screened at a shelter for leaked radiation._
PHOTO: AP

*OSAKA* - THE operator of Japan's disaster-hit Fukushima  nuclear plant has detected radioactive iodine 1,250 times the legal  limit in Pacific Ocean waters nearby, the nuclear safety agency said on  Saturday. 

In a test by the Tokyo Electric Power Company, 'radioactive  iodine-131 at 1250.8 times the legal limit was detected several hundred  metres offshore near reactor number one,' the agency official told AFP.

The readings were taken about 300m offshore, public broadcaster NHK said. 

The reading is sharply higher than several taken last week.  Tepco said on Thursday that iodine-131 levels in the ocean near the  plant were 145 times the legal level, Kyodo News reported. 

Fire-engines and concrete trucks have poured thousands of  tons of seawater onto the reactors and into fuel rod pools at the plant  after cooling systems were knocked out by the March 11 quake and  tsunami. 

straitstimes.com

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by robuzo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Koojo
> ...


That cooling water has to go somewhere. It won't all fit in a couple guys' boots.

----------


## Mid

*Highly radioactive water near second Japan reactor* 
Mar 26, 2011


_Highly radioactive water at 10,000 times  the normal level has seeped from a second stricken reactor building at  Japan's quake-hit Fukushima nuclear plant._
PHOTO: AP

*OSAKA* - HIGHLY radioactive water at 10,000 times the  normal level has seeped from a second stricken reactor building at  Japan's quake-hit Fukushima nuclear plant, its operator said on  Saturday. 

The water was found in the basement of the turbine building  of reactor one - a day after similar readings in the reactor three  turbine basement heightened fears that the reactor vessel or its valves  and pipes were leaking. 

The worst-case scenario at reactor three would be that the  fuel inside the reactor core, a volatile uranium-plutonium mix, has gone  critical and burnt its way through the bottom of its steel pressure  vessel. 

However, the nuclear safety agency has also said that other  data suggested that the reactor vessel was still stable. The seaside  plant was hit by the March 11 quake and tsunami which knocked out  reactor cooling systems. 

The reactors have since been doused with thousands of tons  of water to cool them and keep spent fuel rods submerged in their pools,  to stop them from being exposed to air and spewing out plumes of  radioactive material. 

The high radioactivity in the water was likely to slow  efforts to stabilise the reactors, after three workers were contaminated  when they sloshed through the puddle in the reactor three turbine room  Thursday. The water in both cases contained iodine, caesium and cobalt  10,000 times the normal level, said a spokesman for Tokyo Electric Power  Co (Tepco).

straitstimes.com

----------


## nostromo

Interesting article. Recently or last year I read a book Yakuza Moon, memoirs of a gansters daughter. (available in, I think bought it in Asiabooks store in some Central mall)
Goes to show that white is not white and black is not black.





> 11 hours 15 mins ago
>  Terril Yue Jones
> 
> 
> 
> Tons of relief goods have been delivered to victims of Japan's catastrophic earthquake and tsunami from a dark corner of society: the "yakuza" organised crime networks. Skip related content
> 
> Yakuza groups have been sending trucks from the Tokyo and Kobe regions to deliver food, water, blankets and toiletries to evacuation centres in northeast Japan, the area devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami which have left at least 27,000 dead and missing.
> 
> ...

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## Little Chuchok

> to think this will not be as big as chernobyl is beyond naive
> 
> that whole area will need to be abandonned eventually
> 
> once more human stupidity and greed in true American style is once more responsible for this


American style? You got that one wrong old son.

Japanese style....Like we are the best and will not admit to fuck all unless we are seriously shamed, because we are better than you.

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by Butterfly
> 
> 
> to think this will not be as big as chernobyl is beyond naive
> 
> that whole area will need to be abandonned eventually
> 
> once more human stupidity and greed in true American style is once more responsible for this
> 
> ...


Hubris, it will be the death of us all.

----------


## nostromo

as of this moment estimate of deaths is 10000, of tsunami. Nuclear plant caused some 5-50 people to possibly or probably have cancer later in their life. And some brave people might have died or are on the way.

----------


## robuzo

> as of this moment estimate of deaths is 10000, of tsunami. Nuclear plant caused some 5-50 people to possibly or probably have cancer later in their life. And some brave people might have died or are on the way.


Asahi this morning: 死者１万１５１人、不明者１万７０５３人―２６日１０時
10,151 dead, 17,053 missing as of 10 am this morning.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> as of this moment estimate of deaths is 10000, of tsunami. Nuclear plant caused some 5-50 people to possibly or probably have cancer later in their life. And some brave people might have died or are on the way.
> 
> 
> Asahi this morning: 死者１万１５１人、不明者１万７０５３人―２６日１０時
> 10,151 dead, 17,053 missing as of 10 am this morning.


Thanks for update on asahi, please keep updating if you read japanese, I lived in Tokyo once upon a time but did not learn enough either of two scripts, to read

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by robuzo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by nostromo
> ...


I have been making some small contributions, but for simple things like headlines you can probably make sense of what is going on using Google Translate. asahi.com

----------


## misskit

*Fault line shifted up to 30m*

NHK WORLD English


The earthquake and tsunami were caused by a 450 kilometer fault line shifting up to 30 meters in 3 minutes.

----------


## misskit

*Int'l commission recommends Japan temporarily increase radiation limits for public*

An international advisory body has recommended the Japanese government temporarily raise the annual limit of radiation exposure for the general public in light of the ongoing crisis at the quake- and tsunami-crippled nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture.

The government stipulates that regular citizens in Japan should be exposed to no more than 1 millisievert of radiation per year, but the International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) on March 21 recommended the limit be tentatively raised to 20 to 100 millisieverts per year, with the nuclear crisis showing no signs of abating.

The institution pointed out that even if the power plant comes safely out of the critical situation, areas affected by the accident will remain radioactive for many years to come. Therefore, it suggested, even after the power plant crisis is resolved, the government should keep the upper limit at 1 to 20 millisieverts per year before it gradually brings it back to its original 1, in order to prevent residents of Fukushima Prefecture from abandoning their hometowns.

Both targets proposed by the advisory body greatly exceed the current limit set by the Japanese government, but the ICRP -- which normally recommends the annual limit of radiation exposure for nuclear facility workers be set at 50 millisieverts and that for the general public at 1 millisievert -- says the proposal is to protect the future of areas facing radioactive contamination.

It is said that radiation exposure in excess of 100 millisieverts per year may slightly increase the risk of cancer.

Int'l commission recommends Japan temporarily increase radiation limits for public - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## Mid

> Int'l commission recommends Japan temporarily increase radiation limits for public


and thus have shown that they ain't worth their weight in dog shit .

----------


## misskit

^ No kidding. The easy way out.

----------


## misskit

*Level of iodine-131 in seawater off chart
Contamination 1,250 times above maximum limit*

Level of iodine-131 in seawater off chart | The Japan Times Online



They can just raise the allowable limit on this too. Problem solved!

----------


## MakingALife

Skimming some of the thread posts and running down the links....   Finding now reports of highly radioactive water present in lower levels of some turbine buildings as well as in the reactor buildings...    

Workers with radiation burns, and higher level exposures from walking in this water....

Tepco quoted in one article, admitting they knew water in some buildings spaces was radioactive, but they failed to notify workers, or cover all the bases in areas of other standing water.  They say they arent sure where the water is coming from & still do not believe its from containment failure,  but of course they dont rule that out.    Other reports that imply with good logic that the radioactive water is likely to be from a combination of containment breaches, piping failures, damaged eactor valves and  or leakage  valve issues

Getting a handle where this "basement level" water is coming from isnt miracle work.   Its radioactive -  so that is a good clue....  With a little though and some simple action,  tracing this water back to its possible sources a simple and logical process. 

Hmmm - What could Tepco do now a better understanding of were these  water sources originate ???   

How about picking the reactor they  suspect may have a low possibility of containment damage and dosing that reactor core with  some regular or phosphorescent dye.   Add it with the boron.....  It comes in many colors as well.  Put a different color in each reactor and then   Then  monitor other  the area's of reactor building basements sumps  and turbine building basement sumps with  pooled water and see if dye traces show up there.      The phosphorescent dye works much better, because it shows up via black light -  so even the slightest concentrations (not seen by eye) are easily revealed with black light.  

A little common sense approach - would add to their ability to  understand what they are grasping to try and get a handle on.    This  kind of dye tracing work to look for leakage sources - is done all over  the world, in many ndustries and many systems.    Its a common practice  across many different systems. I doubt it will hurt water chemistry in light of all the SW pumped in.      

Perhaps TEPCO is concerned and wanting not to reveal what such testing might actually show.  As far fetched as that sounds - It may not be off the mark if Japan is as insanely litigious as one poster has revealed. "Discovering a containment breach" later rather than sooner -  gets them the protection of the "whocouddapossiblyhaveknown" defense in the eyes of future litigation.  Preferring not to investigate, with available tools, isnt really a cover up.  It offers protection, while actually they are failing in their responsiblites by taking this track.  When the worst is later confirmed....  They are harmless held harmless from any poor decision made = if they understanding and knowledge were more firm.   

Perhaps TEPCO just is not getting a big enough bang from their technical advisers and engineers.  Nobody does dye leak tests in the nuclear arena.  Surely they cannot be so out of touch, as not to understand how to leak trace with available tools.   Nuclear mindset for pipe and system integrity is based on performing more rigorous tests such as hydrotesting and other measures to determine continuity of pipe and vessel integrity.  Dye testing isnt in their bag of tricks normally.        

Tepco's  pronouncement related to these hot sump's   -  now suggests that this radioactive water - is going to create significant delays for some of the system restoration work in progress.  Work force trust in TEPCO to provide warning and manage worker site  safety was dealt a harsh blow - after the (3) worker got burned  sloshing around.   

Folks - It doesn't take an expert to recognize that local option for restoration of some normal cooling and other remediation efforts related to pumps and power are becoming further delayed.  

TEPCO's  ability to continue the "local option" on their temporary cooling measures is as well fading,  because the hot zones in plant areas are increasing - even when TEPCO chose to not share that information.   

 Japan official bureaucrat are justified in the loud protests over TEPCOS willingness to disclose information.  Information and follow up work that could have prevented the three latest workers given high exposures.    The loss of trust factor in TEPCO's safety practices amid the current crisis - is now out in the open.  

Yes - No question TEPCO is on the front line of a difficult process to manage.   There failings are becoming more and more obvious...  It is at a point where they need deeper partnerships from Japanese Nuclear Safety groups and agencies -  to get more strongly in the game and give better direction and reduce errors.   TEPCO needs a co-leading partner - to coordinate.  It should be NISA and any other available Nuclear Safety consortium in place in Japan.   

TEPCO has stood naked before the masses for two long - decked out in "The EMPERORS NEW CLOTHES"....   To the point where their mistakes and ineptitude's are showing up in simpler and simpler area's.   

Perhaps it is symptomatic of stress and burn out.  Very hard not to be susceptible given the circumstances.   Its a sign their intellectual and management resources are losing the crispness of their decisions.   Its a cry for help.... on TEPCO's part to drop the ball so many times...   TEPCO continues to have many big decisions ahead,  they cannot afford to lose that ability to manage what they know.  As well as being able to see with enough insight - How to build deeper understand in the current moment - Instead of just reacting...  

On the plus side,  I read No. 1 reactor was being fed with FW now, vice SW before.   OK something positive.  While it does not reflect a FW purge and replacement of water in the damaged reactor core -  It it remains a reasonable bet that salinity levels will trend down.   

It is probably inappropriate to point out what should be obvious, to most following this thread.   The crisis situation is far from over,  it should be trending towards better understanding and more cohesiveness in responses,   reports do seem to support the opposite trend.   

As they say here  "choke dee" - Good luck.  Getting in an intelligent and equal partner at this point is not going to hurt the situation.  Perhaps loss of FACE for TEPCO....  But It might just improve worker safety and drive efficiency towards getting safety corners turned in a major way.

----------


## robuzo

^Great post by Making, as usual.

Here are some good links for info:
All Things Nuclear
Arms Control Wonk &bull; an arms control blog network
The author of the second blog posts the English version of the journal of the Japanese trade association for electric power, the FEPC, every (US) morning.

----------


## MakingALife

Rubozo - Great links posted.    I have looked at some of the blog postings on the "All things Nuclear" link...  Nice job the writer has done to intelligently look at information related to Japans crisis, and as well dig into US spent pool fuels and related topics.

They made a reference to pneumatically inflated gate seals on the links  between spent pools and reactor vessel's for use in fuel transfers / refueling.   Comments from US NRC files to the effect that extended nuclear plant outage / power grid power outages have resulted spent pool leakage,  because those gate seals air source is not driven by emergency power systems, but depend on grid and normal power circuits to have pneumatic power.    The implications of that blog post is that the Japan site may have had such an issue with the NO. 3 / 4 pools.   A bank of a few bottles of dry compressed nitrogen with a regulator would be all that would be needed to give important support to this pool gate seal inflation issue.    Its quite surprising that such requirements have not been put into place.   Its probably considered "over kill" in the minds of the designers and regulators -  who believe grid outtage or plant power bus outages are short lived transient events.   The Japan scenerio we are witnessing,  show's the folly of an over depend upon assumptions grids and EDG reserve power are redundant enough to only be short time black out events....

Thanks for posting those links.  The topics and their handling seem first rate.

----------


## Mid

_The Japanese operator of a stricken Fukushima  nuclear plant Saturday marked 40 years since the first reactor started  commercial operations with a boast of safety "unthinkable elsewhere".

 "It is extremely disappointing to mark the 40th anniversary this  way," Sakae Muto, vice-president of Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO),  told a news conference. "And we feel very sorry."
_
Bangkok Post : Japan reactor 40 years old

----------


## Mid

_Singapore suspended food imports of fruit and  vegetables from more Japanese prefectures on Saturday after "radioactive  contaminants'' were found in two new food samples from the disaster-hit  country._

_"Radioactive contaminants have been detected in another two samples  of vegetables from Japan,'' the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of  Singapore (AVA), the country's food regulator, said in a statement._

_"In view of the latest developments, the Agri-Food and Veterinary  Authority will extend its suspension on the import of fruits and  vegetables to include the prefectures of Kanagawa, Tokyo and Saitama,''  it said._


Bangkok Post : Singapore widens import ban

meanwhile in Thailand ?  :mid: 

.

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## misskit

*Collective relocation of Fukushima residents* 

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*Signs of disaster were there to see
Seismology experts warned for years nuclear plants can't withstand true worst-case scenario*

Signs of disaster were there to see | The Japan Times Online

----------


## misskit

May deserve its own thread....


*China: Japan crisis won't deter its nuclear growth*

BEIJING (AP) -- China says it has faith in the safety of its nuclear power technology and won't scrap plans to expand its domestic industry because of Japan's crisis.

The Environmental Protection Ministry's nuclear safety director, Tian Jiashu, says China has drawn on the best nuclear energy standards and practices among industrial nations, and that it has learned from accidents at Three Mile Island in the United States and Chernobyl in the former Soviet Union.

Tian says China suspended approvals for new projects this month pending a safety review but will not scrap expansion plans.

He made the comments in an interview posted Saturday on the website of the official People's Daily newspaper.

(Mainichi Japan) March 26, 2011

----------


## StrontiumDog

SkyNewsBreak   Sky News Newsdesk                                             

            Japan Nuclear Agency: Radioactivity in sea water off Fukushima plant is up to 1,850 times the usual level.

----------


## MakingALife

> ^Great post by Making, as usual.
> 
> Here are some good links for info:
> All Things Nuclear
> Arms Control Wonk &bull; an arms control blog network
> The author of the second blog posts the English version of the journal of the Japanese trade association for electric power, the FEPC, every (US) morning.


Robuzo.  I have been pouring over your second link to the Arms Control Blog site.   IF one reads even more deeply into comments exchanged around the principle posts...  It becomes clear that a good level of academic debate exists around the quantitative analysis of the composition of radionuclide found in this  "hot" leakage water with 10,000 x radiation levels.   Secondly the analysis also extends to the half life profiles of these radioactive nucleotides are factored into discussion's to build theories as to their potential origin, and what specific conditions are needed to create some of the radionuclides found, some of which are normally not part of the fission process.

These academic discussions, although not conclusive, make case's for some sustaining fission reactions which generally would imply continued issues (ie meltdown) in the core,  or excessive neutron releases from the Plutonium in either the MOX fuel core, or the MOX fuel in spent pools.   Remembering the blog post was on leakage water found in the plants lowest levels.  These kinds of academic discussions - in the blog,  which I can follow what is being implied,  are way outside my own memories of when I studied these fission reaction and decay properties 30+ years ago.   

It is becoming clear that this kind of analysis applied - extended with the help of strong current experts in the field - would be capable of giving a picture of the internal conditions of reactor core's - in terms of the  state radionuclides that are contained within, which could be used to construct core reaction activities present.    It would seem that if they had and ability to obtain a "hot" sample of water from the reactor core (with significant samplng risks) -  It would be possible to get a thumbnail as to what kind of reactions are continuing to be supported or are taking place in the core.   It would be an effective window into what is happening in side these pressure vessels / fuel cores.  

As an example,  If they see only decay  radionuclides in a common profile with minimal other activated radioisotopes traces... It can be concluded that the core is progressing on a  radionuclides path to cold shutdown

IF they see high profiles of certain radionuclides with half live measurements that show the materials are newly created -  I would indicate that stronger fission chains are taking place inside the reactor, not just decay heat.   This would be a dead ringer insight into core activity is sustaining fission at least in some areas -  and such measurements would be an insight to the level of core instability that present.  It will not show where or by what mechanism,  but only show 

While it may not be possible to sample the core cooling by an engineered tap point,  It may be possible to drain some out via their water injection system.  It would seem worth the risk - to gain greater knowledge levels. 

It is food for thought as to why this kind of sampling and analysis is not being applied.  It may well be that the external metrics that plant staff can observe (water temp, feed nozzle temp, reactor pressure, and pressure vessel temp) is all the qualitative information need to pronounce thermal stability or lack of it, in these reactor cores.   Such trending would show relative stability without the risks of taking a hot sample.    

That said however, I would think - this information would differentiate which reactor cores have the highest levels of internal uncontrolled reactions taking place inside.  It would be a quick way to determine if its only decay heat, or something more at work.  A good understanding to carry forward,  when assigning priorities for restoration of cooling and other repairs.  

Because this kind of analysis examines not only composition profiles,  but as well half life measurement values.   This information has a time component that makes it very valuable to understand activity levels
This same kind of analysis is applied to fallout compounds detected in environmental sampling.  Its puzzling why they havent attempted to use these techniques to look at what is taking place inside the reactor vessels ???

Again thanks for posting that 2nd link... It and the "comments" from the academic community give fresh insight into potential scenarios that may be in play.   Things which TEPCO remains unwilling to float out to the public, but which  they could get a better handle upon,  just by some careful sampling work.  

 It seems TEPCO is leaving more tools on the table, going unused - to sharpen their understanding of what is happening inside these reactors.

----------


## robuzo

^One of my closest friends is a nuke tech at UCLA, and I am off to visit him and family later this week. Going to get him to take a look at this stuff, I don't have the background to add anything to your informative commentary.

This NYT article has some, um, amusing quotes: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/27/wo...a/27japan.html
My favorite- “There are areas where we don’t have information,” Mr. Amano said. “We don’t, and the Japanese don’t, too.” 

So, time to break out the Oujia board?

----------


## misskit

*Extreme radiation detected at No.2 reactor*

Tokyo Electric Power Company says it has detected radioactive materials 10-million-times normal levels in water at the No.2 reactor complex of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

The plant operator, known as TEPCO, says it measured 2.9-billion becquerels of radiation per one cubic centimeter of water from the basement of the turbine building attached to the Number 2 reactor.

The level of contamination is about 1,000 times that of the leaked water already found in the basements of the Number 1 and 3 reactor turbine buildings.

The company says the latest reading is 10-million times the usual radioactivity of water circulating within a normally operating reactor.
TEPCO says the radioactive materials include 2.9-billion becquerels of iodine-134, 13-million becquerels of iodine-131, and 2.3-million becquerels each for cesium 134 and 137.

These substances are emitted during nuclear fission inside a reactor core.

The company says the extremely contaminated water may stem from a damaged reactor core, and are trying to determine how the leakage occurred.

University of Tokyo graduate school professor Naoto Sekimura says the leak may come from the suppression chamber of the Number 2 reactor, which is known to be damaged. The chamber is designed to contain overflows of radioactive substances from the reactor.

Sunday, March 27, 2011 13:44 +0900 NHK WORLD English

----------


## HermantheGerman

*Looks like they would have left earlier if they could
*





*Military wraps up first round of departures from Japan*


YOKOTA AIR BASE, Japan  Military-sponsored evacuation flights out of  Japan for the 10,000 dependents en route to the U.S. were more than  half-way completed by Friday, officials said.
Departures from  Yokota  the main exit point for the militarys voluntary departure  program  as well as from Naval Air Facility Atsugi and Misawa Air Base,  nearest the devastated northern Tohoku region, should have taken more  than 7,000 people out of the disaster-plagued country by Saturday,  according to figures provided by officials at five bases in mainland  Japan.
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Additional flights for the remaining U.S.-military  sponsored dependents and personnel still waiting to leave Japan were  expected in the coming days, U.S. Forces Japan spokesman Sgt. Maj.  Stephen Valley told Stars and Stripes on Friday afternoon in an e-mail.  Plans for those flights are still tentative and will fluctuate  up or  down  depending on the demand, he said.
Yokosuka Naval Base was  quiet by Friday, with thousands of its sailors deployed on a fleet of  ships off the tsunami-ravaged northern coastline and 3,008 dependents  signed up for departure flights having already left. Another 1,400 are  still registered for departures, though officials say they do not expect  all registrants to show up.
Hundreds of other family members had  left Yokosuka after purchasing tickets for commercial flights prior to  the military announcing its program on March 17.
About 2,000 from  Naval Air Facility Atsugi, 1,350 from Misawa Air Base, 600 from Yokota  Air Base and 300 from Camp Zama have left or will be gone by Saturday,  with people from each of those bases departing from commercial airports  through flights arranged by the U.S. military.
While some services  at bases throughout Japan have been limited or canceled by the  unfolding natural disaster and subsequent mass exodus from the military  community, all schools in mainland Japan were all still open as of  Friday.
Advertisement

Department  of Defense Education Activity officials were determined to keep all  schools open despite the ever-dwindling numbers of students and teachers  in classrooms.
The absentee rate climbed from 32 percent to 36  percent among 8,508 students and hit 12.76 percent among 1,158 teachers,  according to DODEA figures based on student-teacher populations at the  25 schools sites on mainland Japan. Additionally, many students have  disenrolled to attend stateside schools, meaning they are no longer  counted in absentee figures.
Closing schools remained an option of  last resort, DODEA spokesman Charly Hoff told Stars and Stripes on  Friday. School officials expected to have a better picture of the number  teachers and students staying in Japan by Monday, Hoff said.
The  stress of waiting has been really hard, Kim Deverick, the wife of a  school teacher based at Camp Zama, said as she waited for a flight out  of Yokota with other Zama residents Friday around noon. 
I thought we were going sooner, Deverick said. When the order came  down it seemed like it was going to be within the next 24-48 hours and  its a week later.
Deverick was taking her two children to Texas  to wait out the crises in Japan. Her husband is staying at Zama  the  headquarters base for U.S. Army Japan about 25 miles southwest of  downtown Tokyo.  A bittersweet goodbye with her husband was compounded  by media reports, military information, Japanese government  announcements and the endless supply of rumors circulating around Japan  and the self-contained military community within the country.
Being at the end of the first wave of Americans who have left Japan had not settled well with Deverick.
Its hard being towards the end, knowing others already got out, she said.
Deverick  did not book commercial plane tickets after the military announced it  would begin a voluntary evacuation last week, a move she now regrets  after worrying for days about whether she and her kids would indeed be  able to get out of Japan.
In hindsight I wish I would have booked the ticket, she said.
Fellow Zama resident Amanda Green, who was also Texas-bound and waiting to leave Yokota on Friday, was a little more upbeat.
Green,  whose husband is deployed to Afghanistan, praised the military for  keeping the community informed and was short on criticism.
Its  pretty scary, but nothing prepares you for a natural disaster, Green  said, acknowledging her own concerns of radiation exposure, rolling  blackouts and other disaster-related issues while caring for children is  what drove her out of the country.
Im really excited to go, Green said.


Military wraps up first round of departures from Japan - Japan - Stripes

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Woes deepen over radioactive waters at nuke plant, sea contamination | Kyodo News
*
*Woes deepen over radioactive waters at nuke plant, sea contamination*

 TOKYO, March 27, Kyodo

 Japan on Sunday faced an increasing  challenge of removing highly  radioactive water found inside buildings  near some troubled nuclear  reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, with  the radiation level of  the surface of the pool in the basement of the  No. 2 reactor's turbine  building found to be more than 1,000  millisieverts per hour.

 The concentration level is 10 million times higher than that seen   usually in water in a reactor core, according to plant operator Tokyo   Electric Power Co. Hidehiko Nishiyama, spokesman for the government's   nuclear safety agency, said the figure is ''quite high'' and ''likely to   be coming from the reactor.''

 Adding to woes is the increasing level of contamination in the sea   near the plant. Radioactive iodine-131 at a concentration 1,850.5 times   the legal limit was detected from water extracted Saturday afternoon,   compared with 1,250.8 times the limit found Friday, the agency said.
 Nishiyama said he cannot deny the possibility that radioactive   materials are continuing to be released into the sea, although it is not   clear from what route, but he reassured that there is no need for   health concerns so far.

 The pools of water containing radioactive substances have drawn   attention after three workers who were engaging in work to restore the   No. 3 reactor at its turbine building on Thursday were exposed to high   radiation. Two of them had their feet in water without noticing then   that it was highly contaminated.

 The radioactivity at the surface of the puddle at the No. 3 unit was 400 millisieverts per hour.

 The three workers, who had been taken to a radiation research center   in Chiba Prefecture for examination, would be discharged as early as   Monday afternoon, officials of the center said, adding that the exposure   has not affected their health.

 According to the latest data released Sunday, radioactive iodine-134,  a  substance which sees its radiation release reduced to about half in   some 53 minutes, existed in water at the No. 2 reactor's turbine   building at an extremely high concentration of 2.9 billion becquerels   per 1 cubic centimeter.

 The water also contained such substances as iodine-131 and  cesium-137,  known as products of nuclear fission, and thus leading to  speculation  that it may have come through pipes that connect the reactor  vessel and  turbines, where steam from the reactor is normally directed  to for  electricity generation.

 The pool of water at the No. 4 reactor's turbine building included   radioactive substances, but the concentration level was not as high as   at the Nos. 1, 2 and 3 buildings, the data showed.

 Following the March 11 massive earthquake and tsunami, the reactors   and the spent nuclear fuel tanks of the Nos. 1, 2 and 3 units lost their   cooling functions. Their reactor cores also partially melted at the   plant, possibly discharging radioactive substances.

 The No. 4 unit, meanwhile, had all of its fuel rods stored in the   spent fuel tank for maintenance work, and the cooling functions of the   tank were also lost.

 To cool down the reactor cores or spent fuel tanks, massive amounts  of  seawater or freshwater have been injected such as by spraying water   from outside the damaged part of the reactor buildings' outer shell.

 Tokyo Electric is continuing efforts to restore power and enhance   cooling efficiency at the crisis-hit nuclear power plant, but the highly   radioactive pools of water are slowing the progress of the restoration   work.

 Workers there are planning to turn on the lights in the control room   of the No. 4 reactor, while also trying to inject fresh water into tanks   storing spent nuclear fuels at the plant's Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 4 reactors   to prevent crystallized salt from seawater already injected from   hampering the smooth circulation of water and thus diminishing the   cooling effect.

 The company will also try to inject fresh water into the Nos. 1, 2  and  3 reactors using electrical pumps instead of fire pumps currently   used.

 Electrical pumps enable workers to spend less time and energy   operating the machines at the site, thus reducing the risk of exposure   to radioactivity. The fire pumps require workers to supply fuel at the   site of operation.

----------


## Thetyim

iodine-131 has a half-life of 8.02 days

caesium-137 has a half-life of about 30 years

----------


## Butterfly

maybe a stupid question, who is making the calls for all those solutions ? the same clueless management of that company with a poor safety record ? or a panel of experts with the Japanese authority help ? I am afraid of the answer on that one

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident Update (27 March, 9:00 UTC) | Facebook
*
*Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Accident Update (27 March, 9:00 UTC)*

by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Sunday, March 27, 2011 at 1:51am

According  to the Japanese Prime Minister’s office, TEPCO has begun work to remove  water that has accumulated in the turbine buildings at the Fukushima  Daiichi nuclear power plant. Workers have started to *remove water from the Unit 1 turbine building to its main condenser* and  are making preparations to do the same at Unit 2. (A main condenser’s  function in a nuclear power plant is to condense and recover steam that  passes through the turbine.) Work to remove water from the turbine  buildings in Units 3 and 4 is currently under consideration.

Removal of water from the turbine buildings is an important step to continue power restoration to the plant.

The  IAEA is seeking further updates from Japanese authorities on the  progress of this process and will update as information becomes  available.

----------


## StrontiumDog

New tsunami video just recently posted online. Probably one of the best and most terrifying!

----------


## Takeovers

Terrifying indeed. The water keeps coming and coming.

----------


## Thetyim

"The apology by the Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) related to water readings at reactor 2 at the plant, 240km (150 miles) north of Tokyo.

It had said radiation levels reached 10 million times higher than normal in the cooling system but because the level was so high the worker taking the reading had to evacuate before confirming it with a second reading.

"The number is not credible. We are very sorry," said Tepco spokesman Takashi Kurita."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-12875327

----------


## StrontiumDog

*IAEA Briefing on Fukushima Nuclear Accident (27 March 2011, 13:30 UTC) | Facebook
*
*IAEA Briefing on Fukushima Nuclear Accident (27 March 2011, 13:30 UTC)*

by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Sunday, March 27, 2011 at 6:36am

*IAEA Briefing on Fukushima Nuclear Accident (27 March 2011, 13:30 UTC)*

*1. Current Situation*

The situation at the Fukushima Daiichi plant remains very serious.

The restoration of off-site power continues and lighting is now available in the central control rooms of *Units 1, 2 and 3*. Also, fresh water is now being injected into the Reactor Pressure Vessels (RPVs) of all three Units.

Radiation measurements in the containment vessels and suppression chambers of *Units 1, 2 and 3* continued to decrease. White “smoke” continued to be emitted from *Units 1 to 4*.

Pressure in the RPV showed a slight increase at *Unit 1* and was stable at *Units 2 and 3*, possibly indicating that there has been no major breach in the pressure vessels.

At *Unit 1*, the temperature measured at the bottom of the RPV fell slightly to 142 °C. At *Unit 2*,  the temperature at the bottom of the RPV fell to 97 °C from 100 °C  reported in the Update provided yesterday. Pumping of water from the  turbine hall basement to the condenser is in progress with a view to  allowing power restoration activities to continue.

At *Unit 3*,  plans are being made to pump water from the turbine building to the  main condenser but the method has not yet been decided. This should  reduce the radiation levels in the turbine building and reduce the risk  of contamination of workers in the turbine building restoring equipment.

No notable change has been reported in the condition of *Unit 4.*

Water is still being added to the spent fuel pools of Units 1 to 4 and efforts continue to restore normal cooling functions.

*Units 5 and 6* remain in cold shutdown.

We understand that three workers who suffered contamination are still under observation in hospital.

*2.* *Radiation Monitoring*

Dose rates at the Fukushima site continue to trend downwards.

In  28 of the 45 prefectures for which data are available, no deposition of  radionuclides was detected in the period 18 to 25 March. In seven of  the other 17 prefectures, the estimated daily deposition was less than  500 becquerel per square metre for iodine-131 and less that 100  becquerel per square metre for caesium-137.

On 26 March, the  highest values were observed in the prefecture of Yamagata: 7500  becquerel per square metre for iodine-131 and 1200 becquerel per square  metre for caesium-137. In the other prefectures where deposition of  iodine-131 was reported, the daily range was from 28 to 860 becquerel  per square metre. For caesium-137, the range was from 2.5 to 86  becquerel per square metre.

In the Shinjyuku district of Tokyo,  the daily deposition of iodine-131 on 27 March was 220 becquerel per  square metre, while for caesium-137 it was 12 becquerel per square  metre.

No significant changes were reported in the 45 prefectures  in gamma dose rates compared to yesterday. In general, gamma–dose rates  tend to decrease due to the decay of short-lived radionuclides such as  iodine-131.

Two IAEA teams are currently monitoring in Japan. One  team made gamma dose-rate measurements in the Tokyo region at 8  locations. Gamma-dose rates measured ranged from 0.08 to 0.15  microsievert per hour, which is within or slightly above the normal  background. The second team made additional measurements at distances of  30 to 41 km from the Fukushima nuclear power plant. At these locations,  the dose rates ranged from 0.9 to 17 microsievert per hour. At the same  locations, results of beta-gamma contamination measurements ranged from  0.03 to 3.1 Megabecquerel per square metre.

The first results of  aerial surveys of gamma dose rates by the Japanese authorities have been  received by the Incident and Emergency Centre. These are being analysed  and will be presented when more detailed data have been received.

New  data from monitoring of the marine environment, carried out from 24  March 22:55 UTC to 25 March 03:32 UTC about 30 km offshore, show a  decrease in both caesium-137 and iodine‑131. The contamination at these  locations is influenced by aerial deposition of fallout as well as by  the migration of contaminated seawater from the discharge points at the  reactor. The measured radiation doses rates above the sea remain  consistently low (between 0.04 and 0.1 microsievert per hour). The first  results of model predictions received from the SIROCCO Group at the  University of Toulouse are being assessed.

Recommendations  relating to the restriction of drinking water consumption, based on  measured concentrations of iodine-131, remain in place in seven  locations (in one location for both adults and infants, and in six  locations for infants).

As far as food contamination is concerned,  samples taken from 23 to 25 March in five prefectures showed iodine-131  in unprocessed raw milk, but the levels were far below the regulation  values set by the Japanese authorities. Caesium-137 was also detected in  samples of unprocessed raw milk taken on 23 March in Chiba prefecture,  but at levels far below the Japanese regulation values. Caesium-137 was  not detected in any of the samples taken from 24-25 March in the other  four prefectures.   

Based on samples taken on 22 and 24-25 March,  three prefectures (Chiba, Ibaraki and Tochigi) reported iodine-131 in  celery, parsley, spinach, and other leafy vegetables above the  regulation values set by the Japanese authorities.  Caesium-137 was also  detected above the regulation values in one sample of spinach taken on  24 March in Tochigi prefecture, but in the remaining two prefectures,  the results were below regulation values.

The Joint FAO/IAEA Food  Safety Assessment Team arrived in Tokyo on Saturday. It will meet  regulatory officials in various prefectures where food contamination has  been detected. The team left for Fukushima early today. The Mission  will assist and provide advice on sampling protocols, analytical  procedures, data collected to date, and actions taken by the Japanese  authorities for the control of contaminated foods.

----------


## ceburat

What happened to the idea of pouring cement over all and stopping the leaks?  Was it decided to be a bad idea or is it still being considered?

----------


## misskit

*March 11th tsunami confirmed up to 13 meters high*

The March 11th tsunami that hit Japan's northeastern coast was as high as 13 meters in the city of Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture.

Researchers from the University of Tokyo and the Tokyo University of Marine Science and Technology said on Sunday that the tsunami reached a gymnasium one kilometer from the shoreline and climbed as high as 13 meters.

They also said they found the waves had touched the beams just beneath the roof of the 2-story building.

The municipality had designated the gym an emergency shelter. Many people who had gathered there to take shelter were swept away by the tsunami.

Researchers from Yokohama National University and the University of Tokyo said on Sunday that they confirmed the tsunami had reached about 10 meters high at a location along the coast of Kamaishi city, Iwate Prefecture.

The waves climbed over and partially destroyed a huge breakwater set up to protect the mouth of a bay in Kamaishi city.

Yokohama National University professor Jun Sasaki says evacuation plans should be reconsidered now that a tsunami exceeding previous estimates has hit the region.

Monday, March 28, 2011 05:54 +0900 NHK WORLD English

----------


## robuzo

Latest at the Yomiuri: ３号機、水蒸気が激しく噴出…陸自ヘリ撮影
"Steam spewing from No. 3, Japan SDF helicopter photo":


An expert quoted in the article says it looks like it is coming from the reactor containment vessel, but there is a strong possibility that it is coming from a storage pool.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Radiation in seawater may be spreading in Japan - Yahoo! News
*
*Radiation in seawater may be spreading in Japan*


AP Photo/The Yomiuri Shimbun, Masanobu NakatsukasaEvacuees  from Fukushima, where the troubled Dai-ichi nuclear power plant is  located, receive meals for dinner at an evacuation center in Saitama,  Japan, Sunday, March 27, 2011. More photos »
 

                                 By SHINO YUASA, Associated Press                  –     5 mins ago

                                TOKYO – Highly radioactive iodine seeping from  Japan's damaged nuclear complex may be making its way into seawater  farther north of the plant than previously thought, officials said  Monday, adding to radiation concerns as the crisis stretches into a  third week.

                 Mounting problems, including badly miscalculated  radiation figures and no place to store dangerously contaminated water,  have stymied emergency workers struggling to cool down the overheating  plant and avert a disaster with global implications.

                 The coastal Fukushima Dai-ichi power plant, located  140 miles (220 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo, has been leaking  radiation since a magnitude-9.0 quake on March 11 triggered a tsunami  that engulfed the complex. The wave knocked out power to the system that  cools the dangerously hot nuclear fuel rods.

                 On Monday, workers resumed the laborious yet urgent  task of pumping out the hundreds of tons of radioactive water inside  several buildings at the six-unit plant. The water must be removed and  safely stored before work can continue to power up the plant's cooling  system, nuclear safety officials said.

                 The contaminated water, discovered last Thursday, has  been emitting radiation that measured more than 1,000 millisieverts per  hour in a recent reading at Unit 2 — some 100,000 times normal amounts,  plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said.

                 As officials scrambled to determine the source of the  radioactive water, chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano repeated Monday  that the contaminated water in Unit 2 appeared to be due to a temporary  partial meltdown of the reactor core.

                 He called it "very unfortunate" but said the spike in radiation appeared limited to the unit.

                 However, new readings show contamination in the ocean  has spread about a mile (1.6 kilometers) farther north of the nuclear  site than before. Radioactive iodine-131 was discovered just offshore  from Unit 5 and Unit 6 at a level 1,150 times higher than normal,  Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokesman for the Nuclear and Industrial Safety  Agency, told reporters Monday.

                 He had said earlier there was no link between the  radioactive water leaking inside the plant and the radiation in the sea.  On Monday, though, he reversed that position, saying he does suspect  that radioactive water from the plant may indeed be leaking into the  ocean.

Closer to the plant, radioactivity in seawater tested  about 1,250 times higher than normal last week and climbed to 1,850  times normal over the weekend. Nishiyama said the increase was a  concern, but also said the area is not a source of seafood and that the  contamination posed no immediate threat to human health.

                 Up to 600 people are working inside the plant in  shifts. Nuclear safety officials say workers' time inside the crippled  units is closely monitored to minimize their exposure to radioactivity,  but two workers were hospitalized Thursday when they suffered burns  after stepping into contaminated water. They were to be released from  the hospital Monday.

                 Meanwhile, a strong earthquake shook the region and  prompted a brief tsunami alert early Monday, adding to the sense of  unease across Japan. The quake off the battered Miyagi prefecture coast  in the northeast measured magnitude-6.5, the Japan Meteorological Agency  said.

                 No damage or injuries were reported, and TEPCO said  the quake would not affect work to stabilize the plant. Scores of strong  earthquakes have rattled Japan over the past two weeks.

                 Confusion at the plant has intensified fears that the  nuclear crisis will last weeks, months or years amid alarms over  radiation making its way into produce, raw milk and even tap water as  far as Tokyo.

                 On Sunday, TEPCO officials said radiation in leaking  water in the Unit 2 reactor was 10 million times above normal — an  apparent spike that sent employees fleeing the unit. The day ended with  officials saying the huge figure had been miscalculated and offering  apologies.

                 "The number is not credible," TEPCO spokesman Takashi Kurita said late Sunday. "We are very sorry."

                 A few hours later, TEPCO Vice President Sakae Muto  said a new test had found radiation levels 100,000 times above normal —  far better than the first results, though still very high.

                 But he ruled out having an independent monitor oversee the various checks despite the errors. 

 Muto acknowledged it could take a long time to clean up the Fukushima complex. 

 "We cannot say at this time how many months or years it will take," he said.

----------


## Mid

*Japan water plants warned over radioactive rain*
วันจันทร์ ที่ 28 มี.ค. 2554 

Japan's health ministry has asked water purification plants  nationwide to stop taking in rainwater, cover pools with tarpaulins to  shield them from radiation from crippled nuclear plant.

mcot.net

----------


## Cujo

> *Japan water plants warned over radioactive rain*
> วันจันทร์ ที่ 28 มี.ค. 2554 
> 
> Japan's health ministry has asked water purification plants  nationwide to stop taking in rainwater, cover pools with tarpaulins to  shield them from radiation from crippled nuclear plant.
> 
> mcot.net


Holy shit sherlock. Radioactive precipitation, that's a worry.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*^ Check this out!

DPH: Trace Amounts Of Radiation Detected In Rainwater Samples In Massachusetts
*
*DPH: Trace Amounts Of Radiation Detected In Rainwater Samples In Massachusetts* 

         3/28/2011 2:31 AM ET  



        (RTTNews)  - Trace amounts of I-131, a radioactive form of elemental iodine,  resulting from Japan's nuclear radioactive fallout has been detected in a  rainwater sample in Massachusetts, according to the Massachusetts  Department of Public Health, or DPH. Japan's Fukushima Dai-Ichi power  plant has suffered extensive damage due to a massive earthquake and  tsunami that struck the country's coast on March 11. 

In a  statement released yesterday, the department said that until the Japan  nuclear plant is stabilized I-131 may continue to be detected as it  rains in Massachusetts. However, the levels of the radioiodine will  remain significantly lower and not of any health concern assure health  officials.

The rain water samples were tested for I-131 in  Massachusetts as part of ongoing federal safety requirements. However  there is no reason to be concerned about I-131 in the state drinking  water supplies said John Auerbach, commissioner of the Department of  Public Health. The raw drinking water samples from Quabbin and Wachusett  reservoirs of Massachusetts have showed no detections of I-131.

The  radioisotope I-131, which has a short "half-life" of 8 days, was first  detected in air and rainwater on the west coast and these trace amounts  of I -131 have moved east, health officials said. 

More tests of  air and water samples for I-131 or other radioisotopes will be conducted  across Massachusetts beginning March 27, 2011. The results of the tests  will be released as soon as they are available.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Latest video of reactors, smoke seen etc

----------


## Butterfly

it's official, they acknowledge that there was a partial meltdown of the core

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Footage of Japan Kessenuma 'ghost' port city smashed by tsunami  *

----------


## Gerbil

> it's official, they acknowledge that there was a partial meltdown of the core


Shouldnt be a problem. I've seen these 'core breaches' on Star Trek many times. All you do is eject the core into space and a new one is magically there a few minutes later when the plot needs it.

 :bunny3:

----------


## StrontiumDog

japantimes   The Japan Times                                              

            Plutonium detected in soil at Fukushima nuclear plant (Kyodo)

----------


## Gerbil

^ game over.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Contaminated water found in underground tunnels at Japan nuclear plant - The Washington Post
*
*Contaminated water found in underground tunnels at Japan nuclear plant*

 
*Gallery:*   Japan’s nuclear crisis: Japan battles to prevent a nuclear catastrophe  and to care for millions of people without power or water in its worst  crisis since World War II. 
*
By Michael Alison Chandler, Monday, March 28, 12:48 PM*

TOKYO — Attempts to contain and eliminate highly irradiated water at the  embattled Fukushima Daiichi power plant stumbled Monday when  contaminated water was reported in three underground tunnels outside the  nuclear reactors. 

 Officials said Monday afternoon that dangerously radioactive water  had been found a day earlier just four inches below ground level in one  tunnel, and government officials were concerned it would overflow and  spread into the soil or out to sea, less than 200 feet away.

Tokyo  Electric Power Co., which owns the plant, also found small amounts of  plutonium in the soil around the plant, company officials said late  Monday night. The levels of the radioactive element, found in two out of  five samples taken March 21 and 22, were low enough that they should  not pose a significant health risk, officials said, according to  Japanese national broadcaster NHK. The finding will not require a  stoppage of work at the plant, NHK reported. 

Plutonium is created  when uranium is enriched; it is also an ingredient in the mixed oxide  fuel--known as MOX--that has been used in the plant’s third reactor. If  inhaled, plutonium can cause cancer in the lungs or other organs or  bones.

Radiation levels found in the water in the underground  tunnels were similar to those found in contaminated water that has  pooled in turbine rooms adjacent to three of the six nuclear reactors in  the Daiichi plant..  The highest levels, measuring at over 1,000 millisieverts per hour (or  more than four times the legal exposure limit for nuclear workers), were  found outside the second reactor. The levels in the other two tunnels  were much lower. 

Water that has leaked into the turbine room in  the second reactor probably came into contact with partially melted  nuclear fuel rods, Japan’s nuclear safety agency reported Monday.  Workers are still trying to determine how the water leaked out. 

Japan’s chief cabinet secretary, Yokio Edano, called the  discovery of contaminated water outside concrete buildings designed to  seal off contamination “regrettable.” He said at a news conference that  the government “will do everything it can to bring the problems under  control” and “to minimize the impact on human health.”

The spreading contamination represents a critical safety concern  for workers at the plant and will mean further delays to fully  restoring power needed to cycle cool water around the fuel rods and keep  them from overheating.

The hazardous water was first discovered  outside reactors Thursday when three workers were hospitalized after  suffering radiation burns in the turbine room of the second reactor. The  workers were released Monday, and doctors said they had no internal  injuries or skin abnormalities. 

As power company officials  investigate the source of the leaks, the amount of water being injected  into the second reactor Monday was reduced from nine tons to seven tons,  according to Japanese news reports. 
The reduction might limit flooding, but it could also increase the risk that the fuel rods will overheat. 

The  additional contaminated water complicates an already difficult cleanup  job. The stagnant water still has not been drained from the turbine  buildings, Hidehiko Nishiyama, deputy-general for the government’s  Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said in a news conference. A pump  has been placed in the first building, he said, but in the second two,  “we are considering what to do.” 

He added: “We need to make a decision and act as soon as possible.”

At  the same time, radioactive water was measured in the sea surrounding  the plant for the third consecutive day. The levels of iodine-131 in  water sampled Sunday were 1,150 times greater than government-set safety  levels. 

The nuclear safety agency said it had ordered the power  company to begin sampling water in additional places throughout the  ocean to monitor the situation. At the same time, hundreds of people who  live or work around the plant are being screened for radiation exposure.

Questions  over the power company’s monitoring arose Sunday, when officials  reported inaccurate information about the level of radioactive iodine in  the plant. Leaked water sampled from one unit was 100,000 times more  radioactive than normal background levels, but it was initially reported  as being 10 million times the norm, prompting an evacuation of the  building. 

Workers at the plant “are becoming very tired,” Edano  said. “However, measurement of the radioactivity is vital for insurance  of safety for the workers. Such a mistake is not something that should  be forgiven or acceptable.”

With conditions at the plant still out  of control, Edano issued a plea to families from the 12-mile evacuation  zone around the plant to please stay away until it is safer. Many  people fled shortly after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami with only  the clothes they were wearing. Some have returned to their homes in  recent days to gather their belongings.

----------


## robuzo

Christian Science Monitor:
What Japanese think of PM Kan's response to the crisis - CSMonitor.com
Amid the destruction and nuclear crisis caused by the March 11 tsunami, there is a joke making the rounds in Japan: President Obama telephones Naoto Kan, Japan’s prime minister… and asks to speak to his spokesman, Yukio Edano.

----------


## Butterfly

> ^ game over.


it was clear after 5 days that they had no clue, so it has been "game over" since then

it will get worse,

what is amazing is the lack of reaction from the Japanese authority and the International body to solve the situation

----------


## Carrabow

> *^ Check this out!*
> 
> *DPH: Trace Amounts Of Radiation Detected In Rainwater Samples In Massachusetts*
> 
> *DPH: Trace Amounts Of Radiation Detected In Rainwater Samples In Massachusetts* 
> 
> 3/28/2011 2:31 AM ET 
> 
> 
> ...


 
How do they know the  radiation isn't from Chernobyl or some other source? Does Radiation have a DNA source that can be traced?  :Confused:

----------


## BobR

> Originally Posted by Gerbil
> 
> ^ game over.
> 
> 
> it was clear after 5 days that they had no clue, so it has been "game over" since then
> 
> it will get worse,
> 
> what is amazing is the lack of reaction from the Japanese authority and the International body to solve the situation



More likely they do know how serious the problem is, but are releasing a distorted watered down version to prevent panic in both the population and the financial markets.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japanese potatoes with signs of radioactivity seized

*Japanese potatoes with signs of radioactivity seized*

                            By The Nation
                                             Published on March 29, 2011                

*The Public Health Ministry, detecting a slight  contamination of radioactive iodine (I-131) in sweet potatoes imported  from Japan, has ordered a small consignment be seized and destroyed,  Public Health Minister Jurin Laksanawisit said yesterday.*

                                                            The Medical Science Department is working on procuring  more radioactive contamination-detecting devices soon, worth Bt5  million-Bt10 million each. 

Officials said 74 out of 94 food  samples, imported from Japan and submitted to radioactive contamination  testing, had yielded the results. One sample of sweet potato was found  to have a radioactive iodine (I-131) reading at 15.25 becquerel (Bq) per  kilogram, Jurin said. 

Although the amount didn't exceed the  standard 100 Bq per kilogram, Thai authorities had seized the  contaminated lot, totalling 75 kilograms, to be destroyed by burning, he  added. 

Food and Drug Administration (FDA) secretary Pipat  Yingseri said the contaminated sweet potato was imported from Ibaraki  province on Honshu Island on March 23, detected on March 24 and seized  on March 25 - to study the half-life in another eight days - before  deciding whether to destroy it.

He said not many fruits or  vegetables were imported from Japan to Thailand, and affirmed that the  Office of Atoms for Peace had already given a second  contamination-detecting device to FDA.

----------


## Thormaturge

It's looking grim for the Japanese.

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> Japanese potatoes with signs of radioactivity seized


Does this mean the'y're pre-cooked and table ready stright out of the bag?

----------


## BobR

*Although the amount didn't exceed the standard 100 Bq per kilogram*, Thai authorities had seized the contaminated lot, totalling 75 kilograms, to be destroyed by burning, he added. 


Kick em when they're down.  Every political buffoon is now trying to score points with their constituents at the Japanese expense.  Just plain arbitrary and silly.

----------


## robuzo

Let's ask the good people at FART their expert opinion on the situation in Fukushima: ŽÐ’c–[at]l[at]•Ÿ“‡Œ§•úŽËü‹ZŽt‰ï

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> Holy shit sherlock. Radioactive precipitation, that's a worry.


Not really just get yourself a lead umbrella!

----------


## StrontiumDog

*China finds trace radiation in more areas | Asian Correspondent
*
*China finds trace radiation in more areas*

_By AP News Mar 29, 2011 2:45AM UTC_ 

 
BEIJING (AP) — Chinese  authorities say trace amounts of atmospheric radiation from Japan’s  stricken nuclear power plant have been detected in more part parts of  China.

 Authorities have  already reported that low levels of radioactive iodine-131 were detected  in the air above northeastern Heilongjiang province over the weekend.  In a notice viewed on its website Tuesday, the Environmental Protection  Ministry says further traces were found over the southeastern regions of  Jiangsu, Shanghai, Zhejiang, Anhui, Guangdong and Guangxi.

 The ministry says the tiny amounts of iodine-131 pose no threat to public health.

 The trace amounts are  the only evidence of radiation reaching China thus far linked to the  hobbled Fukushima nuclear plant, which was damaged by the massive March  11 earthquake and tsunami.

----------


## Thormaturge

Food and fish stocks contaminated, Tokyo water supplies too, serious doubts about the future of their energy supplies, the Japanese are in serious trouble, and the damage caused the the earthquake and tsunami are almost insignificant by comparison.

 If the world is to learn anything from the past it is that we are all human beings and the Japanese who inflicted such horror on my father's generation are not the Japanese who are suffering today.  Similarly the Germans who recently bailed out Greece and Ireland are not Nazis.

  We are all in this together. Forget about the potatoes, what the Japanese need now is good clean fish and clean water.

----------


## StrontiumDog

BBC News - Japan nuclear: PM Naoto Kan signals maximum alert

29 March 2011 Last updated at 04:42 GMT             *

Japan nuclear: PM Naoto Kan signals maximum alert*

 
_Japan is in for the long haul in coping with nuclear fallout from the 11 March earthquake  _ 

                      Japanese  Prime Minister Naoto Kan has said his government is in a state of  maximum alert over the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. 

         Plutonium was detected in soil at the facility and highly radioactive water had leaked from a reactor building. 

         Officials in China, South Korea and the United States have recorded traces of radioactive material in the air.

         Earlier, Japan's government strongly criticised the plant's operator, Tepco, over mistaken radiation readings.

         Mr Kan told parliament the situation "continues to be unpredictable". 

         The government "will tackle the problem while in a state of maximum alert," he said.

*'Very grave'

*Speaking on Tuesday about how the government might fund relief  and recovery efforts, Mr Kan said: "We need to pursue various  possibilities."

         Scrapping a planned cut in corporate taxes was one option under consideration, he added. 

         Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said: "The situation is very grave."

         "We are doing our utmost efforts to contain the damage.

         "We need to avoid the fuel rods from heating up and drying  up. Continuing the cooling is unavoidable... We need to prioritise  injecting water," he said.

         Correspondents say the government has been accused of indecision and delay. 

 
_Q&A: Health effects of radiation_ 

*Regional fallout*

 The Environmental Protection Agency in  the United States said it had detected traces of radiation in rain water  in the north east of the country.

         It said these were consistent with the Fukushima nuclear accident and also said they did not constitute a health hazard.

         China's Ministry of Environmental Protection has said that  "extremely low-level" doses of iodine-131, a radioactive material, have  been found in coastal areas including Jiangsu, Shanghai, Zhejiang,  Anhui, Guangdong and Guangxi.

         It had already reported traces of the radioactive material in the air above the northeastern province of Heilongjiang.

         However, the doses were so small as to not pose a threat to  public health and no measures against it were necessary, the agency  statement said.

         Water and food is being tested for radiation; bans on some imported Japanese foodstuffs remain in place.

         In Vietnam, the Thanh Nien newspaper has reported that Vietnamese scientists have found small amounts of radiation in the air.

         The Korea Institute of Nuclear Safety said it had detected  traces of iodine-131 in Seoul and seven other places across South Korea.

         However, an agriculture ministry official told AFP that "no  trace of radiation has been found so far either in our own fish or those  imported from Japan".

*Plutonium*

 Highly radioactive water has been found for the first time outside one of the reactor buildings at Fukushima plant.

         The leak in a tunnel linked to the No 2 reactor has raised fears of radioactive liquid seeping into the environment. 

         Plutonium has also been found in soil at the plant, but not at levels that threaten human health, officials say. 

         Tepco later said that plutonium had also been detected in  soil at five locations at the plant but not at levels that represented a  risk to human health. 

         It said the results came from samples taken a week ago and would not stop work at the plant. 

         Plutonium was used in the fuel mix for only one of the six reactors, No 3. 

         On Sunday ,Tepco said radiation levels at reactor No 2 were  10 million times higher than normal, before correcting that figure to  100,000. 

         "Considering the fact that the monitoring of radioactivity is  a major condition to ensure safety, this kind of mistake is absolutely  unacceptable," said Mr Edano. 

         Tepco has been criticised for a lack of transparency and  failing to provide information more promptly and for making a number of  mistakes, including worker clothing. 

         Workers are battling to restore power and restart the cooling  systems at the stricken nuclear plant, which was hit by a quake and  tsunami over two weeks ago.

         A 9.0-magnitude earthquake on 11 March and the powerful  tsunami it triggered is now known to have killed 10,901 people, with  more than 17,000 people still missing.



*FUKUSHIMA UPDATE (28 MAR)*
 *Reactor 1:* Damage to the core from cooling problems. Building holed by gas explosion. Highly radioactive water detected in reactor *Reactor 2:* Damage to the core from cooling  problems. Building holed by gas blast; containment damage suspected.  Highly radioactive water detected in reactor and adjoining tunnel *Reactor 3:* Damage to the core from cooling  problems. Building holed by gas blast; containment damage possible.  Spent fuel pond partly refilled with water after running low. Highly  radioactive water detected in reactor *Reactor 4:* Reactor shut down prior to quake. Fires and explosion in spent fuel pond; water level partly restored *Reactors 5 & 6:* Reactors shut down. Temperature of spent fuel pools now lowered after rising highQ&A: Fukushima radiation alertA new way to look at radiation

----------


## mobs00

> *Although the amount didn't exceed the standard 100 Bq per kilogram*, Thai authorities had seized the contaminated lot, totalling 75 kilograms, to be destroyed by burning, he added. 
> 
> 
> Kick em when they're down.  Every political buffoon is now trying to score points with their constituents at the Japanese expense.  Just plain arbitrary and silly.


Would you feed theses potatoes to your kids??

----------


## StrontiumDog

_^ Breathing the air might be a problem too now..._

http://www.tannetwork.tv/tan/ViewDat...DataID=1042217

Radioactive Particles Detected in China and Thailand 

UPDATE : 29 March 2011 

*China said on Monday that radioactive  particles have been detected in the air above China and Thailand, but  says they will pose no threat to local people or the environment. 

The Agency Italia website quoted China's National Nuclear Emergency  Coordination Committee as saying that radiation has been found in the  air in China's southeastern areas and Thailand. 
*

However, the level of radiation detected is not harmful to the public,  nor will it pollute the environment as radiation levels are  one-hundred-thousandth of concerning levels. 

Meanwhile, the Thai Food and Drug Administration's Secretary-General  Phiphai Yingseri said authorities recently discovered sweet potatoes  contaminated with the nuclear particles that had been imported from  Japan. 

Phiphat went on to say that Thai officials will be stricter with foods  imported from Japan, but that authorities are unlikely to ban the  products for good. 

Thai authorities have been randomly inspecting foods imported from Japan  since March 16 after the Japanese authorities found radiation in green  vegetables and water around the crippled Daiichi nuclear plant.

----------


## robuzo

> *Although the amount didn't exceed the standard 100 Bq per kilogram*, Thai authorities had seized the contaminated lot, totalling 75 kilograms, to be destroyed by burning, he added. 
> 
> 
> Kick em when they're down.  Every political buffoon is now trying to score points with their constituents at the Japanese expense.  Just plain arbitrary and silly.


Sure looks that way.

----------


## Takeovers

> Does Radiation have a DNA source that can be traced?


Indeed it does. The half life time of radioactive Iodine is so low that the Chernobyl remnants no longer contain it. So from the relative content of different isotopes you can at least determine how old the contaminatin is. If it contains radioactive Iodine it is very new.

----------


## MakingALife

Sorry to say,  the level of complication - because of expanding hot zones that continue to show up in the individual buildings, site tunnels and related areas.   Now call into question the difficulties staff must pass through to get cooling back.    

With further evidence of leakage - the radiation sources appear to be the reactors themselves, and this calls into question the risks of maintaining liquid injection.    

Had cooling been restored by now -  better control of cool down, Water levels in reactors to give full core immersion, and an ability to hold pressure vessels at the lowest obtainable pressures in core and supression pools.  Such a condition would minimize leakage rates form what ever is compromised.

As had been pointed out before - Delay in power restoration and cooling function - is only adding complications, and risks over time the ability to move foward and at time to be able just to sustain the current cooling efforts.    

These complications that have developed, are the kinds of risks that become game changers, and the process of managing these facilities to cold shutdown conditions cannot side step the safety and exposures that come from these complications.  The longer cooling and water level controls systems are out of the picture -  The high the potential for game changing influences to produce a run- away reactor condition - if they lose their local injection option.    

Opportunities lost, by inefficient pressing of the earlier time window open to restoration efforts, is coming back to bite this operator badly.  

Judging from public response in Japan -  people are at times taking to the streets in protest.   The government and Nuclear industry in general will be paying a heavy price in Japan, or the back lash that will tumble from the ineptitude displayed in this crisis.    That change in public sentiment - will have longer ramifications, even when this sites issues are over

----------


## BobR

> Originally Posted by BobR
> 
> 
> *Although the amount didn't exceed the standard 100 Bq per kilogram*, Thai authorities had seized the contaminated lot, totalling 75 kilograms, to be destroyed by burning, he added. 
> 
> 
> Kick em when they're down.  Every political buffoon is now trying to score points with their constituents at the Japanese expense.  Just plain arbitrary and silly.
> 
> 
> Would you feed theses potatoes to your kids??


Yes, and I would eat them myself.  The whole purpose of a standard id to define what is safe and acceptable.  Destroying this food even though it clearly met the standard is arbitrary by definition.  Radiation is not a human invention, it exists in the environment, that's why the standard allows it to a certain degree.

----------


## crippen

Quote SD post 1

to be destroyed by burning, 

Does that destroy the radioactivity then???   :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## robuzo

^This article is about a week old, but I can guarantee people are going to be mighty upset about this in Japan. There are aspects of the political culture that make Japan prone to this kind of crap:
Japan nuclear firm admits missing safety checks at disaster-hit plant | World news | guardian.co.uk
One month before the tsunami, government regulators approved a Tepco request to prolong the life of one of its six reactors by another decade, despite warnings that its backup power generator contained stress cracks, making them more vulnerable to water damage.

Weeks later, Tepco admitted it had failed to inspect 33 pieces of equipment inside the plant's cooling systems, including water pumps, according to the nuclear safety agency's website.

Regulators have been accused of uncritically backing industry moves to prolong the life of ageing nuclear power plants such as Fukushima Daiichi amid mounting local opposition to the construction of new facilities.
---
Regulator fail equaled financial meltdown a couple of years ago. Now it results in an actual meltdown. There is another word for "regulator fail"- systemic corruption. _Amakudari_ is one way it happens in Japan Amakudari - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

----------


## Thormaturge

> "We have the government commission overseeing nuclear safety standards and in my opinion they are not doing their job," he told ABC correspondent Eric Campbell last Thursday in Tokyo in an exclusive interview for Four Corners.


 The best argument I have yet seen for halting all future plans for nuclear power.

 Worldwide.

 Unless you can convince me that the USA (three mile island), the UK (Windscale) or Russia (Chernobyl) are any more reliable.

----------


## sabang

> The Medical Science Department is working on procuring more radioactive contamination-detecting devices soon, worth Bt5 million-Bt10 million each.


 :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic): 



> Although the amount didn't exceed the standard 100 Bq per kilogram,


 :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic): 

Read between the lines.

----------


## Seekingasylum

> Originally Posted by robuzo
> 
> 
> "We have the government commission overseeing nuclear safety standards and in my opinion they are not doing their job," he told ABC correspondent Eric Campbell last Thursday in Tokyo in an exclusive interview for Four Corners.
> 
> 
> The best argument I have yet seen for halting all future plans for nuclear power.
> 
> Worldwide.
> ...


The Fukushima power station bears as much relation to the latest generation of reactors as a Boeing 707 does to the 777. It was badly constructed and managed improperly. TEPCO are the culprits here as indeed a succession of governments wallowing in complacency.

Generally speaking, nuclear power is and will be the way to go. However, I do think they should only be constructed and managed under the direct commissioning authority of an international body. Still, how you square that with the likes of China, North Korea and Iran I don't know.

----------


## Poo and Pee

i wonder where the produce came from, and when it was sent.

given the area most affected is non-accessable, it must have come from somewhere away from the quake zone. perhaps ibaraki prefecture? 

also, if it arrived in thailand in the last few days, then it was most likely picked from the ground atleast over a week ago. 

it rained just over a week ago - which apparently brings the radiation in the air to the ground. 

let's hope this is not going to be a common occurence..

----------


## Seekingasylum

> i wonder where the produce came from, and when it was sent.
> 
> given the area most affected is non-accessable, it must have come from somewhere away from the quake zone. perhaps ibaraki prefecture? 
> 
> also, if it arrived in thailand in the last few days, then it was most likely picked from the ground atleast over a week ago. 
> 
> it rained just over a week ago - which apparently brings the radiation in the air to the ground. 
> 
> let's hope this is not going to be a common occurence..


Of course it will be and much worse. The radioactive particles released by the stricken reactors have circled the globe already. The core of one of the reactors seems to have been exposed and the sea around now contaminated. The food chain will obviously be similarly affected and in time you may well have rather more than you thought when eating your next fish and chips.

Best to keep taking the pills and eat out of cans for the next 2 years.

----------


## Thormaturge

> managed under the direct commissioning authority of an international body.


 The IAEA are an International body, or should we have a different one, rather like the United Nations, where the entire world has to agree to anything, or nothing gets done?

 Hundreds of thousands of people would be dead if Chernobyl were left to a UN-style body to sort out.

----------


## harrybarracuda

I've just spent all this time learning what a fucking millisievert is and now they've started using becquerels? I thought that was a pasta sauce?

I give up.

----------


## VocalNeal

[QUOTE=mobs00;1716894]


> [B]
> 
> Would you feed theses potatoes to your kids??


Probably less harmfull than a lifetime of McDonalds fries :deadhorsebig:

----------


## kmart

> Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> 
> Japanese potatoes with signs of radioactivity seized
> 
> 
> Does this mean the'y're pre-cooked and table ready stright out of the bag?


Self-sauteeing spuds? Sounds great to me, what will those wacky Japs think of next? :bananaman:

----------


## Carrabow

> Originally Posted by Carrabow
> 
> Does Radiation have a DNA source that can be traced?
> 
> 
> Indeed it does. The half life time of radioactive Iodine is so low that the Chernobyl remnants no longer contain it. So from the relative content of different isotopes you can at least determine how old the contaminatin is. If it contains radioactive Iodine it is very new.


 
T.O 

Thanks; you learn something every day. After I made the comment I thought about it and simmered over the idea that maybe radiation had a signature wavelength or possible spectrum that could be traced. 

*Your explanation makes a hell of a lot more sense*  :Smile:

----------


## baldrick

> I've just spent all this time learning what a fucking millisievert is and now they've started using becquerels


and ....    cpm, curie, gray, rad, rem, roentgen, rutherford

----------


## sunsetter

hope theres no tsunami

Latest Earthquakes in the World - Past 7 days

----------


## sunsetter

Magnitude 6.1 - OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN






any clue as to why it got moved here please?

----------


## sunsetter

this isnt the same news item at all, dunno why you moved it here

Channel 6 News

----------


## Gerbil

Same area, there have been hundreds of aftershocks in the last weeks. If we have a thread for each one, there wont be much that's readable in News.  :Smile:

----------


## sunsetter

fair doos, no tsunami warning been issued anyway

Channel 6 News 

TOKYO (BNO NEWS) -- A strong earthquake struck off northeastern Japan on Tuesday afternoon, seismologists said, but no tsunami warnings were issued and there were no immediate reports of damage or casualties. 
The 6.4-magnitude earthquake at 7.54 p.m. local time (1107 GMT) was centered about 126 kilometers (78 miles) east-northeast of the city of Iwaki in Fukushima Prefecture, where the troubled Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant is located. It struck about 18.2 kilometers (11.3 miles) deep, making it a shallow earthquake, according to the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). 
No tsunami warnings were immediately issued, although the earthquake was widely felt in northeastern Japan where people described it as a "very long" shake. There were no immediate reports of damage or casualties. 
Parts of Japan were devastated by an enormous 9.0-magnitude earthquake which struck off its northeastern coast on March 11, generating a large tsunami and killing at least 11,000 people and leaving more than 17,000 others missing. Tuesday's earthquake is believed to be an aftershock.

----------


## Chairman Mao

Seems the radioactivity has reached Glasgow.

Video: Japan Radioactive Iodine Traces Detected In Glasgow After Tsunami And Earthquake Disaster | UK News | Sky News

----------


## HermantheGerman

It's time to send in the Putzmeister !
I'am sure that they are there for back up. But not to pour water but pour concrete. The Japanese have to face the music. Game over ! Fukushima will be a reminder and become a "The Graveyard" for the nuclear industry.





> Originally Posted by Thaihome
> 
> 
>  
> Note that the concrete pump (that the mainstream press was sure was a sign they were going to fill the reactors with concrete) is being used to spray water with the 58 metre flexible boom that allows them to direct the spray more accurately.
> TH
> 
> 
> 
> ...

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> The Japanese have to face the music. Game over ! Fukushima will be a reminder and become a "The Graveyard" for the nuclear industry.


Sorry Herman old boy..TH insists the Japanese weren't resposible in any way, so why are people making so many "waves" about the Japanese nuclear industry if it really wasn't their fault?  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic): 

p.s. answers on a postage stamp with what is going to replace nuclear power in the future please?

----------


## sabang

_"The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two, and at least some of it is down on the floor of the drywell," Lahey said. "I hope I am wrong, but that is certainly what the evidence is pointing towards."_
Japan may have lost race to save nuclear reactor | World news | guardian.co.uk

A partial meltdown, it looks like. Not good. Certainly not as bad as Chernobyl, nowhere near. But worse than Three Mile Island. I suppose the event that led to this- a natural disaster- offers some alleviating circumstance, but there is a lot of post mortem to follow on this (partial meltdown or not) before nuclear power can really be declared safe, or society can accept it as a feasible alternative to fossil fuels. The 'Mutually Assured Destruction' or MAD scenario we grew up with (the older ones) has given people a healthy suspicion of anything nuclear. Which isn't necessarily bad.

I for one do not write off nuclear power at all. But lessons will need to be learnt from this, and exactly how serious it will be is still in the balance- but again, no Chernobyl. Sobering stuff, anyway. I suspect _post factum_ stories will be emerging of just how bad this could have been, and how critical the situation was for a while. A narrowly avoided core meltdown 140 miles(?) from the worlds biggest metropolis is no joke.

----------


## Thaihome

> ..TH insists the Japanese weren't resposible in any way...


You misquoting me. II have never said the Japanese are not responsible in any way for the incident. What I did say in response to a comment that this incident was caused by the mismanagement and greed of TEPCO and the Japanese nuclear regulators was the incident was caused by a 9.0 earthquake and a 14 meter tsunami that overwhelmed the design of the plant which at the time it was built was considered adequate. 

Certainly TEPCO and the regulator bear the responsibility for incident and certainly some of the decisions they made back then and even now have made it worse, but they didnt cause it.

TH

----------


## Thormaturge

> answers on a postage stamp with what is going to replace nuclear power in the future please?


Loads of unemployed people - give them bicycles hooked to generators.

It would solve the obesity problem too.


Failing that, solar power, although there are ridiculous amounts of money being thrown at wind power at present.

----------


## HermantheGerman

> p.s. answers on a postage stamp with what is going to replace nuclear power in the future please?


Use less ! I know, that's a shocking answer but think about it.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Biggest spike in radiation at Japan power plant | The Jakarta Post
*
*Biggest spike in radiation at Japan power plant*

 Mari Yamaguchi, Associated Press, Tokyo | Wed, 03/30/2011 11:06 AM | World                    

Seawater outside the hobbled nuclear power plant in northeastern  Japan was found to contain 3,335 times the usual amount of radioactive  iodine - the highest rate yet and a sign that more contaminated water  was making its way into the ocean, officials said Wednesday.

The  amount of iodine-131 found offshore some 300 yards (meters) south of the  coastal Fukushima Dai-ichi power plant does not pose an immediate  threat to human health but was a "concern," said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a  Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency official. He said there was no  fishing in the area.

"We will nail down the cause, and will do our utmost to prevent it from rising further," Nishiyama said.

The  power plant has been leaking radiation since a March 11 tsunami slammed  into Japan's northeast, knocking out power and backup systems crucial  to keeping temperatures down inside the plant's reactors.

Residents  within 12 miles (20 kilometers) have been evacuated, while those up to  19 miles (30 kilometers) have been urged to leave as radiation has made  its way into vegetables, raw milk and water. Last week, tap water as far  away as Tokyo, 140 miles (220 kilometers) to the south, contained  levels of cancer-causing iodine-131 considered unsafe for infants.

The  latest findings - based on a sample taken Tuesday - highlight the  urgency of stabilizing the crippled power plant. The mission has been  fraught with setbacks, as emergency crews have dealt with fires,  explosions and radiation scares in the frantic bid to prevent a complete  meltdown.

The government acknowledged Tuesday that its  safeguards had been insufficient to protect the facility against the  magnitude-9.0 earthquake and tsunami.

"Our preparedness was not  sufficient," Chief Cabinet secretary Yukio Edano told reporters Tuesday.  "When the current crisis is over, we must examine the accident closely  and thoroughly review" the safety standards.

An Associated Press  investigation found that Tokyo Electric Power Co. officials had  dismissed scientific evidence and geological history that indicated that  a massive earthquake - and subsequent tsunami - was far more likely  than they believed.

That left the complex with nowhere near enough protection against the tsunami.

Highly  toxic plutonium was the latest contaminant found seeping into the soil  outside the plant, TEPCO said. Safety officials said the amounts did not  pose a risk to humans, but the finding supports suspicions that  dangerously radioactive water is leaking from damaged nuclear fuel rods.

"The situation is very grave," Edano said.

Workers  succeeded last week in reconnecting some parts of the plant to the  power grid. But as they pumped in water to cool the reactors and nuclear  fuel, they discovered numerous pools of radioactive water, including in  the basements of several buildings and in trenches outside.

The  contaminated water has been emitting many times the amount of radiation  that the government considers safe for workers. It must be pumped out  before electricity can be restored and the regular cooling systems  powered up.

That has left officials struggling with two crucial  but contradictory efforts: pumping in water to keep the fuel rods cool  and pumping out contaminated water.

Officials are hoping tanks at  the complex will be able to hold the water, or that new tanks can be  trucked in. Officials from the Nuclear Safety Commission said other  possibilities include digging a storage pit for the contaminated water,  recycling it back into the reactors or even pumping it to an offshore  tanker.

On Tuesday, three workers trying to connect a pump  outside the Unit 3 reactor were splashed by water that gushed from a  pipe. Though they wore suits meant to be waterproof and protect against  high levels of radiation, nuclear safety official Hidehiko Nishiyama  said the men were soaked to their underwear.

They quickly washed it off and were not injured, officials said.

Last  week, two workers were hospitalized with burns after they waded into  highly radioactive water that reached their knees while wearing  ankle-high protective boots. They have been treated and released.

Nikkei,  Japan's top business newspaper, called it "outrageous" that TEPCO had  been slow to release information about trenches outside the reactors  filled with contaminated water, one just a few inches (10 centimeters)  from overflowing.

TEPCO's shares plunged nearly 20 percent on Tuesday. Its share price has nose-dived a staggering 73 percent since the tsunami.

Prime  Minister Naoto Kan reiterated in a speech to parliament that Japan was  grappling with its worst problems since World War II.

More than  11,000 bodies have been recovered, but officials say the final death  toll is expected to exceed 18,000. Hundreds of thousands of people  remain homeless, their homes and livelihoods destroyed. Damage could  amount to $310 billion - the most expensive natural disaster on record.

"This  quake, tsunami and the nuclear accident are the biggest crises for  Japan" in decades, Kan said Tuesday. He said the crises remained  unpredictable, but added: "We will continue to handle it in a state of  maximum alert."

Kan has faced increasing criticism from  opposition lawmakers over the handling of a nuclear disaster stretching  into a third week.

----------


## robuzo

asahi.com
According to this article, the tetrapod breakwater, meant to reduce the force of waves hitting the shore (which they may do during typhoons) had the OPPOSITE effect on the tsunami, concentrating the force through the openings in the breakwater. In Japanese but the diagram on the page says it all.

----------


## Boon Mee

The U.S. Navy surprises Sendai with an unannounced delivery of much needed food and water.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=a9Opf4tzkSAYoull see an older Japanese man a little ways into the  clip, speaking to the camera. What he says is, essentially, that the  townspeople had no idea the Americans were coming or bringing them  anything.  There was no announcement or anything about it. Which is  true. Between the destroyed roads and the radiation fears, hardly anyone  can even get to the Sendai area. But these US pilots did.
Youll  also see, near the end of the clip, a group of older men watching as the  Navy man stacks boxes of supplies from the helicopter on the tarmac.  Theyre standing still watching him because theyre stunned. That plus  the language barrier puts them in a position where they just dont know  what to do. But you can see one of them making little gestures with his  hands, as if in prayer. Thats a sign of very deep respect and  gratitude.

----------


## robuzo

^Great news, great gesture and great PR. The US military tried its best to help after  the Kobe quake and ran into a Japanese bureaucratic wall at every turn. Looks like this time, which is much worse, is different- or maybe they didn't bother asking Tokyo.

----------


## Thaihome

> _"The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two, and at least some of it is down on the floor of the drywell," Lahey said. "I hope I am wrong, but that is certainly what the evidence is pointing towards."_
> Japan may have lost race to save nuclear reactor | World news | guardian.co.uk
> 
> ...


Interesting response to Lahey's remarks on the Physics Forums:
Physics Forums - View Single Post - Japan Earthquake: nuclear plants

_Richard Lahey is wildly speculating, which I suspect has more to do with getting paid to show up on news channels then it does to actually advance the understanding of whats happening. 

A few points which I believe are correct would tend to disprove his assertion. 

1. History has shown via three mile island that its very difficult to melt through a reactor vessel. In the case of three mile island 70% of the core slagged to the bottom of the reactor vessel and heated it to the point where the entire vessel was glowing red. In that case only 5/8" of inch out of 9" was ablated. 

2. A reactor_ _pressure__ vessel is a massive_ _heat__ sink. I believe the drywell on both reactor 1 and 2 where flooded early on in the process; providing addition temperature relief. This doesn't include the water that has been injected since the start of the accident.

3. In three mile island the molten corium destroyed the temperature probes that measure the reactor pressure vessel, which is expected when you heat the sensors to this level. The temperature sensors are still functioning at the bottom of the reactor vessel on Unit 2. If the corium melted through the reactor vessel we would not have temperature data from the bottom of the reactor. I have yet to see a temperature measurement for the bottom of any of the reactor pressure vessels that comes anywhere near the melting point of steel. 

4. Three mile islands coolant loss event occurred much earlier in the reactor shutdown process then did at Fukushima. This implies the fuel rods at three mile island suffered exponentially higher heat loads then the core at Fukushima. 

finally, Richard Lahey states "The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two..."

What indications from the reactor? The radiation readings can be explained by the known damage suffered to the fuel storage pools. 

Just my thoughts on the subject. I reserve the right to be mistaken._

----------


## StrontiumDog

*URGENT: Edano suggests scrapping of all reactors at Fukushima Daiichi plant | Kyodo News
*
*URGENT: Edano suggests scrapping of all reactors at Fukushima Daiichi plant*

 TOKYO, March 30, Kyodo

 Top government spokesman Yukio Edano  suggested Wednesday that all of the reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi  nuclear plant should be scrapped.

 ''It is very clear looking at the social circumstances. That is my  perception,'' Edano said in a news conference when asked if all six  reactors at the troubled nuclear plant should be decommissioned.

 Earlier in the day, Tsunehisa Katsumata, chairman of Tokyo Electric  Power Co., said the company sees decommissioning the Nos. 1-4 reactors  at the plant as inevitable.

----------


## Poo and Pee

^that's  a no-brainer. the plants - along with the entire area are a no entry zone for the unforeseen future...

----------


## Takeovers

> that's a no-brainer. the plants - along with the entire area are a no entry zone for the unforeseen future...


Three reactorblocks in Chernobyl were operating long past the accident.

The last reactor in Chernobyl was switched off in Dec. 2000. They even attempted to continue work on two half finished reactors for some time until it was decided the radiation level is too high for construction work.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Short Sharp Science: Resin to be sprayed on Fukushima nuclear plant
*
*Resin to be sprayed on Fukushima nuclear plant*

  15:28 30 March 2011   

_Michael Marshall, environment reporter_

  With no sign of the crisis at Fukushima Daiichi being resolved any time soon, plans are now afoot to spray a resin over the embattled nuclear power plant.
Kyodo News explains:Within the compound, masses of debris are strewn about the  plant as a result of explosions, and this is making it very difficult  for plant workers to bring the crisis under control. While frantic  efforts are under way to cool reactors and remove water contaminated  with high levels of radiation from facilities in the plant, the  government hopes to facilitate the task by making it safe for workers to  perform. The resin is designed to prevent dirt containing radioactive  substances being scattered in the wind, the officials said.In short, this is a short-term measure to help the workers do their jobs in (relative) safety.

                Meanwhile the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), which owns and runs the plant, is running into all sorts of difficulties. Reuters reports that it is in serious financial trouble:Tokyo Electric Power warned on Wednesday that a $24-billion  bank loan was not enough to keep it afloat and pay for Japan's worst  nuclear disaster, adding to expectations the government will step in to  bail out the stricken company. [The company's] share price has crashed  nearly 80 per cent since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that  sparked the crisis._The Washington Post_ notes that the company's chairman has been hospitalised:[Masataka] Shimizu, 66, has not been seen in public since a  13 March news conference in Tokyo, raising speculation that he had  suffered a breakdown. For days, officials deflected questions about  Shimizu's whereabouts, saying he was "resting" at company headquarters.  Spokesman Naoki Tsunoda said Wednesday that Shimizu had been admitted to  a Tokyo hospital after suffering dizziness and high blood pressure. The  leadership vacuum at TEPCO... comes amid growing criticism over its  failure to halt the radiation leaks. Bowing deeply, arms at his side,  chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata announced at a news conference that he  would step in and apologized for the delay.And in an unsurprising development given the amount of seawater that  has been pumped into them, the company has announced that the four  reactors at the centre of the crisis will be permanently scrapped. The BBC reports:[TEPCO] made the announcement three weeks after failing to  bring reactors 1-4 under control. Locals would be consulted on reactors 5  and 6, which were shut down safely.Xinhua quotes Japan's chief cabinet secretary Yukio Edano as saying that all six should be decommissioned.

  Radioactive material from the plant has reached the Pacific Ocean. According to the BBC:Radiation levels in the sea near the stricken Fukushima  plant have risen to their highest yet, more than 3000 times above the  legal limit. It is the strongest sign yet that highly radioactive water  from the plant is leaking into the Pacific Ocean. The continuing  radiation leaks are dismal news for people up and down the east coast of  Japan who depend on the sea for their livelihoods.So it should come as no surprise that Japan has ordered a review of safety procedures at its nuclear reactors. Reuters reports:[Japan's trade ministry] said on Wednesday that nuclear  plants would be required by mid-April to deploy back-up mobile power  generators and fire trucks able to pump water, while beefing up training  programs and manuals, aiming to avoid a repeat of the crisis at the  Fukushima nuclear plant. It will also look at longer-term solutions such  as requiring higher sea walls at nuclear stations and will review its  energy policy to encourage renewables, although it reiterated that  nuclear power was expected to retain an important role.

----------


## foreigner

"An Associated Press  investigation found that Tokyo Electric Power Co.  officials had  dismissed scientific evidence and geological history ... "

evangelicals in TPC management?

----------


## misskit

*Up to 1,000 bodies left untouched within Fukushima no-go zone*

Up to 1,000 bodies left untouched within Fukushima no-go zone | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Loy Toy

> Up to 1,000 bodies left untouched within Fukushima no-go zone


Good gracious me.  :34:  :Sad: 


I just hope that lessons have been learned and the 100's of thousands of people who have either died, been affected or will be affected in the future by this tragedy will not have suffered in vain.

----------


## Mid

> I just hope that lessons have been learned and the 100's of thousands of people who have either died, been affected or will be affected in the future by this tragedy will not have suffered in vain.


whilst I share your sediments the pragmatist in me knows that it is in vain .  :Sad:

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Radiation levels in seawater off Japan plant spike to all-time highs - CNN.com
*
*Radiation levels in seawater off Japan plant spike to all-time highs*

  By  *the CNN Wire Staff*
March 31, 2011 -- Updated 0623 GMT (1423 HKT)

*STORY HIGHLIGHTS*Levels of iodine-131 in the sea off the nuclear plant are 4,385 times the normal limitCesium-137, with a half-life of 30 years, is measured at 527 times above the standardAuthorities do not know what's caused this radiation spike or exactly how to stop itDespite new findings from IAEA, Japan says it won't yet expand the evacuation zone*Tokyo (CNN)*  -- The levels of radiation in ocean waters off Japan's embattled  Fukushima Daiichi plant continue to skyrocket, the nation's nuclear  safety agency said Thursday, with no clear sense of what's causing the  spike or how to stop it.

 The amount of radioactive iodine-131  isotope in the samples, taken Wednesday some 330 meters (361 yards) into  the Pacific Ocean, has surged to 4,385 times above the regulatory  limit. This tops the previous day's reading of 3,355 times above the  standard -- and an exponential spike over the 104-times increase  measured just last Friday.

 Officials have downplayed the potential perils posed by this isotope, since it loses half of its radiation every eight days.

 Yet  amounts of the cesium-137 isotope -- which, by comparison, has a  30-year "half life" -- have also soared, with a Wednesday afternoon  sample showing levels 527 times the standard.

 "That's the one I  am worried about," said Michael Friedlander, a U.S.-based nuclear  engineer, explaining cesium might linger much longer in the ecosystem.  "Plankton absorbs the cesium, the fish eat the plankton, the bigger fish  eat smaller fish -- so every step you go up the food chain, the  concentration of cesium gets higher."

 On Thursday, Hidehiko  Nishiyama, a Japanese nuclear safety official, reiterated that seawater  radiation doesn't yet pose a health risk to humans eating seafood.

 Fishing  is not allowed within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the plant, and he  claimed that waterborne radiation should dilute over time.

 Still, authorities don't know where the highly radioactive water is coming from.

 Nishiyama  said it may be flowing continuously into the sea. Another explanation  is that water, which authorities have pumped and sprayed in by the tons  in recent weeks to stave off a meltdown, became contaminated by  overheating nuclear fuel in the process and ended up in the ocean  without having any room to settle in the nuclear plant.

 "They  have a problem where the more they try to cool it down, the greater the  radiation hazard as that water leaks out from the plant," said Jim  Walsh, an international security expert at the Massachusetts Institute  of Technology.

 Persistent rain and wind forced the plant's owner,  the Tokyo Electric Power Company, to postpone Thursday a new fix to  contain the spread of radiation: a water and synthetic resin mix to  envelop radioactive particles. The plan is to spend at least three weeks  spraying the solution on the grounds and sides of reactors at the  Daiichi facility.

 The nuclear plant has been in a state of  perpetual crisis since being rocked by the March 11 earthquake and  subsequent tsunami, and there's no clear end in sight.

 This has all left the plant's owner reeling, with the ordeal taking a significant toll on both its reputation and bottom line.

 On  Wednesday -- the same day the company announced that its president,  Masataka Shimizu, had been hospitalized due to "fatigue and stress" --  Tokyo Electric's chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata said it had no choice but  to decommission four of the plant's six reactors.

 He acknowledged  reports Japan's government is mulling nationalizing the company after  the disaster, saying, "We want to make every effort to stay a private  company."

 Beyond the recovery and clean-up expenses, Toyko  Electric will likely be asked to pay those who suffered because of the  nuclear crisis.

 A report from Bank of America Merrill Lynch  estimates the utility firm will face 1 trillion Japanese yen ($12.13  billion) in compensation claims if the recovery effort lasts two months,  rising to 10 trillion yen if it goes on for two years, said Takayuki  Inoue, a spokesman with the financial giant.

 That might include  farmers, their livelihoods shattered after the detection of high  radiation in several vegetables prompting the government to ban sales.  Contaminated tap water also has prompted officials to tell residents in  some locales to only offer bottled water to infants. Businesses have  been hit hard, too, by rolling blackouts tied to the strained power  grid.

 But those most affected have been the thousands, living  within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the stricken plant, who have been  ordered to evacuate.

 The International Atomic Energy Agency on  Thursday urged Japanese authorities to "carefully assess the situation"  -- and consider expanding the evacuation zone further -- after high  radiation levels were found in Iitate, a town of 7,000 residents 40  kilometers northwest of the nuclear facility.

 The U.N. agency did  not say how much radiation it had detected, though the environmental  group Greenpeace said Sunday it found levels more than 50 times above  normal.

 Koboyashi Takashi, Iitate's manager for general affairs,  said radiation levels in soil and water were decreasing. Residents had  temporarily evacuated, but later returned to take care of livestock, he  said.

 Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters  Thursday the "IAEA results will be taken into consideration," but said  "there is no plan" to expand the evacuation zone to 30 kilometers or  beyond.

 "There is no immediate health hazard,"  Edano said. "If the exposure continues for a long period of time, (a  negative) impact can occur. We will continue to survey the situation."

----------


## Loy Toy

> Officials have downplayed the potential perils posed by this isotope, since it loses half of its radiation every eight days.


This one quote sums up the most dangerous component in this whole ecological disaster.

Whilst these bureaucratic bums sit there trying to play down every aspect of this ongoing disatser our ecology is being adversely affected to levels never experienced before.

They should muzzle these fookers or jail them for lying.

----------


## Mid

only took 20 days for the apology to be forth coming and then they had to roll out the aging chairman as the President fell sick last night . 

no doubt the illness was compounded by the horror of losing face in delivering the apology .

----------


## Loy Toy

> only took 20 days for the apology to be forth coming and then they had to roll out the aging chairman as the President fell sick last night . no doubt the illness was compounded by the horror of losing face in delivering the apology .


I don't know what you think mate but it makes me wonder what else they are not telling us.

Yes, others here will claim they are sworn to secrecy so as not to inflame riots and public concern (to protect us  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic): ) but they push health and safety boundries and in an attempt to save some bucks.

The Japs are doing it as we type, as do all other governments as they lie through their teeth holding back the truth and when it comes to the larger corporations fok-ups and when it is tied to money.

----------


## Mid

WE know what is good for you , TRUST US .   :Sad: 

bhaaa

----------


## misskit

This will make Butterfly happy.


*Kan & Sarkozy to cooperate in handling nuke crisis*

NHK WORLD English

----------


## Gerbil

^ presumably this will involve wrapping the reactors in some sort of giant white flag?  :bunny3:

----------


## Butterfly

Sarko trying to find a new noble cause so everyone can forget his success with the last one in Libya

----------


## StrontiumDog

*IAEA Briefing on Fukushima Nuclear Accident (31 March 2011, 14.00 UTC) | Facebook
*
*IAEA Briefing on Fukushima Nuclear Accident (31 March 2011, 14.00 UTC)*

by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Thursday, March 31, 2011 at 7:10am

*1. Current Situation*

Overall at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, the situation remains very serious.

The *Unit 1*  condenser is full.  Pumping water from the Unit-1 turbine building  basement to the Unit-1 condenser has been stopped as of 22:30 UTC on 28  March.  For *Units 2 and 3*, in order to prepare for  removal of the water from the turbine building basement, pumping of  water from the condenser to the suppression pool water surge tank  started  at 07:45 UTC 29 March and 08:40 UTC March 28 respectively.

For *Unit 1*  fresh water has been continuously injected into the Reactor Pressure  Vessel (RPV) through the feed-water line at an indicated flow rate of 8  m3/h using a temporary electric pump with diesel backup. In *Unit 2*  fresh water is injected continuously through the fire extinguisher line  at an indicated rate of 8 m3/h using a temporary electric pump with  diesel backup.  In *Unit 3* fresh water is being injected  continuously at about 7 m3/h into the reactor core through the fire  extinguisher line using a temporary electric pump with diesel backup.

The indicated temperature at the feed water nozzle of the RPV on *Unit 1*  has decreased from 281 oC to 251 oC and at the bottom of RPV decreased  from 134 oC to 128 oC. There appears to be a corresponding decrease in  RPV pressure with a slight decrease in Drywell pressure.  The indicated  temperature at the feed water nozzle of the RPV of *Unit 2*  has increased from 177 oC to 181 oC. The temperature at the bottom of  RPV was not reported. Indicated Drywell pressure remains at atmospheric  pressure.  The indicated temperature at the feed water nozzle of the RPV  in *Unit 3* is about 89 oC and at the bottom of RPV is  about 114 oC. The validity of the RPV temperature measurement at the  feed water nozzle is still under investigation.

No further information is available regarding the plan to commence the pumping of water into the *Unit 1* Spent Fuel Pool by concrete pumping truck from 29 March.  On *Unit 2*   the temporary electric pump supplying water to the spent fuel pool  experienced a malfunction. Spent fuel pool water supply was changed to a  fire truck pump but a crack was discovered in a hose on 30 March 04:10  UTC. Pumping water to the spent fuel pool was therefore stopped.   Pumping was subsequently restored and water was fed into spent fuel pool  in *Unit 2* from 10:05 UTC on March 30.  Water injection into the spent fuel pool in *Unit 4* by concrete pump was completed at 09:33 UTC on March 30.

*Units 5 and 6* remain in cold shutdown

*2. Radiation Monitoring*

On  30 March, deposition of iodine-131 was detected in 8 prefectures, and  deposition of cesium-137 in 12 prefectures. On 30 March in the  prefectures where deposition of iodine-131 was reported, the range was  from 2.5 to 240 becquerel per square metre. For caesium-137, the range  was from 3 to 57 becquerel per square metre. In the Shinjyuku district  of Tokyo, the daily deposition of both iodine-131 and cesium-137 on 30  March was below 30 becquerel per square metre. No significant changes  were reported in the 45 prefectures in gamma dose rates compared to  yesterday.

Most of the previously imposed recommendations  for restrictions on drinking have been lifted. As of 28 March,  recommendations for restrictions based on I-131 concentration remain in  place in four villages of in the Fukushima prefecture, in three of these  villages, restrictions continue to apply for infants only.

Two  IAEA teams are currently monitoring radiation levels and radioactivity  in the environment in Japan. On 30 March, one team made gamma dose-rate  measurements in the Tokyo region at 7 locations. Gamma-dose rates  measured ranged from 0.03 to 0.28 microsievert per hour, which is within  or slightly above the background. The second team made additional  measurements at 7 locations in the Hirono area, South of  Fukushima-Daiichi NPP. The measurement locations were at distances of 23  to 39 km from the Fukushima nuclear power plant. The dose rates ranged  from 0.5 to 4.9 microsievert per hour. At the same locations, results of  beta-gamma contamination measurements ranged from 0.04 to 0.34  Megabecquerel per square metre.

Since our briefing of  yesterday, significant data related to food contamination has been  submitted by the Japanese Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.   Seventy-six samples were taken from 28-30 March, and reported on 30  March. Analytical results for 51 of the 76 samples for various  vegetables, fruit (strawberry), seafood (sardines), and unprocessed raw  milk in eight prefectures (Chiba, Fukushima, Gunma, Ibaraki, Kanagawa,  Niigata, Saitama, and Yamagata), indicated that iodine-131, caesium-134  and caesium-137 were either not detected or were below the regulation  values set by the Japanese authorities.  However, it was reported that  analytical results in Fukushima prefecture for the remaining 25 of the  76 samples for broccoli, cabbage, rapeseed, spinach and other leafy  vegetables, indicated that iodine-131 and/or caesium-134 and caesium-137  exceeded the regulation values set by the Japanese authorities.

The  Joint FAO/IAEA Food Safety Assessment Team met with local government  officials in Gunma prefecture on Wednesday.  Farmers and producers were  also represented and the meeting attracted media coverage.  The  questions to the IAEA/FAO team mainly focused on technical issues of  remediation strategies, including the implications of long term releases  if the NPP is not stabilized, the disposal of contaminated produce,  mechanisms of 131I and 137Cs contamination, other possible radionuclides  that may be produced/should be monitored, contamination of fruit and  mushrooms, occupational exposure risks in the handling animals and  agricultural products, feeding strategies for animals in affected areas,  monitoring of  soil and fallout and remediation strategies and  methodologies.  There were also discussions with producers and farmer  organizations over the development of strategies for the next cropping  season.

Local government officials briefed the FAO/IAEA  Team on current knowledge of the extent of contamination in Gunma  prefecture, including the principal agricultural products affected and  levels of contamination found.

The Joint FAO/IAEA Team  presented their report and responded to inquires at a follow-up  inter-ministerial meeting in Tokyo. The meeting was attended by  representatives of the Japanese Cabinet Office, Ministry of Foreign  Affairs, Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare and the Ministry of  Agriculture. Strong interest was expressed as to the remediation of the  agricultural land, continued possible contamination of agricultural  products, and the need to maintain communication with relevant  ministries in the future.

New results from the marine  monitoring stations 30 km off-shore were reported for 28 March. These  results indicate a decrease for the northernmost sampling station for  I-131 and a slight increase for Cs-137 as compared to values measured on  27 March. For sampling points situated towards the south of the  transect an increase has been recorded, both for I-131 and for Cs-137 as  compared to the previous day, with maximum concentrations in water  below 30 Bq/l and 20 Bq/l respectively, still considerably lower than  the maxima recorded on 23 March. This increase can be correlated with  trends in concentrations measured close to the discharge points.

The  latest analyses in seawater 330 m south of the discharge point of NPP  Units 1 – 4, and 30 m north of the discharge point of Units 5-6 were  made available for 29 March. In particular readings of 130 000 Bq/l of   I-131, 32 000 Bq/l of Cs-137 and 31 000 Bq/l of Cs-134 were reported  near Units 1 - 4.

The Russian Federation, Singapore,  Ireland and Switzerland reported the detection of very small amounts of  iodine-131 and cesium-137 in air. Highest levels found are in the order  of a few millibecquerel per cubic meter.  The levels are not of any  radiological concern.

----------


## Takeovers

Good to hear the concrete pump is utilized and useful. That should clarify the intentions of getting it in place at Fukushima. Burying the reactors with concrete is not their primary aim. Recently it could be seen frequently in photos and videos in position to pump water.

----------


## robuzo

So, if they decide to bury the reactors and holding ponds containing 60+ tons of spent fuel under boric-acid treated concrete, how much concrete are we talking about? Is this joint not on a bluff overlooking a beach? Will the dirt/sand/rock under the surely enormous pile of concrete be able to support the weight, or will it all go sliding down onto the beach? Just wonderin'.

----------


## StrontiumDog

BBCWorld   BBC Global News                                             

            Radioactivity 10,000 times the limit detected from groundwater around #Fukushima reactor: Kyodo news agency, quoting Tokyo Electric Power Co
1 minute ago

----------


## Takeovers

> So, if they decide to bury the reactors and holding ponds containing 60+ tons of spent fuel under boric-acid treated concrete, how much concrete are we talking about?


Fortunately that option seems increasingly unlikely. Did you read the IAEA report quoted by SD in post 1136?

Three of four reactor cores are now under direct cooling by injecting cooling water into the core, excellent news. Especially as reactor 3 is one of them, that is the one with MOX-fuel that contains Plutonium.
If they can achieve the same on reactor 4 the immediate danger of a major disaster is averted. They can then move on to cleaning up operations.
The report also seems to indicate that there is pressure on those reactor containments which would mean they are not breached.

I do wonder why they put those facts into a dry buerocratic report instead of announcing the success with major fanfare. Probably they fear to be accused of downplaying danger.

----------


## Airportwo

*Link:  Mike Whitney: Is Fukushima About to Blow?*



*The Doomsday Scenario*

*Is Fukushima About to Blow?*

By MIKE WHITNEY
Conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant are deteriorating and the doomsday scenario is beginning to unfold. On Sunday, Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) officials reported that the levels of radiation leaking into seawater at the Unit 2 reactor were 100,000 times above normal, and the airborne radiation measured 4-times higher than government limits. As a result, emergency workers were evacuated from the plant and rushed to safe location. The prospect of a full-core meltdown or an environmental catastrophe of incalculable magnitude now looms larger than ever. The crisis is getting worse.
If spent fuel rods catch fire from lack of coolant, the intense heat will lift radiation plumes high into the atmosphere that will drift around the world. That's the nightmare scenario, clouds of radioactive material showering the planet with lethal toxins for months on end. And, according to the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics of Vienna, that deadly process has already begun. The group told New Scientist that:
"Japan's damaged nuclear plant in Fukushima has been emitting radioactive iodine and caesium at levels approaching those seen in the aftermath of the Chernobyl accident in 1986. Austrian researchers have used a worldwide network of radiation detectors – designed to spot clandestine nuclear bomb tests – to show that iodine-131 is being released at daily levels 73 per cent of those seen after the 1986 disaster. The daily amount of caesium-137 released from Fukushima Daiichi is around 60 per cent of the amount released from Chernobyl. ("New Scientist", March 24 ---thanks to Michael Collins "They said it wasn't like Chernobyl and they were wrong")

----------


## Muadib

> ^ presumably this will involve wrapping the reactors in some sort of giant white flag?


Either that or wrap it in crepes... The French are good at crepes... 

In the meantime, let's pump a few thousand gallons of radioactive water directly into the sea... No one will notice...

----------


## robuzo

^"If spent fuel rods catch fire from lack of coolant, the intense heat will lift radiation plumes high into the atmosphere"

Again and again we come back to the stored spent fuel rods. One of my closest friends is a nuke tech and prof at UCLA who teaches, amongst other course, a nuclear safety course (for radiologists). He says that for the life of him he can't understand why they would store the spent fuel rods onsite, unless it was a simply a cost-saving measure driven by the bean counters (and greedy pricks in management). The decision to do so is one that has already come back to haunt TEPCO's management, and may be haunting Japan (and other parts of the world) for years to come.
By the way, the aftershocks continue, with a mag 6 on the seabed off Miyagi on the 31st, and one the day before. According to this article in the Yomiuri å°éï¼é±é å¼ãç¶ãä½éæ³¨æãNHKãã¥ã¼ã¹, which quotes Japan's Meteorological Agency, while the number of aftershocks have been decreasing, a mag 7 remains a possibility, with a violent 5 or 6 near the epicenter of the original quake a concern. Imagine what sort of monkey wrench another tsunami would throw into the works.

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## HermantheGerman

[quote=Takeovers;1719180]


> I do wonder why they put those facts into a dry buerocratic report instead of announcing the success with major fanfare. Probably they fear to be accused of downplaying danger.


Woohw, you got some strange kind of humour there Takeovers.

The report started off that the situation is very serious. I don't know what you are interpertrating out of this.

I have not heard any good news yet. They now found radiation in beef and in the groundwater.

Its like peeing into a campfire. The fire is not going out.....and the sparks are lighting up the forest.


P.S.  They we running out of workers at Fukushima. The ones there are very tired and their life expectancy is getting shorter by the minute.

----------


## Takeovers

> He says that for the life of him he can't understand why they would store the spent fuel rods onsite,


That is a strange statement from some who you say is well informed. It is a calculated decision made as much on safety as on financial reasons. It is done exactly the same way in german reactors (fact) and probably worldwide (my guess).

The reason is that they did not want to move the freshly removed fuel rods more than absolutely necessary from reactor to their temporary storage.

They may reconsider now on the basis of the Fukushima disaster.

And I stand by my understanding of the IAEA report that it contains very good positive news. That Fukushima approaches Chernobyl scale is utter bullshit. At least so far and if nothing new catastrophic happens.
That is not saying Fukushima is not bad, it is.

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by robuzo
> 
>  He says that for the life of him he can't understand why they would store the spent fuel rods onsite,
> 
> 
> That is a strange statement from some who you say is well informed. It is a calculated decision made as much on safety as on financial reasons. It is done exactly the same way in german reactors (fact) and probably worldwide (my guess).
> 
> The reason is that they did not want to move the freshly removed fuel rods more than absolutely necessary from reactor to their temporary storage.
> 
> They may reconsider now on the basis of the Fukushima disaster.


Hmm, why would they reconsider now if it made so much sense? Kind of undermined your own argument, such as it was.  Um, "temporary storage"- you mean, until they thought of somewhere else to put them? Of course, getting approval for that is difficult, so why not let them pile up where they are? The "calculated" (do you think using that word makes the decision seem more thoughtful?) decision was based on expediency and cost, not to mention the fact that TEPCO had the regulators in their back pocket and so wouldn't face complaints about what was being done onsite.

----------


## misskit

*Tsunami-hit towns face dire future*
Fearful survivors see little appeal in rebuilding

Tsunami-hit towns face dire future | The Japan Times Online

----------


## misskit

*284 Thais still missing in Japan, delays irk relatives*

Bangkok Post : 284 Thais still missing in Japan, delays irk relatives

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## Butterfly

isn't the temporary storage used to "recycle" the spent fuel rods ? or to "re-energize" the spent fuels for further process ?

----------


## Thaihome

> Originally Posted by misskit
> 
> Up to 1,000 bodies left untouched within Fukushima no-go zone
> 
> 
> Good gracious me. 
> 
> 
> I just hope that lessons have been learned and the 100's of thousands of people who have either died, been affected or will be affected in the future by this tragedy will not have suffered in vain.


 
The article in the link actaully said nothing about bodies being left "left untouched within Fukushima no-go zone".  

There is no No-Go Zone. Residents within 20km have been evacuated but rescue work continues within that area as the level of radiation are not harmful if exposure is kept limited.  Workers are transported into and out of the area every day.  

Would you care to explain what you mean by "suffered in vain"?  

TH

----------


## misskit

^The link was wrong. Sorry.
   Share 	| 	 	 	 	 

 Friday, April 1, 2011

*Hundreds of corpses believed irradiated, inaccessible*

  Kyodo News
    Radiation is preventing the retrieval of hundreds of  bodies from inside the 20-km evacuation zone around the Fukushima No. 1  nuclear power plant, police sources said Thursday. 

    Based on initial reports after the March 11  catastrophe, the number of bodies is estimated at between a few hundred  and 1,000, one of the sources said, adding that high radiation is now  hampering full-scale searches.
     That view was supported by the Sunday find of high  radiation levels on a body found in Okuma, Fukushima Prefecture, 5 km  from the plant.
     The rescuers are now in a bind. Even if they retrieve  the bodies, anyone who comes into contact with them risks being  irradiated, too, whether they're in the evacuation zone or not.
     And if the bodies are cremated, the smoke could spread  radioactive materials as well, the sources said. Even burial poses a  problem. When the bodies decompose, they might contaminate the soil with  radioactive materials.
     Authorities are considering decontaminating and  inspecting the bodies where they are found, but the sources said  cleansing the decomposing bodies could damage them further. 



Hundreds of corpses believed irradiated, inaccessible | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Cujo

Bloody hell, one thing after the next.
You've got to feel for those living near the plant, first an earthquake, then a tsunami now radiation poisoning, on top of that many of them would have lost loved ones. They must be feeling pretty stressed.

----------


## Thaihome

> ^The link was wrong. Sorry.
>   Share | 
> 
> Friday, April 1, 2011
> 
> *Hundreds of corpses believed irradiated, inaccessible*
> 
> Kyodo News
> Radiation is preventing the retrieval of hundreds of bodies from inside the 20-km evacuation zone around the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, police sources said Thursday. 
> ...


Thanks for the correct link. 

Would make sense that any bodies within 5 km or so of the plant, especially to the northeast, would be contaminated after almost 3 weeks of exposure. They do not say what the level of contamination is, mostly I suspect because it rather low. 

It is important to keep in mind these people were killed by the earthquake and tsunami, not radiation poisoning.


The article does make what is now a common mistake among the mass media in confusing the terms irradiated and contaminated. A body that has been irradiated cannot irradiate a person touching it. 

_Contamination versus Irradiation_ 

_Contamination_

_Contamination is the process by which radioactive material is deposited any place where it is not desired, particularly where its presence may be harmful. The harm may be invalidating an experiment or a procedure, or in actually being a source of danger to personnel._

_Contamination could be thought of as a cup of coffee that has spilled. If the coffee cup is securely covered with a lid you can take it in the car or take it on a walk without any fear it might spill. If the coffee cup is not securely covered with a lid, some of the coffee could spill on your clothes while driving your car. That is contamination, material deposited in a place where it was not desired. Someone else could also spill some coffee on a table and you could put your papers in the coffee. That is the process of spreading the unwanted coffee contamination from one location to another._

_Facilities using radioactive materials regularly monitor for contamination. Workers can safely work with radiation and are trained in special handling techniques so as not to create or spread contamination._ 



_Irradiation_

_When an unstable atom decays it emits energy in the form of radiation. This radiation has the ability to deposit energy in the material that is in the pathway of the radiation. This process of being in the pathway of traveling radiation is called exposure. When the traveling radiation is ionizing radiation, like alpha, beta, gamma and x-rays, this process is called irradiation. Once the person or object is removed from the pathway of the radiation, or is outside of the range of the radiation, they are no longer being irradiated. An application of irradiation most people experience is medical or dental x-rays._

_When someone or something is irradiated it does not become radioactive. To be radioactive the person, or object, must be able to emit radiation. Since the person, or object, did not come in actual physical contact with the radioactive material and was only in the pathway of the emitted radiation, the person or object could not be contaminated with radioactive material. Thus, the person or object does not have radioactive material on them and is not able to emit radiation._ 

_Irradiation could be thought of as the aroma from a cup of coffee as you pass by. When you are near the coffee you can smell a strong aroma. As you walk further away from the coffee, the smell becomes fainter and fainter. Since you did not come in physical contact with the coffee there is no way the coffee could be on you or your clothes. By only passing the coffee and smelling the coffee the coffee did not contaminate you._ 



_Source_

_Office of Radiation Protection, Washington State Department of Health_ 
Office of Radiation Protection - Contamination versus Irradiation Fact Sheet - Washington State Department of Health


TH

----------


## Mid

One Satellite Phone

One Stretcher

and

One Hundred Years before it will be safe .

Go Nuclear  :mid: 

Japan plant&#039;s disaster plan &#039;inadequate&#039; | Herald Sun

----------


## misskit

*Over 28,000 dead or missing*

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*Thailand to send power facility to Japan*

NHK WORLD English

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Mother: Fukushima workers expect to die from radiation - World Watch - CBS News
*
*Mother: Fukushima workers expect to die from radiation*

  Posted by CBSNews.com staff 

 
Workers in radiation protection suits prepare  for the decontamination of two nuclear plant workers exposed to high  radiation at the Fukushima Medical University March 24, 2011.
 (Credit: STR/AFP/Getty Images) 

Workers at Japan's severely damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear  power plant believe they will likely die from the radiation exposure  they have endured while trying to keep the nuclear reactors from melting  down, the mother of one of the workers told Fox News.  "He  told me they have accepted they will all probably die from radiation  sickness in the short term or cancer in the long-term," the mother of a  32-year-old worker said through a translator. She asked to remain  anonymous because the plant workers and their families have been told  not to speak to the media.

  A group of workers, dubbed the  "Fukushima 50" have remained at the earthquake- and tsunami-damaged  site despite dangerous levels of radiation in the air and water there.  They have "discussed it at length and they have committed themselves to  die if necessary to save the nation," the woman said.

  Online postings and emails from workers at Japan's nuclear power plants have provided glimpses into their largely unknown lives in the three weeks since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, which is estimated to have killed 19,000 people.

  In  the handful of messages posted on social networking websites and  obtained by media outlets, workers acknowledge that they might not  survive efforts to prevent a meltdown at the nuclear plant and ask  readers to appreciate that trying to contain leaking radiation has  prevented them from reconnecting with loved ones they haven't seen since  the natural disaster hit.

  "My town is gone," a worker named Emiko Ueno wrote in an email that The New York Times published  in print editions Thursday. "My parents are still missing. I still  cannot get in the area because of the evacuation order. I still have to  work in such a mental state. This is my limit."

  Tokyo  Electric Power Co., which operates the stricken plant, says medical  teams conduct regular testing on the workers for signs of radiation  sickness, Fox reported. Three workers were hospitalized last week after  being burned by highly radioactive water, but no further  hospitalizations have been reported.

  Men  working at the site have been sleeping in conference rooms and  hallways, Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said. The  worker's mother said that her son has been sleeping on a desk because he  is afraid of further radiation exposure from lying on the floor.

  On Thursday, the New Scientist published a translation of a portion of a message a worker identified as Morizo published to a Japanese blog site March 19:It's  probably a given that we employees are to handle the situation even if  the consequences may be dire for us. So we are doing what we can as best  as we can. We will be carrying a cross on our back for the rest of our  lives... We are very sorry for the inconvenience we are causing because  of the scheduled blackouts ... We employees at TEPCO have not been able  to make time to take care of our own health let alone check on our own  families' safety.

----------


## misskit

Dog is rescued after 3 weeks at sea.

----------


## Carrabow

> Dog is rescued after 3 weeks at sea.


 
Three weeks with no water? That dog is gonna be in bad shape. Hope his liver a kidneys recover.

----------


## Mid

> Mother: Fukushima workers expect to die from radiation


She needs to speak with TH .  :Sad: 




> the level of radiation are not harmful if exposure is kept limited. Workers are transported into and out of the area every day.

----------


## misskit

> Three weeks with no water? That dog is gonna be in bad shape. Hope his liver a kidneys recover.


Did you see the dog? It looks to be well fed! The announcer said the rescuers were hoping the dog would lead them to its owner. I shutter to think perhaps the owner was alive for a while.

----------


## Carrabow

> Originally Posted by Carrabow
> 
> Three weeks with no water? That dog is gonna be in bad shape. Hope his liver a kidneys recover.
> 
> 
> Did you see the dog? It looks to be well fed! The announcer said the rescuers were hoping the dog would lead them to its owner. I shutter to think perhaps the owner was alive for a while.


 
The Japanese spoil their pets, it might be possible it was extremely obese before the incident. Or the length of time exagerated.

----------


## Butterfly

> She needs to speak with TH


because the mother is a nuclear expert ?  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## StrontiumDog

Bangkok Post : How much danger is there from Japan's radiation leak?

IN Print                     *

How much danger is there from Japan's radiation leak?*
Published:  2/04/2011 at 12:00 AMNewspaper section: News
 Even though the Fukushima nuclear power plant  appears under control at least to a certain degree, the periodic  explosions from buildings housing reactors have created panic among the  people about the danger of radiation leakage into the atmosphere, water  and soil, noted Thai Rath.

 Since radiation leakage is not visible to the naked eye, rumours have  spread widely on social media websites, multimedia and traditional word  of mouth. Some rumours quoted international news agencies saying that  radiation had spread to the Philippines, Hong Kong and was on its way to  Thailand.

 Some believe that iodine tablets can completely cure radiation  sickness. Some even believe the rumour that Betadine, Purdue Pharma's  brand of consumer-available povidone-iodine (PVPI) topical antiseptic,  can be applied at the throat to prevent thyroid cancer caused by  radiation.

 Dr Sathaporn Wongcharoen, director-general of the Department of  Medical Sciences, pointed out that right now there is no medicine that  can [completely] cure sickness caused by being exposed to nuclear  reactor radiation. Stable iodine (iodine-127) or potassium iodine  tablets are used to fight against being exposed to iodine-131, one of  the most carcinogenic nuclear fission products.

 These tablets are being taken by Japanese nuclear plant workers whose  duty it is to hose water onto the reactors at the plant to prevent the  fuel rods from overheating.

 Those workers face higher risks of exposure to iodine-131 that is  concentrated in the thyroid gland. The consumption of stable iodine is  in order to make it harder for iodine-131 to attach to their thyroid  glands.

 He also cautioned against stocking up on iodine tablets for personal  consumption because taking a dose without a doctor's prescription could  cause death as the iodine tablet has a concentration of 130,000  microgrammes while an iodine tablet given to a pregnant woman to prevent  a child being born with cretinism due to an iodine deficiency disorder  has only 150 microgrammes of iodine concentration.

 Buying such a high concentration iodine tablet and consuming it  without a medical doctor's supervision could cause side effects such as  an irregular heartbeat, leading to possible death.

 If a person is over 40 years old, taking iodine tablets to prevent  radiation sickness is unnecessary as people over 40 have thyroids that  don't easily absorb iodine. Thus, when the body receives radioactive  iodine, the body mechanism flushes it out naturally.

 Dr Sathaporn also debunked the idea of rubbing Betadine on to the  throat as the iodine in Betadine cannot be absorbed through the skin  into the thyroid gland. Smearing Betadine over one's throat only ends up  making it look discoloured and ugly, he said.

 He also discounted the benefit of stocking iodine tablets at home  because the tablet can only prevent radioactive iodine-131 being  absorbed by the body's thyroid gland. However, the leaked radiation from  the nuclear fission also contains radioactive caesium-137 and  caesium-134, against which iodine tablets are useless.

 Dr Sathaporn noted that even though at present there is no drug that  can cure radiation sickness [entirely], Thai people should not be unduly  worried about the perceived danger.

 "The closer a person is to a stricken nuclear power plant, the more  danger he faces. But if a person stays at least 30 kilometres away, the  danger is insignificant. Thailand is much farther, thousands of  kilometres away. There is really no cause for concern at all."

 Even within a 30-kilometre radius of a stricken nuclear power plant,  the danger occurs only when a person is exposed to a sudden intense  radiation at the level of 4,000-5,000 millisieverts. Then the casualty  rate is about 50%. Those who survive such intense radiation are likely  to die from cancer later. Very few people are exposed at such a high  level unless they are very near a stricken plant. The further from the  plant, the less the danger is from leaked radiation.

 Dr Sathaporn pointed out that a high level radiation exposure of at  least 1,000 millisieverts is likely to cause cancer to any part of the  body it affects. If it comes into contact with the bone, it will cause  bone cancer. If it reaches the thyroid, it will cause thyroid cancer and  so on. However, each individual does not have an equal defence  mechanism against cancer caused by radiation.

 During the Chernobyl nuclear accident in 1986, the radiation leakage reached 4,000-5,000 millisieverts.

 Yet not all people who lived within a 30-kilometre radius died from  cancer. Some did. The reason why so many died from cancer at the time  was that the authorities in the Soviet Union did not inform and evacuate  nearby residents promptly, thus exposing innocent victims to a lot of  radiation for a long time. However, there were no reports of any unusual  occurrences of cancer among those people who lived outside the  30-kilometre radius.

 Dr Sathaporn noted that at the time, the Department of Medical  Sciences was assigned by the government to inspect imported foods from  Europe. The monitoring lasted from 1986-1992.

 Out of 4,000 food samples, none was contaminated with radiation at a level that was above the international safety standard.

 Chernobyl with its 4,000-5,000 millisieverts radiation leakage still  did not cause harm to the global population, so why should Thai people  be excessively worried about the Fukushima plant's stricken reactors  with a reported leakage of about 400 millisieverts, which is 10 times  less than at Chernobyl?

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Emergency workers caught in bind over response to overheated Fukushima reactors - The Mainichi Daily News
*
*Emergency workers caught in bind over response to overheated Fukushima reactors*

 
_In this March 24, 2011 aerial photo taken by a  small unmanned drone and released by AIR PHOTO SERVICE, damaged Unit 3  of the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant is seen in  Okumamachi, Fukushima prefecture, northern Japan._ (AP Photo/AIR PHOTO  SERVICE)

 Emergency workers have been doing all they can to cool down  overheating nuclear reactors in northeastern Japan by injecting massive  amounts of water into them, but they are now caught in a dilemma, with  the water they apply leaking out as radioactive water that threatens to  overflow.

 The amount of contaminated water in the basements of turbine  buildings and trenches outside, believed to have leaked from pressure  vessels containing the reactors, is expected to reach tens of thousands  of metric tons. The Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), operator of the  Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant, quickly ordered temporary tanks  after judging that the capacity of existing storage tanks would not be  enough to hold all of the contaminated water. The company has also  decided to install unmanned cameras to monitor water levels around the  clock.

 The reactor buildings at the No. 1, 2, 3, and 4 reactors were badly  damaged by hydrogen explosions that occurred one after another in March.  The government is considering covering the reactor buildings with a  special film that can shield radiation, and it has also worked out plans  to spread on the plant grounds a chemical developed by private  companies, in order to hold back the spread of radioactive material. It  planned to spray the chemical on March 31 but postponed the plan due to  bad weather.

 Meanwhile, TEPCO is hurriedly trying to get seawater pumps online in  order to restore the cooling systems for the No. 1, 2, 3, and 4  reactors, which malfunctioned when the plant was hit by the tsunami. The  company has already installed temporary seawater pumps for the No. 2  and 3 reactors, and those for the No. 1 and 4 reactors are expected to  be set up soon. Once the pumps are connected to the outside power grid  and begin operating, part of the cooling system for the nuclear reactors  should begin functioning again.

 Under normal reactor conditions, cooling water that heats up after  absorbing heat from the reactor core is sent to a heat exchanger, cooled  and returned to the nuclear reactor. The heat exchanger is filled with  cold seawater and the seawater pump is designed to supply that seawater.

 
_This March 24, 2011 aerial photo taken by a small  unmanned drone and released by AIR PHOTO SERVICE shows damaged Unit 3 of  the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in Okumamachi,  Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan._ (AP Photo/AIR PHOTO SERVICE)

 The seawater pumps and the plant's electricity went offline because  of the tsunami, causing the plant to lose its ability to cool down the  reactors and spent nuclear fuel pools at the No. 1, 2, 3 and 4 reactors,  paving the way for the hydrogen explosions to occur. The physically  removed No. 5 and 6 reactors achieved a controlled shutdown thanks to  temporary seawater pumps, and their spent nuclear fuel pools were  cooled.

 "We want to move from the current situation where water is injected  into the reactors to a stage where the reactors are under control like  the No. 5 and 6 reactors as soon as possible," said a TEPCO official.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Crews 'Facing 100-Year Battle' at Fukushima | Common Dreams
*
*Crews 'Facing 100-Year Battle' at Fukushima*

by David Mark and Mark Willacy            

A nuclear expert has warned that it might be 100 years before  melting fuel rods can be safely removed from Japan's Fukushima nuclear  plant.

 
_Fukushima Nuclear Plant -- Handout photo taken by a camera attached to  the tip of the arm of a concrete squeeze pump shows inside the broken  building housing the No. 4 reactor of the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Station in Fukushima Prefecture on March 24, 2011. Steam is seen  rising from around a fuel-handling crane_ (top L, green). 

The pump's  50-meter arm has been used to pour water into the spent fuel pool of the  reactor as part of efforts to get the crippled plant under control.  (Photo courtesy of Tokyo Electric Power Co.)  The warning  came as levels of radioactive iodine flushed into the sea near the plant  spiked to a new high and the Wall Street Journal said it had obtained  disaster response blueprints which said the plant's operators were  woefully unprepared for the scale of the disaster.

 Water is still being poured into the damaged reactors to cool melting fuel rods.

 But one expert says the radiation leaks will be ongoing and it could  take 50 to 100 years before the nuclear fuel rods have completely cooled  and been removed.

 "As the water leaks out, you keep on pouring water in, so this leak  will go on for ever," said Dr John Price, a former member of the Safety  Policy Unit at the UK's National Nuclear Corporation.

 "There has to be some way of dealing with it. The water is connecting  in tunnels and concrete-lined pits at the moment and the question is  whether they can pump it back.

 "The final thing is that the reactors will have to be closed and the fuel removed, and that is 50 to 100 years away.

 "It means that the workers and the site will have to be intensely controlled for a very long period of time."

 But Laurence Williams, Professor of Nuclear Safety at England's  University of Central Lancashire and the former head nuclear regulator  for the UK, is relatively comfortable with the situation.

 "I have been monitoring it for the last couple of weeks and [the]  three reactors seem to be more or less unchanged from initially when  they got into the seawater flowing into them," he said.

 "We don't know exactly the state of the fuel in those reactors but  looking at the data, the pressures and temperatures look fairly stable  over the last couple of weeks.

 "My view is that as there hasn't been any sort of major catastrophic  release of radioactivity, if they can continue to get the fresh water  into the reactors and cool them, the decay heat is now fairly  stabilising.

 "It will take some time before it disappears but so far, so good. But it will take some time to bring under control."

 Both experts agree capping the damaged reactors with concrete is not an option.

 Meanwhile the Wall Street Journal says it has obtained  disaster-readiness plans which show the facility only had one satellite  phone and a single stretcher in case of an accident.

 The blueprints also provided no detail about the possibility of using  firefighters from Tokyo or national troops - both of which have been  part of the response to the Fukushima crisis - to deal with any  disaster.

 Levels of radioactive iodine-131 in the Pacific off the plant have been recorded at a new high of 4,385 times the legal limit.

 In 2002, the plant's operator TEPCO admitted to falsifying safety  reports, leading to all of its 17 boiling water reactors being shut down  for inspection.

 TEPCO has already vowed to dismantle the four reactors at the centre  of the world's worst atomic accident in 25 years, but now Japanese prime  minister Naoto Kan says the Fukushima plant must be scrapped.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> I've just spent all this time learning what a fucking millisievert is and now they've started using becquerels
> 
> 
> and ....    cpm, curie, gray, rad, rem, roentgen, rutherford


We get background radiation much more than some japanese potatoes would ever do. Now Ill get my Spots card to Tops. They have Japanese sale now

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/03/wo...er=rss&emc=rss
*
*Regulator Says Radioactive Water Leaking Into Ocean From Japanese Nuclear Plant*

*By HIROKO TABUCHI and KEN BELSON*

*Published: April 2, 2011   * 

 Japan’s nuclear regulator said that workers discovered a crack about  eight inches wide in the pit, which lies between the No. 2 Reactor and  the sea and holds cables used to power seawater pumps.        

 The operator of the plant said that air directly above the water leaking  into the sea had a radiation reading of more than 1,000 millisieverts  an hour, said Hidehiko Nishiyama, deputy director-general of the Nuclear  and Industrial Safety Agency. Although higher levels of radiation have  been detected in the ocean waters near the plant, the leak discovered  Saturday is the first identified direct leak of such high levels of  radiation into the sea. Earlier Saturday, Mr. Nishiyama had said that  above-normal levels of radioactive materials were detected about 25  miles south of the Fukushima plant, much further than had previously  been reported.        

 The pit was filled with four to eight inches of contaminated water, said  the operator of the plant, Tokyo Electric Power Company. It was unclear  where that water was coming from. Highly radioactive water has also  been discovered in the reactor’s turbine building in the past week.         

 Workers will try to patch up the crack with concrete, the company said.        

 Saturday’s announcement of a leak came a day after the U.S. Energy Secretary Steven Chu  said Reactor No. 2 at the Fukushima plant had suffered a 33 percent  meltdown. He cautioned that the figures were “more of a calculation.”  Speaking from Washington, Mr. Chu also said that roughly 70 percent of  the core of Reactor No. 1 had suffered severe damage.        

 The crisis at the nuclear plant has overshadowed the recovery effort  under way in Japan since the 9.0 magnitude quake and tsunami hit the  northeastern coast on March 11. Earlier Saturday, Prime Minister Naoto Kan  made his first visit to the region since last month’s disaster, where  he promised to do everything possible to help. His tour came a day after  asking Japan to start focusing on the long hard task of rebuilding the  tsunami-shattered prefectures.        

 “We’ll be together with you to the very end,” Mr. Kan said during a stop  in Rikuzentakata, a town of about 20,000 people that was destroyed on  March 11. “Everybody, try your best.”        

 Dressed in a blue work jacket, Kan also visited with refugees stranded  in an elementary school and then visited a J-Village about 20 miles  south of the disabled nuclear plant. The training facility has been  turned into a staging area for firefighters, Self-Defense Forces and  workers from Tokyo Electric, which owns the nuclear reactors.        

 Despite the massive destruction in Iwate, Miyagi and other parts of  northeastern Honshu, the largest and most populous of Japan’s islands,  the government has also been battling to gain control of the damaged  nuclear station. Tokyo Electric has struggled to find a place to dump  water that has been contaminated during efforts to cool the reactors and  spent fuel pools.        

 On Saturday, contaminated water was transferred onto a barge to free up  space in other tanks on land. A second barge also arrived.

----------


## StrontiumDog

DailyYomiuri   The Daily Yomiuri                                             

            TEPCO says putting newspapers, sawdust and  polymer in the crack leaking radioactive water into the ocean has so  far not reduced the leak.

----------


## misskit

^They should add rice straw and cow crap too.

What the hell?

----------


## StrontiumDog

^^More on this...

News from The Associated Press

Apr 3, 6:33 AM EDT

*2nd try at sealing Japan nuke leak not working yet   *  

  By RYAN NAKASHIMA and MARI YAMAGUCHI         
Associated Press


 AP Photo     

TOKYO     (AP) -- It could take several more months to bring  Japan's tsunami-ravaged nuclear plant under control, a safety agency  spokesman said Sunday as engineers tried to find a way to stop highly  radioactive water from pouring into the Pacific.

 The  Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear complex has been spewing radioactivity since  the March 11 tsunami carved a path of destruction along Japan's  northeastern coast, killing as many as 25,000 people. The final death  toll is not known because many are still missing.

 Nuclear  safety agency spokesman Hidehiko Nishiyama on Sunday offered the first  sense of how long it might take to bring an end to the nuclear crisis,  which has forced people within 12 miles (20 kilometers) of the plant to  abandon their homes due to radiation concerns.

 "It  would take a few months until we finally get things under control and  have a better idea about the future," Nishiyama said. "We'll face a  crucial turning point within the next few months, but that is not the  end."

 Bringing the reactors at the plant under  control will require permanently restoring cooling systems knocked out  by the tsunami that prevent reactors from dangerously overheating. That  task has been complicated by dangerous conditions at the plant that have  often forced workers to stop what they are doing.

 Some  new problem crops up at the complex nearly every day. Workers  discovered an 8-inch (20 centimeter) crack in a maintenance pit Saturday  and said they believe water from it may be the source of some of the  high levels of radioactive iodine that have been found in the ocean for  more than a week.

 They have had trouble  telling where the water is coming from, and this is the first time they  have found it leaking directly into the sea. A picture released by plant  operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. shows water shooting some distance  away from a wall and splashing into the ocean, though the amount is not  clear.

 The contaminated water dissipates quickly in the ocean but could pose a danger to workers at the plant.

 Engineers  tried to seal the crack with concrete on Saturday, but that didn't  work. So on Sunday they injected a mix of sawdust, shredded newspaper  and a polymer that can expand to 50 times its normal size when combined  with water. The polymer mix had not yet stopped the leak Sunday night  but engineers have not given up hope and should know by Monday morning  whether it will work.

 TEPCO on Sunday  confirmed the first tsunami deaths at the plant itself, saying a  21-year-old and a 24-year-old were conducting regular checks when the  9.0-magnitude earthquake that preceded the tsunami hit.
 They apparently ran to a basement turbine room, which is where they were when the massive wave swept over the plant.

 "It  pains us to have lost these two young workers who were trying to  protect the power plant amid the earthquake and tsunami," TEPCO Chairman  Tsunehisa Katsumata said in a statement.

 The  high levels of radioactivity at the plant made searching for the men  dangerous. Their bodies were not discovered until Wednesday and had to  be decontaminated. The announcement was delayed while authorities  notified their families, TEPCO spokesman Kazufumi Suzuki said.

 The  nuclear crisis has compounded the suffering of people in the northeast  and, at times, overshadowed their plight. Tens of thousands have lost  their homes and are living in shelters, 200,000 households do not have  water, and 170,000 do not have electricity.

 Running  water was just restored in the port city of Kesennuma on Saturday, and  residents lined up Sunday to see a dentist who had flown in from the  country's far north to offer his services. Many were elderly and  complaining of problems with their dentures.

 Overhead  and throughout the coastal region, meanwhile, helicopters and planes  roared by as U.S. and Japanese forces finished their all-out search for  bodies.

 The effort, which ends Sunday, is  probably the final hope for retrieving the dead, though limited  operations may continue. It has turned up nearly 50 bodies in the past  two days.

 In all, more than 12,000 deaths have been confirmed, and another 15,500 people are missing.

----------


## misskit

*2 TEPCO workers at Fukushima plant found dead*

Tokyo Electric Power Company has said two employees who had gone missing since the March 11th disaster were found dead at the Fukushima nuclear power plant.

The bodies of Kazuhiko Kokubo and Yoshiki Terashima, both in their 20s, were found in the basement of the turbine building for the Number 4 reactor on Wednesday.

They had been carrying out a regular check-up at the plant.

The chairman of Tokyo Electric Power Company, Tsunehisa Katsumata, said in a statement that the company is extremely sorry about losing two young employees who had tried to maintain the plant's safety in the midst of disaster.

Sunday, April 03, 2011 13:02 +0900 (JST)

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

Explanation of the above deaths.

They died of bleeding from multiple injuries about an hour after the quake struck the plant, according to the utility known as TEPCO. It is the first time that TEPCO workers have been confirmed to have died at the Daiichi plant. 
Absorbent used to soak up radioactive water, 2 found dead at nuke plant - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## Butterfly

> TEPCO says putting newspapers, sawdust and polymer in the crack leaking radioactive water into the ocean has so far not reduced the leak.


they are really doing their best at demonstrating their incompetence

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> 
> TEPCO says putting newspapers, sawdust and polymer in the crack leaking radioactive water into the ocean has so far not reduced the leak.
> 
> 
> they are really doing their best at demonstrating their incompetence


If that picture correctly shows the leak (being on a vertical surface -  It would make patching a little harder,  but the process should be fairly quick -  Not taking over the weekend to gauge results.

The reference to TEPCO - attacking the problem -  by putting in items that would flow into the crack and possibly stop it,  rather than attacking the crack directly... Suggests to me that radiation levels in the water a simply too high for a direct attack to stop the leakage.  

As of yet -  TEPCO has yet to complete any of their planned contaminated water tanks.   That being said -  Letting his leak go un-resolved for  while, ensures that TEPCO will not have to handle at least that volume of water for storage.   It will be stored in the sea.  So there is a little conflict of interest in getting that leak resolved quickly.   

There are countless methods that can be put in play for that leak (as shown in the picture).   A simple 3 or 4 sided open top plywood box -  Placed against the leaking wall, and retained in place with a few sand bags would put a good form in place.   They would only have to start opening up and dumping in bags of Portland cement.   Doing that will shut off the leak fairly quickly.  Use of an open top wood box and portland cement is a time tested casualty control method to stop water leaks.    If the flow is so aggressive that the patch cant take.  A steel back - natural rubber faced blank would be lowered in place and the force of suction created by the leak would likely hold the rubber faced disc in place over the leakage.    When that is done -  the concrete method would work, without issue.   

I have seen the concrete method used many times, and for as large a leakage point as a 8 inch diameter hole.  That took more than 100 bags of portland cement in a large wood box used to stop a large leak.  

There is no point in going over the many available options to stop the leak.  It is well to recognize leaking the water into the ocean - gets the plant operator out of  more complex task of dealing with storing and treating this water.   If they need ideas -  anyone with marine training can give them plenty of options and ideas to stop the leak easily.   Even shoveling in dry coal cinders above the leak point - would go a long way to shutting down the leak.   It is a common practice used in sealing stop log's in intake bays -  in order to seal the logs,  to allow for dewater hydroelectric .

 :deadhorsebig:     Saying they cannot stop the leak with concrete is a pretty naive statement for TEPCO to make.   They are not deploying the resources and intelligence correctly on this issue.   Perhaps so because solving the leak, only adds to the issue on their plate.

----------


## Carrabow

M.A.L

I have seen your threads on hydrology and that seems to be a very viable solution, the only issue is the exposure to the irradiation when trying to position the form in the area of the leak. Could be done with a remote camera but still poses issues in placement. The time line involved also has it's own unique aspects. Just to be in the area of the leak could be lethal.

----------


## Butterfly

and TEPCO is now asking for more money, I wonder if their "failure" to stop the leak is related  :mid: 

a small ransom wouldn't hurt their bottom line  :Wink:

----------


## Thaihome

> Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> 
> Mother: Fukushima workers expect to die from radiation
> 
> 
> She needs to speak with TH . 
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 
Japan Nuke Crisis: American in Dead Zone - ABC News

----------


## Thaihome

Article with good diagram of the pit that is leaking that shows why it is difficult to patch it. 
TH


Tepco dumps concrete to plug radiation leak at No. 2 | The Japan Times Online
Tepco dumps concrete to plug radiation leak at No. 2
*Sea contamination traced to cracked storage pit connected to reactor*



By MASAMI ITO and MINORU MATSUTANI
Staff writers
Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Saturday that a cracked storage pit at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant was the source of a radioactive water leak contaminating the ocean and that it is attempting to fill it with concrete.

*Holed up: A worker at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant points to a cracked storage pit from which highly radioactive water was found leaking Saturday.* KYODO PHOTO

According to the utility and the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, the square, concrete-covered pit is situated near an intake used to pump seawater into reactor No. 2. 
Although the pit is small, it contains highly contaminated water with a radioactivity exceeding 1,000 millisieverts per hour that is leaking into the ocean from a 20-cm crack, Tepco said.

The pit, which is 1.2 meters x 1.9 meters and 2 meters deep, is usually used to store cables. But it is also connected directly to the reactor building through a cable trench, raising the possibility that the source of the contaminated water is the reactor itself, a NISA official said.

The cable trench is different from the pipe trench at No. 2, where water with the same level of radioactivity was discovered Monday. Although the two trenches are connected, no water has been found in the cable trench because it is at a higher elevation, the official said.

How much water has leaked and for how long were not known as of Saturday afternoon.

NISA spokesman Hidehiko Nishiyama said Tepco has been told to make sure there are no other leaks near reactor No. 2 and to strengthen is monitoring of seawater.

Earlier Saturday, NISA said seawater tested near the power plant contained nearly twice the legal limit for radioactive iodine but presented no "immediate" health risk.

According to a March 30 sample taken by the technology ministry, seawater tested about 40 km south of the plant contained 79.4 becquerels per liter of iodine-131, compared with the legal limit of 40 becquerels per liter.

This number shows that the highly contaminated water apparently draining from the plant has spread.

Nevertheless, Nishiyama said the radioactive material has dispersed and gave more assurances that it was not an "immediate" danger to the public.



"As for the high-level number, it is our understanding the water rode the tide toward the south," Nishiyama said. "We don't think there are any risks even if people eat the fish . . . but we will continue to observe the situation carefully."
Despite his assurances, however, he didn't provide estimates on radioactivity levels that actually would affect human health.
Meanwhile, radiation levels in Tokyo and Chiba, Ibaraki and Miyagi prefectures remain elevated, according to daily readings from the technology ministry. NISA said the numbers were on the decline.

In Tokyo, for example, environmental radioactivity was measured at a harmless 0.098 microsieverts per hour on April 1, compared with the capital's average range of 0.028 to 0.079 microsieverts per hour. 

"Although the levels are higher than past average numbers, you can see that the numbers are roughly declining," Nishiyama said.

As for Tepco's latest botched readings for contaminated water at the Fukushima plant, Nishiyama said the utility was reviewing all it past data releases to make sure no other mistakes were made.

Tepco has been scrambling since Friday to review past analyses after finding errors in its tellurium calculations.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://english.aljazeera.net//news/a...422691143.html

Japan mulls huge sheet for nuclear plant*  

                                                                    Operator of crippled Fukushima nuclear plant studies possibility of wrapping leaking reactors in sheeting.

                                                                          Last Modified: 04 Apr 2011 06:56                                              

 *
Fukushima's No. 2 reactor leaks containment water through a crack in a concrete pit [Reuters/Tokyo Electric Power Co]* 

Japan's government has asked the operator of the stricken Fukushima  nuclear plant to consider wrapping a giant sheet around the facility to  contain further radioactive leaks.

 The proposal calls for building framed structures around the  45-meter-high reactor buildings and then wrapping them with the  sheeting, sources told Kyodo news agency on Monday.

 If all of the four damaged reactors were wrapped in this manner, it  would take up to two months and cost about 80bn yen ($950m), the sources  said. It is not clear what kind of material would be used for the  sheeting.

 Atomic energy experts are sceptical about the feasibility of the plan that was proposed by a general construction firm.

 They stress the risk that such sheeting would be torn apart by heat  emanating from nuclear reactors, and that it would also hamper  restoration work, including the spraying of water onto the reactors.

 An immediate concern is a radioactive leak into the Pacific Ocean  through a cracked concrete pit, which has continued despite efforts to  stem the flow in a pipe upstream with a polymer capable of absorbing 50  times its own volume in water.

 Engineers of Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), the operator of the  plant, mixed sawdust and newspapers with polymers and cement to try to  seal the crack.

 "We were hoping the polymers would function like diapers but are yet  to see a visible effect," Hidehiko Nishiyama, a deputy director general  of the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said.

 The engineers used a colour dye to trace source of the leak. White  powder was poured into a tunnel from reactor number two, to ascertain if  it is the origin of the contaminant leaking out into the ocean, where  high iodine-131 levels have been detected.

 "There is no significant change in the amount of water leaking. We  haven't achieved the original goal of stopping the water," a spokesman  for TEPCO said.

 If the polymer fails to plug the leak, "we will consider solidifying  the soil around the pit to prevent water from seeping through," the  official said, adding that chemicals might be employed to achieve that.

 Since the quake struck more than three weeks ago, throwing Japan into  its worst post-war calamity, fears have mounted over the impact on the  world's third-largest economy, and a survey Monday suggested the hurt  could be massive.

 The Bank of Japan said in its Tankan survey that Japanese business confidence is set to plunge in the months ahead.

 The central bank's re-release of a quarterly survey from Friday  showed the breakdown in the replies it received before and after the  disasters.

 Friday's report showed business sentiment among large manufacturers  improving to "six" in March from "five" in December, but it was  predicted to fall to "minus two" in the April-June period.

 One of the big question marks is how the Japanese economy will be  affected by a looming power shortage, triggered when the quake and  tsunami knocked out a sizable portion of the nation's  electricity-generating capacity.

----------


## robuzo

Ze Cherman Government provides this, not publicized in Japan (but I got it at Asahi):

----------


## StrontiumDog

Tepco may release radioactive water 100 times legal limit into Pacific | The Japan Times Online

Monday, April 4, 2011

*Tepco may release radioactive water 100 times legal limit into Pacific*

  Kyodo News

    The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power  station plans to release water containing radioactive materials into the  sea possibly from Tuesday in a bid to help speed up work to bring the  crippled complex under control, it said Monday.

    The total amount of contaminated water to be released  will be 15,000 tons and the concentration of the waste water is  estimated at about 100 times the legal limit, which is deemed as a  relatively low level, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said.

     The water, which has been left in several parts of the  plant, including those close to reactor cores, has prevented workers  from dealing with problems at the plant due to its high level of  radiation.

     The utility announced the plan as it struggles to find  locations to transfer contaminated water to from many parts of the plant  on the Pacific coast, such as underground rooms and trenches.

----------


## Mid

and just where has the water been going now ?   :mid:

----------


## Poo and Pee

well, i don't think i will be going surfing in ibaraki this year...

----------


## misskit

*Rescued drifting dog reunited with owner*

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*100 residents in no-go zone refuse to evacuate*

NHK WORLD English

People living in the Japanese countryside are mostly old people and are very attached to family land. I am really surprised that more old people are refusing to leave. If the government is saying that it will take years for the radiation to damage their health, why would they be worried about it killing them?

----------


## Takeovers

> People living in the Japanese countryside are mostly old people and are very attached to family land. I am really surprised that more old people are refusing to leave. If the government is saying that it will take years for the radiation to damage their health, why would they be worried about it killing them?


Actually a good argument. 

I am 60 years old. I would not be too concerned about the radiation level in the area. I might evacuate during the time of the acute crisis, but would return at the very latest 2 or 3 month after the situation is under control. That would be enough time for the iodine radiation to disappear and the rest would not bother me at all. Why bother at my age about an increased cancer risk 20-30 years down the line?

Young people are a different matter. I would like to know much more about the levels of radiation before I recommend my (young adult) children to return.

BTW I believe you wanted to say that you are surprised that NOT more are refusing to leave. Am I correct?

----------


## misskit

^ Yes, typo.

----------


## Takeovers

About the radioactive water released into the sea. 

They say they release low radioactive water from storage to make space for the much more radioactive water that is currently hampering the restoration efforts. That sounds at least possible, maybe it is true?

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan bans shiitake mushrooms over radiation fears April 4, 2011 &mdash; RT News line

----------


## Poo and Pee

quite a lot of fruit and vege produce comes from the miyagi, fukushima and ibaraki regions. 

this is really going to be difficult for japan to deal with for years to come..

----------


## misskit

*Leak at Fukushima appears to be lessening*

 			The operator of the crisis-hit Fukushima nuclear plant has  injected a hardening agent beneath a leaking concrete pit in a bid to  stem the flow of highly radioactive water into the sea.

The firm says the leakage seems to be decreasing, following the infusion of the hardening agent.

The utility showed reporters a photo of the leak on Tuesday evening, saying it indicates such a decrease.

TEPCO said it will infuse another 1,500 liters of liquid glass.

NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*TEPCO to offer provisional damages to people hit by nuclear crisis*

TEPCO to offer provisional damages to people hit by nuclear crisis - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## misskit

*Coroner overwhelmed by scale of carnage*

    SENDAI (Kyodo) Corpses recovered from disaster areas  three weeks after the March 11 megaquake and tsunami in the Tohoku  region have become increasingly difficult to identify because of  extensive damage, according to a coroner involved in the identification  process.
     In a letter depicting what he witnessed, the forensic  scientist, who is helping police coroners and declined to be named, said  identification work is lagging because more than 100 bodies are turning  up daily in hardest-hit Miyagi Prefecture alone.
     The damage was "as heavy as to arouse feelings of  paralysis even in one such as myself, a forensic doctor familiar with  dead bodies," he wrote, referring to some 100 bodies laid out at a  school gymnasium where he worked one day.
     "I tried hard to control myself by thinking 'I should  show composure as a scientist,' while hearing desperately repressed  voices (of the next of kin), voices cursing their fates and voices of  anger that had nowhere to turn," the doctor said.
     "But I couldn't fight back my tears when I saw the body of a little girl looking very similar to my daughter," he added.
     As of 10 a.m. Monday, the death toll from the disaster  stood at 12,157 in 12 prefectures and 15,496 people had been reported  missing by relatives to police in six prefectures, according to data  compiled by the National Police Agency.
     Forensic doctors are in charge of collecting medical  biographies from the bodies, locating traces of past surgery, estimating  ages and collecting blood samples with long needles for DNA analysis.
     At the gym of an elementary school, he and other  coroners examined bodies on makeshift tables assembled by lining up  students' desks in a space screened by blue plastic sheets, he said. 
     Identified bodies were then put in coffins and moved  onto a stage in the gym to wait for visits by any surviving relatives.  "The sound of bereaved families crying and sobbing was always heard from  the stage," he said.
     While the bodies so far found in the cold northeast  were relatively clean after mud and dried grass were wiped away by  police with water, quite a few were overdressed or had bulky luggage, he  said. 
     The little girl had a bag full of retort pouch foods  that may have been too heavy for her to run with, while an elderly  person wearing a layer of five sweaters and people with backpacks  containing passbooks, personal seals and other valuables were found  under collapsed houses.
     "They may have been accustomed to quakes or tsunami,  but that seems to have worked negatively. I couldn't help but think what  if they had fled without any belongings," he said.
     The postmortem certificates he writes have become  almost identical, citing "suspected drowning" as the cause of death,  "quake-triggered tsunami" as the reason behind the deaths and "around 3  p.m." as the time they died. The quake struck at 2:46 p.m.


Coroner overwhelmed by scale of carnage | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Butterfly

TEPCO market price is in the shit, down 80%, company might not survive either

----------


## Norton

> company might not survive either


Judging by top 10 shareholders sure something will be worked out to ensure survival.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Seawater radiation shoots far past limit | The Japan Times Online

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

*Seawater radiation shoots far past limit*

*Experts fear pollution may affect seafood abroad*

By *KANAKO TAKAHARA*
   Staff writer

     Radioactive iodine-131 readings taken from seawater  near the water intake of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant's No. 2  reactor reached 7.5 million times the legal limit, Tokyo Electric Power  Co. admitted Tuesday.

 *
Measured response: Prefectural workers monitor radiation levels at an elementary school in the city of  Fukushima on Tuesday. The checks at schools across the prefecture were prompted by inquiries from  concerned parents.  *  KYODO PHOTO 

     The sample that yielded the high reading was taken  Saturday, before Tepco announced Monday it would start releasing  radioactive water into the sea, and experts fear the contamination may  spread well beyond Japan's shores to affect seafood overseas.

     The unchecked radioactive discharge into the Pacific  has prompted experts to sound the alarm, as cesium, which has a much  longer half-life than iodine, is expected to concentrate in the upper  food chain.

     According to Tepco, some 300,000 becquerels per cu.  centimeter of radioactive iodine-131 was detected Saturday, while the  amount of cesium-134 was 2 million times the maximum amount permitted  and cesium-137 was 1.3 million times the amount allowable.

     The amount of iodine-131 dropped to 79,000 becquerels  per cu. centimeter Sunday but shot up again Monday to 200,000  becquerels, 5 million times the permissible amount.

     The level of radioactive iodine in the polluted water  inside reactor 2's cracked storage pit had an even higher concentration.  A water sample Saturday had 5.2 million becquerels of iodine per cu.  centimeter, or 130 million times the maximum amount allowable, and water  leaking from the crack had a reading of 5.4 million becquerels, Tepco  said.

     A total of 60,000 tons of radioactive water is believed  to be flooding the basement of reactor buildings and underground  trenches.

     "It is a considerably high amount," said Hidehiko Nishiyama, spokesman for the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.

     Masayoshi Yamamoto, a professor of radiology at Kanazawa University, said the high level of cesium is the more worrisome find.

     "By the time radioactive iodine is taken in by  plankton, which is eaten by smaller fish and then by bigger fish, it  will be diluted by the sea and the amount will decrease because of its  eight-day half-life," Yamamoto said. "But cesium is a bigger problem."

     The half-life of cesium-137 is 30 years, while that for  cesium-134 is two years. The longer half-life means it will probably  concentrate in the upper food chain.

     Yamamoto said such radioactive materials are likely to  be detected in fish and other marine products in Japan and other nations  in the short and long run, posing a serious threat to the seafood  industry in other nations as well.

     "All of Japan's sea products will probably be labeled  unsafe and other nations will blame Japan if radiation is detected in  their marine products," Yamamoto said.

     Tepco on Monday began the release into the sea of  11,500 tons of low-level radioactive water to make room to store  high-level radiation-polluted water in the No. 2 turbine building. The  discharge continued Tuesday.

     "It is important to transfer the water in the No. 2  turbine building and store it in a place where there is no leak,"  Nishiyama of the NISA said. "We want to keep the contamination of the  sea to a minimum."

     Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano apologized for the  release of radioactive water into the sea but said it was unavoidable to  prevent the spread of higher-level radiation.

     Fisheries minister Michihiko Kano said the ministry  plans to increase its inspections of fish and other marine products for  radiation.

     On Monday, 4,080 becquerels per kilogram of radioactive  iodine was detected in lance fish caught off Ibaraki Prefecture.  Fishermen voluntarily suspended its shipment. The health ministry plans  to compile radiation criteria for banning marine products.

     Three days after Tepco discovered the crack in the  reactor 2 storage pit it still hadn't found the source of the high  radiation leak seeping into the Pacific.

     Tepco initially believed the leak was somewhere in the  cable trench that connects the No. 2 turbine building and the pit. But  after using milky white bath salt to trace the flow, which appeared to  prove that was not the case, the utility began to think it may be  seeping through a layer of small stones below the cable trench.

     To halt the radioactive water leak, Tepco injected sodium silicate to solidify the stone layer Tuesday.

     Meanwhile, efforts were also under way to prevent contaminated water from spreading to the outer sea.

     Tepco ordered a silt fence, an underwater curtainlike  structure, to be draped around the leak and is considering putting big  steel fences, often used for constructing bridges, in the perimeter to  prevent further contamination.

----------


## HermantheGerman

Anyone believe in Karama ?

They killed the wales for scientific research...they got a Tsunami.
They are polluting the ocean... now they get scrub typphus (*Tsutsugamushi)*

----------


## MakingALife

I think there is an important bit of information that may be unclear in a lot of peoples minds regarding half life values referred to for different radioisotopes.

It takes about 4 to 5 times the half live value,  inorder for the risks to be significantly reduced in a radioactive compound.  That is a good rule of thumb, and sometimes more than this.   It depends upon the kind of radioactive emission the element gives off, and the kinds of biological impact that this emission producers.     In general for many radioactive isotopes  that radiation takes the form of high energy neutrons or other particles.   These items behave in the same destructive way that other high energy sources such as X- rays behave -  by damaging cells and impacting DNA - which is responsible for cell mutation.  Often the mutation process will end the cell division process.   Sometimes the mutation is mininimal and altered DNA is replicated and passed on.    Most complex organisms - such as the animals have body systems designed to react to such foreign items in the body and attempt to attack and neutralize the offending cells.     

The issue with food chain involvement in some of the isotopes - is that the source of the problem - in those isotopes, becomes attached in the food chain and contaiminates all species that are associated with a specific food chain.    The organisms cannot rid themselves of that source nearly as easily as it attacks mutated cells.

When speaking about Cesium 137 with a half life of 30 years...   It is very reasonable to recognized that it will be 120 to 150 years duration before the radioisotope is cool enough in its decay process to be of little threat to species in the food chain.   

Whether that food chain is ocean borne - into sea foods (fish, shell fish, seaweeds & kelp).  OR if it is in land based chains such as may crops -  It moves along the chain to the ultimate consumer which is man.   

People should not think,  OH well in 2 half lives - the radioactivity is gone.   It doesn't work that way.  When people realize the time duration is significantly longer -  They will understand the risk posed by this radiation release more seriously

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://english.aljazeera.net/news/as...913998830.html

Japan finally plugs radioactive leak                *  

Nuclear plant operator says engineers stop radioactive water leak but more contaminated water to be pumped into the sea.

                                                                          Last Modified: 06 Apr 2011 02:36

 
*Japan still needs to pump low-level contaminated water into the sea because of a lack of storage space [Reuters]* 

Engineers have stopped highly radioactive water leaking into the sea  from a crippled Japanese nuclear power plant, the facility's operator  said.

 The development at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, announced on  Wednesday, is a breakthrough in the battle to contain the nuclear crisis  caused by last month's earthquake and tsunami.

 However, the company operating the plant, Tokyo Electric Power  (TEPCO), still needs to pump low-level contaminated water into the sea  because of a lack of storage space at the facility.

 "The leaks were slowed yesterday after we injected a mixture of  liquid glass and a hardening agent and it has now stopped," a TEPCO  spokesman told the Reuters news agency.

 Engineers had been desperately struggling to stop the leaks and had  used sawdust, newspapers and concrete as well as liquid glass to try to  stem the flow of highly-contaminated water.

 The liquid glass was injected into the ground beneath the leaking  storage pit on Tuesday and stopped the leak after solidifying the earth.

 Engineers are still faced with the massive problem of how to store  60,000 tonnes (60 million litres) of contaminated seawater used to cool  over-heated fuel rods and are being forced to pump 11,500 tonnes of  low-level radioactive water back into the sea.

*'Not yet under control'*

 "The situation is not under control yet," Thomas Grieder, Asia analyst at forecasting firm IHS Global Insight, said.

 "TEPCO's decision to displace the contaminated water into the ocean  reflected the urgency of clearing the turbine buildings and trenches of  radioactive water so as not to damage equipment needed for restoration  of cooling systems."

*Al Jazeera's Marga Ortigas reports on toxic chemicals  devastating Japan's farmlands after the tsunami*

     Workers are struggling to restart cooling pumps - which recycle the  water - in four reactors damaged by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami  that hit northeast Japan.

 Until those are fixed, they must pump in water from outside to prevent overheating and meltdowns.

 On Tuesday, Japan asked Russia to send a floating radiation treatment plant,which would solidify contaminated liquid waste from the nuclear plant, Russian media reported.

 The _Suzuran_ is one of the world's largest liquid radioactive  waste treatment plants. It treats radioactive liquid with chemicals and  stores it in a cement form.

 It can process 35 cubic metres of liquid waste a day and 7,000 cubic metres a year.

 Engineers also planned to build two giant "silt curtains" made of  polyester fabric in the sea to block the spread of more contamination  from the plant.

 They had resorted to desperate measures to contain the damage, such  as using bath salts as a dye to try to locate the source of leaks at the  complex, 240km north of Tokyo.

*'Condolence money'*

 TEPCO said on Tuesday it had started paying "condolence money" to  local governments to aid people evacuated from around its stricken plant  or affected by the radiation crisis.

 The company is facing a huge compensation bill, but said it must first assess the extent of damage before paying compensation.

 The quake and tsunami left nearly 28,000 people dead or missing, thousands homeless and Japan's northeast coast a wreck.

 Radiation fears have also seen several countries ban Japanese food  imports from the nuclear zone; India is the first to ban food imports  from all areas of Japan over radiation fears.

 Japan has called for calm over radiation concerns, but is itself considering imposing radioactivity restrictions on seafood for the first time after contaminated fish were found.

 Samples of the water used to cool reactor No. 2 were five million  times the legal limit of radioactivity, officials said on Tuesday,  adding to fears that contaminants had spread far beyond the disaster  zone.

 Small levels of radiation have been detected as far away as Europe and the west coast of the United States.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Tepco moves to prevent new explosion at plant
*
*Apr 6, 2011                                         * 

*Tepco moves to prevent new explosion at plant                                         * 

 
*A man is reflected in the entrance door  of the Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) headquarters building in Tokyo.  Tepco said they may inject nitrogen gas into a reactor container to  prevent a possible explosion. -- PHOTO: REUTERS*


TOKYO - THE operator of a stricken Japanese nuclear  power plant on Wednesday said it may inject nitrogen gas into a reactor  container to prevent a possible explosion due to a buildup of hydrogen. 

Workers at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi plant are  concerned that hydrogen gas will build up in the container of reactor  number 1 to the level where it will react violently with oxygen, causing  an explosion. 

'We are considering injecting nitrogen into the container of  reactor number 1 because hydrogen gas has possibly accumulated in the  container,' a Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco) official said. 

The plan is to inject nitrogen, an inert gas abundant in the  atmosphere, to displace the oxygen that could react dangerously with  the hydrogen. NTV reported that the nitrogen injection operation could  take place 'as early as today'. 

In the days after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami  crippled the plant, an accumulation of hydrogen near the reactors caused  large explosions that heavily damaged the outer buildings housing them.  

The latest worries signal the fragility of the situation at  the Fukushima Daiichi plant more than three weeks after the disasters  that knocked out reactor cooling systems, triggering explosions and  fires and releasing radiation. The plant north-east of Tokyo has emitted  radioactive materials into the air, contaminating farm produce and  drinking water. -- AFP

----------


## StrontiumDog

Freaky vid of man driving and walking around the devastated areas,  encountering dogs, cows and earthquake damaged roads. Then walking  around with radiation levels increasing, towards the end rather rapidly. Quite  long.

----------


## StrontiumDog

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/feature/gra...3497&id=108047

Quake-hit island bids farewell to U.S. marines : National : DAILY YOMIURI ONLINE (The Daily Yomiuri)

*Quake-hit island bids farewell to U.S. marines*

   The Yomiuri Shimbun

     SENDAI--U.S. marines on Wednesday said goodbye to residents of   Oshima--a Miyagi Prefecture island left devastated and cut off by the   giant March 11 earthquake and tsunami--where they had spent several days   helping with restoration work.

  Residents of the island off Kesennuma held a ceremony to thank the   U.S. service members assigned to remove rubble from roads and do other   repairs. The troops were part of a larger U.S. military contingent   dispatched to help with search-and-rescue, restoration and other   missions after the Great East Japan Earthquake.

  "You arrived very quickly and we truly appreciate your efforts,"  said  Yuji Shirahata, head of the island's disaster relief headquarters,   during the morning ceremony at a community center.

  Rear Adm. Jeffrey Jones, chief of the marines assigned to the  island,  said his team received a warm welcome by the island's residents,   adding that he was confident they would rebuild their home.

  The island's port was destroyed by the earthquake and tsunami,   cutting it off from the mainland and hampering reconstruction and the   delivery of emergency supplies. 

  (Apr. 7, 2011)

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Japan tackles hydrogen buildup, cumulative radiation | Reuters
*
*Japan tackles hydrogen buildup, cumulative radiation*







              By Mayumi Negishi and Yoko Nishikawa
                  TOKYO |          Wed Apr 6, 2011 11:13pm EDT         

  (Reuters) - Japan  pumped nitrogen gas into a crippled nuclear reactor on Thursday, trying  to prevent an explosive buildup of hydrogen gas as the world's worst  nuclear disaster in 25 years stirred atomic safety debate and  inspections in the United States.

  Engineers worked through the  night injecting nitrogen into the containment vessel of reactor No.1 at  Fukushima Daiichi power plant, following success in stopping highly  radioactive water leaking into the sea at another reactor in the  complex.

"It is necessary to inject  nitrogen gas into the containment vessel and eliminate the potential  for a hydrogen explosion," an official of plant operator Tokyo Electric  Power (TEPCO) told a news briefing.

The  possibility of another hydrogen explosion like those that ripped  through reactors No.1 and No.3 early in the crisis, spreading high  levels of radiation into the air, was "extremely low," he said.

But TEPCO suspected that the outside casing of the reactor vessel was damaged, said the official.

"Under  these conditions, if we continue cooling the reactors with water, the  hydrogen leaking from the reactor vessel to the containment vessel could  accumulate and could reach a point where it could explode," he added.

A  second TEPCO official said 6,000 cubic meters of nitrogen gas would be  pumped into reactor No.1 and the utility was preparing nitrogen gas  injections for reactors No.2 and No.3 in the six-reactor plant as a  safety precaution.

Although TEPCO  succeeded after days of desperate efforts to plug the leak at reactor  No.2, they still need to pump 11.5 million liters (11,500 tonnes) of  contaminated water back into the ocean because they have run out of  storage space at the facility. The water was used to cool overheated  fuel rods.

Nuclear experts said the  damaged reactors were far from being under control almost a month after  they were hit by a massive earthquake and tsunami on March 11.

SAFETY CONCERNS IN ASIA

In  Vienna, the head of a U.N. scientific body said the Fukushima accident  is not expected to have any serious impact on people's health, based on  the information available now.

Wolfgang  Weiss, chairman of the United Nations Scientific Committee on the  Effects of Atomic Radiation (UNSCEAR), also said the Fukushima disaster  was less dramatic than Chernobyl in 1986 but "much more serious" than  Three Mile Island in 1979.

Asked what health risks he expected from Fukushima, he said: "From what I know now, nothing, because levels are so low."

"We  have seen traces of iodine in the air all over the world now but they  are much, much, much lower than traces we have seen at similar distances  after Chernobyl," Weiss added.

Neighboring South Korea and China,  however, are worried about radioactive fallout. China's health ministry  found traces radioactivity in spinach in three Chinese provinces and  South Korean media are reporting fears about contaminated rainfall.

Immigration data reflected wider foreign fears  about the crisis, with international arrivals in Tokyo from March 11-31  down 75 percent for the same period in 2010, local media said.

The  government is preparing to raise the legal radiation limits to adjust  to the fact that people near the plant are sustaining cumulative  exposure. The original policy was set to cover reactor workers briefly  sustaining high doses in an accident.

Workers are struggling to restart cooling pumps -- which recycle the water -- in four damaged reactors.

Until  those are fixed, they must pump in water to prevent overheating and  meltdowns, but have run out of storage capacity for the seawater when it  becomes contaminated.

Radioactive  iodine detected in the sea has been recorded at 4,800 times the legal  limit, but has since fallen to about 600 times the limit. The water  remaining in the reactors has radiation five million times legal limits.

Martin  Virgilio, a top official for the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission,  said at a House of Representatives hearing that the NRC did not believe  that the core of Fukushima's reactor No. 2 had melted down.

Earlier,  a Democratic lawmaker had said the NRC informed him the core had become  so hot it had probably melted through the reactor pressure vessel.  Lawmakers also grilled the NRC on whether the U.S. nuclear power  industry was doing enough to ensure American reactors can withstand  worst-case scenarios.

The NRC is  conducting special inspections at two Illinois nuclear plants operated  by Exelon Corp after routine checks in February found a problem with  backup pumps that would be used to remove heat from the reactors in case  of an accident.

COOLING REACTORS KEY

Japan  is facing its worst crisis since World War Two after the 9.0 magnitude  earthquake and tsunami left nearly 28,000 people dead or missing and  thousands homeless, and rocked the world's third-largest economy.

The quake shifted the seabed near the epicenter in northern Japan by a record 24 metres (79 ft), the coastguard said.

To  help fund its extra budget for disaster relief, Japan, the world's No. 5  donor, is considering cutting foreign aid by 20 percent this fiscal  year, local media reported.

It  will likely take months to finally cool down the reactors and years to  dismantle those that have been damaged. TEPCO has said it will  decommission four of the six reactors.

Two  Fukushima plants together provide 4 percent of Japan's electric power  and local politicians warn that reopening them will be politically  difficult.

The key to bringing the reactors under control is the extent of damage to the plant's cooling system, said analysts.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Radiation in Japan Seas: Risk of Animal Death, Mutation?
*
*Radiation in Japan Seas: Risk of Animal Death, Mutation?    * 
*
More radiation from nuclear plant could cause "bizarre mutations."*

 
Aboard a boat pulling a barge with water for Japan's overheating Fukushima nuclear plant Thursday.
                                                                                Photograph from Japan Maritime Self-Defence Force via Reuters

                                                                                                                                                                                            Christine Dell'Amore
National Geographic News
                                                 Published April 1, 2011

*If radioactive material from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant—disabled by the March11* *Japan earthquake and tsunami**—continues to enter the* *ocean**, marine life could be threatened, experts say.* 

 In the past week, seawater samples taken near the nuclear power plant, on Japan's eastern coast, have shown elevated levels of radioactive isotopes, including cesium 137 and iodine 131, according to the _New York Times__._ (See "Japan Tries to Avert Nuclear Disaster.")

 All life on Earth and in the oceans lives with exposure to natural  levels of ionizing radiation—high-frequency radiation with enough energy  to change DNA. Most such genetic damage heals, but the addition of  human-made radiation can make it harder for the body to repair broken  genes.

 Radiation concentrations in the Japanese seawater samples have  fluctuated in past days, but on Wednesday the amount of iodine spiked to  3,355 times the legal limit for seawater, Japanese nuclear safety  officials told the Associated Press.

 That level is the highest so far—and an indication that more  radiation is entering the ocean, though how is still unknown, the agency  reported. Cesium was also found to be 20 times its safety limit on  March 28, according to the _Times_.

*Radiation Can Cause "Bizarre Mutations"*

 Once in seawater, radiation can hurt ocean animals in several ways—by  killing them outright, creating "bizarre mutations" in their offspring,  or passing radioactive material up the food chain, according to Joseph Rachlin, director of Lehman College's Laboratory for Marine and Estuarine Research in New York City.

 "There will be a potential for a certain amount of lethality of  living organisms, but that's less of a concern than the possible effects  on the genetics of the animals that become exposed," Rachlin said.

 "That's the main problem as I see it with radiation—altering the genetics of the animal and interfering with reproduction."

 Even so, according to radioecologist F. Ward Whicker,  the concentrations of iodine and cesium levels "would have to be orders  of magnitude larger than the numbers I've seen to date to cause the  kind of radiation doses to marine life that would cause mortality or  reductions in reproductive potential.

 "I am very doubtful that direct effects of radioactivity from the  damaged reactors on marine life over a large area off the coast of Japan  will be observed," Whicker, professor emeritus at Colorado State  University, said via email.

 Likewise, using legal limits to gauge damage to marine life is of little value right now, he said.

 To make a "credible assessment" of the risk to marine animals,  scientists would have to know the actual concentrations of radioactive  iodine in the water and fish or other marine animals off Fukushima  Daiichi, he said.

*Radiation Hardest on the Little Ones*

 It's possible that levels of radioactive contamination near the  Fukushima nuclear reactors could increase and cause some harm to local  marine life, Whicker said.

 "If this happens, the most likely effects would be reductions in reproductive potential of local fishes. ... ," he said.

 Marine organisms' eggs and larvae are highly sensitive to radiation,  since radioactive atoms can replace other atoms in their bodies,  resulting in radiation exposure that could alter their DNA, Whicker  said. (Get the basics on genetics.)

 Most such deformed organisms don't survive, but some can pass  abnormalities on to the next generation, Lehman College's Rachlin said.  Either way, the radiation exposure could hurt the population's ability  to survive long-term.

 Rachlin thinks the most susceptible critters would be soft-bodied invertebrates  such as jellyfish, sea anemones, and marine worms—which can take up the  radiation more quickly than shelled creatures—though Whicker said fish  may be most at risk.

 Whicker added, "I would expect any temporary losses in reproduction  in local fish to be offset by immigration of unaffected individuals from  surrounding areas that would be impacted to a lesser degree."
 (See "Chernobyl Birds' Defects Link Radiation, Not Stress, to Human Ailments.")

 In addition to its threats to reproduction, pockets of radioactive  material can can burn fish passing through, hitting them like a stream  of searing water, Rachlin said.

 Complicating matters is the fact that predator species in the Pacific such as tuna and sailfish are already stressed by overfishing, according to Rachlin.

 "I'm concerned—this is the spawning season. ... If this impacts the  survivorship of the young and larvae, this will be a further insult."

*Radiation Threat Here to Stay?*

 According to chemical oceanographer Bill Burnett, "In the short run [the radiation] could have some definite negative impacts" on marine life.

 "The good news is the half life [of iodine] is only eight days,"  added Burnett, an expert in environmental radioactivity at Florida State  University.

 So "if they stop the source of radioactive leakage, this is going to be a short-term problem."

 However Fukushima Daiichi's leaking cesium is potentially more  serious, since that isotope takes 30 years to decay, Burnett said.

*Radiation Can Travel Up the Food Chain*

 There could also be some movement of radiation up the food chain if  animals eat irradiated plants and smaller, radioactive animals, Rachlin  said.

 In particular, plants such as kelp can quickly absorb iodine, FSU's Burnett said. (See pictures of ocean wildlife.)

 There's a possibility that the devastation of towns in northeastern  Japan caused by the earthquake and tsunami also released toxic metals  such as lead into the soil and water, according to Texas Tech University  ecotoxicologist Ron Kendall.

 Previous studies have shown that metals can work in concert with  radiation to suppress immune systems in vertebrates, making them more  vulnerable to disease, Kendall said.

 It's a "big issue for the environment and human health because of the  widespread destruction. It takes me back to New Orleans after Hurricane  Katrina—this to me is even more complicated with the radiation."
 (See photos: "Japan Reactor Crisis: Satellite Pictures Reveal Damage.")

*Ocean Resilient Against Radiation*

 The ocean has a "tremendous capacity" for diluting radiation, Colorado State's Whicker noted.

 "It also has resilience, in the sense that the area would recover  over time as the situation improves and as the radioactivity decays and  disperses."

 "But I should caution that we have not had much opportunity to study  the effects of very large releases of radioactivity into marine  ecosystems," he said. The best data comes from nuclear weapons tests in  the Pacific in the 1950s and 1960s.

 Texas Tech's Kendall also pointed out that there's not much known about radiation in seawater.

 "The dose makes the poison," he said, "and the more concentrated the  radiation, the more potential effects. It's something we definitely need  to monitor."

 Added Lehman's Rachlin: "If it's a one-shot pulse, OK, not a problem.

 But if the radiation leaks continue for several months, Japan may be dealing with a more serious blow to marine life, he said.

 The coastline, after all, isn't Chernobyl, he said. "We can't cement [over] that whole area."

----------


## Carrabow

2 words: *Eco Nightmare*

----------


## Mid

*S.Korea schools shut over radioactive rain fear*
Apr 7, 2011

 _
People hold umbrellas as it rains in  Seoul. Concerns about radiation fallout from Japan's nuclear disaster  prompted some schools in South Korea to shut on Thursday as rain fell  over most of the country, but the nuclear safety agency played down  immediate health risks._
PHOTO: REUTERS

*SEOUL* - DOZENS of South Korean schools cancelled classes  on Thursday as officials scrambled to quell fears that rain contained  radioactive material from Japan's stricken nuclear plant. 

More than 130 elementary schools and kindergartens in  Gyeonggi province surrounding the capital Seoul cancelled or cut classes  after rain began falling on orders from the provincial education  office. 

An office spokesman called it part of 'preemptive measures  for the safety of students'. The office had told schools on Wednesday to  cancel or shorten classes due to 'growing anxiety among students and  parents over conflicting claims on the safety of radiation exposure'. 

Schools in remote areas, where students have a long walk to  class, were particularly encouraged to cancel activities. At schools  which stayed open, teachers were advised to suspend outdoor activities. 

Complaints from parents mounted on the website of Seoul  city's education office, which refused to cancel classes and called for a  calm response to the fears. 'Please order class cancellation. I'm  worried to death about my kid and can't sleep,' said one posting. 

Education authorities in North Chungcheong province south of  Gyeonggi postponed football, baseball and other sporting events.  Concern grew in the nation closest to Japan after the weather agency  said on Monday that radioactive material from the crippled Fukushima  nuclear plant may be carried to the peninsula by southeasterly winds.

straitstimes.com

related : https://teakdoor.com/the-teakdoor-lou...ilippines.html

----------


## Thormaturge

> the nuclear safety agency played down  immediate health risks


Absolutely.

Any health risks probably won't show up for at least a decade, so I don't know what anyone is worried about.



Radiation?  Phooey, give them all an umbrella and a "Hello kitty" face mask and there is nothing to worry about.

----------


## Cujo

check out the websites for geiger counters. There's a worldwide shortage. I was going to buy some and make a profit but they're all sold out. I'm looking for a geiger counter manufacturer to invest in.

----------


## Warwick

> check out the websites for geiger counters. There's a worldwide shortage. I was going to buy some and make a profit but they're all sold out. I'm looking for a geiger counter manufacturer to invest in.


This company has wide experience and a good reputation for producing cost effective detection products of all types.

http://www.atscltd.com/

 :mid:

----------


## Poo and Pee

oh no, here we go again...  :Sad: 

7.4 quake in Miyagi

It was quite strong here in Tokyo.


*Magnitude 7.4 earthquake hits off Japan coast*

The Associated Press
Posted: 04/06/2011 11 :32: 28 PM PDT

TOKYO—Japan's  northeastern coast has been rattled by a strong aftershock. The Japan  meteorological agency has issued a tsunami warning for a wave of up to  one meter. The warning was issued for a coastal area already ravaged by  last month's tsunami.     Officials say the quake was a 7.4-magnitude  and hit 25 miles (40 kilometers) under the water and off the coast of  Miyagi prefecture. The quake that preceded last month's tsunami was a  9.0-magnitude.     
Buildings as far away as Tokyo shook for about a minute.     
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. 




Tsunami warning has been issued..


http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_1...nclick_check=1

----------


## StrontiumDog

DailyYomiuri   The Daily Yomiuri                                             

            Quake measured upper 6 on Japanese seismic intensity scale of 7 in parts of Miyagi, lower 6 in parts of Iwate, Miyagi.

-----

Tonight's 7.4 magnitude aftershock was bigger than the Kobe '95 quake, reports [at]HirokoTabuchi

----------


## Butterfly

and for more good news

BBC News - Japan: Tsunami warning for north-east after earthquake

A tsunami warning has been issued for north-eastern Japan after an earthquake with a magnitude of 7.4 struck off the east coast of Honshu.

----------


## Poo and Pee

Reports coming in that there has been no damage at the reactors. Workers evacuated to safe ground.

Shinkansen trains have been stopped.

People being told to evacuate to high ground.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Bangkok Post : Japan farm products banned
*
*Japan farm products banned*

Published:  7/04/2011 at 05:47 PMOnline news: Health
 Thailand has announced a ban on imports of  agricultural, meat and dairy products from 12 provinces in Japan, but  seafood is still off the radiation-leak watch list.

 The ban covers  fresh vegetables, fruits, meat, eggs and milk from 12  provinces — Fukushima, Gunma, Ibaraki, Tochigi, Miyagi, Yamagata,  Niigata, Nagano, Yamanashi, Saitama, Tokyo and Chiba —  effectivene on  April 11, said Food and Drug Administration secretary-general Pipat  Yingseree.

More vegetables brought into the country by Japanese passengers have been found to contaminated with radiation, he said.

 Readings of 33 and 83.3bq/kg of radioactive odine 131 were detected  in wasabi roots and mizuba, plants in the  mustard family, at  Suvarnabhumi airport. The passengers came from Narita airport on April  1.

Dr Pipat said he would discuss with the Customs Department and  the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperation possible measures to  control individual passengers bringing agricultural products into the  country, in the interests of food safety.

----------


## good2bhappy

reduced to a 7.1

----------


## Thormaturge

> Quake measured upper 6 on Japanese seismic intensity scale of 7 in parts of Miyagi, lower 6 in parts of Iwate, Miyagi.
> i


...and probably around 1 on the TEPCO "nothing to worry about" scale.

----------


## StrontiumDog

BreakingNews   Breaking News                                             

            2 reported dead in northeastern Japan after Thursday night's powerful quake - Kyodo

----------


## MakingALife

Good luck to Japan regarding future seismic disturbances and the threats to secondary Tsunami's.  Hopefully Nature will give them 20 or 30 good years before pummeling them once again with a plate pop like the one that caused the current tragedy.

While I think I commented before that it appears to be a good chance that  TEPCO officials were looking into a strategy to inert their reactor vessels with Nitrogen to offset hydrogen explosions risks....      It appears that this work has started in earnest.  GOOD FOR TEPCO 

I chuckle to myself,  that it is not common knowledge that people recognize that often a HYDROGEN blanket is used on most of the larger Utility generators.   

Hydrogen is supplied to most utility large  generators and filled and purged till the generator internals are totally filled with high purity Hydrogen.   The gas is maintained at a net positive pressure to off set any leak off at shafting glands of the generator.   The hydrogen blanket serves two purpose's,  One is to cut the windage friction that exists between the rotating rotor and stationary stator in the generator.     This increases efficiency for the machine.   The molecular weight of H2 is very low - so its windage resistance is much lower than air, or even Nitrogen.       Secondly this H2 environment reduces the oxidation of the winding insulation - therefore extending its dielectric life and properties.    This is why these generators are inerted, and why hydrogen is the gas of choice, over nitrogen.  
These Hydrogen blanket systems come with their own cooling systems and heat exchangers - designed to keep the generator winding cool by forced circulation of cooling water and forced circulation of the H2.  


I was shocked when I first saw this practice.  Because Hydrogen is explosive and a pretty aggressive fuel.   Scenes of the Hindenburg air ship going up in a fireball ran through my head - every time I checked H2 pressures, cooling temps , and all the other system metrics etc - when baby sitting these generators.   

Use of  Nitrogen has no down side like this.    No down side for explosion.  Nitrogen enerting has a low probability to form Nitric Acid, and would take the right chemistry involved to make it become destructive in that manor.    However Nitrogen is not used to inert gentrators -  the atomic weights of Hydrogen  favors it to be used Nitrogen as an inerting gas for generators.    

The turbine systems I observed had alarm systems to sound if the static pressure levels of H2 dropped.   The systems also has purity meters that rated the concentration percentage and alarmed if the concentration of H2 dropped below 95%.   The H2  inerting  systems also had automated purging systems designed to vent periodically, with the gases pipe way up and out of the building.    There were automatic and manual Hydrogen "make up"systems in place to pipe up the generator H2 system into very large high pressure Hydrogen storage cylinders.  Ground based storage that was supplimented by a separate H2 tractor trailer that used quick couple fittings, so it could be disconnected and drove away in case of an adverse hydrogen event.      

So Hydrogen itself finds unique safety and efficiency  purposes within most utility generators.  

Hydrogen however useful it can be as an inerting agent is considered an undesirable item - when its in a location where the H2 cannot be maintained outside of its explosive limit range.

It is well to observe that  TEPCO -  by the choice to innert with N2 -  is now dealing reasonably with a risk assesment they have woken up to recognize.  The issue of H2 that may now be in dry wells,  or found in the supression pools .  Is another aspect of the N2 inerting question that they have yet to speak about.   They may have no provision to inner these other areas.  No piping or conduits open to allow this to take place.    

With the risk of containment damage, and the expectation of know H2 concentrations -  the willingness to now inert with N2 -  carrys a small risk that the H2 will become displaced into other regions (drywell and supression pools) where the flow path migration is increased because of the establishment of a complete N2 blanket in the RPV.    

TEPCO rolls the dice here just a little.  Mitigating the riske they reasonably believe they have, against one they are unable to gauge.   They are late in the game with all this strategy.   For a risk that is know within the industry -  It seems like they are late in the game.   

Perhaps - in the early crisis  the pressures and temperaturs inside the reactor vessels were too high and out of range to bring in N2  inerting technology.   Their RPV's have been out of that pressure range for quite some time.    

My hope is that they do N2 inerting co-incident with some kind of controlled atmospheric venting.   This way to scrub away the H2,  rather than just force its migration else where.

I guess they deserve to be congratulated for taking some positive initiative - regardless of when they have gotten on board.      My only hope is that they do it intelligently so as not to increase risks rather than reduce risks.    Addressing H2 Migration paths with a use of controlled venting when first establishing the N2 blanket.   It remains hopeful that TEPCO engineering has covered this basis, before starting the N2 inerting process.   

Time will tell,  as TEPCO doesnt disclose all their details and considerations behind the limited sound bites that define their action.

----------


## mobs00

Japan quake causes fresh radioactive spill

Japan quake causes fresh radioactive spill - Asia-Pacific - Al Jazeera English

Small amounts of radioactive water leaking at Onagawa nuclear plant, following an aftershock that left three dead.

Last Modified: 08 Apr 2011 06:27




> A powerful earthquake in northeast Japan rocked a nuclear plant, causing a small amount of radioactive water to spill, but the operator said there was no immediate danger.
> 
> Thursday's 7.1-magnitude aftershock resulted in water flowing from containers onto the floor in all three reactor buildings at the Onagawa plant, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency said on Friday.
> 
> This comes as three people were confirmed dead and about a hundred were injured following the quake.
> 
> Meanwhile authorities reported there was no new damage at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, about 100km away from Onagawa.
> 
> Thursday's aftershock was the strongest since the devastating quake and tsunami that flattened the country's northeastern coast last month.
> ...

----------


## robuzo

^Spent fuel pools, again. Just finished reading an article at the Asahi site quoting the J-gov't Earthquake Study Committee saying we should expect more serious aftershocks because "the Earth's crust is out of balance." One interesting figure- since the initial big one there have been 460 aftershocks of Mag 5+. Does this mean Japan is another period similar to Ansei? Ansei Great Earthquakes - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

----------


## Takeovers

> Good luck to Japan regarding future seismic disturbances and the threats to secondary Tsunami's. Hopefully Nature will give them 20 or 30 good years before pummeling them once again with a plate pop like the one that caused the current tragedy.


Let us hope. The Great One of Tokyo is still pending. It is overdue already. If Tokyo would be struck with a powerful quake before Japan has recovered from the present disaster it would be very hard to recover.

----------


## Muadib

The thought of a 10 meter tsunami wave rolling into Tokyo and the subsequent loss of life & damage is terrifying... Or Los Angeles, New York, Singapore, Hong Kong, etc...

----------


## robuzo

Ishikawa hopes to inspire homeland by playing well | Philadelphia Inquirer | 04/08/2011
"“Ishikawa already has pledged every dollar of his winnings in 2011 to the relief effort in his country, which would be close to $2 million if he equaled his earnings of last year. Even though his heart is there, he believes he can inspire his countrymen by playing well."

It would be unfair to contrast this behavior with that of Thailand's most prominent international sports figure after the Boxing Day tsunami, so I won't.

----------


## misskit

> Let us hope. The Great One of Tokyo is still pending. It is overdue already. If Tokyo would be struck with a powerful quake before Japan has recovered from the present disaster it would be very hard to recover.


Though I live in Thailand most of the time now, I am a Japanese resident and have a house in Tokyo. The thought of a major earthquake there has always frightened the shit out of me. Tokyo is the last place on earth I want to be for the big one. The city is huge, wooden houses are so close together, and natural gas is piped in. All I can imagine is my beautiful neighborhood reduced to a pile of rubble, on fire with no way to escape.

Can't bring myself to go there next month. The earth must settle down a bit more before I feel comfortable again.

----------


## misskit

*Townspeople facing 'starvation' as aid fails to reach disaster area households*

   SHICHIGAHAMA, Miyagi -- Some four weeks after the disasters of March  11, survivors who have returned home from refugee shelters are  struggling with severe shortages of basic necessities, with some even  saying they face starvation.
 Priority in the provision of relief supplies is given to refugee  shelters in the disaster-stricken northeast, depriving areas where  people remain at home of access. Even in places where there is enough  food to go around, a shortage of staff is preventing distribution of  supplies to every household.
 Satoshi Onodera, a 35-year-old school teacher in this tsunami-devastated town, has turned to an acquaintance in Kyushu for help.
 "Delivery companies are finally running again, so could you send some  food, or medicine or clothes? Anything really," Onodera asked of his  friend. Onodera was at his primary school when the earthquake and  tsunami hit, and he was stranded there for about a day.
 His 64-year-old father and 63-year-old mother, who live on high  ground about 700 meters from the coast, narrowly escaped harm when the  tsunami tore into the town. However, an explosion and fire at a nearby  petroleum complex forced them to evacuate to a refugee shelter on March  13. They returned to their house about a week later to restart their  lives, but lack of supplies made this untenable.


 The couple received a bare-bones aid package of bread, instant  noodles and drinking water every two days -- far fewer items than they  had been getting at the refugee center. Onodera, meanwhile, has been  hard pressed to help. His car was washed away in the tsunami, making it  impossible to drive further afield for supplies. Instead, he has relied  on friends in other parts of Japan to send aid, which he also shares  with his neighbors.
 Onodera and his parents have been joined by a trickle of returning  residents sick of the lack of privacy at the refugee shelters and  worried about leaving their houses empty and vulnerable to thieves.  However, all who move home again are confronting the same hardships.
 In another part of town, one woman in her 50s who returned to her  house -- which survived the tsunami despite standing just tens of meters  from the ocean -- says water and sewage services are still cut, meaning  she can't do any laundry.
 "At home, I don't even get the fresh underwear that was distributed  at the shelter. I'm worried about health and hygiene," she says.  "Thinking of people who've lost their families, I can't really talk  about luxuries, but I have to say everyday life is difficult."
 However, even as residents worry about hunger and hygiene, a  veritable mountain of boxes packed with relief supplies sits in a  municipal sports center.
 "It's not getting to survivors at home because there aren't enough  people to deliver it," says Onodera, who works with other town employees  distributing supplies at refugee centers. "To some extent it can't be  helped, but if people out there rely on the town for aid, they'll starve  to death."
 According to the municipal welfare section, refugee shelters are  given priority in the distribution of aid sent to Shichigahama, with the  remainder divided up between community centers in the town's 16  districts. Splitting up the aid and the frequency of deliveries to  individual households is left to the district heads and welfare  officers. "But the people in charge of distributing the aid are  suffering themselves, so it's difficult to order them to do this and  that," a source at the welfare section commented.
 Onodera fears that the municipal government hasn't grasped the  seriousness of the situation, pointing to elderly citizens who returned  home only to become so weak from lack of supplies they can no longer  leave their houses.
 "I want the town to understand how bad things are for people who've  left the shelters and have become terribly weak because their aid is  always delayed," Onodera says.

    (Mainichi Japan) April 8, 2011




Who could imagine Japanese faced with starvation in this day in age?

----------


## misskit

*Old age prevents residents near nuke plant from evacuating*

Old age prevents residents near nuke plant from evacuating - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## MakingALife

> ^Spent fuel pools, again. Just finished reading an article at the Asahi site quoting the J-gov't Earthquake Study Committee saying we should expect more serious aftershocks because "the Earth's crust is out of balance." One interesting figure- since the initial big one there have been 460 aftershocks of Mag 5+. Does this mean Japan is another period similar to Ansei? Ansei Great Earthquakes - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Thanks for the Link,  I reviewed the history for that cited time span.  I just hope to God they are not facing that kind of short term set of future events.... 460 + aftershocks imply s their geological foundations are still adjusting.  Either they are edging towards greater equilibrium, which would be very much welcome.   Or they are skittering towards a path of much larger EQ's if current plate adjustments only add to imbalanced stresses.   I hope for the sake of humanity these after shocks ramp down into some kind of long term equilibrium.




> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> Good luck to Japan regarding future seismic disturbances and the threats to secondary Tsunami's. Hopefully Nature will give them 20 or 30 good years before pummeling them once again with a plate pop like the one that caused the current tragedy.
> 
> 
> Let us hope. The Great One of Tokyo is still pending. It is overdue already. If Tokyo would be struck with a powerful quake before Japan has recovered from the present disaster it would be very hard to recover.


    For an uninformed one like myself -  It is pretty sad to hear expectations for a Major Tokyo quake, such that it is considered "over due" in the minds of those who study this field. 




> The thought of a 10 meter tsunami wave rolling into Tokyo and the subsequent loss of life & damage is terrifying... Or Los Angeles, New York, Singapore, Hong Kong, etc...


My wifes extended family lost relatives in the Thai Tsunami.  A good friend of mine had just built a surf camp on Sumatra but it was spared from that same disaster.  I have been aboard large ocean vessels, and lucky enough to be standing on the Navigation Bridge to see a Tsunami wave front pass.  Passing one is a non event in the ocean, it doesnt even put water on a  vessels deck.   But such a wave front is easy to see because its a faster moving low wave that stretches across the horizon as far as one can see.   The power they pack is hard to fathom.   Even in stormy weather,  green sea's breaking on a ships deck (only knee high), on a vessel traveling 18 knots, is enough to knock the most hearty off their feet, even if they find something to to hang on to.   Its a far cry different than a normal wave at the beach - although a beach wave is taller - It has much less energy than green water on a ships deck. Its all about the velocity.   Tsunami's pack so much more power, I cannot imagine what it must be like to recognize that someone is watching one bear down upon them with no escape path available.           




> Originally Posted by Takeovers
> 
> Let us hope. The Great One of Tokyo is still pending. It is overdue already. If Tokyo would be struck with a powerful quake before Japan has recovered from the present disaster it would be very hard to recover.
> 
> 
> Though I live in Thailand most of the time now, I am a Japanese resident and have a house in Tokyo. The thought of a major earthquake there has always frightened the shit out of me. Tokyo is the last place on earth I want to be for the big one. The city is huge, wooden houses are so close together, and natural gas is piped in. All I can imagine is my beautiful neighborhood reduced to a pile of rubble, on fire with no way to escape.
> 
> Can't bring myself to go there next month. The earth must settle down a bit more before I feel comfortable again.


I have traveled to Japan on many occasions, and some of those visits  allowed me time to catch their train networks to travel into Tokyo and  explore.   Beyond the high rise's there are miles of urban sprawl, which  would be flattened.  Misskit is quick to point out the large gas distribution network in place throughout the city -  The twisted building wreckage would be quick to incinerate from the gas leaks.   A horrific picture for any group of citizens to suffer.   In particular Japan with their sense of civility and courtesy experiencing such a future fate is very wrong.     They have built strong country, anchored on work ethic, sacrifice, and a sense of duty and honor.  Overcoming more than their share of adversities and thriving in spite of them.  It seems unfair that these kind of Natural fates seem destined to wash up on their shores.

----------


## Sailing into trouble

Lived next to Winscale in Cumbria until I moved to Canada. Let's remember that we all turn a blind eye to the the down side of nuclear energy. Next time you fly over Japan . USA Canada Europe all those lights. Just wonder how much power could be saved if we realy wanted too, or had to.

 Britain in the early years of Ww2 showed what could be done when a nation understands that life could not continue as before. Perhaps we as a global nation need to understand that we are not dealing with finite resources. Westerners have shown the unwashed the pie we enjoy, so  need to figure out quick how we can share what we have before we all destroy ourselves by believing that their is always more. Can you imagine the price of gas or the effect on air quality if evry Indian and chinese family had 2 cars? In Canada as an educator we are now having to  educate young Canadians that they can not expect the same standard of living as their parents.. 

Kobi struck home, an Irish friend and a Japanese friend almost bought it. He stayed at his post in a school for 7 days until the last of his students were claimed. That was amongst the dead. This was commonIn Canada we use the San Fran experience where 7 out of 10 doctors nurses did not report for duty. Point, we are all living on the edge, non of us can point fingers. Vanccouver the home of the winter games would be a a disaster that would destroy the city totaly when the big one comes...

Can anyone name me a country that has a safe Nuclear program ? Serious guys we have to change the way we live. That extra TV comp left on, light, aircon does make a difference.  Electric cars have to get power from a source?  SO who wants to pay what the cost would be if we looked at the cost of a hundred years from now.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Man stranded in empty town since tsunami
*
*Apr 9, 2011                                         * 

*Man stranded in empty town since tsunami                                         * 


 
*Stranded alone inside the unheated, dark  home is 75-year-old Kunio Shiga (above). He cannot walk very far and  doesn't know what happened to his wife. --PHOTO: AP*


MINAMI SOMA (Japan) - THE farmhouse sits at the end of a  mud-caked, one-lane road strewn with toppled trees, the decaying  carcasses of dead pigs and large debris deposited by the March 11  tsunami.

Stranded alone inside the unheated, dark home is 75-year-old  Kunio Shiga. He cannot walk very far and doesn't know what happened to  his wife.

His neighbours have all left because the area is 20km from  the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant - just within the zone  where authorities have told everyone to get out because of concerns  about leaking radiation. No rescuer ever came for him.

When a reporter and two photographers from The Associated  Press arrived at Mr Shiga's doorstep on Friday, the scared and  disoriented farmer said: 'You are the first people I have spoken to'  since the earthquake and tsunami.

'Do you have any food?' he asked. 'I will pay you.' Mr Shiga  gratefully accepted the one-litre bottle of water and sack of 15-20  energy bars given to him by the AP. With Mr Shiga's permission, the AP  notified local police of his situation.

On Saturday, a police official in charge of missing persons  called the AP to say Mr Shiga had been rescued and taken to a shelter.  The official, who did not give his name because he is not authorised to  speak to the media, said Mr Shiga was expected to be fine. -- AP

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Fukushima to insulate itself from the Pacific &mdash; RT
*
*Fukushima to insulate itself from the Pacific*

Published: 09 April, 2011, 17:29 

 
 TEPCO announced on April 2,  2011 it had discovered a crack in a pit at the Fukushima power station  leaking highly radioactive water straight into the sea (AFP Photo)

The operator of the devastated Fukushima-1 nuclear power plant has  made the decision to construct a 120-meter wall in the sea consisting of  seven steel sheets and a silt curtain to cut the reactor No. 2 intake  from the open sea.

 [at]On Wednesday, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, TEPCO, resorted to  liquid glass to stop the leakage of water contaminated with radioactive  materials from reactor No. 2.

The radioactive iodine-131 reading  in the sea near the reactor has dropped significantly to 63,000 times  the legal limit, whereas previously it was 7.5 million times higher than  allowed.

Nevertheless, the discharge of low-radioactive water  into the sea continues. By the end of Saturday, the plant will have  poured about 9,000 tons of relatively low-radioactive water into the  Pacific to free up reservoirs for even more contaminated water that  flooded the No. 2 reactor's turbine building and a maintenance tunnel  system underneath.

In the meantime, TEPCO is constantly pumping inert nitrogen into unit No. 1 to prevent yet another hydrogen explosion.

The  situation there remains unstable, as the temperature inside the reactor  has risen to plus 240 Celsius on Saturday morning, following the new  7.1-magnitude earthquake late on Thursday.

Also, if the weather  allows on Saturday, an unmanned helicopter drone will take photos of the  damaged buildings of reactors No. 1 to 4. The level of radiation there  is too high for a man to get closer.

The Thursday earthquake made  the Japanese government’s nuclear safety agency call on the country’s  power producers to have at least two backup diesel generators on standby  for each nuclear reactor instead of one, no matter whether it is stable  or undergoing maintenance.

The instruction came after all three  back-up diesel generators at the Higashidori nuclear power plant in  Aomori Prefecture failed to function after the 7.1-magnitude aftershock.

The  nuclear catastrophe was brought on after the March 11 devastating  9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami that destroyed all power supplies  and backup system cooling generators at the Fukushima-1 nuclear power  plant. This led to the overheating of the reactors and subsequently –  hydrogen explosions and partial melting of the fuel rods inside the  reactors.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Excessive radioactive cesium found in fish sampled off Fukushima | Kyodo News
*
*Excessive radioactive cesium found in fish sampled off Fukushima*

 TOKYO, April 10, Kyodo

 Radioactive cesium above the legal limit  for consumption was detected Saturday in young sand lance caught off  Fukushima Prefecture, as the prefecture took samples amid a voluntary  ban on fishing there in the wake of the ongoing nuclear crisis.

 One of the four sample fish had a level of cesium of 570 becquerels  per kilogram on Thursday about 1 kilometer off the city of Iwaki, and  the other three measured 480 to 500 becquerels. The limit is 500  becquerels under the Food Sanitation Law.

 The samples were taken after the species was found contaminated off  Ibaraki Prefecture, although fishermen have voluntarily refrained from  fishing off Fukushima due to the crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear  Power Station.

 Radioactive iodine measured 1,100 to 1,700 becquerels in the samples against the legal limit of 2,000 becquerels.

 The move came as food makers and restaurant operators in Japan have  increasingly begun to check levels of radioactive substances in food  coming from the Kanto region, where Fukushima is not included.

 A guild of tobacco growers in Fukushima said, meanwhile, it has  decided not to plant leaf tobacco this year although the prefecture  ranked seventh last year in output among Japan's 47 prefectures.

 Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries Minister Michihiko Kano visited  the prefecture the same day to coordinate with local authorities to keep  farmers from planting rice near the nuclear complex, saying he expects  the size of the banned area to be decided on in about mid-April.

 Up to 26 becquerels of iodine and 8 becquerels of cesium were found  in two flatfish species caught Friday off the Ibaraki city of  Hitachinaka, according to the latest test results released by Ibaraki  Prefecture.

 The radioactive levels were also below the limits or none in  strawberries and other farm produce in Fukushima, while no levels were  found in spinach and three other types of produce tested in Niigata  Prefecture.

----------


## Bangyai

Some interesting pictures here :

Japan earthquake and tsunami debris floats across the Pacific toward the US west coast - Telegraph



*Japan earthquake and tsunami debris floats across the Pacific toward the US west coast*





Massive floating rubbish islands almost 70 miles in length from the Japanese tsunami are causing chaos in the shipping lanes of the Pacific Ocean as they head for the west coast of the United States

----------


## Takeovers

Sorry that looks like a fake to me. A completely intact house floating in the middle of the ocean?

----------


## Bangyai

> Sorry that looks like a fake to me. A completely intact house floating in the middle of the ocean?


Check out the other pictures. Some other oddities in there.

----------


## Thormaturge

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> Good luck to Japan regarding future seismic disturbances and the threats to secondary Tsunami's. Hopefully Nature will give them 20 or 30 good years before pummeling them once again with a plate pop like the one that caused the current tragedy.
> 
> 
> Let us hope. The Great One of Tokyo is still pending. It is overdue already. If Tokyo would be struck with a powerful quake before Japan has recovered from the present disaster it would be very hard to recover.


They have yet to experience the volcanic activity that follows these major quakes.  With all this activity I would expect Japan to be in a real mess yet again in less than five years' time.  

Indonesia had several volcanic eruptions last year as a consequence of the 2004 quake, so if you want to see Mount Fuji in its present state I would get over there PDQ.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Flying drone peers into Japan's damaged reactors - CNN.com
*
*Flying drone peers into Japan's damaged reactors*

  By *Matt Smith*, CNN
April 10, 2011 -- Updated 1438 GMT (2238 HKT)


A remote-controlled helicopter with a camera attached was sent over the damaged nuclear power plant Sunday to get pictures.

*STORY HIGHLIGHTS*Engineers hope the drone will give them a better picture of the reactorsMore than 2,000 people protest against nuclear power in TokyoA worker falls ill at the plant, but Tokyo Electric says radiation wasn't the cause
*Tokyo (CNN)*  -- Engineers used a flying drone to peer into the damaged reactors at  the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant Sunday as the crisis spurred  more than 2,000 people to march against nuclear energy in Tokyo.

 "I  was just a couch potato critic, but here we are today with friends for  the first time, and I'm sure it's the first time for a lot of people  today," said Karima Asuma Stickan, one of the protesters.

 Monday  marks a full month in the battle to prevent a worse disaster at  Fukushima Daiichi, which was battered by the earthquake and resulting  tsunami that struck northern Japan on March 11. Japan's largest utility,  the Tokyo Electric Power Company, has been struggling to cool down  three damaged reactors and prevent a wider release of radioactivity than  has already occurred.

  A  camera was mounted on a remote-controlled helicopter to get pictures of  the damaged reactors from above Sunday in hopes of getting a better  look at the damaged housings of the No. 1, 3 and 4 reactors and  hopefully the pools of spent fuel inside, company spokesman Junichi  Matsumoto said. The drone hovered over the plant for 28 minutes at an  altitude of about 150 meters (492 feet), he said.

 The T-Hawk  drone, built by the U.S. company Honeywell, can transmit ordinary  pictures as well as infrared images, Matsumoto told reporters. Images  captured by the drone are expected to be released Monday, he said.

In addition, the company is now using remote-controlled heavy  machinery to clear away debris outside the plant and has begun the  process of laying new pipes to start pumping radioactive water out of  the flooded basements of the turbine plants behind units 1 through 3.  One worker fell ill during the work Sunday, the company said, but said  there was no indication that radiation was the cause.

 Workers  have been pouring hundreds of tons of fresh water a day into the three  damaged reactors and the spent fuel pools of units 1-4 to keep them cool  until normal circulation systems can be restored. The No. 2 reactor is  believed to be leaking highly radioactive water, some of which had been  spilling into the Pacific until Wednesday, while flooded basements in  the turbine plants of all three units are making it impossible to  restore power, company officials say.

 To make room for the fluid,  Tokyo Electric has been dumping less-contaminated water into the  Pacific Ocean from a waste treatment facility on the site. That process  -- which also includes the release of radioactive water from the  drainage basins beneath reactors 5 and 6 -- was nearly complete Sunday  evening, Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency reported.

 The  radioactive particles in the water are dispersing into the ocean. But  concentrations of radioactive iodine-131 remained 25 times higher than  the Japanese legal standard in water sampled 16 km (10 miles) south of  the plant on Saturday.

 That's down from 93 times the limit on  Wednesday, according to sampling data released Sunday. Levels of  longer-lived cesium-137, which takes 30 years to lose half its  radioactivity, remained nearly six times the legal limit but well below  levels reported earlier this week.

 The discharge was billed as an  emergency measure, but it infuriated Japan's fishing industry and drew  protests from neighboring South Korea. And participants in Sunday's  protest in Shiba Park, at the foot of the landmark Tokyo Tower,  expressed concern about the long-term effects of the radioactive  releases so far.

 "The air pollution gets into the lungs," said  Dr. Nobuhiko Murapsu, a pulmonary care physician from Chiba Prefecture,  north of Tokyo. "Five years, 10, 20 years later, they get lung cancer.  This is a very severe problem."

  Murapsu  said he's changed his views on nuclear power since the accident and  decided to join the demonstration. Protesters marched from the park,  ringed with cherry blossoms, to Tokyo Electric's headquarters and on to  the Ministry of the Economy, Trade and Industry, which regulates  Japanese nuclear power plants.

 Makiko Mikami told CNN that no one believes they're getting enough answers from either the utility or the government.

 "The  problem is, I think I'm not sure they know the whole picture  themselves," Mikami said. "If they know, they should share that  information with us. And if they don't, they should admit that they're  scared as well."

Improvisation, frustration mark nuclear crisis at four weeks

Japanese turn in cash found in tsunami zone

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Digging Up a Tsunami Prediction - WSJ.com
*
*The Man Who Predicted the Tsunami * 

*After studying ancient rocks, a Japanese geologist warned that a disaster was imminent—to no avail*

*By PETER LANDERS* 

The giant tsunami that assaulted northern Japan's  coast surprised just about everyone. But Masanobu Shishikura was  expecting it. The thought that came to mind, he says, was "yappari," a  Japanese word meaning roughly, "Sure enough, it happened." 

 "It was the phenomenon just as I had envisioned it," says the 41-year-old geologist, who has now become the Japanese Cassandra.


                                                                                     Peter Landers/The Wall Street Journal                 Masanobu Shishikura wrote in August about a likely tsunami.

Dr.  Shishikura's studies of ancient earth layers persuaded him that every  450 to 800 years, colliding plates in the Pacific triggered waves that  devastated areas around the modern city of Sendai, in Miyagi Prefecture,  as well as in Fukushima Prefecture.

 One early tsunami was known to  historians. Caused by the 869 Jogan quake, its waves, according to one  chronicle, killed 1,000 people. Dr. Shishikura had found strong evidence  of a later tsunami in the same region, which probably took place  between 1300 and 1600. 

 "We cannot deny the possibility that [such a tsunami] will occur  again in the near future," he and colleagues wrote in August 2010. That  article appeared in a journal published by the Active Fault and  Earthquake Research Center in Tsukuba, the government-funded institute  where Dr. Shishikura works.

 He was beginning to spread the word. Plans were under way at his  center to hand out maps so people would understand which areas were at  risk. Dr. Shishikura had an appointment on March 23 to explain his  research to officials in Fukushima. 

 Dr. Shishikura's boss at the center, Yukinobu Okamura, had even  mentioned the results at a 2009 meeting of an official committee  discussing the safety of nuclear-power plants. Dr. Okamura says the idea  of beefing up tsunami preparedness didn't go anywhere. 

 At Dr. Shishikura's eighth-floor office, bookshelves and televisions  crashed to the floor during the quake on March 11. He has found  temporary office quarters one story below, where he discussed his  unheeded warning. "It's unfortunate that it wasn't in time," he said.  But he also felt vindicated after past slights, remembering the local  official who didn't want to help him dig holes in the earth for research  and who called the endeavor a "nuisance."

 His work is part of a young field  called paleoseismology. Kerry Sieh, a pioneer in the specialty, says  that the few dozen people who do this kind of work are usually doomed to  be ignored. Humans are made to trust what they have seen themselves, or  what someone they know has seen. They aren't designed "to deal with  these once-in-500-year events," says Dr. Sieh, formerly of the  California Institute of Technology and now head of the Earth Observatory  of Singapore. 

 From his youth, Dr. Shishikura liked to collect fossils in the hills  outside Tokyo. He says he realized in high school how geology could  answer questions about the past. 

 His method is fairly simple. Miyagi  Prefecture has rich soil, but sandwiched in it are layers of sand and  pebbles that Dr. Shishikura says must have been carried from the shore  by tsunamis. Looking at the layers allowed his group to estimate the  rough dates of waves that struck as far back as 3,500 years ago. 

 Many lives could have been saved, at  relatively little cost, by spreading awareness of the danger. People in  Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures were used to strong quakes, but the  location and magnitude of these seismic events didn't generate tsunamis.  Further north on the eastern coast, tsunamis were well-known from  quakes in 1896 and 1933. Those were of yet another, weaker variety that  affected mainly low-lying areas along the coast.

 During the magnitude 9.0 quake on March 11, some people well inland,  thinking themselves safe, took time to change clothes or to make phone  calls. Others watched the disaster unfold instead of running to high  ground. They proved what Dr. Shishikura's group wrote last year about  local tsunamis: "It appears to be almost completely unknown among the  general public that in the past great tsunamis have inundated areas as  far as 3-4 kilometers inland as the result of earthquakes exceeding  magnitude 8."

 Now, Dr. Shishikura's team is looking  at the Nankai trough to the south, which could trigger tsunamis hitting  the island of Shikoku and the Kii Peninsula. Dr. Shishikura says large  tsunamis appear to hit there every 400 to 600 years, with the most  recent in 1707.

 Those rough calculations suggest the danger is at least a century  away. Still, Dr. Shishikura says, "we had better be on the lookout."

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Japan to evacuate more towns around crippled nuclear plant - CNN.com
*
*Japan to evacuate more towns around crippled nuclear plant*

  By  *Matt Smith*, CNN
April 11, 2011 -- Updated 0820 GMT (1620 HKT)


Tokyo Electric Power Company president Masataka Shimizu (left) speaks at a news conference in Tokyo on March 13, 2011.

*STORY HIGHLIGHTS**NEW*: Japan's point man for the crisis warns the situation may still worsen*NEW:* The evacuations are based on expected long-term radiation levels*NEW*: Evacuations won't occur right away, Edano saysNEW: Tokyo Electric's president apologizes to Fukushima residents for the disaster
*Tokyo (CNN)* -- Japan's government Monday called  for evacuations for several towns beyond the danger zone already  declared around the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, warning that  residents could receive high doses of radiation over the coming months.

 "This  policy does not require immediate evacuation right away, but we take  the long-term perspective, considering the long-term effect of radiation  on your health," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters.

 Edano  said the municipalities are likely to see long-term radiation levels  that exceed international safety standards, and warned that the  month-old crisis at Fukushima Daiichi was not yet over.

 "Things  are relatively more stable, and things are stabilizing," he said.  "However, we need to be ready for the possibility that things may turn  for the worse."

 Edano named several towns outside the  30-kilometer (19-mile) radius already drawn around the plant, where  three nuclear reactors were damaged following the earthquake and  resulting tsunami. Another community, the city of Minamisoma, was  partially covered by the new orders.

 "If you're living in these  towns and villages, I'm sorry. We may cause you some inconvenience," he  said. But he said the evacuation zone may be limited to a one-month  period.

 Residents within 20 kilometers of the plant were ordered  to evacuate as the crisis unfolded, while those living between 20 and 30  kilometers were told to take shelter indoors. The orders covered about  85,000 people inside the 20-kilometer zone and another 62,000 within 30  kilometers, Fukushima Prefecture officials told CNN.

 Edano said  some of those inside the 20-30 kilometer belt now should prepare to  evacuate, and that local governments would deliver more detailed  instructions.

 The anti-nuclear group Greenpeace, which had warned  about higher radiation levels in towns outside the evacuation zone two  weeks ago, called Edano's declaration a good step.

 Jan van de  Putte, who took readings in the town of Iitate, said the levels of  radioactivity are likely to remain dangerous "for years to come."

 The  announcement came as Japan marked one month since the March 11  disaster. The plant's owner, the Tokyo Electric Power Company, has been  struggling to cool down the overheated reactors and pools of spent fuel  since the tsunami knocked out the plant's coolant system.

 Tokyo  Electric President Masataka Shimizu visited the off-site headquarters  for authorities attempting to manage the disaster Monday and met with  local officials, emerging to issue an apology for the situation.

 In  comments carried by Japanese public broadcaster NHK, Shimizu -- who was  hospitalized for "fatigue and stress" in late March -- also expressed  regret that he didn't apologize to Fukushima Prefecture residents before  Monday.

----------


## StrontiumDog

stcom   The Straits Times                                             
    FLASH: Buildings in Tokyo sway after a 7.1 quake struck north-east Japan. Quake's epicentre was in Fukushima prefecture.

TimeOutTokyo   TimeOutTokyo                                             
            Quake apparently downgraded to 6.8 from initial report of 7.1 (both on richter scale)

[BREAKING] Strong quake hits north-east of #Japan, #tsunami alert issued FRANCE 24 - france 24 live - twitter

CNNInternatDesk   International Desk
     Japan: Now Tsunami warning and alert - wave expected 2 meters

ProducerMatthew: Just in: Workers have been evacuated from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant following earthquake, tsunami warning.

----------


## good2bhappy

Another 7.1 quake
Tsunami warning!

----------


## Mid

NHK WORLD English

----------


## Mid

*Tsunami Warnings/Advisories*

            Tsunami Information                       

                     Occurred at 17:16 JST 11 Apr 2011

Region name Fukushima-ken Hamadori

Depth about 10 kmMagnitude 7.1

 

Tsunami Forecast 

Region Classification of Tsunami Warning/Advisory

IBARAKI PREF.TSUNAMI WARNING(TSUNAMI)

MIYAGI PREF.TSUNAMI ADVISORY

FUKUSHIMA PREF.TSUNAMI ADVISORY

KUJUKURI AND SOTOBO AREA, CHIBA PREF.TSUNAMI ADVISORY

*Tsunami Warning/Advisory*

Issued at 17:18 JST 11 Apr 2011  

*******************Headline*******************

Tsunami Warnings (Tsunami) have been issued for the following coastal regions of Japan:

IBARAKI PREF.

Evacuate immediately to safe place away from the shore in the above coastal regions.

Tsunami advisories are currently in effect in other coastal regions of Japan.

********************Text*********************

Tsunami Warnings have been issued for the following coastal regions of Japan:

<Tsunami Warning (Tsunami)>

  *IBARAKI PREF.

Evacuate immediately to safe place away from the shore in the above coastal regions.

Tsunami Advisories have been issued  for the following coastal regions of Japan:

<Tsunami Advisory>

  MIYAGI PREF.

  *FUKUSHIMA PREF.

  KUJUKURI AND SOTOBO AREA, CHIBA PREF.

Tsunamis are expected to arrive imminently in the following coastal regions of Japan

(coastal regions shown above with * marks):

  IBARAKI PREF.

  FUKUSHIMA PREF.

************About Tsunami Forecast*************

<Tsunami Warning (Tsunami)>

Tsunami height is expected to be up to 2 meters. Caution advised.

<Tsunami Advisory>

Tsunami height is expected to be about 0.5 meters. Attention advised.

********  Earthquake Information  ********* 

Occurred at 17:16 JST 11 Apr 2011 

Region name FUKUSHIMA-KEN HAMADORI 

Latitude36.9N Longitude140.7E 

Depth about 10 km 

Magnitude 7.1

jma.go.jp

----------


## Mid

NHK stating that Tsunami warnings and advisories lifted .

----------


## misskit

What a sick feeling reading that just gave me. Thank god nothing else happened.

*Japan rattled by aftershock on quake anniversary*

  SENDAI, Japan (AP) -- A strong earthquake rattled Japan's northeast  Monday and sparked a fresh tsunami alert on the one-month anniversary of  the massive temblor and wave that devastated the northeastern coast and  unleashed a still-unfolding nuclear crisis.
 The 7.1-magnitude aftershock briefly forced Tokyo's main  international airport to close both of its runways. The epicenter was  just inland and about 160 kilometers north of Tokyo. The operator of the  crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear complex said the latest quake had no  impact on the plant.
 A warning was issued for a one-meter tsunami, the same as for after  an aftershock that shook the northeast coast last week. That quake  generated no tsunami.
 People at a large electronics store in the northeastern city of  Sendai screamed and ran outside, though the shaking made it hard to move  around. Mothers grabbed their children, and windows shook. After a  minute or two, people returned to the store.
 There were no new reports of damage. Aftershocks have repeatedly  rattled the disaster-weary region, but there is little left in the  northeast to ruin. Last Thursday's 7.1-magnitude aftershock, which had  been the strongest tremor since the day the original quake hit, did sink  hundreds of thousands more households into darkness, however. Most of  that electricity has been restored.
 The 9.0-magnitude earthquake and the tsunami it generated on March 11  are believed to have killed more than 25,000 people and caused as much  as $310 billion in damage. The nuclear power plant they disabled has  been spewing radiation since, and even a month on, officials say they  don't know how long it will take to cool reactors there.returned to the  store.

    (Mainichi Japan) April 11, 2011


Japan rattled by aftershock on quake anniversary - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://news.xinhuanet.com/english201...c_13823141.htm

Death toll reaches 13,116 from great quake, tsunami in Japan * 
English.news.cn 
2011-04-11 11:16:58
 Police  officers in protective suits observe a moment of silence for those who  were killed by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, as they search for  bodies at a destroyed area in Minamisoma, Fukushima prefecture, about  18km from the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant, April 11, 2011.  (Xinhua/Reuters Photo)

      TOKYO, April 11 (Xinhua) -- The Japanese National Police Agency said  on Monday that the March 11 earthquake and tsunami have left 13,116  people dead and 14,377 others unaccounted for in Japan by 10:00 a.m.  local time (0100 GMT).

 About 151,000 survivors are staying in 2,300 shelters across the country as one month has passed since the quake and tsunami.

 A 9.0-magnitude earthquake hit the Pacific coastal areas of  northeastern and eastern Japan on March 11, triggering enormous tsunami.

 Heavy casualties and extensive damage have been caused by the twin disasters.

----------


## Loy Toy

> What a sick feeling reading that just gave me. Thank god nothing else happened.


I felt much the same.

How much more can these poor souls bear.  :Sad:

----------


## good2bhappy

must be terrible
There have been 8 shocks alone today!

----------


## StrontiumDog

^ Yes, been watching them come in on Twitter, at one point there were 3 aftershocks in quick succession, all over 4.0 and in different places. Insanely active.

----------


## Thormaturge

> *Japan rattled by aftershock on quake anniversary*


WOW that year went quickly.

----------


## misskit

*Japan to raise Fukushima crisis level to worst*


 			The Japanese government's nuclear safety agency has decided to  raise the crisis level of the Fukushima Daiichi power plant accident  from 5 to 7, the worst on the international scale.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency made the decision on Monday.   It says the damaged facilities have been releasing a massive amount of  radioactive substances, which are posing a threat to human health and  the environment over a wide area.

The agency used the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale,  or INES, to gauge the level.  The scale was designed by an international  group of experts to indicate the significance of nuclear events with  ratings of 0 to 7.

On March 18th, one week after the massive quake, the agency declared the  Fukushima trouble a level 5 incident, the same as the accident at Three  Mile Island in the United States in 1979.

Level 7 has formerly only been applied to the Chernobyl accident in the  former Soviet Union in 1986 when hundreds of thousands of terabecquerels  of radioactive iodine-131 were released into the air.  One  terabecquerel is one trillion becquerels.

The agency believes the cumulative amount from the Fukushima plant is less than that from Chernobyl.

Officials from the agency and the Nuclear Safety Commission will hold a  news conference on Tuesday morning to explain the change of evaluation.
 			Tuesday, April 12, 2011 05:47 +0900 (JST)


NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*Strong aftershock kills 4

*NHK WORLD English

----------


## Mid

> All the scare mongering about this being worse then Chernobyl seem to be finally dying down. You had talking heads on the news talking about the reactors like they actually knew what they were talking about. The Japanese response hasn't been the best, but what are you going to do, these things happen during a natural disaster. The only problem I have is they were faking the safety reports at the nuke plants for over a decade.


You were saying ?  :mid:

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by Mr Gribbs
> 
> 
> All the scare mongering about this being worse then Chernobyl seem to be finally dying down. You had talking heads on the news talking about the reactors like they actually knew what they were talking about. The Japanese response hasn't been the best, but what are you going to do, these things happen during a natural disaster. The only problem I have is they were faking the safety reports at the nuke plants for over a decade.
> 
> 
> You were saying ?


"The only problem I have is they were faking the safety reports at the nuke plants for over a decade."

Oh, yeah, that.

----------


## robuzo

> *Japan to raise Fukushima crisis level to worst*


Does that mean it can't get worser?

----------


## HermantheGerman

> Telling lies on purpose or not ?
> May I remind you folks about Tschernobyl. All of our governments have lied to us about this accident. 
> I think that the japanese are also lying on purpose in order to stop hysteria.
> Amazing how calm the Japanese are at this moment. Could you imagine New York with the same scenario.
> The worst is yet to come.


The money that this accident cost can never be paid by the company. Meaning, that nuclear power is a one way street. At the end the taxpayers and their children (and children childrens and...) have to pick up the bill. This does not only apply to Japan !!

----------


## Loy Toy

> This does not only apply to Japan !!


Indeed. The events in Japan over the last month does not only affect Japan, it affects every country and every person on the planet.

A big wake up call especially as most thought the Japanese would be able to handle, let alone be prepared for the disaster which is still panning out.

----------


## Thormaturge

> Originally Posted by misskit
> 
> 
> *Japan to raise Fukushima crisis level to worst*
> 
> 
> Does that mean it can't get worser?


 TEPCO seem to be working on it.  Give them time.  As a corporate entity they are finished.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/13/wo...mid=tw-nytimes

Japan Nuclear Disaster Put on Par With Chernobyl*

 
Sergey Ponomarev/Associated Press
 Cars destroyed in Iwate Prefecture by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami. A search went on for bodies in Iwate on Sunday. 

*By HIROKO TABUCHI and KEITH BRADSHER*

*Published: April 12, 2011   * 

                  TOKYO — Japan  has decided to raise its assessment of the accident at the crippled  Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to the worst rating on an  international scale, putting the disaster on par with the 1986 Chernobyl  explosion, the Japanese nuclear regulatory agency said on Tuesday.         

Officials, monks, military officers and other  emergency workers observed a moment of silence on Monday in Natori,  Japan.                            

    The decision to raise the alert level to 7 from 5 on the scale amounts  to an admission that the accident at the nuclear facility, brought on by  the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, is likely to have substantial and  long-lasting consequences for health and for the environment. Some in  the nuclear industry have been saying for weeks that the accident  released large amounts of radiation, but Japanese officials had played  down this possibility.        

 The new estimates by Japanese authorities suggest that the total amount  of radioactive materials released so far is equal to about 10 percent of  that released in the Chernobyl accident, said Hidehiko Nishiyama,  deputy director general of Japan’s nuclear regulator, the Nuclear and  Industrial Safety Agency.        

 Mr. Nishiyama stressed that unlike at Chernobyl, where the reactor  itself exploded and fire fanned the release of radioactive material, the  containments at the four troubled reactors at Fukushima remained intact  over all.        

 But at a separate news conference, an official from the plant’s  operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, said, “The radiation leak has  not stopped completely and our concern is that it could eventually  exceed Chernobyl.”        

 On the International Nuclear Event Scale, a Level 7 nuclear accident  involves “widespread health and environmental effects” and the “external  release of a significant fraction of the reactor core inventory.” The  scale, which was developed by the International Atomic Energy Agency and countries that use nuclear energy,  leaves it to the nuclear agency of the country where the accident  occurs to calculate a rating based on complicated criteria.        

 Japan’s previous rating of 5 placed the Fukushima accident at the same  level as the Three Mile Island accident in Pennsylvania in 1979. Level 7  has been applied only to the disaster at Chernobyl, in the former  Soviet Union.        

 “This is an admission by the Japanese government that the amount of  radiation released into the environment has reached a new order of  magnitude,” said Tetsuo Iguchi, a professor in the department of quantum  engineering at Nagoya University. “The fact that we have now confirmed  the world’s second-ever level 7 accident will have huge consequences for  the global nuclear industry. It shows that current safety standards are  woefully inadequate.”        

 Mr. Nishiyama said “tens of thousands of terabecquerels” of radiation  per hour have been released from the plant. (The measurement refers to  how much radioactive material was emitted, not the dose absorbed by  living organisms.) The scale of the radiation leak has since dropped to  under one terabecquerel per hour, the Kyodo news agency said, citing  government officials.        

 The announcement came as Japan was preparing to urge more residents  around the crippled nuclear plant to evacuate, because of concerns over  long-term exposure to radiation.        

 The authorities have already ordered people living within a 12-mile  radius of the plant to evacuate, and recommended that people remain  indoors or avoid an area within a radius of about 19 miles.        

 The government’s decision to expand the zone came in response to  radiation readings that would be worrisome over months in certain  communities beyond those areas, underscoring how difficult it has been  to predict the ways radiation spreads from the damaged plant.        

 Unlike the previous definitions of the areas to be evacuated, this time  the government designated specific communities that should be evacuated,  instead of a radius expressed in miles.        

 The radiation has not spread evenly from the reactors, but instead has  been directed to some areas and not others by weather patterns and the  terrain. Iitate, one of the communities told on Monday to prepare for  evacuation, lies well beyond the 19-mile radius, but the winds over the  last month have tended to blow northwest from the Fukushima plant toward  Iitate, which may explain why high readings were detected there. 

 Officials are concerned that people in these communities are being  exposed to radiation equivalent to at least 20 millisieverts a year, he  said, which could be harmful to human health over the long term. In  addition to Iitate, evacuation orders will come within a month for  Katsurao, Namie and parts of Minamisoma and Kawamata, said Yukio Edano,  the chief cabinet secretary.           

 People in five other areas may also be told to evacuate if the  conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi plant grow worse, Mr. Edano said.  Those areas are Hirono, Naraha, Kawauchi, Tamura and other sections of  Minamisoma.        

 “This measure is not an order for you to evacuate or take actions  immediately,” he said. “We arrived at this decision by taking into  account the risks of remaining in the area in the long term.” He  appealed for calm and said that the chance of a large-scale radiation  leak from the Fukushima Daiichi plant had, in fact, decreased.        

 Mr. Edano also said that pregnant women, children and hospital patients  should stay out of the area within 19 miles of the reactors and that  schools in that zone would remain closed.        

 Until now, the Japanese government had refused to expand the evacuation  zone, despite urging from the International Atomic Energy Agency. The  United States and Australia have advised their citizens to stay at least  50 miles away from the plant.        

 The international agency, which is based in Vienna, said Sunday that its  team measured radiation on Saturday of 0.4 to 3.7 microsieverts per  hour at distances of 20 to 40 miles from the damaged plant — well  outside the initial evacuation zone. At that rate of accumulation, it  would take 225 days to 5.7 years to reach the Japanese government’s  threshold level for evacuations: radiation accumulating at a rate of at  least 20 millisieverts per year.        

 In other words, only the areas with the highest readings would qualify for the new evacuation ordered by the government.        

 Aftershocks have continued in northeastern Japan since the March 11  quake and tsunami. The latest occurred Tuesday at 2 p.m. local time when  a shock measuring magnitude 6.0 struck off the Fukushima coast at a  relatively shallow depth of about six miles under the seabed, according  to the United States Geological Survey.  Officials at Tokyo Electric said that workers were moved to safer areas  within the Fukushima Daiichi plant, but there appeared to be no damage  to the power supply and no disruption to pumps sending cooling water  into the plant’s four most severely damaged reactors.        

 The aftershock appeared to be centered very close to a magnitude 6.6  temblor that struck the area on Monday, which knocked out power to the  plant for almost an hour, stopping vital cooling work.

----------


## misskit

*Tens of millions of 'lost' cash found in tsunami-hit areas*

Tens of millions of 'lost' cash found in tsunami-hit areas - The Mainichi Daily News


Free money, ya'll. Anyone going to risk it to get some?

----------


## StrontiumDog

RT_com   RT                                             

            Small amount of strontium found outside 30km zone around Fukushima plant #news #japan

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update Log
*
*Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update Log*

*Updates of 12 April 2011*

 Staff Report 
 

*  Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update (12 April 2011, 04:45 UTC)*

  The Japanese Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) today issued  a new provisional rating for the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi  nuclear power plant on the IAEA International Nuclear and Radiological  Event Scale (INES).

   The nuclear accident at Fukushima Daiichi is now rated as a level 7  "Major Accident" on INES. Level 7 is the most serious level on INES and  is used to describe an event comprised of "A major release of  radioactive material with widespread health and environmental effects  requiring implementation of planned and extended countermeasures".   Japanese authorities notified the IAEA in advance of the public  announcement and the formal submission of the new provisional rating.

   The new provisional rating considers the accidents that occurred at  Units 1, 2 and 3 as a single event on INES. Previously, separate INES  Level 5 ratings had been applied for Units 1, 2 and 3. The provisional  INES Level 3 rating assigned for Unit 4 still applies.

   The re-evaluation of the Fukushima Daiichi provisional INES rating  resulted from an estimate of the total amount of radioactivity released  to the environment from the nuclear plant. NISA estimates that the  amount of radioactive material released to the atmosphere is  approximately 10%  of the 1986 Chernobyl accident, which is the only  other nuclear accident to have been rated a Level 7 event.

   Earlier ratings of the nuclear accident at Fukushima Daiichi were assessed as follows:

   On 18 March, Japanese authorities rated the core damage at the  Fukushima Daiichi 1, 2 and 3 reactor Units caused by loss of all cooling  function to have been at Level 5 on the INES scale. They further  assessed that the loss of cooling and water supplying functions in the  spent fuel pool of the Unit 4 reactor to have been rated at Level 3.

   Japanese authorities may revise the INES rating at the Fukushima  Daiichi nuclear power plant as further information becomes available.

   INES is used to promptly and consistently communicate to the public  the safety significance of events associated with sources of radiation.  The scale runs from 0 (deviation) to 7 (major accident).

    Further information on the INES scale:  International Nuclear Events Scale (INES).

----------


## StrontiumDog

*               Latest close-up shots of Fukushima, video of Japan tsunami hitting plant  *

----------


## StrontiumDog

Japan raises nuclear crisis to Chernobyl level - Channel 4 News

*japan raises nuclear crisis to chernobyl*

Tuesday 12 April 2011

As Japan raises the level of the nuclear  accident at Fukushima to that of Chernobyl, a nuclear engineer tells  Channel 4 News that burying the reactors is increasingly the only  option.                                            

An official at Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency raised the Fukushima  accident to a 7, the worst on the internationally recognised scale, due  to the overall levels of radiation released into the air and sea. But  the authorities stressed that, despite the rating, radiation leaks were  currently only at around 10 per cent of those at Chernobyl - the world's  worst nuclear accident.

As aftershocks continued to rock Japan,  a major fire also broke out at the nuclear plant (pictured). Engineers  managed to extinguish the blaze but its very existence is a blow to  those hoping the reactors had been sufficiently cooled to avoid further  problems.

Almost a month on from the earthquake and tsunami which devastated much of north east Japan  and damaged the Fukushima plant, Japan also increased the evacuation  zone around the plant in a sign of the severity of the accident.

As Japan struggles to contain the nuclear disaster, it is also still coping with the twin impact of 11 March earthquake and tsunami.  Up to 28,000 people may have died, with 150,000 made homeless. The  estimated cost stands at $300bn - the world's most expensive disaster.

*Disaster still gathering pace* 

Even whilst I was in the area around Fukushima three and a half weeks ago, the nuclear operators seemed vague, indistinct, even unwilling to admit what was actually happening, *writes Jon Snow.* 

Today I feel more forgiving, I suspect they simply did not know, and still do not know.

The exclusion zone is being expanded. Three communities beyond even twenty miles are to be evacuated this week…two more inside the zone have been told to pack up today. Twenty one workers at the plant have now exceeded the radiation levels any man is supposed to be able to tolerate without serious life threatening consequences.

The disaster that is Fukushima is still gathering pace...

*Read more on Snowblog: disaster that is Fukushima still gathering pace* 

 
*
Disaster scale*

At Fukushima, an official from Prime Minister Naoto Kan's  office said the leak was not getting worse, saying instead that it had  taken time to assess the full impact of the disaster.

"Even before this, we had considered this a very serious  incident in that sense, so there will be no big change in the way we  deal with it just because it has been designated level 7," he said.
*It is telling people that the accident has the potential to cause trouble to our neighbours.* _Nuclear expert Kenji Sumita_ 
Previously, the Fukushima nuclear crisis had been rated a 5,  in line with the Three Mile Island incident in the United States in  1979. According to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), a  level 5 accident is a limited release of radioactive material, with  several deaths, whereas a level 7 means a major release of radiation  with widespread health and environmental impact.

At Fukushima, the level was raised to reflect a radiation  reading near the plant of 10,000 terabecquerels per hour - a level which  has since dropped to less than 1 per hour, according to reports.
*
Read more: life in the shadow of Japan's nuclear crisis* 

Some experts suggested the rating was hysterical, pointing  out that Chernobyl blew its containment vessels and spewed radioactive  material into the atmosphere, while the Fukushima buildings remain  mostly intact and the leaks steady. 

However others said the rating was a sign of the seriousness of the accident.

Kenji Sumita, a nuclear expert at Osaka University, said:  "Raising the level to 7 has serious diplomatic implications. It is  telling people that the accident has the potential to cause trouble to  our neighbours."
*
Solutions?* 

Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers member Victor J. Petrelli, who helped design a nuclear plant in Illinois, in the United States, told *Channel 4 News* that the solution to the ongoing problem would be to bury or concrete the reactors.

"If the containment leak cannot be mitigated in any other  way, the most likely scenario would be to pump the area full of concrete  which would seal the containment leak as it hardens," he said.

He said that the time for cooling the reactors was over, if the radiation continued to leak. 

"Stop trying to cool the reactor with liquids. Bury it," he said.
*
Read more: Fukushima clean-up 'will take decades and cost billions'*

Long term, he said the radiation risks and how the authorities cleared them up depended on the type of material leaking.

"It depends on what radioactive material is leaking -  specifically its half life. Iodine-131 has only an eight day half life  before becoming harmless, whereas plutonium-239 has a half life of  24,000 years. Isolated trace quantities of plutonium found in the soil  could be simply dug up and moved to a long term storage area. 

"But note that ingesting plutonium is not very harmful,  however breathing it is harmful as it is very toxic to the lungs. So  eating spinach fertilized with plutonium laced soil would not be very  harmful wherein inhaling dust from the soil would be."

Eventually, the accident will be cleared up and dealt with, he said.

"Long term containment is to encase the reactor in concrete which was done at Chernobyl," he said.

"Now, some 30 years later, nature has reclaimed the  Chernobyl area with plant and animal life. So apparently Nature believes  the area to now be safe."

The Japanese authorities said the amount of radiation released into the atmosphere was around 10 per cent that of Chernobyl  - but plant operator Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) warned that the  release could eventually exceed the 1986 disaster if leaks were not  fixed.

People living in five communities in areas beyond the 20km  exclusion zone have also been encouraged to leave the area because of  the long-term risks to health.

*In Pictures - Fukushima nuclear crisis worsens*


_Click on the image to see more photos from Fukushima_

----------


## Butterfly

and as expected and predicted, it has become another Chernobyl

----------


## Gerbil

> Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers member Victor J. Petrelli, who helped design a nuclear plant in Illinois, in the United States, told Channel 4 News that the solution to the ongoing problem would be to bury or concrete the reactors.
> 
> "If the containment leak cannot be mitigated in any other way, the most likely scenario would be to pump the area full of concrete which would seal the containment leak as it hardens," he said.
> 
> He said that the time for cooling the reactors was over, if the radiation continued to leak. 
> 
> "Stop trying to cool the reactor with liquids. Bury it," he said.


Idiot, without cooling the heat will simply increase and burn its way through any concrete containment.




> "Long term containment is to encase the reactor in concrete which was done at Chernobyl," he said.
> 
> "Now, some 30 years later, nature has reclaimed the Chernobyl area with plant and animal life. So apparently Nature believes the area to now be safe."


I suggest he goes and builds a house there then if he thinks it's safe.


Chernobyl was really easier to deal with as the fire dispersed much of the radioactive material into the atmosphere (and across Europe  :Sad: , but at concentrations which really didn't do much long term damage)


In Japan it is collecting in molten blobs at the bottom of the damaged reactors and the heat/radiation is more focused in one place.

----------


## nostromo

> and as expected and predicted, it has become another Chernobyl


No, this could never become another Chernobyl, anymore, since in Chernobyl the most damage was not done by technological disaster, but human (or homo soviet :Smile:  ie soviet human)  mismanagement and culture of secrecy, one party rule and dictatorship that prevented warnings going out. 

Japanese are one of the most able nations to handle this kind of situation.

----------


## Muadib

^ Yes, I looks like they are handling the situation with typical Japanese efficiency...  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> 
> Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers member Victor J. Petrelli, who helped design a nuclear plant in Illinois, in the United States, told Channel 4 News that the solution to the ongoing problem would be to bury or concrete the reactors.
> 
> "If the containment leak cannot be mitigated in any other way, the most likely scenario would be to pump the area full of concrete which would seal the containment leak as it hardens," he said.
> 
> He said that the time for cooling the reactors was over, if the radiation continued to leak. 
> 
> "Stop trying to cool the reactor with liquids. Bury it," he said.
> ...


QUOTE]

As this was an old General Electric reactor "made in the USA", so maybe mr. Petrelli has some insider information. 

As for nature plant and animal life returning to Chernobyl, the plants or animals - dont really know with radiation if it is not dangerous or not. They might not sense it any more than humans. Their insticts do not cover this eventuality. What I hear human babies still have serius abnormalities over there in Ukraine. They had the first dose over and over again for some weeks come months while their government (Soviet Union) did nothing. Could not happen in civilized world, like it does not happen in Japan.

----------


## nostromo

> ^ Yes, I looks like they are handling the situation with typical Japanese efficiency...


Well, in many/most? countries on something like the original event happening there would have been large scale looting, killing and disintegration of state, not in Japan though.

----------


## Takeovers

> "Now, some 30 years later, nature has reclaimed the Chernobyl area with plant and animal life. So apparently Nature believes the area to now be safe."


That statement would be hilarious if the background were not so serious. Yes nature sees the area as safe now because humans are not interfering, not because radiation levels have dropped. Even during the worst time of Chernobyl nature was never seriously affected except in the immediate vincinity of the reactor core.
Of course the levels pose an unacceptable risk to human life causing cancer and birth defects but do not threaten the survival of any species.

----------


## Muadib

> Originally Posted by Muadib
> 
> 
> ^ Yes, I looks like they are handling the situation with typical Japanese efficiency... 
> 
> 
> Well, in many/most? countries on something like the original event happening there would have been large scale looting, killing and disintegration of state, not in Japan though.


Yes, the Japanese people are handling this in their typical stoic, communal behavior... I was eluding to TEPCO and the mis-information campaign they have been waging since the outset of this crisis...

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by HermantheGerman
> 
> This does not only apply to Japan !!
> 
> 
> Indeed. The events in Japan over the last month does not only affect Japan, it affects every country and every person on the planet.
> 
> A big wake up call especially as most thought the Japanese would be able to handle, let alone be prepared for the disaster which is still panning out.


Am I not mistaken you and HermantheGerman are "the members" of the anti-nuclear power lobby?

Nuclear disasters are local - say parts of Japan, or all of New York, France or Shanghai would become dead for next 1000 years, that would be horrible, but world and human race would still live on. But global warming is global in effect and can finish off human life from this planet. Logic is this, nuclear power so far is slowing this and that is why scientiest, even green party scientists support nuclear power. Of course we hope for fusion reactor or other technology but its not here yet.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by StrontiumDog
> 
> "Now, some 30 years later, nature has reclaimed the Chernobyl area with plant and animal life. So apparently Nature believes the area to now be safe."
> 
> 
> That statement would be hilarious if the background were not so serious. Yes nature sees the area as safe now because humans are not interfering, not because radiation levels have dropped. Even during the worst time of Chernobyl nature was never seriously affected except in the immediate vincinity of the reactor core.
> Of course the levels pose an unacceptable risk to human life causing cancer and birth defects but do not threaten the survival of any species.


Animals - or some biologist do mention which animals do- do not have sensory instincts for radiation, and they will just carry on getting on radiation-affected offsprings.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Muadib
> ...


TEPCO is a company so they do have their spin. It is not a country and very unfair to think Japan is TEPCO or TEPCO speaks for them. TEPCO is probably one of the 5 largest power suppliers in the world and it means they have real... power :Smile:  What you think would be happening if this was California?

----------


## nostromo

> Am I not mistaken you and HermantheGerman are "the members" of the anti-nuclear power lobby?


And of course Butters :Smile:

----------


## Muadib

> Originally Posted by Loy Toy
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by HermantheGerman
> ...


No, I am Pro Nuclear power... 

What does that have to do with the mis-information campaign that TEPCO and in turn the Japanese government have been spouting in order to save face?

----------


## Muadib

> Originally Posted by Muadib
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by nostromo
> ...


The Japanese government placed sufficient reliance on the information provided by TEPCO to relay to the world community... It is obvious that either they are complicit in the mis-informaiton campaign or inept... Take your pick... In the mean time, no one really knows the extent of the damage and radiation footprint this is leaving behind and it has been 1 month since the incident...

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Loy Toy
> ...



I never thought you were with anti-nuclear lobby. And I agree with you as I said in previous post, TEPCO is a company and they want to tell things they want - but I dont see Japanese government involved in TEPCO spin (of course there are links at this level between them, but it is not the issue now) .

----------


## Takeovers

> Animals - or some biologist do mention which animals do- do not have sensory instincts for radiation,


Correct, so they behave as if there would be no radiation.




> and they will just carry on getting on radiation-affected offsprings.


Correct too. But if only a part of their offspring is affected they can thrive in an area where they are not bothered by humans. Only if all or too many are affected they will die out. As it is they thrive in the Chernobyl area, so not too many of their offspring are affected. As would be the case with humans living there except we don't accept the number of deformed children those animals do.

----------


## Takeovers

> The Japanese government placed sufficient reliance on the information provided by TEPCO to relay to the world community.


According to Greenpeace the radiation level data provided by the Japanese Government are correct. They are in line with the own measurements by Greenpeace. 
And I would not leave my home at an radiation level of 20 mSievert per year unless forced to do so.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> Animals - or some biologist do mention which animals do- do not have sensory instincts for radiation,
> 
> 
> Correct, so they behave as if there would be no radiation.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Following this, there might be a huge mutant animal population near Chernobyl area now? Of course animals disperse, most the birds

----------


## Takeovers

> Following this, there might be a huge mutant animal population near Chernobyl area now? Of course animals disperse, most the birds


They simply die or perish after conception. No Ninja Turtles.

I grew up with Science Fiction stories about radiation caused Mutants too. That is not what happens in the real world. It seems the populations of rare animals who have migrated there is quite healthy.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> Following this, there might be a huge mutant animal population near Chernobyl area now? Of course animals disperse, most the birds
> 
> 
> They simply die or perish after conception. No Ninja Turtles.
> 
> I grew up with Science Fiction stories about radiation caused Mutants too. That is not what happens in the real world. It seems the populations of rare animals who have migrated there is quite healthy.


Beside Science Fiction, there are mutations. You could try google with "chernobyl +mutation". Unfortunately for them and us they do not simply die, they do carry their genetic faults to general population.

----------


## Takeovers

> Beside Science Fiction, there are mutations. You could try google with "chernobyl +mutation". Unfortunately for them and us they do not simply die, they do carry their genetic faults to general population.


Yes I am aware of that. But it is not a very common occurence.

----------


## Takeovers

I had commented on the news that cooling of reactors 1 to 3 has resumed even if not in a closed circuit. I wondered why no reports on cooling of reactor 4, but have found a reason now.

From Kyodo News




> The No. 4 reactor, halted for a regular inspection before the quake, has  had all of its fuel rods stored in the pool for the maintenance work.


Quite detailed info there. All of the fuel rods of reactor 4 had been removed for a full inspection. The problem there is with the fuel pool "only" so no cooling of the empty reactor core.

----------


## foreigner

> Originally Posted by Takeovers
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by nostromo
> ...



i saw a video ..part of a series w/ a brit journalist eating in wierd places (myanmar was one) ..

any way he visited w/ ate with squatters in the 'no go' zone around Chernobyl..
apparently there are many people who have not evacuated .. many pigs rooting about the area so plenty of animals to slaughter.. .. they had vegetable gardens & made moonshine

the rooskies in the 'reputedly valid series' were mostly older & obviously the poorist of the poor 
most of the rooskie squatters displayed no evidence of teeth but outside no dental care (radiation fs'up x-ray diagnostics?) the people did not seem worse for wear.

----------


## Takeovers

> any way he visited w/ ate with squatters in the 'no go' zone around Chernobyl.. apparently there are many people who have not evacuated ..


Don't know of people living in the area, I have my doubts. But there are lots of old people with low pensions who had their gardens there and are still growing and eating vegetables and fruit simply because they cannot afford to buy them in the market. Not too much of a problem for old people really. Young people especially in their reproductive age or younger should stay clear.

----------


## Butterfly

> The Japanese government placed sufficient reliance on the information provided by TEPCO to relay to the world community... It is obvious that either they are complicit in the mis-informaiton campaign or inept... Take your pick... In the mean time, no one really knows the extent of the damage and radiation footprint this is leaving behind and it has been 1 month since the incident...


well said, and that's basically the problem. The Japanese are not fit to manage those nuclear plants.




> No, I am Pro Nuclear power...
> 
> What does that have to do with the mis-information campaign that TEPCO and in turn the Japanese government have been spouting in order to save face?


I am also pro-nuclear but when it's done correctly. TEPCO is just another company that is killing the credibility of nuclear power, they need to be removed from that business.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Takeovers
> ...


I hear this happens. I have NGO friend who was in area early on. Perhaps got radiation dose. Fuck russia.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by Muadib
> 
> The Japanese government placed sufficient reliance on the information provided by TEPCO to relay to the world community... It is obvious that either they are complicit in the mis-informaiton campaign or inept... Take your pick... In the mean time, no one really knows the extent of the damage and radiation footprint this is leaving behind and it has been 1 month since the incident...
> 
> 
> well said, and that's basically the problem. The Japanese are not fit to manage those nuclear plants.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Butters you just say that because of your hate for the Asians.
Except for the, eh, ones the boys you like. Now you can not give any credibility to your claim that Japanese Government has been running a fake campaign all this time. 

I say I trust Japanese Government.

----------


## misskit

> I say I trust Japanese Government.


I'll second that. They are no less trustworthy than other first world governments.

----------


## misskit

*Aftershocks continue*


 			Strong aftershocks from the March 11th earthquake have been jolting the Pacific coast of northeastern Japan since Monday.

The Meteorological Agency is urging people in the region to remain on the alert for further powerful aftershocks.

On Tuesday, a strong quake struck Fukushima and Ibaraki prefectures just  after 2 PM.   Intensities of 6 minus on the Japanese scale of 0 to 7  were registered in some areas.

The agency says that about 100 aftershocks with intensities of 4 or  higher have shaken many parts of the northeastern Tohoku region as well  as areas around Tokyo in the past month.

It says that 3 earthquakes with a magnitude of over 6.0 were observed on Monday and Tuesday alone.

In areas still recovering from the March 11th quake, the aftershocks  have slowed the recovery of essential services.  Many households in  Iwaki, Fukushima Prefecture, are without water again.

Bottled water has once again disappeared from supermarket shelves.

Iwaki Mayor Takao Watanabe says the city is without basic services again  just when it was about to return to normal.  He says he is deeply  disappointed.


 			Wednesday, April 13, 2011 07:52 +0900 (JST)


NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*IAEA: Fukushima very different from Chernobyl*

NHK WORLD English

----------


## nostromo

I would like a live feed do you think there is one? Pref English but in not available Japanese.

I was in Japan before and after Kobe.

----------


## misskit

^Not one I know of.

----------


## robuzo

That's the headline at the Yomiuri site right now:
*Experts: Magnitude 8 quake could strike east of the original epicenter at the earliest within a month*
k¹æ¤ÅlWA¯êÎP©àcêåÆ : Èw : YOMIURI ONLINEiÇV·j

According to the article, that would mean a number of experts. . .there are people who would accuse a western news agency of sensationalism for publishing this kind of thing, not that I see anything wrong with giving people the honest appraisal of seismologists.

----------


## nostromo

> That's the headline at the Yomiuri site right now:
> *Experts: Magnitude 8 quake could strike east of the original epicenter at the earliest within a month*
> k¹æ¤ÅlWA¯êÎP©àcêåÆ : Èw : YOMIURI ONLINEiÇV·j
> 
> According to the article, that would mean a number of experts. . .there are people who would accuse a western news agency of sensationalism for publishing this kind of thing, not that I see anything wrong with giving people the honest appraisal of seismologists.


Reading Yomiuri this moment. Besides TEPCO boss resigning, no one knows any more.

I am with the Japanese.

----------


## misskit

*102-year-old Fukushima man facing evacuation commits suicide*

  IITATE, Fukushima -- A 102-year-old man, apparently deeply troubled  at the prospect of being forced to leave his home in this village close  to the crippled Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant, has committed  suicide -- a stark indicator of the emotional toll exacted by the  nuclear crisis evacuations.
 Iitate was included in the central government's expanded evacuation  zone announced April 11 and required residents to evacuate within one  month. According to local sources, the man took his own life on April  12, in the midst of a discussion with his eldest son and the man's wife  about evacuating.

http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/natio...na001000c.html


Poor old guy.

----------


## Mid

Oh Jesus wept  :Sad: 

To live to 102 only to commit suicide due to your fellow man's ineptitude .

RIP

----------


## Mid

_Fire at Fukushima No. 1 April 12. Note the smoke, note the proximity of  the ocean. Move along: Nothing to see here, folks. It’s all under  control…_

https://facthai.wordpress.com/2011/0...-fuck-u-shima/

----------


## Takeovers

That's an auxiliary structure. Nothing to do with the reactors.

----------


## crippen



----------


## Loy Toy

> That's an auxiliary structure. Nothing to do with the reactors.


http://img716.imageshack.us/img716/2...lleryv9npa.jpg

So even the auxiliary equipment is having major problems?

Friggin hell. It's worse then what I thought.

----------


## Takeovers

> So even the auxiliary equipment is having major problems?


Just in case you don't remember. There has been a 9.0 earthquake, a Tsunami and then the fire came as a result of another 7.0 earthquake. Yes there are still problems. Yet the cooling is now working on all reactors. Admitted not in a closed circuit yet.

----------


## Loy Toy

> Just in case you don't remember.


It's just over 1 month ago if my memory serves me correctly.



> Yes there are still problems.


Certainly as there is a fire raging in an ancilary piece of equipment. 



> Yet the cooling is now working on all reactors. Admitted not in a closed circuit yet.


I'll believe that when they can show us some pictures.

----------


## misskit

*Fuel rod fragments at bottom of vessels*

*No meltdown risk if cooling efforts continue*


Melted fuel rod fragments have sunk to the bottoms of  three reactors at the Fukushima No. 1 power plant and could  theoretically burn through the pressure vessels if emergency  water-pumping operations are seriously disrupted, the Atomic Energy  Society of Japan said Friday.

    If too many of the melted fuel fragments puddle at the  bottom, they can generate enough concentrated heat to bore a hole in the  pressure vessel, which would result in a massive radioactive release to  the environment..
    "It will take at least two or three months ... until  the situation of fuel rods is stabilized" said Takashi Sawada, vice  chairman of the nuclear body.


remainder of article:

Fuel rod fragments at bottom of vessels | The Japan Times Online

----------


## misskit

*One month on, debris fields barely dented*

A month after the devastating earthquake and tsunami,  the challenges seem as daunting as ever: Thousands are missing and  feared dead, tens of thousands have fled their homes, the Fukushima No. 1  nuclear plant continues to leak and powerful aftershocks keep coming.

   Vast tracts of the Tohoku region are demolition sites:  The stuff of entire cities is sorted into piles taller than three-story  buildings around which dump trucks and earthmovers crawl. Ankle-deep  water stagnates in streets, and massive fishing boats lie perched atop  pancaked houses and cars. The occasional telephone poll or bulldozer is  sometimes the only skyline.


One month on, debris fields barely dented | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Takeovers

> Certainly as there is a fire raging in an ancilary piece of equipment.


There is no fire raging. There was a small fire after the 7.0 earthquake that was quickly controlled and put out.






> I'll believe that when they can show us some pictures.


It is the position of the IAEA. And even Greenpeace confirmed that the Japanese Government statements regarding radiation are correct as far as they can check them and they have checked quite thouroughly.

----------


## Loy Toy

> And even Greenpeace confirmed that the Japanese Government statements regarding radiation are correct as far as they can check them and they have checked quite thouroughly.


So Greenpeace has access to the reactors?

----------


## Takeovers

> So Greenpeace has access to the reactors?


Says who?

----------


## Loy Toy

> Says who?


I'm asking you the question and based upon your quote.





> And even Greenpeace confirmed that the Japanese Government statements regarding radiation are correct as far as they can check them and they have checked quite thouroughly.


Were they allowed access to the reactors and to see their exact condition themselves?

----------


## Takeovers

> Were they allowed access to the reactors and to see their exact condition themselves?


I did not say that and it would be difficult to read it out of my statement. Greenpeace confirmes the radiation readings outside. That has been questioned by many, saying they are surely much higher than admitted.

If there were a core melting to an extent that the containment was breached the radiation would be higher and more dangerous isotopes would be measured. That again confirmed by the IAEA. See the link






> Fuel rod fragments at bottom of vessels | The Japan Times Online


Like so many other articles the headline is as alarmist as the facts allow, actually more so. But basically it says the reactor cores are not breached and are very unlikely to be breached in the future.

The plutonium detected is so low that it may be from bomb testing in the 60ies. Way too low to come from any possible containment breach.

----------


## Mid

*Smoke at another Japan nuclear plant*


_Operations at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear complex were suspended for two years from 2007 following an earthquale_

Deleted
_Map_

*TOKYO* — Smoke briefly rose Saturday from a control panel at a  Japanese nuclear power plant operated by the same company battling to  stop radiation seeping from a quake-stricken facility, a report said.

There  were no injuries but the cause of the smoke at the plant in coastal  Niigata prefecture was not clear, Kyodo news said, citing Tokyo Electric  Power Co. (TEPCO).

The incident occurred in the evening during  the checking of water purification equipment at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa  nuclear complex, the company was quoted as saying.

The beleaguered  TEPCO has been fighting to prevent more radiation from leaking out of  the Fukushima Daiichi plant in Japan's northeast after it was crippled  by the devastating March 11 quake and tsunami.

google.com

----------


## Mid

_TOKYO/FUKUSHIMA: Japanese  engineers began dumping          zeolite mineral          to check sea  water contamination near the crippled          Fukushima nuclear plant           , even as desperate efforts were launched today to combat the  surge in the level of highly          radioactive water          in the  reactor's tunnel.          

          As efforts  continued to stabilise the plant, an aftershock of 5.9 magnitude struck  the Kanto region in eastern          Japan          today at 11:19 am  local time and was centred about 79 km below the ground in southern  Ibaraki prefecture, according to the country's Meteorological Agency.
_
New 5.9 quake jolts Japan; Zeolite dropped in Pacific - The Economic Times

----------


## misskit

> the plant in coastal Niigata prefecture


Goofus maps has it wrong again. Niigata is on the west coast at the top of the map, not where pointed.

----------


## Mid

Thanxs , map deleted

----------


## Mid

_JAPAN, THURSDAY: Tsunami survivors take a bath in the devastated town of Minamisanriku, Miyagi prefecture._ 
Photo: Yasyoshi Chiba

The First Post | News, comment, opinion, people, arts, sport & life

----------


## robuzo

> *Smoke at another Japan nuclear plant*
> 
> 
> _Operations at the Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear complex were suspended for two years from 2007 following an earthquale_
> 
> Deleted
> _Map_
> 
> *TOKYO*  Smoke briefly rose Saturday from a control panel at a  Japanese nuclear power plant operated by the same company battling to  stop radiation seeping from a quake-stricken facility, a report said.
> ...


Probably just an auxiliary structure, nothing to worry about.

----------


## misskit

*Government considering plan to dismantle TEPCO*



A secret plan to dismantle Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), the  operator of the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, is  circulating within the government.      The proposal, which is associated with a faction of bureaucrats who  have long supported liberalization of Japan's power industry, envisages  the passing of a special measures law that would put the company under  close government supervision before eventually bankrupting it and  completely restructuring its remnants. 



     There are also proposals to smash the company's powerful influence on  politicians and the mass media and force executives to give all their  pay and severance settlements to victims of the earthquake. 



     However, a rival faction in the Ministry of Economy, Trade and  Industry and the Agency for Natural Resources and Energy (ANRE) and  politicians with links to the power industry may try to fight or  emasculate the radical proposals. 
     Sources said internal government discussions about how to handle  TEPCO began in earnest around March 28, as it became clear that  trillions of yen would be required just to compensate residents of  Fukushima Prefecture affected by the nuclear disaster. The plan to  dismantle the firm was being circulated by the end of the month. 



     At its center is a special measures bill placing TEPCO under government supervision and paving the way to pulling it apart. 
     A former ANRE official who supports the plan said: "The special  measures law will be necessary when we consider the need for  comprehensive reform of TEPCO's management, including the establishment  of a third-party organ to certify compensation decisions, a way to come  up with the funds to pay compensation, and the separation of the  company's nuclear energy department." 



     According to an outline draft proposal, there would be four main measures within the bill. 

     An independent committee would be established within the government  to oversee TEPCO's management. It would monitor the selection of  executives, the compensation process and management reform. 
     The law would allow the government to guarantee all loans from  financial institutions needed to pay for the disaster response at the  Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.  
     Business transactions, such as payments for fuel, would also be protected. 
     Finally, the law would put a moratorium on the repayment of debt,  including corporate bonds, from before the March 11 earthquake and  tsunami. 
     A key issue in handling the issue will be timing. If the government  uses public funds to save the company before the compensation to be paid  out is decided, the burden on the public is likely to be increased. 



     Even if the central government injects capital into TEPCO in exchange  for preferred stock, that stock would have a subordinate claim to the  assets of the company compared with debt held by financial institutions  and corporate bonds. Its claims would be the first to be pushed aside in  bankruptcy proceedings. 
     A government official said it would be folly to "inject fresh water  into polluted water, because that water would end up becoming polluted  as well." 
     Instead, supporters of the restructuring plan want to keep TEPCO in  its current form in the short term and use government guarantees to keep  it running. 
     Those guarantees would not extend to financial claims dating from  before the finalization of the government bailout plan, including  approximately 2 trillion yen ($23.6 billion) in emergency loans recently  extended by major financial institutions.  
     A government source said those loans had been "something the private sector did based on its own risk assessments." 



     The plan expects bankruptcy proceedings to begin once the amount of  compensation is settled and the total cost of handling the Fukushima  accident can be estimated. 
     According to the company's financial statements for the fiscal year  ending in March 2010, TEPCO had 13.2 trillion yen in assets and 10.6  trillion yen in liabilities. If compensation exceeds the difference  between those amounts, TEPCO would have excess liabilities. Some  estimates put the cost of compensation and handling the Fukushima  accident at approximately 10 trillion yen, meaning TEPCO is already  effectively bankrupt. 



     The plan envisages a drastic restructuring of TEPCO during the bankruptcy and rehabilitation process. 
     During the bankruptcy proceedings, a financial dissolution plan would  be compiled after most of the debt was finalized. That plan would  likely include eliminating all the company's capital and asking  financial institutions to forgive debt.  
     To lessen the impact on the corporate bond market, the discounting of  bonds would likely be less severe than the writing off of debt from  financial institutions. 
     The biggest issue at the rehabilitation stage is likely to be a  proposal supported by some METI officials to separate the power  generation and power transmission arms of TEPCO. 



     When Britain privatized its electricity generation industry, it was  separated into two distinct sectors: companies handling power generation  and firms responsible for power transmission. The aim was to keep down  the price of electricity by encouraging competition in the industry. 
     In Japan, all nine electric power companies handle both power  generation and transmission, and they have been fighting the idea of  separating the two functions for years. 



     Under the plan, TEPCO would first be made a holding company and  subsidiaries would be established to separately handle power generation  and power transmission. Conventional thermal and hydro power plants  owned by the power generating arm would be gradually sold off to new  entrants to the market. Selling off plants and profitable subsidiaries  would lessen the financial burden on the public. 



     Eventually, TEPCO would end up as a power transmission company on a far smaller scale than it is at present. 
     Sources said separation into power generation and transmission  companies would probably happen two or three years after passage of the  special measures law.  
     There are also proposals for a ban on political donations by TEPCO  and its labor union. The power industry is known for its strong  political connections, with key backers including Lower House member  Akira Amari and other Liberal Democratic Party members, who make up the  commerce lobby, and Upper House Democratic Party of Japan member Masashi  Fujiwara, who has roots in the Federation of Electric Power Related  Industry Worker's Unions.  
     Another issue that may be addressed is TEPCO's influence over the  mass media, maintained using a huge advertising budget, which was used  to foster the widespread belief that nuclear plants did not pose a  safety risk. 
     There are also proposals to force all TEPCO executives to donate all  of their remuneration and severance pay to victims of the nuclear  accident, to cut corporate adviser posts, and to prevent retiring  executives from getting jobs at related companies, a practice known as  "amakudari." 



     The fate of the plans may partly rely on bureaucratic politics, and,  specifically, the relative influence of two rival bureaucratic factions  within METI and ANRE. 
     Around 2004, when Katsusada Hirose and Seiji Murata were METI vice  ministers, a group arguing for liberalization of the electric power  industry was in the ascendancy. But bureaucrats defending the status  quo, under the patronage of Hideji Sugiyama and Takao Kitabata, who  later served as vice ministers, have made a comeback and now hold a  number of important ministry posts. The plan to dismantle TEPCO is  associated with the liberalizing group. 
     One high-ranking ANRE official emphasized that the plan had not yet  been authorized, and a mid-level METI bureaucrat said, "It is only being  talked about by those in the Prime Minister's Official Residence and  the National Policy Unit." 
     There is a strong possibility that the plan will be watered down by  politicians in the Diet or emasculated by officials in METI and ANRE,  which has been chosen as the lead agency overseeing the future of TEPCO. 


asahi.com

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Japan nuclear operator aims for cold shutdown in 6-9 months | Reuters
*
*Japan nuclear operator aims for cold shutdown in 6-9 months*

             By Taiga Uranaka
                  TOKYO |          Sun Apr 17, 2011 3:52am EDT         

   (Reuters) - Japanese nuclear power plant operator Tokyo Electric Power  Co. (TEPCO) hopes it will be able to achieve cold shutdown of its  crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant within six to nine months, the  company said on Sunday.

  The firm said the first step  would be cooling the reactors and spent fuel to a stable level within  three months, then bringing the reactors to cold shutdown in six to nine  months. That would make the plant safe and stable and end the immediate  crisis, now rated on a par with the world's worst nuclear accident, the  1986 Chernobyl disaster.

TEPCO,  founded 60 years ago, added it later plans to cover the reactor  buildings, damaged by a massive earthquake and tsunami that struck on  March 11.

The latest data shows  much more radiation leaked from the Daiichi plant in the early days of  the crisis than first thought, prompting officials to rate it on a par  with Chernobyl, although experts were quick to point out Japan's crisis  was vastly different from Chernobyl in terms of radiation contamination.

TEPCO Chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata said he was considering resigning over the accident, but that he couldn't say when.

"This  is the biggest crisis since the founding of our company," Katsumata  told a news conference at which the timetable was unveiled.

"Getting  the nuclear plant under control, and the financial problems associated  with that... How we can overcome these problems is a difficult matter."

The  toll from Japan's triple catastrophe is rising. More than 13,000 people  have been confirmed dead, and on Wednesday the government cut its  outlook for the economy, in deflation for almost 15 years, for the first  time in six months.

TEPCO and the  government are under pressure to clarify when those who have had to  evacuate the area around the damaged plant will be able to go home.  Prime Minister Naoto Kan faced heavy criticism over comments, which he  later denied making, suggesting the evacuees might not be able to return  for 10 or 20 years.

"We would like  to present objective facts to help the government make judgment and  outlook on when those who have evacuated can come back home," TEPCO  Chairman Tsunehisa Katsumata told a news conference at which the  timeframe was unveiled.

Katsumata  also said the company was taking steps to cope with the possibility of  another big tsunami. The area has been rocked by large aftershocks since  the magnitude 9.0 quake struck and triggered the devastating tsunami.

But he said he had no idea how much it would ultimately cost to stabilize the plant.

----------


## MakingALife

> *Government considering plan to dismantle TEPCO*
> 
> A secret plan to dismantle Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), the  operator of the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, is  circulating within the government......   The proposal...  envisages  the passing of a special measures law that would put the company under  close government supervision before eventually bankrupting it and  completely restructuring its remnants.  There are also proposals to smash the company's powerful influence on  politicians and the mass media and force executives to give all their  pay and severance settlements to victims of the earthquake.... 
> 
> The plan expects bankruptcy proceedings to begin once the amount of  compensation is settled and the total cost of handling the Fukushima  accident can be estimated..... 
> 
> Some  estimates put the cost of compensation and handling the Fukushima  accident at approximately 10 trillion yen, meaning TEPCO is already  effectively bankrupt..... 
> 
> The plan envisages a drastic restructuring of TEPCO during the bankruptcy and rehabilitation process. 
> ...


  I shortened the full quote above, just for simplicity sake to capture the high points - most of which are captured in the first paragraph. Fox broke similar but less detailed news a few days ago, and I believe even Bloomberg may have covered this topic.  Its all interesting - reading what was published in Japan.  The details speak about the shameful public private incest that delivered this industry to its current low ethic less state, now exposed by the disaster.  It is shameful when influence, buys out regulatory safety, for the sake of profits - and heads are turned away from the growing scientific  research that pointed to elevated risks (specifically EQ assesments, Tsunami hardening against impled risks).  Consequences will follow......

I spent two years working for an independent power producer in Northern New England back in the late 80's.  That company was only a generation company,  and used regional utility grids and power purchase agreements to market its power via the Major Utilities.

The power industry break up - into generation companies and transmission companies had not yet taken place. That was pushed though about a decade or so later - touted as a real win-win for the consumer - allowing them to purchase lowest cost power - wheeled across the grid.      

So MOM and POP could sign up with many different power companies for their juice.   Bills received would include generation price (often with a fuel adjustment factor involved)  - there would also be a "stranded cost" portion - to pay for grid services (based as well on Kw use factor).     Sadly once put in practice.... These bills (totaling generation and distribution costs together)  proved to be a significantly higher cost for electric power than rate payers were used to.   

By allowing the break up and deregulation into functional separate entities - It removed some of the efficient rate regulation by state public service board approvals for rate increases, in the industry.  Regulation measures that replaced some PSB's methods were less effective.  Some states managed the process better than others,  but overall it was a major failure for the consumer.  The idea of better competition to benefit lower consumer pricing was a pure fantasy.  Yes there would be more competition by energy generation companies.   However there is no real competition in distribution sectors.  There is not a lot of rural redundancy in distribution grids.  Power Distribution will always be a choke point in the energy cost equation to rate payers. Transmission and distribution grids are major investments and have high costs.  They are tied to geography, and will never have a large amount of competition.   They grew organically from former regional utilities as they expanded electrification projects from the power industry at its infancy.    No one builds distribution networks from scratch in hope of developing customers.  Not in this day and age,  The costs for land, right of way, permitting etc is way to high to recover the investment.

Formerly with a unified power (generation and distribution under the same company) - profits from the generation side, covered grid upgrades and maintenance.   PSB's regulated rate increases based on a careful need assessment.    Split into stand alone functional groups,  PSB's had to assess rate increases for transmission company's separately from those of generation companies.   Making it easier for these separate groups to make cases for rate increases,  because revenue streams were different.     

With transmission / distribution having firm geographic footing, and generation companies forced much hard to compete for customers, is not gain for consumers or for power system reliability.   Consumers got gouged for the T&D costs, and generation companies were forced to run leaner models (based on higher competition) - ultimately reducing private industry generation reliability.   When bad weather and ice storms swept through - T&D companies costs could not absorb all the costs so rates were raised.  This split up was a sham sold to the public and passed across many state and regional utility territories.       

In my former US residence.   My regional utility changed names and changed hands.   My power came from its generational assets - which had been sold a British Company.  The distribution service came across the same old grid (as before),  but was billed at a  rate, almost as high as my former total power cost alone.     Equally it was not welcome to recognize my power costs, were generating profits for a foreign company. 

Yes I was free to shop for lowest cost generation companies (anywhere),  but by the time the power wheeling & grid costs were factored in -  It remained lowest cost to by my power locally, but at a  significantly higher than before this break up along function lines took place.

This kind of functional break up will be a net loser for the Japan consumer as well.   Large Utilities will often prefer the older model - because it gives them a stable monopoly on their distribution territory.  It makes future system planning and budgeting easier, as well,  because they can very well model system growth and conservation measures as well, and upgrades such as smart grid technology.    

Traction for the new model is best where generational assets and grid assets are old and outmoded.   As split entities its easier to get rate increases for separate refurbishment of pieces, rather than across the board for their entire system.  In the ERA of new environmental regulations (and future carbon taxation models) - It is much easier to abandon old fossil fuel dirty generation assets at or near end of life and develop new Cogen cycle plants using LNG / LPG cycles and get a rate set for good life cycle cost recovery than to hold on and extend old assets.   Spliting utilities along function lines -  Makes this easier to do, than with the old model.  When those advantages are well understood - Utilities get behind the break up along functional lines.   

It appears this like this disaster and the question of TEPCO - is about to open the door for this kind of utility structural change in Japan.  People have to be careful for what the wish for -  because it probably is not going to be lower cost or better for the consumer.

The question of TEPCO's future is pretty clear.  They are not financially strong enough to cover the damages and service debts.   They are toast just from that fiscal point of view.   But it goes deeper than that. Regardless of how weak or strong the final agreement will become - TEPCO will be gutted, broken up, sold off, because of TEPCO's persona and public perception - punitive action will also be placed against all executives as well.  

TEPCO will be maintained in some skeleton form to serve as a glaring example to others in the business - of what happens when power and influence go array and where arrogance arises to the point where they believe they can re-write their own conduct rules, which ignore their public duty of putting safety first, and which incorrectly bolstered a believe they can squeeze and cut corners like other rabid "for profit" large industries in Japan.   When you are a utility - you must meet mission and safety first, profit marginally after that.   TEPCO seems to have forgotten that.  They will pay heavily for that breach of public trust.

They are destined to remain crucified and strung up - like the bodies along the Appian Way -  the central road that lead into ROME -  as evidence that those on the path must bear witness to the consequences of forgetting their allegiance to Rome and the laws that govern her citizens.   TEPCOs going to be strung up and left waving in the breeze...  It will be part of the shake up in the Japan power sector, and will usher in a full restructure of the Nuclear power and Nuclear safety industries as well.   

Where that is going to end up is hard to predict, but Its fair to say the Japanese public has probably lost faith in its own mechanisms and will demand the highest accountability and independent safety assessments across the board.   It will likely mean a shuttering and decommissioning of any nuclear facilities close to the end of their economic life.  It will mean deep safety assessments and hardened of back up power redundancy for other Nuclear plants with significant remaining economic life.  It will mean a major shift away from spent nuclear fuel storage on site - With a costly governmental solution being drafted and implemented.   

The Japanese sentiment with their resolve and focus will push these things to the forefront and slay these dragons - as a new norm model that the rest of the worlds nuclear industries should take note of. 

Japan as a last prong will be pushing alternative energies as well, other more modern non nuclear utilities,   and the core Nuclear plants will remain the major work horses that service their industrial power needs.    

These are likely the agenda items that will tumble as Japan picks up Nuclear and Utility power issues in the future.  MissKit did a great service do drag out and post this good quote -  Its a tale of the tape to come, and its an example of the political unwinding that is sweeping as a result of this disaster.   This unfortunate chain of events, are proving to be the tipping point for change for greater transparency in Japans power sector.   

I remain hopeful they shy away from the model of split function between generation and distribution -  Thats clearly a losing game for customers.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Japan's crisis: one month later*

 	Japan is just in the  beginning of the long term recovery effort from the earthquake that  struck off northeastern Japan on March 11. The crisis alert level from  the damage to the  Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant has now been raised to  the highest level of impact, the same as the Chernobyl Russia incident  25 years ago.  Searchers continue to look for the dead, displaced  Japanese live in shelters, protests continue over use of nuclear power,  Japan's economic engine may be disrupted, the massive cleanup of debris  is just underway, aftershocks are feared and many continue to mourn  those who were lost. The photos collected here are from one month to the  day of the quake and beyond. -- _Lloyd Young_  (36 photos total)

Buddhist  monks, Japan Self-Defense Force personnel, firefighters, and other  relief workers observed a moment of silence on "Hiyori Yama," or Weather  Hill, in Natori, Miyagi prefecture, on April 11, 2011, exactly one  month after the devastating earthquake and tsunami hit northeastern  Japan.  Local fishermen used to climb the manmade hump and decide  whether it was safe to fish. (Koichi Nakamura,Yomiuri Shimbun/Associated  Press) 


2
Elementary  school children crouched under their desks at their school in Onagawa,  Miyagi prefecture, on April 12, 2011, as a powerful aftershock hit  northern Japan. Japan added to the evacuation zone around the stricken  nuclear plant, as a powerful aftershock rattled the nation a month after  its biggest recorded earthquake wrought devastation. (AFP/Getty Images)  #


3
Mud  and trees covered part of a road after a landslide caused by a  magnitude 7.0 earthquake on April 11, 2011, in Iwaki, Fukushima  prefecture, Japan. (Kyodo News/Associated Press)  #


4
An  evacuee sat in a partitioned "room" at a gymnasium converted into a  shelter in Kamaishi, Iwate prefecture, on April 12, 2011, a month after  the March 11 earthquake and tsunami hit the northeastern coast of Japan.  (Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty Images #


5
Rui  Sato, 2, showed off his key chain while playing with a Japan Red Cross  member at an evacuation center in Fukushima, northeastern Japan, on  April 11, 2011. (Hiro Komae/Associated Press) #


6
Teru  Sutou, 8, and his brother Ren, 9, ate a distributed hot stew and rice  at a parking lot in Minamisanriku, Miyagi prefecture, on April 12, 2011.  Japan's Prime Minister Naoto Kan said that the Fukushima nuclear plant  is gradually stabilizing and that the amount of radiation being released  is falling. (Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP/Getty Images) #


7
A  volunteer cleaned a family photo that was washed by the March 11  earthquake and tsunami as baby photos were placed to dry at a volunteer  center in Ofunato, Iwate prefecture, April 12, 2011. (Toru  Hanai/Reuters)   #


8
Japanese  police officers climbed up a slope in Minamisanriku, Miyagi prefecture,  after receiving a tsunami warning following a powerful tremor, one of  hundreds of aftershocks stemming from the massive earthquake a month  ago. (Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP/Getty Images)   #


9
Fisherman  Koichi Sasaki looked for his wedding ring, which was lost a month  earlier during the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, at a damaged area in  Ofunato, Iwate prefecture. (Toru Hanai/Reuters)  #


10
Shoppers  looked for vegetables during a sale of produce from the city of Iwaki  in Fukushima prefecture on April 12, 2011. The government is trying to  support farmers in Fukushima who are hurting from dropped sales due to  rumors of the spread of radiation from the troubled nuclear power plant.  (Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP/Getty Images) #


11
Kiyoi  Oikawa, 74, collected water from a well with a recycled bucket to wash  her clothes from her destroyed home in Minamisanriku on April 12, 2011.   Japan's Prime Minister Naoto Kan said that the Fukushima nuclear plant  is gradually stabilizing and that the amount of radiation being released  is falling. (Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP/Getty Images)  #


12
A  Japanese man cleaned up his workshop in the area devastated by the  March 11 earthquake and tsunami in the town of Minamisanriku. (Sergey  Ponomarev/Associated Press)  #


13
Japan's  Prime Minister Naoto Kan spoke at a news conference at his official  residence in Tokyo on April 12, 2011. China said on Tuesday it was still  concerned about Japan's nuclear calamity, a disaster Japan put on a par  with the world's worst nuclear accident, Chernobyl. (Yuriko  Nakao/Reuters)  #


14
Japan's  Nuclear Safety Agency official Hidehiko Nishiyama spoke during a news  conference on the announcement on nuclear accident severity level in  Tokyo on April 12, 2011. Japan raised the severity of its nuclear  disaster to seven, the highest level, on Tuesday, putting it on a par  with the world's worst disaster nuclear accident at Chernobyl after  another major aftershock rattled the quake-ravaged east. (Yuriko  Nakao/Reuters)   #


15
Fire  could be seen in the sampling building near a water drain of TEPCO  Fukushima No.1 (Dai-Ichi) nuclear power plant in the town of Okuma in  Fukushima prefecture. The fire broke out at the stricken nuclear plant  in the morning of April 12, 2011, but was soon extinguished.  (TEPCO/AFP/Getty Images)  #


16
An  employee inspected auto parts on the production line of Iwaki Diecast  Co.'s plant in Yamamoto, Miyagi prefecture, Japan. Toyota Motor Corp.  told US dealers that assembly disruptions triggered by last month's  record earthquake and tsunami in Japan may thin supplies of vehicles  into the third quarter. (Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg)  #


17
A  man looked at the closing price of Japan's Nikkei share average (top  center) displayed along with major indices outside a brokerage in Tokyo.  The Nikkei average dropped for a second straight day April 12 on  growing worries that the impact of the March 11 earthquake may be more  severe than hoped and as Japan put its nuclear crisis on par with  Chernobyl. (Yuriko Nakao/Reuters)  #


18
A  man looked for his personal belongings at a collection center for items  found in the rubble of an area devastated by the March 11 earthquake  and tsunami, in Natori, northern Japan. (Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters) #


19
Japan  Self-Defense Force members searched for victims in debris caused by the  March 11 tsunami in Natori, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan, on April 12,  2011. (Lee Jin-man/Associated Press) #


20
During  an event in Tokyo to promote safety of agricultural products, a man  used a radiation detector to measure the level in strawberries produced  in Iwaki City, Fukushima prefecture. (Koji Sasahara/Associated Press) #


21
A  man was tested for contamination in Koriyama, Fukushima prefecture,  northern Japan, on April 12, 2011. (Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters)  #


22
A  Buddhist monk prayed for earthquake victims at a burial site in  Higashimatsushima, Miyagi prefecture, one month after the earthquake and  tsunami struck northern Japan.  Across the country people stood in  silence at 2:46 p.m. local time on April 11 to remember the thousands  killed. (Athit Perawongmetha/Getty Images)  #


23
Greenpeace  activists and other environmentalists lit candles amid hundreds of  paper cranes at the Heroes' Monument at suburban Quezon city,  Philippines, on April 11 in solidarity to the Japanese disaster victims.  The protesters are calling for an end to nuclear power around the  world. (Bullit Marquez/Associated Press) #


24
People  wearing masks and raincoats took part in an antiradioactivity rally in  Seoul, South Korea, to urge the government to quickly release  information about "radioactive rain" and other risks on April 12, 2011.  China and South Korea have been critical of the crippled nuclear plant  operator's decision to pump radioactive water into the sea, a process it  has now stopped. (Jo Yong-Ha/Reuters)  #


25
Family  members looked at their collapsed house in Kesennuma, Miyagi  prefecture, on April 11, 2011, a month after the earthquake and tsunami.  (Kazuhiro Nogi/AFP/Getty Images)  #


26
Japanese  Self-Defense Forces cleaned the rooms at the Okawa elementary school in  Ishinomaki, Miyagi prefecture. Japan said it was to widen the  evacuation area around a crippled nuclear plant to include territory  outside the current 12-mile exclusion zone. (Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP/Getty  Images) #


27
A  Japanese man rode a bicycle along a flooded street at an area  devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in the port town of  Kesennuma, Miyagi prefecture, Japan. (Sergey Ponomarev/Associated Press)   #


28
A  man looked at newspaper reports about the earthquake and tsunami on  display at the Miyagi Prefectural Government building in Sendai,  northeastern Japan. (Vincent Yu/Associated Press)  #


29
Survivors prayed at the wreckage of a house in Natori, Miyagi prefecture, northern Japan. (Lee Jin-man/Associated Press)  #


30
Abandoned  flowers wilted within the exclusion zone of Fukushima Nuclear Power  Plant in Futaba Town, Fukushima prefecture, Japan. (Athit  Perawongmetha/Getty Images)  #


31
A  deserted street in Futaba inside the exclusion zone around from  Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant. (Athit Perawongmetha/Getty Images)  #


32
Debris  was strewn in Namie, within the exclusion zone around Fukushima Nuclear  Power Plant. Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency raised the  crisis alert level from level five to seven, the highest level on the  scale. (Athit Perawongmetha/Getty Images)  #


33
Members  of the Japan's Self-Defense Force cleaned up debris on April 11 in an  area destroyed a month ago by the tsunami in Natori, Miyagi prefecture,  northern Japan. (Vincent Yu/Associated Press)  #


34
A  month after the tsunami devastation, 2-year-old Ayaka and family  members prayed for her missing grandmother and great-grandmother at a  vacant lot where they lived in Ishinomaki, Miyagi prefecture. (Yasuyoshi  Chiba/AFP/Getty Images)   #


35
Masataka  Shimizu (center), president of Tokyo Electric Power Co. , flanked by  vice presidents Takashi Fujimoto and Sakae Muto, bowed during a news  conference at the company's headquarters in Tokyo on April 13. The  president defended the utility's response to the worst nuclear crisis  since Chernobyl and pledged pay cuts as workers struggle to control  radiation leaks from a crippled atomic power station. (Kiyoshi  Ota/Bloomberg) #


36
The  sun set on April 13, 2011, over debris still piled up nearly five weeks  after the earthquake and tsunami disaster devastated the city of  Ishinomaki in Miyagi prefecture. The impact of Japan's earthquake and  nuclear crisis rippled through the economy as the government downgraded  its outlook and Toyota announced more temporary plant shutdowns  overseas. (Yasuyoshi Chiba/AFP/Getty Images)   #

----------


## StrontiumDog

WBNS 10TV : Home - WBNS-10TV, Central Ohio's News Leader

Apr 18, 12:34 AM EDT

*Japan sends robots in to stricken nuclear plant   *  


 AP Photo/Shuji Kajiyama                           

TOKYO     (AP) -- Nuclear safety officials say the first radiation  measurements taken inside two reactor buildings at Japan's  crisis-stricken nuclear plant show a harsh environment but not one that  will be impossible for humans to work in.

 Nuclear  safety agency official Hidehiko Nishiyama said Monday the measurements  taken by two robots sent in to units 1 and 3 of the tsunami-wrecked  Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant mean that workers trying to restore  plant systems will only be able to stay for short intervals inside the  reactor buildings.

 He said the radiation would not delay progress toward achieving a cold shutdown of the plant within nine months.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Gov't under fire for disaster response; TEPCO chief heckled in Diet* 

 
Prime Minister Naoto Kan speaks in the Diet on Monday.
POOL PHOTO 

*Gov't under fire for disaster response; TEPCO chief heckled in Diet*

  Monday 18th April, 12:15 PM JST

  TOKYO — 

 A blueprint for ending radiation leaks and stabilizing reactors at  Japan’s crippled nuclear plant drew a lackluster response Monday, as  polls showed diminishing public support for the government’s handling of  the country’s recent disasters.

  The plan issued by Tokyo Electric Power Co over the weekend, in  response to a government order, is meant to be a first step toward  letting some of the tens of thousands of evacuees from near the  company’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant return to their homes.

  Those forced to flee due to radiation leaks after a catastrophic  earthquake and tsunami on March 11 knocked out the plant’s power and  cooling systems are frustrated that their exile will not end soon. And  officials acknowledge that unforeseen complications, or even another  natural disaster, could set that timetable back even further.

  “Well, this year is lost,” said Kenji Matsueda, 49, who is living in  an evacuation center in Fukushima after being forced from his home 20  kilometers from the plant. “I have no idea what I will do. Nine months  is a long time. And it could be longer. I don’t think they really know.”

  Pressure has been building on the government and TEPCO to resolve  Japan’s worst-ever nuclear power accident, and Prime Minister Naoto Kan  is facing calls for his resignation.

  “You should be bowing your head in apology. You clearly have no  leadership at all,” Masashi Waki, a lawmaker from the opposition Liberal  Democratic Party, shouted during an intense grilling of Kan and members  of his cabinet in parliament Monday.

  “I am sincerely apologizing for what has happened,” Kan said,  stressing that the government was doing all it could to handle  unprecedented disasters.

  TEPCO’s president, Masataka Shimizu, looked visibly ill at ease as lawmakers heckled and taunted him.

  “I again deeply apologize for causing so much trouble for residents  near the complex, people in Fukushima and the public,” Shimizu said.

  Meanwhile, polls by several Japanese national newspapers released  Monday showed widespread dissatisfaction with TEPCO’s plan and how Kan’s  administration has dealt with the nuclear crisis.

  “Nothing concrete,” said a headline in the Mainichi newspaper of the  plan. “The nuclear timetable does not show enough consideration for the  residents,” said the Nihon Keizai, a financial newspaper.

  A majority of those surveyed in the polls by the Mainichi, Nihon  Keizai and Asahi newspapers expressed support, though, for tax increases  to pay for reconstruction of areas devastated by the tsunami.

  Goshi Hosono, an adviser to the prime minister and member of his  nuclear crisis management task force, said the government would closely  monitor TEPCO’s implementation of its crisis plan and hoped it could be  carried out ahead of schedule.

  The timetable’s first step focuses on cooling the reactors and spent  fuel pools, reducing radiation leaks and decontaminating water that has  become radioactive, within three months. The second step, for within six  to nine months, is to bring the release of radioactive materials fully  under control, achieve a cold shutdown of the reactors and cover the  buildings, possibly with a form of industrial cloth.

  Nuclear safety officials described the plan as “realistic,” but acknowledged there could be setbacks.

  “Given the conditions now, this is best that it could do,” said  Hidehiko Nishiyama of the government’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety  Agency, adding that conditions at the facility remain unstable.

  Explosions, fires and other malfunctions have hindered efforts to repair the stricken plant and stem radiation leaks.

  “There is no shortcut to resolving these issues. Though it will be  difficult, we have to go step by step to resolve these problems,” he  said.

  Even with the announcement of the timeline, it remained unclear when evacuees might be able to return home.

  The area would need to be decontaminated, including removing and replacing the soil, Nishiyama said.

  Hosono said the evacuees would not have to stay in gymnasiums for such a long period, but would be moved into temporary housing.

  Some evacuees were unswayed by TEPCO’s plan.

  “I don’t believe a word they say,” said Yukio Otsuka, 56, a private  school owner whose home is about three miles (five kilometers) from the  power plant. “I don’t trust them. I don’t believe it is possible. We  have really drawn the short stick on this one.”

  Activists criticized the delay in the roadmap’s announcement.

  “TEPCO has taken far too long to provide an indication of the  direction it plans to take to bring the situation at Fukushima Dai-ichi  under control,” said Philip White of the Tokyo-based Citizens’ Nuclear  Information Center, a group of scientists and activists who have opposed  nuclear power since 1975. “We hope TEPCO meets its targets, but there  are many challenges ahead and many uncertainties.”

  The unveiling of the roadmap came two days after TEPCO - also under  pressure from Kan’s government - announced plans to give 1 million yen  in initial compensation to each evacuated household, with much more  expected later.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Scary frontier footage of Fukushima ruins, images of robots inside reactor  *

----------


## SteveCM

Apologies if this video has been posted here before - new to me. Town residents watching from the top of a hill as their town is swept away - and some residents still fleeing to get to the high ground. Terrifying.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Yeah, posted before...but god knows where....way back in the thread.

----------


## misskit

*Nearly 28,000 dead and missing in Japan disaster*


 			Nearly 28,000 people are dead or missing in the March 11th quake and tsunami in northeastern Japan.

The National Police Agency says that as of 3PM Monday, 13,858 people  have been confirmed dead, including those who were killed in aftershocks  on April 7th and 11th.

14,030 are listed as missing.  The police agency says, however, that the  number does not include people missing in Sendai City, the capital of  Miyagi Prefecture, as authorities are checking for any overlapping  reports.

Miyagi Prefecture suffered the largest number of deaths at 8,412, followed by 3,996 in Iwate and 1,387 in Fukushima.

About 84 percent, or 11,609, of the recovered bodies have been identified.

The police agency says more than 136,000 people are still living in  evacuation centers, with most of them in Miyagi, Iwate and Fukushima  prefectures.

Of the approximately 22,000 evacuees outside the 3 prefectures, many of  them are from Fukushima Prefecture and are taking refuge from the  ongoing crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.


 			Monday, April 18, 2011 16:46 +0900 (JST)


NHK WORLD English

----------


## misskit

*Experts doubt TEPCO's timetable for bringing nuke plant under control*

Experts doubt TEPCO's timetable for bringing nuke plant under control - The Mainichi Daily News

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Fukushima plant not to have meltdown if cooling continues: Edano | Kyodo News
*
*Fukushima plant not to have meltdown if cooling continues: Edano*

 TOKYO, April 19, Kyodo

 The crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant  will not have a total meltdown if the current cooling of its  overheating reactors continues, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said  Tuesday.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*High levels of radiation at 2 reactors : National : DAILY YOMIURI ONLINE (The Daily Yomiuri)
*
*High levels of radiation at 2 reactors*

   The Yomiuri Shimbun

     High levels of radiation were measured Sunday by remote-controlled  robots inside the buildings that house reactors Nos. 1 and 3 of the  Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant--levels that would need to be lowered for  workers to work inside the buildings, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety  Agency said Monday.

  The agency said radiation levels were measured from 10 to 49  millisieverts per hour for the No. 1 reactor and from 28 to 57  millisieverts per hour for the No. 3 reactor.

  "As things stand now, it would be difficult to send workers inside  them to work. We need to lower the radiation levels or block them  somehow," said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a spokeman for the agency.

  It marked the first time that radiation levels have been measured  inside the buildings housing reactors Nos. 1 and 3 since hydrogen  explosions occurred in these two units in the wake of the massive quake  and tsunami on March 11.

  Tokyo Electric Power Co., which operates the crisis-hit plant, used two U.S.-made robots to take the measurements.

  Measurements at the No. 3 reactor, taken between 11:30 a.m. and 2  p.m. Sunday, found that the temperature inside was from 19 C to 22 C,  the humidity from 32 percent to 35 percent, and the oxygen content of  the air inside 21 percent.

  At the No. 1 reactor, where measurements were taken between 4 p.m.  and 5:30 p.m., the temperature ranged from 28 C to 29 C, the humidity  from 49 percent to 56 percent, while the oxygen content was 21 percent.

  Inside the building housing reactor No. 3,  the interior of which  was also photographed by a robot Sunday, there was a large amount of  debris found, making it impossible for the robot to advance further.

 ===

*N-policy to be verified*

  Prime Minister Naoto Kan on Monday told a Diet session, held to  discuss issues concerning the recent quake, tsunami and nuclear crisis,  that the government needs to review its nuclear power policy right from  the fundamentals.

  Regarding the government's future nuclear policy in light of the  latest accident at the Fukushima plant, Kan said: "We need to take all  preconceived ideas and go back to the drawing board to examine from the  ground up the reasons why the accidents occurred. When we've reached a  certain point, we would like to make a thorough verification."

  When asked what specific issues were to be verified, Kan said, "The  issue of the spent fuels being stored as they were [in the pool inside  the reactor building], without there being a proper, systematic  framework in place with regard to such issues as the nuclear fuel cycle  and final disposal site."

  Meanwhile, TEPCO President Masataka Shimizu apologized before the  members of the House of Councillors Budget Committee, where he appeared  as an unsworn witness, for the recent spate of accidents at the  Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.

  "I would like to sincerely apologize once again for causing so much  trouble and anxiety to the residents near the power plant, the people in  Fukushima Prefecture and the public at large over the extremely serious  matter of radioactive material leaking  outside the plant," said  Shimizu.

  During the upper house committee meeting, Kan rejected the view that  the government failed to respond appropriately to the twin disasters  and ensuing nuclear plant accident in the inital stages, and that Kan's  leadership came into question.

  "It is not correct to say that the government's initial response was  insufficient. I believe we have been responding to the issues in a  sufficient manner," Kan said.

  Regarding the timetable for bringing the nuclear crisis at the plant  under control, announced by TEPCO on Sunday, Kan said, "The government  will do its utmost in cooperating with work undertaken by TEPCO, taking  an approach in which we will do whatever we can as the state, so that  the timetable presented by TEPCO can be realized as soon as possible."

----------


## MakingALife

> *Experts doubt TEPCO's timetable for bringing nuke plant under control*
> 
> Experts doubt TEPCO's timetable for bringing nuke plant under control - The Mainichi Daily News


It should be remembered that water levels inside these troubled reactors have yet to be raised to a point where all the fuel rod groups are fully covered.   So there remains a risk of localized overheating in portions of the fuel rods.  While this is lessened because time reduces decay heat,  It clearly does not represent a "stabilized" condition.   

Restoring normal cooling and circulating systems was a pathway that appears tabled for a variety of reasons, and making due with temporary measures remains their current mode of operation  - at best.     

Earlier reports of a large sea containment wall to cut off the plant from the ocean, was a strategy they are considering to limit sea borne radiation.   This wall was planned outboard of all cooling intakes at the plant.  Such a plan is almost mutually exclusive - to the restoration of any kind of normal cooling / circulation cycles from being returned into service.  

Continued seismic events - and the possibility of perhaps larger events in the near future, only add to the real perception of peril overshadowing this pathway towards stability and leakage containment.

Juggling all these strategies, for leak containment, for water processing plants,  for restoration of normal system cooling -  all the while they leave reactors with exposed fuel rods.   It doesnt make a lot of sense.  Leaving heat generating fuel exposed in a steamy and gas inerted environment   Its just not a good way to remove heat, as full water immersion can do.

With the pumping capacity and demonstrated water injection technology TEPCO has in place -   It would seem like they can position the reactor water levels with a much greater margin for safety and heat removal.   But they arent apparently doing so.
No one seems to speak much about this detail.    

Every one could see first hand the potential damage and excessive heat generation in the spent fuel pools from fuel not submerged.   Such spent fuel is typically not as "hot" as fuel present in an active reactor - recently kicked off line.  

Is TEPCO rolling the dice here, leaving fuel out of the water - because their reactor cores have the safety of containment ?   Or is there some technical reason - unable to get the water levels any higher in these reactor cores,  leaving at least a meter of fuel assemblies not submerged ???

Those technical reasons preventing full fuel immersion,  could be things like damaged feed system lines or valves, which may possibly allow reactor water above a certain water height to back flow in the feed system, supression pool,  or end up in the condensers. 

In any case -  Lack of information as to why these reactor cores are not under full immersion  does not appear to be a discussion point that TEPCO is willing to speak about or show concern about.

I interpret this failure to discuss the topic, as being motivated by failure to want to release certain information.   Their lack of transparency on this obvious concerning issue, undercuts their credibility.

While speaking about grand future plans and timetables, as mandated by Japan Authorities.  No one is forcing them to disclose what or why they are unable to get full fuel rod immersion in their reactor cores.    

Even if TEPCO believes its a "non issue"  -  They ought to clearly state this, and explain why they are responding with limited water injection and not going for full immersion.   

Yes, while they may be minimizing water injection to a minimum because of unknown leakage sources,  They fail to speak about why their water level practice is not creating an separate risk issue all on its own.   

There is a part of the story they are not speaking about here, even now in this crisis management.  It stinks that they can without information and risk factors from the public at large.

Anyone digesting this thread with concerns about current reactor water levels - ought to weigh in on this topic..

----------


## Thaihome

> ...
> Anyone digesting this thread with concerns about current reactor water levels - ought to weigh in on this topic..


There is a very good reason they cannot completly cover the fuel rods at this time. Here is an excerpt that explains it. It is rather technical in nature so it may be ignored by some.

The entire article is worth a read as it explains a lot about TEPCO's roadmap. 

atomic power review: TEPCO plans: further details....

You could also read TEPCO's press release and the attachments to try and understand what the plan is.
TEPCO : Press Release | Roadmap towards Restoration from the Accident at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station



_On the right at the location of the red box we see the feedwater inlet nozzle, and the sparger ring that distributes it all around the circumference of the pressure vessel. The red arrows show the normal flow for feedwater when the reactor is operating.. down around the outside of the core barrel, into the lower plenum, and then up through the reactor core. Now, in the situation we have here, water coming in here cannot be induced to go UP through the core because not only is there no flow path to be induced up and out but, as we now know, water is leaking out somewhere low.. probably from somewhere in one of the recirculating lines. Or multiple places. Look at the blue box showing the recirculating line outlet nozzle; if there is a leak in this system, the highest water level you can maintain in the pressure vessel is the height of the jet pump standpipes... look for the blue star. That's about 2/3 of the height of the active fuel region when the fuel is intact... see the tall yellow rectangle showing one installed fuel element in the core. Thus, in order to get water flow THROUGH this region in this condition, you need water supply from above... see the other yellow boxes showing the location of two of the upper spray sources for the reactor core itself._

So what we have is not some ominous omission by TEPCO, but a situation well understood by nuclear engineers and operators worldwide. 
TH

----------


## Thaihome

An interesting article from last week. 

Lessons about nuclear energy from the Japanese quake and tsunami 
...
*LESSONS ABOUT NUCLEAR ENERGY FROM THE JAPANESE QUAKE AND TSUNAMI*
*Part 1: The recent events in Japan in context*
Early media concentration on the nuclear plant at Fukushima Daiichi created a great sense of fear in people around the world.  Reporting was distorted by both exaggeration and omission, focusing more on the reactors than on the quake and tsunami that killed over 20,000 people according to recent Japanese government estimates.  Media reports still contain phrases like 222 times higher than the legal limit, higher than normal, radiation found in the water, all of which are meaningless without comparisons that permit us to evaluate their significance.  The patchwork of experts who were interviewed to explain the events, each with her/his own particular knowledge and set of interests, added to the confusion instead of replacing it with a sense of proportion.

An example of omission is the absence of follow-up on the oil refinery fire at Chiba, about 20-30 miles east of Tokyo and over 100 miles south of Fukushima.  In fact, it killed 12 workers and required 10 days to put out the fire, which spewed toxic smoke and chemicals far and wide, as well as CO2 into the atmosphere that adds to global warming, and resulted in unknown numbers of latent cancers, heart attacks, asthma, and deaths.  Yet once TV images of the flames, falsely linked through association with the nuclear reactors, lost their usefulness, they disappeared from sight.

Nor did the media report widely, if at all, on a hydroelectric dam in Fukushima prefecture, burst by the quake, that flooded 1800 homes, with unknown numbers of deaths.  In addition to the estimated 20,000+ tsunami deaths, homelessness and ongoing lack of water and electricity affect hundreds of thousands of people.

Furthermore the Japanese government and the Tokyo Electrical Power Co. (TEPCO), owner of the Daiichi nuclear plant, have their own interests that help determine what they are willing to report or relay to the media.  Indeed an Associated Press investigation yielded the fact that Japanese scientists had warned TEPCO that a quake and tsunami of these proportions was overdue according to the history of disasters in that area over the last 3,000 years, but the company rejected this prediction.

This is reminiscent of the ample warnings to the administration that New Orleans levees would not be able to resist a storm the size of Katrina in 2005 and that hundreds or thousands would die.  Or of the recent BP oil spill in which collaborative malfeasance of both the company and the government regulators caused 11 immediate deaths of oil workers and uncountable deaths due to the toxic pollution of the Gulf Coast, as well as destruction of hundreds of thousands of livelihoods in the area.  Or of the Challenger disaster in which 7 astronauts died in 1986, in an explosion of the rocket, seconds after take-off, in which the engineers had warned the NASA administrators that the O-rings had failed in tests and would fail again with fatal results.  But NASA had a schedule to keep, under orders from the administration, and that was more important to them than the astronauts lives.
So in the face of such conflicting self-interests, how do we get a sense of proportion about the nuclear reactors?  One way is to become as knowledgeable as possible about nuclear energy, how these particular reactors are designed, and the progress and design changes that have been made in the 40 years since they began operation.  In fact, theres no substitute for even a little bit of research on the internet, using sources that are familiar with nuclear technology.

A second way is to become further acquainted with the effects of radiation on health and well-being.  And a third way is to become at least as knowledgeable about the comparative dangers of other sources of energy, particularly fossil fuels, that dwarf the dangers of nuclear energy.  Only in these ways can we protect ourselves against the often misleading claims of self-interested parties.

The Daiichi plant contains old reactors, six of them, and lessons have been learned from every mishap at any nuclear reactor in the world, the same as with automobiles, airplanes, cruise ships, paper clips, and zippers.

Henry Petroski, an engineer who has written popular books about design, points out that the mother of invention is not necessity so much as failure  failure of earlier designs that require improvement.  He counters the illusion that modern versions of technology sprang full blown out of the heads of their many designers, and shows the hundreds, if not thousands, of iterations that were necessary, over many decades, to arrive at current designs.  And even these are being improved all the time, as there will always be room for improvement in function and safety
....

----------


## Mid

> Apologies if this video has been posted here before - new to me.


Thanxs SteveCM , new to all of us as it has not been posted before .

----------


## Takeovers

> He counters the illusion that modern versions of technology sprang full blown out of the heads of their many designers, and shows the hundreds, if not thousands, of iterations that were necessary, over many decades, to arrive at current designs. And even these are being improved all the time, as there will always be room for improvement in function and safety


Quite right. 

Unfortunately many possible improvements are not implemented in Nuclear Power Plants.
That is in part due to corparate greed but in a large part also because, especially here in Germany, it would be impossible to build a new reactor to replace an old one as the green lobby is up in arms against them.
The same with coal plants. We operate a large number of totally outdated low efficiency coal power plants because the green lobby is up in arms against building new coal powered plants because they emit CO2. The fact that a new plant wold emit much less than the replaced old one does not enter the equation in their simplistic minds.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Tepco starts to pump out turbine unit | The Japan Times Online

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

*Tepco starts to pump out turbine unit*

*Radioactive water removal  very risky, to run into May*

By *KANAKO TAKAHARA*
     Staff writer

      Tokyo Electric Power Co. started Tuesday pumping highly  radioactive water at its Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant's reactor 2  turbine building to a nearby storage facility, a crucial step toward  restoring the reactor's dedicated cooling system, the government nuclear  watchdog said.

       Because key equipment to activate the cooling  system is located in the basement of the turbine building, workers can  resume efforts to restore the cooling system once the radioactive water  is pumped out.

        "We believe there is no other option but to  transfer the radioactive water to the storage facility," said Hidehiko  Nishiyama, spokesman for the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.

        There is now about 25,000 tons of highly contaminated water in the turbine building and in an underground trench.

        Tepco plans to pump 10,000 tons of radioactive  water with more than 1,000 millisieverts per hour of radiation to the  second-floor basement of the storage facility by around May 14. The  storage facility is located about 800 meters from the No. 2 turbine  building.

        "Although the risk of radioactive leak (by  transferring the water out of the turbine building) is not zero,  measures have been taken to reduce that risk," another NISA official  said.

        Tepco laid as much as possible of the hose inside  the turbine buildings of units 3 and 4 in case the radioactive water  leaks out, NISA said.

        Tepco waterproofed the storage facility and checked  whether it could withstand an earthquake similar to the one on March  11, NISA said.

        The utility said it will do its best to seal the  entrance to the basement to keep seawater out in the event another  tsunami strikes.

        Tepco is also planning to install a water-purifying  system to reduce the levels of radiation and salt in the highly  contaminated water, NISA said, adding the purified water is expected to  be used to cool the fuel rods again.

        It is believed water previously pumped in as a  stopgap measure to cool the fuel rods leaked into the turbine building  through the trench and a storage pit crack and then out into the ocean.  That leak has been patched but disposing of the water proved a big  headache for Tepco.

        The storage facility seemed an ideal, if temporary,  option, but low-level radioactive water was already being stored there.  With the approval of NISA, Tepco earlier this month decided to dump the  less contaminated water into the sea to make room for the highly  radioactive water in the No. 2 turbine building. The move triggered  strong criticism from the international community, including South Korea  and Russia.

        Meanwhile, remote-controlled U.S. robots inspecting  the reactor 2 building to check the radiation level detected 4.1  millisieverts per hour just inside the entrance to the ground floor,  Tepco said.

        High humidity between 94 to 99 percent prevented the robots from checking the radiation level further inside.

        Two robots, one with a radiation detector and the  other with a video camera, were sent inside the building Monday. But  because of the humidity, the camera lens fogged up and couldn't check  the detector beyond the entrance, NISA said.

        Separately Monday night, Tepco said it detected  high radioactivity coming from the spent fuel pool of the No. 2 unit,  indicating that either the fuel rods in the pool were damaged or steam  containing radioactive materials that rose from the reactor dissolved in  the pool water.

        Some 160,000 becquerels per cubic cm of cesium-134,  150,000 becquerels of cesium-137 and 4,100 becquerels of radioactive  iodine-131 were detected in a water sample extracted from the storing  pool on Saturday.

        Normally, these radioactive substances are not present at all.

----------


## StrontiumDog

> Originally Posted by SteveCM
> 
> Apologies if this video has been posted here before - new to me.
> 
> 
> Thanxs SteveCM , new to all of us as it has not been posted before .


yeah, I think I was wrong. 

Thanks Steve. I'd posted so many and thought from the start it looked like another one I'd seen. Just watched it to the end and it looks new. 

Terrifying and worrying. I hope those people at the end were ok.

----------


## HermantheGerman

25 years on, Chernobyl fallout still an eco-hazard
 By Richard Ingham (AFP)  2 days ago
 CHERNOBYL, Ukraine  Fallout from Chernobyl remains a  poorly-investigated hazard for the environment a quarter of a century  after the disaster, say experts.
According to anecdotal evidence,  animals such as beavers, deer, wild horses, hawks and eagles have  returned in abundance to Chernobyl's 30-kilometre (18-mile) exclusion  zone since humans fled and hunting was outlawed.
But this picture  is misleading, said University of South Carolina biology professor Tim  Mousseau, one of the few scientists to have probed biodiversity around  Chernobyl in depth.
"Chernobyl is definitely not a haven for wildlife," he said in a phone interview.
"When  you actually do the hard work, of conducting a scientific study, where  you rigorously control for all the variables, and you do this repeatedly  in many different places, the signal is very strong.
"There are many fewer animals and many fewer kinds of animals than you would expect."
In 2010, Mousseau and colleagues published the biggest-ever census of wildlife in the exclusion zone.
It  showed that mammals had declined and insect diversity, including  bumblebees, grasshoppers, butterflies and dragonflies, had also fallen.
And  in a study published in February this year, they netted 550 birds,  belonging to 48 species at eight different sites, and measured their  heads to determine the volume of their brains.
Birds living in  "hot spots" had five percent smaller brains than those living where  radiation was lower -- and the difference was especially great among  birds less than a year old.
Smaller brains are linked to a lower  cognitive ability and thus survival. The study suggested many bird  embryos probably do not survive at all.
"This clearly ties to the  level of background contamination," said Mousseau. "There are bound to  be consequences for the ecosystem as a whole."
Mousseau said it  was vital to explore the link, not least because of the relevance for  Fukushima, which with Chernobyl is the only nuclear accident to rate a  maximum seven on a world ranking of gravity.
But funding for  Western research into environmental impacts at Chernobyl has slumped and  many Russian-language studies are never translated into English, he  said.
Radioactive dust and ash spewed over more than 200,000  square kilometres (77,000 square miles) after Chernobyl's No. 4 reactor  exploded and caught fire on April 26 1986.
Ukraine, Belarus and  Russia were most affected, although deposits reached as far north as  Scotland and as far west as Ireland, requiring in some places long-term  restrictions on cattle grazing.
Contamination, even in the notorious exclusion zone, is not uniform.
Some  areas are quite clean. But a few hundred metres (yards) away, there can  be "hotspots" -- determined by the winds and rain that deposited the  particles, or the leaves that trapped them -- where radiation is far  higher.
Today, the main threats are caesium 137 and to a lesser  degree strontium 90, which decay slowly in a timescale measured in  decades, according to France's Institute for Radiological Protection and  Nuclear Safety (IRSN).
Their radioactivity has fallen by orders  of magnitude from 25 years ago but in the hotspots it lingers in a 10-  to 20-centimetre (four- to eight-inch) layer of topsoil. They thus  provide a low-dose but constant and lasting source of exposure.
Radioactive  particles pass from the soil into plants via their roots, into animals  that eat the vegetation and into the humans that eat their meat or drink  their milk.
Absorbed into the bones and organs, caesium emits  alpha radiation, which damages DNA in close proximity, boosting the risk  of mutant cells that become tumours -- or, in reproductive cells, are  handed on in progeny.
Western and southern Ukraine were not  affected by fallout from Chernobyl, and in the country's large farms and  food factories there is no risk because of surveillance, say  scientists.
But radioactivity still affects rural areas of  northern Ukraine, where poor farmers pick wild mushrooms and berries and  cannot afford to buy clean hay from uncontaminated regions for their  cows.
Valery Kashparov, director of the Ukrainian Institute of  Agricultural Radiology, said the government cut off funds for radiation  monitoring in 2008. Around 400,000 euros (600,000 dollars) are needed  annually to ensure this food is uncontaminated.
"The contamination is going down, but it will take dozens of years for nature to bring it down to safe levels," he said.
In  research presented in Kiev this month, scientists for Greenpeace  purchased food from village markets in two administrative regions,  Zhytomyr and Rivne.
Tests found caesium 137 above permissible  levels in many samples of milk, dried mushrooms and berries, they said.  Levels were extremely high in Rivne, where a peaty, waterlogged soil  transmits radioactive particles more easily to plants than other soil  types.

AFP: 25 years on, Chernobyl fallout still an eco-hazard

----------


## HermantheGerman

> An interesting article from last week. 
> 
> Lessons about nuclear energy from the Japanese quake and tsunami 
> ...
> *LESSONS ABOUT NUCLEAR ENERGY FROM THE JAPANESE QUAKE AND TSUNAMI*
> *Part 1: The recent events in Japan in context*
> Early media concentration on the nuclear plant at Fukushima Daiichi created a great sense of fear in people around the world.  Reporting was distorted by both exaggeration and omission, focusing more on the reactors than on the quake and tsunami that killed over 20,000 people according to recent Japanese government estimates.  Media reports still contain phrases like “222 times higher than the legal limit,” “higher than normal,” “radiation found in the water,” all of which are meaningless without comparisons that permit us to evaluate their significance.  The patchwork of “experts” who were interviewed to explain the events, each with her/his own particular knowledge and set of interests, added to the confusion instead of replacing it with a sense of proportion.
> 
> An example of omission is the absence of follow-up on the oil refinery fire at Chiba, about 20-30 miles east of Tokyo and over 100 miles south of Fukushima.  In fact, it killed 12 workers and required 10 days to put out the fire, which spewed toxic smoke and chemicals far and wide, as well as CO2 into the atmosphere that adds to global warming, and resulted in unknown numbers of latent cancers, heart attacks, asthma, and deaths.  Yet once TV images of the flames, falsely linked through association with the nuclear reactors, lost their usefulness, they disappeared from sight.
> ...


 

They forgot to mention this one:
*LESSONS ABOUT NUCLEAR ENERGY FROM Chernobyl*
Interesting articles from this week that will haunt the world for the next hundred years. One country alone can not handle this nuclear desaster. Just wonder when Japan has to start begging for money? For how many years to come do we have to pay for this desaster?
*
WORLD TO GIVE 550 MILLION EURO TO SEAL CHERNOBYL REACTOR....*

*EU pledges money for Chernobyl containment......*

*Donors pledge S$1.03b for Chernobyl: French PM...

* 


> And even these are being improved all the time, as there will always be room for improvement in function and safety


*


*

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
> 
> ...
> Anyone digesting this thread with concerns about current reactor water levels - ought to weigh in on this topic..
> 
> 
> There is a very good reason they cannot completly cover the fuel rods at this time. Here is an excerpt that explains it. It is rather technical in nature so it may be ignored by some.
> 
> ...


Sorry TH -  Regardless of excellent commentary by blog poster (Will Davis) a former Naval Reactor Operator.  I dont accept his commentary on this issue.    No do I accept your view that there is no omission from TEPCO involved here.  Or further that this issue is "well  understood" by nuclear engineers and operators world wide.   I dont buy it.

Will Davis (in his blog) carefully explains the normal operating feed water flow pathway for the reactor in service, and proceeds to say there is no method that can lift water to cover the upper portion of the core.     Offering that this area of the exposed fuel core  can only be wet down by spraying water from above.   He implys there is some suspected leakage taking impacting this process, and speculates about its location.

Sorry BUT...   The situation here is a non-operating reactor, exhibiting little steam release.   Water pumped in at the feed line, falls by gravity to the bottom of the vessel and will rise up to what ever level is needed to submerge the top of the fuel rods.  If you want to raise the water level you have to pump in faster than any existing leakage rate.  

IF you want to soak up decay heat and protect the fuel rods & thereby reduce H2 generation and explosion risks -immerse the fuel rods.    Increase the water pump in rate till it exceeds any leakage rate,  this will  raise the water level in the core to cover all the fuel rods.    If you want stabilize the fuel core - immerse it and remove the heat.

It is a perfectly legitimate flow path to increase the water pumped in.     Its all that needs to be done immerse the fuel rods and reduce risk of overheating the fuel.   It is a pretty simple concept to understand.  It should be  well undertood by any plant operator or engineer who at one time was responsible to maintain a water level in a pressure vessel, and who has hands on experience dealing with a water level crisis.....

Its one of TEPCO's first goals - to continue to pump FW into the reactor pressure to maintain cooling and flooding the Primary containment vessel (PCV) up to the level of the active fuel for Units 1 & 3,  and later performing the same on unit 2 when leaks in the PCV are corrected.    They state it very clearly.

Think of a dixie cup with a hole in side 2/3s of the way to the top.   Want to fill the dixie cup to protect something inside it near the top....  You can put the dixie cup in a larger container and fill that outer container above the hole in the dixie cup.     Magically - you'll be able to keep the Dixie cup level where you need it much easier.    

The dixie cup is the reactor pressure vessel, and the outer container is the primary containment vessel.

I've read through the TEPCO links.   Clearly their goal is to achieve immersion of the fuel rods fully in water, as part of their cooling plan and to reach cold shutdown point...

Other than an issue with NO.2 reactor and containment leaks, in the primary containment vessel,   TEPCO has failed to comment  why they have not immersed the fuel rods in No. 1 and No. 3 plants yet....  Matter of fact - Issues with water loss from reactor vessel 1 and 3 are not  even on any remediation list, action plan,  or their road map.   Sorry but this is a omission  on the part of TEPCO.    

Failing to disclose this,  it's (2) additional water leakage streams they dont have to deal with the public about, by keeping it off the radar screen.   Thats not transparent or straight forward dealings.   This is why people with some intelligence (including many waking up in Japan) cant trust or believe what they are hearing.      

While I like Will Davis's blog site, and his calm reassuring tones, and reasonable interpretation of what comes out of TEPCO -  He didnt get this detail right.   He  mistakenly implys they are filling the PCV areas to provide cooling to the reactor vessel bottom head.     TEPCO's intention is pretty clear...  They are considering  filling the PCV's up to highest active fuel levels - as the way to be able to get fuel immersion achieved inside the RPV where the fuel core sits. 

I appreciate your comments, perceptions,  and well defined point of view, and weighing in on this topic, and bringing in of an excellent blog post.  I just dont buy your conclusion or Will Davis either on this matter.   

It is well to recognize Will Davis isnt a degreed engineer, and his experience level is a Navy nuclear operator who is trained and licensed on PWR reactor plants -  not BWR.  Two very different designs.  

He lists many good reference resources -  but he got the details wrong about flow paths that apply now in a near static condition,   his details wrong about what it takes and could be done right now -  to get the fuel rods immersed.  

Further he fails to note TEPCOs omission about other leakages at 1 and 3,  or to understand specifically why they intend to fill all the PCV's to the highest active fuel rod level.   

I hope when you read this,  you will understand my reasoning for saying that I believe Tepco continues to fail to disclose important information here.   And how they continue to keep unneeded risk in the game by not getting water levels above the fuel rods ??? Even now - long after the initial crisis.    

Material I have read from GE and Wiki - suggest that by most standard refueling cycles (exchanging the core in 1/3 increments) -  That spent fuel from any  two previous refueling sequences - would remain "hot enough" in the spent pool - with enough decay heat remaining so as to cause rod melt down on loss of immersion.   The fuel in reactor cores 1, 2, and 3 is significantly hotter than spent fuel....   I still dont think this point is being well enough understood in the current picture.

----------


## robuzo

April 20, 2011
Tsunami Warnings, Written in Stone
By MARTIN FACKLER
ANEYOSHI, Japan  The stone tablet has stood on this forested hillside since before they were born, but the villagers have faithfully obeyed the stark warning carved on its weathered face: Do not build your homes below this point!

Residents say this injunction from their ancestors kept their tiny village of 11 households safely out of reach of the deadly tsunami last month that wiped out hundreds of miles of Japanese coast and rose to record heights near here. The waves stopped just 300 feet below the stone, and the village beyond it.

They knew the horrors of tsunamis, so they erected that stone to warn us, said Tamishige Kimura, 64, the village leader of Aneyoshi.

Hundreds of these so-called tsunami stones, some more than six centuries old, dot the coast of Japan, standing in silent testimony to the past destruction that these lethal waves have frequented upon this earthquake-prone nation. But modern Japan, confident that advanced technology and higher seawalls would protect vulnerable areas, came to forget or ignore these ancient warnings, dooming it to repeat bitter experiences when the recent tsunami struck.

The tsunami stones are warnings across generations, telling descendants to avoid the same suffering of their ancestors, said Itoko Kitahara, a specialist in the history of natural disasters at Ritsumeikan University in Kyoto. Some places heeded these lessons of the past, but many didnt.

The flat stones, some as tall as 10 feet, are a common sight here along Japans rugged northeastern shore, which bore the brunt of the magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami on March 11 that left almost 29,000 people dead and missing.

While some of the stones are so old that the characters are worn away, most were erected about a century ago after two deadly tsunamis here, including one in 1896 that killed 22,000 people. Many of the stones carry simple warnings to drop everything and seek higher ground after a strong earthquake. Others provide grim reminders of the waves destructive force by listing past death tolls or marking mass graves.

Some of the stones were swept away by the tsunami last month, which scientists say was the largest to strike Japan since the massive Jogan earthquake in 869, whose waves left sand deposits miles inland.

Aneyoshis tsunami stone is the only one that specifically tells where to build houses. But many of the regions place names also seem to indicate places safely out of the waves reach, like Nokoriya, or Valley of Survivors, and Namiwake, or Waves Edge, a spot three miles from the ocean that scholars say marks the farthest reach of a deadly tsunami in 1611.

Local scholars said only a handful of villages like Aneyoshi heeded these old warnings by keeping their houses safely on high ground. More commonly, the stones and other warnings were disregarded as coastal towns grew in the boom years after World War II. Even communities that had moved to high ground eventually relocated back to the seaside to be nearer their boats and nets.

As time passes, people inevitably forget, until another tsunami comes that kills 10,000 more people, said Fumio Yamashita, an amateur historian in Iwate Prefecture, where Aneyoshi is located. He has written 10 books about tsunamis.

Mr. Yamashita, 87, who survived the recent tsunami by clinging to a curtain after waters flooded the hospital where he was bedridden, said Japan had neglected to teach its old tsunami lore in schools. He said the nation had put too much store instead in newly built tsunami walls and other modern concrete barriers, which the waves easily overwhelmed last month.

Still, he and other local experts said that the stones and other old teachings did contribute to the overall awareness of tsunamis, as seen in the annual evacuation drills that many credit with keeping the death toll from rising even higher last month.

In Aneyoshi, the tsunami stone states that high dwellings ensure the peace and happiness of our descendants. Mr. Kimura, the village leader, called the inscriptions a rule from our ancestors, which no one in Aneyoshi dares break.

The four-foot-high stone stands on the side of the only road of the small village, which lies in a narrow, cedar-tree-filled valley leading down to the ocean. Downhill from the stone, a blue line of paint has been newly sprayed on the road, marking the edge of the tsunamis advance.

Last week, a university group said the waves had reached their greatest height in Aneyoshi: 127.6 feet, surpassing Japans previous record of 125.3 feet reached elsewhere in Iwate Prefecture by the 1896 tsunami.

Just below the painted line, the valley quickly turns into a scene of total destruction, with its walls shorn of trees and soil, leaving only naked rock. Nothing is left of the villages small fishing harbor, except the huge blocks of its shattered wave walls, which lie strewn across the small bay.

Mr. Kimura, a fisherman who lost his boat in the tsunami, said the village first moved its dwellings uphill after the 1896 tsunami, which left only two survivors. Aneyoshi was repopulated and moved back to the shore a few years later, only to be devastated again by a tsunami in 1933 that left four survivors.

After that the village was moved uphill for good, and the stone was placed. Mr. Kimura said none of the 34 residents in the village today know who set up the stone, which they credit with saving the village once before, from a tsunami in 1960.

That tsunami stone was a way to warn descendants for the next 100 years that another tsunami will definitely come, he said.

For most Japanese today, the stones appear relics of a bygone era, whose language can often seem impenetrably archaic. However, some experts say the stones have inspired them to create new monuments that can serve as tsunami warnings, but are more suited to a visual era of Internet and television.

One idea, put forth by a group of researchers, calls for preserving some of the buildings ruined by the recent tsunami to serve as permanent reminders of the waves destructive power, much as the skeletal Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima warns against atomic war.

We need a modern version of the tsunami stones, said Masayuki Oishi, a geologist at the Iwate Prefectural Museum in Morioka.

Despite Aneyoshis survival, the residents are in no mood for rejoicing. Four of the villages residents died last month: a mother and her three small children who were swept away in their car in a neighboring town.

The mother, Mihoko Aneishi, 36, had rushed to take her children out of the elementary school right after the earthquake. Then she made the fatal mistake of driving back through low-lying areas just as the tsunami hit.

The villages mostly older residents said they regretted relying too heavily on the stone, and not making more effort to teach younger residents such tsunami-survival basics as always to seek higher ground.

We are proud of following our ancestors, the childrens grandfather, Isamu Aneishi, 69, said, but our tsunami stone cant save us from everything.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/wo...l?pagewanted=1

----------


## HermantheGerman

*I hope that these heroes will not be forgotten. And that their families get the compensation they deserve, and not just a mere bow.
*





*Depression, stress, poor sanitation, diet: doctor*

*Nuke workers at risk of overwork death*

    Kyodo
      Tokyo Electric Power Co. workers engaged in efforts to  stabilize the crisis-hit Fukushima No.1 nuclear plant are at risk of  depression or death from overwork, a doctor who recently examined them  said Wednesday.

 *Full-body exam: Dr. Takeshi Tanigawa, who has been  an industrial physician for two Fukushima nuclear plants since 1991,  examines a Tokyo Electric Power Co. worker on Sunday at the Fukushima  No. 2 plant. *  COURTESY OF TAKESHI TANIGAWA/KYODO 
     The workers are not only undertaking dangerous work in  severe conditions but also feel a sense of moral responsibility as  employees of the operator of the crippled plant, Takeshi Tanigawa said  in an interview.
        Many of the workers have been exposed to multiple  stresses, he said, as some of them barely survived the March 11 quake  and tsunami, as well as subsequent hydrogen explosions that wrecked the  plant's reactors, while others lost their homes or saw kin or friends  die.
     "Many are complaining of difficulty sleeping and the  risks of depression and death from overwork will rise further if this  goes on," the doctor said after examining some 90 Tepco workers from  Saturday through Tuesday at the nearby Fukushima No. 2 plant.
        Some were also worried about radiation exposure and its long-term effects on their health, he added.
     Tanigawa, a professor at Ehime University School of  Medicine, has been a part-time industrial physician for the two  Fukushima nuclear plants since 1991.
        At the end of each day, workers are decontaminated  and go to the Fukushima No. 2 nuclear plant some 10 km south to sleep on  the floor of a gymnasium in sleeping bags with blankets. There are  tatami mats on the floor and a sheet to insulate them from the cold, he  said.
     Among the workers was one engaged in work around the clock without being allowed to go out at one point, he said.
        The workers are also on a poor diet, centering on  canned and retort-packed foods, although they can now have three meals a  day, up from the initial one daily.
     Workers other than senior officials work in shifts of  four days on and two days off, but cannot even take a bath during the  four workdays despite sweating heavily in impervious  radiation-protective gear, Tanigawa said.
        "Being unable to feel refreshed, they are not only  vulnerable to various diseases and skin disorders but also may commit  errors in their work," Tanigawa warned.
     Through interviews with about 30 of them, Tanigawa  found that they are heavily stressed not only as a result of the  pressure of their jobs but also by being asked by family members not to  go to work.
        One worker whose home was lost in the disaster felt  exposed to negative perceptions in a shelter where the worker spent  days off, the doctor said.
     "More than 80 percent of the on-site employees have  their homes within a 20-km radius of the nuclear plant and some of them  have lost family members," he said, adding that concerns about their  houses and lives will likely continue to distress them."It was also  stressful for some workers who were unable to confirm the safety of  families for as long as a week to continue working," he said. "On the  other hand, they tend to feel indebted for working for an offending  company and so cannot raise their voices."
        About 50 of the workers were diagnosed with  illnesses such as high blood pressure and colds, cluding one worker whom  he instructed Tepco to replace due to a high fever, he said.
     As the crisis continues, with Tepco aiming to stabilize  damaged reactors in about six to nine months under a road map released  Sunday, the utility must allow workers engaged in the crisis control  efforts thus far to take a rest by mobilizing all its employees and  asking other power utilities to dispatch workers if its workforce is  insufficient, Tanigawa said.
        "Employees engaged in the dangerous work have human  rights and wives and children just like others. We should not treat  their lives without due respect," he said.


Nuke workers at risk of overwork death | The Japan Times Online

----------


## Takeovers

> The fuel in reactor cores 1, 2, and 3 is significantly hotter than spent fuel.... I still dont think this point is being well enough understood in the current picture.


Is that correct? I do wonder. I would guess the spent fuel is hotter due to the fission products. The new Uranium pellets or even Plutonium MOX fuel should not have significant heat emission. 

That's a question, not some attempt on critizism. I do like your posts, very informative.

----------


## Butterfly

so we all agree that TEPCO and the Japanese government has fucked up badly

polls are quite low for the current PM, they all want him to go

----------


## MakingALife

> Originally Posted by MakingALife
> 
>  The fuel in reactor cores 1, 2, and 3 is significantly hotter than spent fuel.... I still dont think this point is being well enough understood in the current picture.
> 
> 
> Is that correct? I do wonder. I would guess the spent fuel is hotter due to the fission products. The new Uranium pellets or even Plutonium MOX fuel should not have significant heat emission. 
> 
> That's a question, not some attempt on critizism. I do like your posts, very informative.


You know what....  This is my belief,  but it should be subject to some  better fact checking.   Newer fuel loads have a higher percentage of  enrichment (U235 percentage)...  This is the isotope that is potent and  has the the higher neutron emission levels.   It fissions and some  neutrons also fission the U 238 and the fission chain continues.

The fission chains from the initial U235 hot isotope is what stimulates the reaction.   Delayed neutrons that are part of the lower fission chains -  give the reactor an ability to restart more easily out in time.   

I studied this stuff in 77 to 79, so its pretty old stuff in my head at this point.   Typical fuel cores are rotated on about a 1/3 replacement basis.   Its more than a change out of 1/3 -  a share of the bundles are always relocated in the core, so its a reshaping as well as a replacement operation.   The goal of that process is to bring the over core back up to it ability to release the reaction heat needed to achieve the units power level.    

I have as well read that in the case of the higher enrichment levels found in Naval reactors (who operate with 95% U 235 enrichment)   That as much as 2/3s  of its fuel load heat output, come from the other radioisotope created from the long time running of its core.   I do not think the small plants (like submarine plants) refuel in stages,  but it is likely done completely at one cycle.   Those reactor designs function different (PWR) as well, but the nuclear process is the very same - just a different core shape.

My older sibling managed nuclear outtage projects during refueling cycles.   Most often it was pipe work / valve work, controls, and other maintenance undertaken at that time.  He typically ran the entire night shifts (12 hour) for those projects.  For many years as a utility representative and later for contracted management companies.   Large projects tied to the fueling outtages,  many hundreds if not 1000's of labor engaged across many trades, in all those outtages.   There was a crew connected to the refueling task - but that was well programmed and mundane.   Its the scope of the other work tasking in those periods which were significant to the plant and more complex.   A whole suite of maintenance was conducted on the rest of the plant (turbine, generator, support system, controls) as well as what was done related to refueling, and pipe work replacement related to the reactors.  A lot of the work engaged was exploratory - taking UT thickness gauging to look at pipeline erosion, and finalize sections to be replaced etc.     He explained to me that the core is well monitored and they have a very good understanding of what refueling cycles will boost plant efficiency enough to warrant the shutdown outage.   I know with great certainty the reactor system loses its heat production ability with older fuel in its core.

I guess I should go back and verify that I have this right, regarding which fuel segments throw off more heat in their decay process.   

Maybe 3 weeks ago I saw graphs on a research  site that profiled in detail decay heat as a function of time, and as a function of the fuel burn percentage used up.    It was  a very detail rich set of graphs, and they had many time lines cures and at least 6 to 7 fuel profiles for which the details were compiled.  It also covered different fuel core shape geometry in this mix....  I skimmed these things for an understanding of rough length of times needed to produce effectively cold fuel -  in terms of its  decay chain products and neutron releases rates and heat developed.

The decay cycle probably goes through something like  12 or 13 fission chains, where some neutrons are released and some heat results as well. It could be as many as 30 different chains take place when all of the lower frequency occurrence ones are counted in.     

This decay process happens regardless if one is working from U235's initial fission, or that of U 238 struck by neutrons of the right energy level to cause 238 to fission.    The next chain products behave similarity and so on.      Whats different is the level of energy release and the energy of the neutron released.   Some of these neutrons cause more fission to take place, others create more isotopes that decay differently.  

One could argue that the decay of fission products are going to be present in newer fuels with some reactor use, as well as older more spent fuels.    The issue becomes what the delayed neutron release is capable of creating.    I think in new fuels -  It will as likely that this process is more capable of triggering more fission reactions than in older fuel assemblies.    Older fuel assemblies have different compositions of decay products, and the heat and neutrons they release from the more distant fission chains (lower atomic weights) have different characteristics.    

I will have to dig into this and fact check.  

You are correct to ask -  Are you sure ????    And I guess I need to confirm - the assumption that I was working from,  when I made the statement that you sought fit to quote and inquire about.       

Any way the curves I saw show a heat vs time (heat release increasing on the vertical axis, time increasing to the right on the horizontal axis  - show almost an exponential decline in heat release moving out on the time cure.    I just cant remember which group of fuel decay curves (higher consumed or lower consumed fuel)  were the curves on the top or below the others.     The all looked very similar in shape.  But it would answer the question - which fuels have higher decay heats - older spent fuels, newer spent fuels, or fuels in a reactor with useful lifecycle remaining.

When I find the information I will post it....

----------


## MakingALife

I could not find the links I had reviewed regarding Decay Heat,  but offer a few others.

http://mitnse.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/decayheat.jpg  tt  
The above link is a good brief post from MIT about Decay heat.   I like it because it has graphs calculated for Fukishima  Reactors for their conditions.   The blog post also includes a table with decay heat for these reactors projected out for about a year into the future.

https://netfiles.uiuc.edu/mragheb/ww...20Reactors.pdf

This link opens up a PDF file which is a textbook chapter that goes into detail about estimates of decay heat, for use in designing reactor safety systems.   It is very intensive math, and derives the applicable equations used for decay heat estimation.  Very vigorous Math is included in this link along with some graphs.

The important part of that link  is that it clarifies that decay heat is a function two items -  one is the power reactor level and duration prior to the shutdown, and the second is the length of time after the shutdown is interested in determining the decay heat.

It makes the case that reactors decay heats present for different periods of operation, are most easily totaled by calculating the decay heat present now - for each separate period of operation and simply sum them together.     Its a numerical technique that is fairly accurate.   

The link works out an example of a rector run at 1000 MW for 100 days,  Off for 80 days, then run at 500 MW for 100 days,  and to calculate the decay heat shutting down the reactor for 20 hours, with such a working history.   The calculation shows the decay heat from the first running period  (100 Days [at] 1000 MW)  is lower than the decay heat from the second running period (100 days [at] 500 MW)...   The decay heat for the second running period generates 3/4 of the decay heat,  while the first period at twice the power level, only genearates 1/4 of the decay heat.   

So time after shutdown seems to be the highest factor behind decay heat level observed.   Followed by length of time and power level for any given run period.  

This implys clearly fuel in service with up to a years run time, will have more decay heat present,  than fuels which came out of the spent pool - after a cooling period spent there.

I think Takeovers is correct in saying new unused fuel has little or no decay heat because it has not been subjeted runing in core condition.     I think fuel in  service is probably going to be hotter than anything that is removed from the spent pools.   

What remains un-nerving to me is that TEPCO statements to the IAEA (via updates)  which points clearly about 1/2 the fuel core is out of the water inside the reactors.    Its a ballsy statement to toss out there, as if its meaningless and without any concerns.

----------


## Takeovers

[at]MakingALife

Thanks for your effort. The math in the second link is way over my head but the graphs are interesting enough.

The first link shows how much heat production in the reactor cores has already reduced, making the cooling easier. I would have loved to see that first period of one or two months more spread out though for reading of the present level. But we must be already at or very near that sustained level of below 15MW for Fukushima 1 and close to the 20MW for Fukushima 2 and 3. Still a lot of heat to dissipate for sure but a lot more manageable than the initial load of heat.

----------


## MakingALife

I agree -  It would have been a better first link,  If they had provided a wider time range of projections to cover the first couple of months for these Japanese reactors.   But it is obvious that the heat falls off fairly quickly,  but the near steady state long duration involved still leaves sizable heat levels to manage - when there is no circulating cooling loop in operation.

Indeed the 2nd link's math is beyond me  at this point.  While I can read the expressions and understand them -  I have forgotten the rules to do the integration and differnentiations.   Remembering those rule are not really needed as there are many Math reference tables that provide the canned solutions to those integal expressions.   The equation manipulations by substitution, to get something useful from them, is standard practice for science & engineering.     

When digging into this topic both times, for decay heat estimates and impacts -  I ran across a lot of interesing work done in those areas.    

Some works - took typical reactors being scrammed off line, with cooling loss, and water level loss due to boil off,  and projected carefully the short time required to expose fuel, and the fuel time transient needed to reach cladding and fuel melting...   

Although the treatments were generic - Its staggering how short a time line is involved before irreversible damage takes place.     For some reactor models (including some PWR's)  that irreversible damage time line was very very short.  BWR's are a little more tolerant.   But there is very little reserve involved here.

Those works provided estimates for some fuel core protections against damage by some of the reactor safety systems in current use.  But many of those systems offer only short benefits, and many require available power to function properly.   

In truth there are no current reactor technology in widespread use that is capable of enduring what happened to the Fukshima power station, without suffering significant fuel core damage.  

GE produced a good white paper on the progression of their BWR modifications developed over time, and phased in at most plants - to address historical incidents and research conducted on the original design.   Their conclusions on Fukshima were clear.... that their design survived much higher overpressure transients  by more than 2 x original design allowances, and while becoming damage eventually but without exhibiting any  catastrophic failures.   There white paper details the complete upgrade and life cycle management GE implemented with their clients.      

Fukshima's three fold catastrophe - loss of emergency power, station power, grid power, and other resources - for an extended period - Will have major negative consequences for any nuclear power station in the world today.   

In reactor safety design -  The work I read pointed out that the most serious failure incident designed around - is typically a total guillotine failure in the largest feed water or circulating water pipe in system, causing major reactor coolant loss, and coolant level loss,  with a rapid containment pressure rise.    Principally all the reactor safety systems are designed to get water into the core - to cool the fuel and restore water level - as tremendous amounts of steam are produced because of reactor depressurization.  Many of those systems rely on external power  to operate, and in the long term - traditional pumping systems need power to operate to remove this decay heat, once the critical safety systems have exhausted their capacity.  

It is well to not that Fukshima's reactors never suffered any kind of piping failure (the major event most safety systems are designed around),  but they simply lost cooling and level control  because of losing all power systems.   This Fukshima catastrophe makes very clear that consequences of such a failure at least as sever as the worst case failure mode that was used to develop many of the reactor safety systems in response.   

Other work I found interesting on Decay Heat - was a very large paper, which did a full analysis and modeling of the storage needs at the proposed Yucca Mountain Nuclear storage repository - under consideration by the DOE, and funded by surcharges levied against all operating Nuclear plants in the US.   The author spent sevaral years developing the model, which included designing around the entire inventory of spent fuel in the US, as well as estimating the current tends in waste creation.   He as well examined the impact of allowing more fuel burn up - in service (to effectively generate less waste per year),  and the impact that this longer duration fuel would have on decay heat models.    The decay heat reactions were broken down into quite an extensive set of time ranges,  with specific types of decay heat determined for each time period.    It is enough to say that decay heats issues were identified in the 100,000 year time window.   

In the end,  The author's analysis pointed to total themal design loading for that faclility,  that produced a storage footprint about 2 x larger than original concept, when longer term needs and when a longer fuel burn down strategy was used to reduce waste.   While there would be less waste generated by that strategy, the long term safe heat dissipation of such waste required about a 30% increase in tunnel spacing between storage rows - to safely manage the waste storage.

This Yucca Mountain analysis was eye opening.  The detailed study was more than 100 pages of  reseach and modeling incorporated within.   The nuclear fuel inventory was detailed down to the last kg kept in spent pools all across America.    The study allowed a 10% volume reserve, estimated for Military nuclear waste generation (principally from the nuclear navy).

The authors conclusion was that the present and near term future nuclear waste long term storage is solveable via Yucca Mountain,  but its build out for current spent fuel trends requires a significantly higher foot print, and therefore more study.   

The author also suggested that reprocessing of nuclear fuels, despite its complexities, is a real viable strategy to the solution of waste disposal requirements.   The technnology has to be made more economical, and more  refined to remove as much as possible from the spent fuel.    The author's purpose was to do the full theral calculations and develope design parameter applicapable for Yucca.    But his short conclusion at the end points towards reprocessing spent fuel into MOx type fuel,  as the only alternative to mitigate the large long term disposal requirements.   

I think it is well known that MOx fuels behave a little different in terms of heat release, and may require some fuel core geometry changes to raise fuel core heat production.   It is also known that the components in the fuel can be more radiologically toxic to the enviroment if released by some kind of accident scenerio.   

My outtake from this Yucca Mountain analysis is that the long term disposal question is a very serious expensive issue.  MOx fuels and money spend in reprocessing technology is a reasonable solution,  but at the expense of producing more costly fuels, and with a core that becomes more dangerous in accidents than the conventional once through nuclear fuel cycle - now in widespread use.    The decay heat accounted for in this study is very eye opening, and when understood - It makes very clear that there is no "free lunch" or "cheap energy" that comes from the Nuclear powers promise.

Interesting and eye opening, and tied to this decay heat issue.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Japan concerned about reactor strength as new quake strikes - Monsters and Critics
*
*Japan concerned about reactor strength as new quake strikes*

    Apr 23, 2011, 11:20 GMT 

  Tokyo - The Japanese government is concerned about the  structural  strength of a reactor at a damaged nuclear power plant  and says the  ongoing water injections might be making the containment  vessel less  earthquake resistant, a news report said Saturday.  

  The report  by broadcaster NHK came shortly before a magnitude-6  earthquake struck  north-eastern Japan. No immediate casualties or  damage were reported,  and no further damage to the stricken Fukushima  Daiichi Nuclear Power  Station was reported.  

  Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), which  runs the Fukushima plant,  plans to fill part of the containment vessel  with water to cool  reactor 1. It was crippled by the March 11  magnitude-9 earthquake and  tsunami, which left 14,238 people dead and  12,228 missing, according  to the National Police Agency.  

   TEPCO said the water accumulation would not compromise the  structure,  but the government's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency  said large  amounts of water could make the vessel less  earthquake-proof, NHK  reported.  

  The operator wants the water level to reach the top  of the fuel  rods in reactors 1 and 3 by mid July so it could cool them  under more  stable conditions.  

  The operator and the government  said injecting water into reactors  at the plant is key to preventing  further overheating, which could  lead to massive radiation leaks.  

   At reactor number 1, where fuel rods are believed to be the most   seriously damaged, six tons of water are being injected every hour.  

   The agency said it would need to check whether the suppression  pool  pipes could withstand higher levels of pressure from the extra  water.  

   The operator also became more cautious about injecting water into  the  spent fuel pool of reactor 4 because of fears that the weight of  the  water might further damage the building, news reports said.  

   The water injection into the spent fuel pools of reactor 4 has   continued to prevent fuel rods from being exposed and further  damaged.   

  At the spent fuel pool of reactor 4, the water temperature was   about 91 degrees Celsius on Friday, more than 50 degrees higher than   the normal level, and the operator was forced to inject 200 tons of   water.  

  TEPCO said excessive water injection could further  weaken the  structure of the building due to damage to the walls of the  building  supporting the pool during last month's hydrogen explosion.  

   The company started Saturday to assess more cautiously the amount  of  water to be injected into the pool with a device to monitor  temperature  and the level of water in the pool.  

  Meanwhile, TEPCO is reportedly considering unveiling plans to  streamline operations as soon as this month.  

   The company is struggling to bring the plant under control and  faces  mounting compensation payouts for damage arising from the  nuclear  crisis.  

  The company's efforts to reduce personnel expenses and  asset sales  are likely to play key roles in its restructuring, the  Nikkei  business daily said.  

  TEPCO has already proposed  slashing workers' annual salaries by 20  per cent and those of  executives by much more than 20 per cent.  

  Assets that could be  on the chopping block include shareholdings  in KDDI Corp and other  companies, as well as real estate and non-core  businesses at home and  abroad, the daily said.  

  The company is also exploring the possibility of unloading  electricity businesses in Europe, the United States and Asia.

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Towns altered in shadow of Japan nuclear disaster - Yahoo! News
*
*Towns altered in shadow of Japan nuclear disaster*

   
 
AP – In this photo taken Sunday, April 17, 2011, part of the crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant …             

                                    By ERIC TALMADGE, Associated Press                  –     9 mins ago

                                FUTABA, Japan – Under a brilliant, cloudless sky, a  half-dozen cows and a pony wander freely, batting the flies off their  ears and chewing on fresh green sprouts. A pair of friendly Shiba dogs —  cautious for just a moment — trot up and wag their tails, expectantly  awaiting scraps of food. At the entrance to Main Street is a sign with  the town's motto: "Nuclear Power is the Energy of a Bright Tomorrow."

                 But a block down, an old house has collapsed. Its roof sits in the middle of the road like an odd little pagoda.

                 Someone should be doing something about that.

                 Someone should be doing something.

                 It is three o'clock in the afternoon. There should be  children laughing as they walk home from school, and young mothers  chatting as they savor those last minutes of leisure before their sons  and daughters return to be fed snacks and hustled off to after-school  judo lessons, or soccer games or dentist's appointments. There should be  shop owners inside the tea houses and inns. There should be old people  sitting outside enjoying the warm sunshine.

                 There should be people, but everyone is gone.

                 In the distance, rising above the hilltops, above the  bamboo groves and the power lines, the exhaust stacks of the nuclear  plant — the reason why no there is no one here — poke at the sky. Gray  and shimmering, they appear to be just another unremarkable part of the  scenery in this rural Anytown, Japan.

                 Strangely still from afar, the plant was the  epicenter of life here. It was a paycheck, a golden goose of tax  revenue, a place where lunches were eaten, turbines adjusted, paperwork  filed. It was the pride of the town, tiny Futaba's contribution to the  national grid, the powerhouse that kept the escalators and vending  machines running in far-off Tokyo.

                 But the plant no longer belongs to Futaba.

                 It is now the world-famous Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear  power station, a battleground for soldiers and police and engineers in  full-body radiation gear, goggles and gas masks. It has become as alien  and foreboding as Mars, the fountain of an invisible poison that wafts  into the air, seeps into the soil, creeps into people's heads.

                 It has changed.

                 And it has changed everything.
                 ___

                 Radioactive Cesium. Iodine 131. Seiverts, micro and milli.

                 People at the shelters, the newly tossed-together  community of refugees from Futaba, Tomioka, Namie, Okuma, Minami Soma —  Japan's nuclear ghost towns — talk about them constantly. They joke,  mostly, but it is the humor of the trenches.

                 Many of these people, like people all up and down  Japan's picturesque northeast coast, lost everything when the earth  unleashed its power at 2:46 in the afternoon on March 11 — an instant  frozen on the big clock above the entrance to the Futaba agriculture  co-op — and sent the Pacific gushing in, enveloping their homes, their  cars, their neighborhoods, their loved ones. They ran desperately for  their lives, dashing for the hills and watching the world transform  around them into a sea of ruin.

                 It was a once-in-a-millennium moment, a moment of  history that will be studied and remembered and retold for generations  to come.

                 For Futaba, it was just the beginning. Having  survived the tsunami — most of Futaba was intact — its survivors soon  learned from the megaphones of police patrol cars racing through their  neighborhoods that they had to keep on moving as fast and as far away as  they could. 

 The plant, hit by a tsunami three stories tall, was overwhelmed. Fires  raged, buildings were on the verge of exploding. The word "meltdown" was  being thrown about. No one knew what would happen next. 
 They just knew they had to get out. 

 "I thought we were going to die," said Hiroyuki Kohno, a radiation  technician and one of the many residents of Futaba who was working in  the plant when the quake hit and saw the tsunami from a hillside perch.  "We didn't know what to do." 

 Kohno soon found himself in a mass exodus the likes of which Japan has not seen since World War II. 

 More than 80,000 nuclear refugees fled a 12-mile (20-kilometer)  evacuation zone set up around the Dai-ichi facility and an additional  6-mile (10-kilometer) ring of heightened danger beyond that. In the  ensuing weeks, as more radiation readings were compiled and the crisis  at Fukushima Dai-ichi dragged on, the zones got bigger, expanding from  the sea to the dairy lands in the mountains. 

 Thousands of Futaba residents made their way in those frenzied first  days up the coast to Soma, on the edge of the hot zone, then to the  local capital, Fukushima City, a two-hour drive inland over buckled and  cracked roads, in cars weighed down with as many possessions as could be  grabbed on the fly. The optimistic ones took nothing at all, assuming  they would be right back. 

 Most ended up with friends or relatives or found public facilities on  the outskirts of Tokyo, 150 miles (250 kilometers) away, where the mayor  and the staff of the town hall had been forced to relocate their  operations. But some stayed behind. 

 More than a month later, they live on the floors of the Azuma Sports  Park, a shiny new gymnasium surrounded by forested hiking paths and a  big athletic stadium on the outskirts of Fukushima City. Behind  chest-high cardboard partitions, in cluttered cubicles lit by the bright  gymnasium ceiling lights, they are hunkered down for a long haul. 

 Each partition, in big red letters, says: "Japan, don't give up." 
 ___ 

 Chernobyl. Three Mile Island. 

 Fukushima. 

 Mikio Tadano bristles at the idea they will be forever linked. 

 An architect who moved to Futaba, population 8,000, when he was 15, he  remembers when the plant was still under construction, back in the  1970s, just a mile (two kilometers) from his home. For town leaders, it  was a godsend, Futaba's savior from the slow death of Japan's coal  industry. 

 Before the disaster, Futaba was even wooing the plant's operator, the  Tokyo Electric Power Co., for two more reactors. Futaba's residents were  encouraged to cheer for the Mareeze — TEPCO's women's soccer team —  like they were hometown heroes. Mareeze posters still flap against the  walls of Futaba's abandoned public gymnasium. 

 Even so, Tadano avoided it. 

 The Futaba that Tadano loved was everything but the plant. It was a  forgotten backwater, a place to raise a family, enjoy the pleasures of  camping trips in the nearby mountains and watch life from the slow lane,  away from the stresses and pressures of the city. 

 "It was nothing special, in a good way," he said, as his wife, Noriko,  and 16-year-old daughter Sumire sat quietly in their empty rectangle at  the end of a long, crowded hall in the Azuma shelter. "Futaba was a  place to go to get away from everything else. It was just another little  town that nobody really cared about." 

 But somewhere in his mind, Fukushima Dai-ichi cast a shadow. 

 "Like most Japanese, I grew up hearing the horrors of Hiroshima and  Nagasaki," he said, his eyelids heavy with fatigue behind his  wire-rimmed glasses. "I don't think any other nation in the world feels  the same way about the word `irradiation' as the Japanese do." 

 In Japanese, that word is "hibaku." Survivors of the 1945 atomic  bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are still called by a  similar-sounding word, "hibaku-sha" — the "bombed ones." For decades the  label alone, which has connotations of irradiation, was a social death  warrant, its bearers shunned and denied jobs and marriages for fear that  they would somehow contaminate those around them, or spawn mutant  babies. 
 It's a senseless fear, but also a resurgent one. 

 Soon after the crisis began, officials reported that Fukushima children  were being turned away from schools in the places they had been forced  to move to, Fukushima produce was thrown out wholesale, and even trucks  with Fukushima license plates were refused service at gas stations. 

 Alarmed by the spreading panic, the government quickly brought in risk  experts from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, internationally renowned professors  who have devoted their careers to the study of radioactivity and the  human body. One of them, Dr. Kenji Kamiya, director of the  Hiroshima-based Research Institute of Radioactive Biology of Medicine,  has gone on national television and led town hall meetings, sometimes  twice a day, to assuage public fears. To each crowd — and the meetings  are always packed — he stresses that Fukushima is not Chernobyl. 

 He explains the jargon, the units called Becquerels and Seiverts that  run across the TV screens all day and rekindle the irrational bigotry. 

 "I hope people understand that the levels we are seeing are fairly low,"  he told a group of school officials and PTA representatives at one  discussion group held a few days after the government raised its rating  of the nuclear crisis to a seven — the top notch on the International  Atomic Energy Agency's scale. 

 Kamiya's message, backed by reams of research and a firsthand knowledge of Hiroshima and Chernobyl, is surprisingly upbeat. 

 Though the crisis is still unfolding, radiation from the Fukushima  nuclear plant has claimed no lives. Perhaps it never will. And despite  the fear-inspiring Level Seven announcement, only one-tenth of the  radioactivity released by Chernobyl has been spewed out by Fukushima  Dai-ichi. 

 Perhaps, as TEPCO has suggested, everything will start going right  again. Perhaps everyone will be able to start going home in another six  to nine months. 

 Japan, unlike any other country, has survived worse — a wartime nuclear  attack. Hiroshima was hell itself. But within a few years, it was  bouncing back. Today, it is a bustling metropolis, its past contained in  a comfortable museum. Ground Zero is now a grassy park and a shopping  arcade. 

 For those who survive, Kamiya said, life has a way of going on. 

 But will Futaba? 

 There is talk of submerging the reactors and then, possibly, entombing  them somehow. Few expect them ever to be productive again. They will  have no bright tomorrow. 

 When Tadano fled, the possibility of a nuclear nightmare on top of all  he had already been through was so unimaginable that he didn't bother to  pack. He collected his family, slept the first night in his car in the  next town over because of the aftershocks, then went home. 

 A few hours later, the sirens began to wail. 

 "It just came out of the blue," he said. "Even after the earthquake and  the tsunami, the idea that there would be a crisis at the plant just  never crossed our minds. For decades, they had told us over and over  that nothing could ever go wrong. And nothing had. I figured we'd be  back the next day." 

 Now, he said, Futaba is a frightening abstraction. To save their dogs  and valuables, and frustrated by shelter purgatory, some residents began  sneaking home for brief day trips. That has now been banned. 

 The closest Tadano has been is a furtive search on Google Earth. 

 "This disaster is still playing itself out, so I don't know what  history's judgment will be," he said. "I'd like to go back. Maybe, like  Hiroshima, it will be safe someday. But Futaba will never be the same.  It will always be associated with nuclear disaster. It is contaminated  in my mind."

----------


## robuzo

^"It was the pride of the town, tiny Futaba's contribution to the national grid, the powerhouse that kept the escalators and vending machines running in far-off Tokyo."

By way of providing a little context, Tohoko (NE Japan) has a relationship to Tokyo not entirely dissimilar to that of Isaan to Bangkok (sans the obvious ethnic differences).

----------


## Mid

*Japan nuclear plant operator slashes wages*
April 25, 2011

   The operator of Japan's stricken nuclear power plant said Monday it  will halve the yearly salaries of its board members as it seeks to  absorb the financial hit from the ongoing atomic crisis.  

Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) said it will also cancel plans to  recruit 1,100 new graduates in 2012 in another cost-cutting measure as  it faces the prospect of compensation payouts, repair costs and loss of  profits.

  The company's chairman, president, vice presidents and managing  directors will see their annual pay cut by 50 percent from April, while  that of executive officers will drop by 40 percent, the statement said.

  From July, the salaries of managers will be reduced by about 25 percent  and those of general employees by about 20 percent, it added.

  TEPCO said it hopes to save 54 billion yen (US $660 million) on its wage bill.

  The company said in a statement it was facing "significant deficits" as  it is likely to have to pay out compensation to those affected by the  world's worst nuclear emergency since Chernobyl in 1986.

  It also faces the cost of repairing its facilities -- although the  crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi plant is expected to close -- and said it  would look at "fundamental downsizing" without sacrificing electricity  supplies.

  "We will continue to endeavour utmost effort to handle current situation  as well as conduct cost reduction in every aspect," TEPCO president  Masataka Shimizu said in the statement.

  The earthquake and tsunami of March 11 knocked out cooling systems at  the plant, triggering explosions and fires that caused radioactive smoke  and water to leak into the air and sea.

  Tens of thousands of people in a 20 kilometre (12 mile) radius around  the plant have been evacuated, leaving homes and livelihoods behind.  Those within 30 kilometres were first told to stay indoors, then  encouraged to also leave.

  On April 15 the company promised an initial one million yen ($12,000) in  "provisional compensation" to each family living close to the stricken  facility on orders from the Japanese government.

  It put the total of those payouts at about 50 billion yen but this was estimated to be only a fraction of the final costs.

  Trade Minister Banri Kaieda said at the time that ministers would ensure  the company, which has seen its share price plummet, was held to  account.

nuclearpowerdaily.com

----------


## Mid

*TEPCO floods containment vessels of 3 reactors at Fukushima No. 1*  Xeni Jardin 
Monday, Apr 25, 2011     
 In Japan, Tokyo Electric Power Co. workers have begun "the  unprecedented and potentially risky measure" of  flooding the  containment vessels of three troubled Fukushima nuclear reactors with  water. _The Asahi Shimbun_ reports that this is the first  known attempt ever in the world to saturate an entire containment vessel  with water in order to cool the pressure vessels inside, and  in turn,  cool the reactor cores within. 

 In related news, TEPCO has released to the public for the first time a map  of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant detailing radiation levels throughout the site.The map released Sunday shows high levels of radiation  in different parts of the site, including 300 millisieverts per hour  from debris near the No. 3 reactor, the outer building of which was  damaged in a hydrogen explosion more than a month ago. 

The map, which  shows radiation levels at about 230 locations within the nuclear plant  complex, indicates the dangers of working at the plant for long periods.  A TEPCO spokesperson said the information revealed by the map would not  affect the timetable for stabilizing the reactors that was released by  the firm this month. 

 "It'll take more than six months to remove all the debris from the site.  Data included in the survey map were taken into consideration when the  timetable [for stabilizing the reactors] was compiled," the spokesperson  said._(Daily Yomiuri)_


boingboing.net

----------


## MakingALife

A slow flooding of the containment - combined with the goal of achieving full immersion of the fuel rods in what is anticipated to be possibly a 3 month process.   Interesting that they are choosing to make this a very long evolution, when they have pumping capacity that could fill the containment spaces above the height of the top fuel rods in probably 24 to 36 hours, for each reactor.      

The logical outcome of both these efforts (filling containment and filling pressure vessels to a water level  above fuel rods) will a trend towards rising pressure in the  pressure vessels - that will require venting.   Likely as well the heat transfer into the containment volume will cause steam formation and rising pressure in that space as well.  Likely some provision to manage  containment venting will have to be established.     

Overall It would seem like the venting that will be required should be a manageable part of this process, and its a good trade off -  to get the fuel cooling and immersion that is needed to achieve greater safety in the fuel core.

If one believes the post that suggests all but 1 ton per hour of injected water boils off inside the core.   This would explain why water levels in the pressure vessel are not capable of being raised much by injection efforts.   If this is a true assessment - their focus should be on changing pumps to increase pumping capacity as a way to raise water levels in the pressure vessel to immerse the fuel.  Likewise if this assessment is true then it is a good indication of the heat discharge still taking place inside the core.    

Others have suggested that water levels in the fuel cores remain low, because of pipe leakage or valve leakage on pipe systems that connect to the core.  Raising containment water levels mitigate this pipe leakage factor and its influence on water level.

It is well to understand - a low water level in the fuel core - doesn't remove nearly as much heat as would take place if the fuel core were immersed.   As the water level on the core rises - more heat will transfer to the water and pressure will rise - and that pressure will be vented with some scheme,  at some desirable pressure level.  Typically controlled relief valves send this steam to the toroidal supression pool.   Although that may not be their only option.  

The higher pressure in the pressure vessel (from increased heat absorbtion by greater immersion) will also translate to a higher exterior pressure vessel temperature.     This will have the effect of  transferring more heat to the containment space (now filling with water) so there will be some pressure rise in that containment space as well.  NO doubt they have a plan to manage these pressure changes and dealing with them safely.

The goal which remains paramount is to achieve a cool down of the fuel.    Best option is the restoration of some kind of closed cooling system operation.   I think the complexities of that challenge have been lost at this point because of the decay in the plant environment..   

Because of the sequential plant mishaps that evolved in the early days (the explosions, over pressurization, containment breaches, etc)  they lost that opportunity for a safe non irradiated work environment.   Leakage into plant trenchs and cable ways - compromised their ability to diagnose and correct cooling and system functioning.    

Prompt patched in stand by power within 16 to  24 hours of the station loss, would have turned this situation into a very different event chain.   It would have restored cooling and mitigated most of the other developments from taking place.   

At this point TEPCO has little choice but to play catch up on this situation to push ahead for a cold shutdown.  Its a slow strategy driven by their current site limitations.   


The question remains why are they opting to pursue this process slowly ?    Why the delays in getting the fuel immersed ???

It is very likely that TEPCO has done the calculations and sees the quenching effect and large steam production that will result and require a lot  of venting control.  This is probably what they recognize that they cannot safely manage.   If H2 production ramps up from fuel core reactions due to increased steam and elevated cladding temperatures.     

I am drawing at straws to understand why they are taking the slow route by their stated plan provided to media.   It is important to recognize that even the best of injection cooling strategy is not as effective as a cooling system.

They are framing the current situation as quasi stable,  but the truth is a lot of hot fuel remains hot.  Further that the exposed fuel has little cooling in place other than some heat conduction down to the area where limited boiling is taking place in the fuel core.  

Sure its manageable like this, and eventually as the water level rises - more cooling will be achieved on all surfaces - both on the pressure vessel surface and on the fuel.   

The down side to this long duration endeavor - is that it lengthens the time required to achieve cold shutdown.   And with seismic events still rolling through the landscape - a long time line only raises risk of adverse events taking place.    

They have been burned badly once - by an inability to get standby power (from any drop in solution) in play to restore cooling.   The consequences and later damage have crippled their ability to respond.      

Now they seem destined to rely on another slow solution, instead of a more forceful  managed process to improve immersion, cooling, and venting.    There has to be a strong reason behind their choice here, and not some believe that slow and steady is a path of least exposure.   Far from it - Its a pathway of greater exposure.    

Managing a crisis is as much about managing the immediate, and as well managing the exposure.   The two events are connected and are equally important.   TEPCO appears on the path of least resistance, not a path of most judicious management.  

These venting processes that may contain hydrogen can be managed through use of flame screens, non return valves and vent construction into piping to stacks that utilize free burning pilots to control any H2 burn off and prevent any flare back propagation.   Its a standard item in the refinery business.   Its a solution that could be put in play hand in hand with a decision to get full fuel immersion to get them on a faster path to cold shut down.   

 This is the stabilization and cooling  that is needed,  not the lip service about walking down a 3 month path of quasi equilibrium.   The next major seismic event is likely to throw them a curve ball, a hot reactor will give much less wiggle time to manage than one that has already been positioned into a cold shutdown mode.   The longer they project their path to achieve a cold shutdown - the larger the exposure they carry from another plant crippling event.

----------


## robuzo

I'm sure they won't mind if I share with you guys:

Sagging Exports to Japan Could Stunt Asia's Growth
Apr.22 Nihon Keizai Shimbun, p.6 

A slowdown in Asian exports to Japan since last month's earthquake could inhibit the region's economic growth.
Exports from Asian markets rose 10-20% or so in 2010 on improving economic conditions in Japan. But disrupted supply chains and weakened demand since the March 11 quake have impeded the flow of goods.
Some estimates show Japan's quake denting the growth in each Asian nation's gross domestic product by 0.1 to 0.7 percentage point, raising concerns about Asia's otherwise brisk economic outlook.
Singapore's exports to Japan last month tumbled 6.9% on the year, widening from a 1.4% dip in February. Taiwan also reported that sales to Japan fell 2.5% from the year-earlier period. And shipments from Indonesia in March plummeted 25% on the month, according to a preliminary figure released by the government. By contrast, their exports to other markets remained solid.
Singaporean exports of electronic devices and parts slid a whopping 28%. If power shortages continue to disrupt industrial production in Japan, the decline may become more pronounced, says an official at Merrill Lynch.

----------


## Mid

*Japan PM orders shutdown of nuclear plant near faultline* 
May 7, 2011

 
_Naoto Kan said on Friday he had ordered  the shutdown of a nuclear power plant south-west of Tokyo because it is  located close to a dangerous tectonic faultline._
PHOTO: AFP

*TOKYO* - JAPAN'S Prime Minister Naoto Kan said on Friday  he had ordered the shutdown of a nuclear power plant south-west of  Tokyo because it is located close to a dangerous tectonic faultline. 

The news comes eight weeks after a massive quake and tsunami  damaged the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant north-east of Tokyo,  sparking the world's worst atomic crisis since Chernobyl a  quarter-century ago. 

Seismologists have long warned that a major quake is long  overdue in the Tokai region southwest of Tokyo where the Hamaoka plant  is located, about 200km from Tokyo in Shizuoka prefecture. 

'As prime minister, I have ordered, through trade minister  (Banri) Kaieda, that Chubu Electric Power halt operations of all the  reactors at the Hamaoka nuclear power plant,' Mr Kan said at a televised  press conference. 

Two reactors, numbers four and five, are currently operating  at Hamaoka. 'The relevant authorities, including the science ministry,  have shown that the possibility of a magnitude-8.0 earthquake hitting  the area of the Hamaoka plant within the next 30 years is 87 per cent,'  he said. 

'This is a decision made for the safety of the people when I  consider the special conditions of the Hamaoka plant.' Japanese  anti-nuclear campaigners have long argued that the seismically unstable  area, where two continental plates meet, makes the plant the most  dangerous atomic facility in the country.

straitstimes.com

----------


## BobR

Doubtful if this is based on a specific scientific analysis or site assessment; more likely a politician in trouble trying to rehabilitate his reputation at any cost (to someone else).

----------


## Greyman

Why did they build nuclear power plants on a known fault line?

You would think this country would have had enough of anything nuclear.

----------


## Spin

> Why did they build nuclear power plants on a known fault line?


Because they are stupid.

----------


## robuzo

> Originally Posted by Greyman
> 
> Why did they build nuclear power plants on a known fault line?
> 
> 
> Because they are stupid.


Well, that's _one_ explanation. Hard to think of a better one, actually. Like building the plant on the beach in the country that invented the word for "tsunami."

----------


## StrontiumDog

*Tepco: Leak Suggests Severe Damage - WSJ.com
*
*Tepco: Leak Suggests Severe Damage* 

*By MITSURU OBE* 

TOKYO—The amount of water leaking from one of the  reactors at the earthquake-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear complex is much  greater than previously thought, plant operator Tokyo Electric Power  Co. said Thursday, a finding that points to severe damage to the  reactor and could force a change in plans for stabilizing the unit.

 The plant operator also said Thursday that the damage the fuel in the  plant's No. 1 reactor sustained in March could be described as a  partial meltdown of the core, though Tepco spokesman Junichi Matsumoto  cautioned that inspections haven't shown that the incident reached the  most severe level. 

 While the nuclear industry lacks a technical definition for the term  meltdown, the term is generally understood to mean that radioactive fuel  has breached multiple containment measures, resulting in a massive  release of fuel. Tepco said that the fuel rods are no longer intact but  are believed to be still inside the pressure vessel.


_Tokyo Electric Power Co./Reuters                 The water-level indicator of Fukushima Daiichi's worst-damaged reactor, Unit 1._

In  response to a question at a press conference on whether the situation  could be described a "meltdown," Mr. Matsumoto said that if the  definition is that the fuel rods melt and lose their shape, "that is  fine." Tepco has previously said more than 50% of the reactor's fuel  rods have been damaged. 

 Reactor No. 1's pressure vessel, a cylindrical steel container that  houses the nuclear fuel, is holding only half as much water as  previously thought, raising questions about where the 11 million liters  of water injected into the vessel has gone, Tepco said. It acknowledged  the possibility of a hole at the bottom larger than has previously been  considered.

 Tepco also suspects water is leaking from the beaker-shaped  containment vessel that holds the pressure vessel—most likely from a  tube-shaped suppression chamber at its base. The pressure vessel can  hold about 330,000 liters of water and the containment vessel some 7.5  million liters.

 Tepco had planned to fill the reactor unit with water, but that  requires the containment vessel be whole. Since May 6, the company has  been engaged in an operation to flood the containment vessel with enough  water to submerge the pressure vessel and bring the temperature of the  fuel inside to a safe temperature.

 The tops of the four-meter-long fuel rods reach a little more than  nine meters from the bottom of the pressure vessel; past data suggested  the water was eight meters deep, enough to mostly submerge them. But  when workers entered the reactor building this week and corrected the  water gauge, it told them the depth was just four meters.

 If the rods were intact, that would leave them high and dry. But  Junichi Matsumoto, Tepco spokesman for nuclear operations, believes that  the fuel partly melted in the days after the March 11 earthquake and  tsunami knocked out the cooling system. Some of it apparently slid down  and is likely sitting in water, he said.

 At the peak of the crisis, soon after the loss of the cooling system,  temperatures likely rose to more than 2,000 degrees Celsius, well above  the point at which the metal casings of the fuel rods would begin to  melt. The fuel pellets inside would start melting at 2,800 degrees,  potentially fusing into a dangerously large mass. Tepco estimates the  fuel rods in the No. 1 reactor have been 55% destroyed, making it the  worst-damaged of the plant's six reactors. 

 The temperature in the pressure vessel now hovers around 100 to 120  degrees Celsius, indicated progress in the cooling effort, Mr. Matsumoto  said. But if a survey finds severe leakage from the containment vessel,  he said, Tepco would have to seal any cracks before continuing with the  flooding operation.

 The setback could delay plans for stabilizing Units 2 and 3. The  current timetable, published on April 17, envisages having Unit 1  flooded by the end of May and Units 2 and 3 by the end of July. Unit 4  was idle at the time of the earthquake and Units 5 and 6 have already  been brought to a safe shutdown.

 Tepco and regulators have a six-to-nine-month road map to bring all  the reactors to a state of cold shutdown and end the emissions of  radiation that have forced mass evacuations from the area.

----------


## MakingALife

Not surprising at this point.   Another example of the continued reactive posture on the part of TEPCO.

A strategy of slow filling for Unit Ones PR vessel and containment spaces.   A volume they represent to be about 7.8 million liters (7800 m3, or about 2.05 millon gallons)     Yet they pumped in a pace that was slow enough  so it didn't allow them the ability to see concrete level changes, and they tossed lack of progress off as either excessive evaporation, or questionable leakage.    Only after hitting the 2.6 million injection level   have they decided to send in a team to investigate / calibrate / or repair the level indication equipment.     A little late in the game.  It should have been a first consideration prior to implementing this filling strategy.  

Now to discover  an extermely low water level, with 50% percent of the fuel  (4+ meters worth) exposed out of the water....    Now to lament "The core has significantly melted down" and  "where has all this highly radioactive water gone ???"    

Simple Logic would suggest - confirming the water level instrumentation (investigating / calibration / repair)...  Prior to engaging in a strategy to fill...

More significant time was lost,  more highly radioactive waste has been generated, that will become a separate issue in its own right.          

What does this suggest about the condition in the other reactors, which have undergone the same loss of cooling ???  With the thermal outputs of 2 and 3 each double that of Unit 1... What does that suggest ???  No. 1 had the passive condenser loop arrangement that the other units did not,  so it had some natural cooling options the other reactors did not have.   All in all it points to a picture of 2 and 3 being potentially much more damaged - if they suffer water level indication errors as well. 

What about TEPCO's other resources that could had detected this issue with No 1 earlier ???  Where were the robots being used ???  Such that they can not be piloted to a point that would have allow leakage water level detection in the hot zones in the bowels of the No. 1 reactor buildings ???    

Such a step as well would denote something gone array....  Rather that waiting for the realization that  2.6 million gallons pumped into a 2 million void has yet to filled it up.  

I sent a note to my twin last night about this recent information release.   Here was his response...

 _I recently read an estimate from a Brit expert who estimated 50 - 75 years to fully stabilize the site complete with fuel removal.   50% of the core at TMI melted into a molten lump in during the first 2 hours of the transient. It took years before the reacted vessel could be opened.  Folks were in shock pretty much speechless at the extent of damage. During the transient the reactor core was exposed due to human error and faulty instruments._ 

_So there is no real surprise here._ 

_TEPCO just got a major infusion from the Japanese government basically as a pass through to fund claims payment. The bailout is basically to keep the bond holders whole and to keep TEPCO from going belly up. Telco needs to borrow more from asset markets so JG got behind them to keep the whole thing from going up in flames financially. I suspect plans will eventually morph to encasing the complex in a cement and steel sarcophagus aka chernyobal_

_There is already a US recruiting company advertising for nuclear workers to work overseas in Japan on the clean up. I suspect most JP won't touch work there with a 10 ft pole given the safety record of TEPCO._ 

I stand by my position TEPCO continues to fail to manage their situation. Reacting linearly - with out clear heads, instead of proactively.

Verifying / Correcting level indicators  is a common sense first step before a high top up evolution to any space.   Doing it with a much more rapid pumping rate will define pretty quickly if other issues existed, which does not happen on a slow bell filling operation.   

There is little positive to say.  If TEPCO cant sort the obvious uncertainties with simple obvious strategy...  How can the be expected to correctly solve the complex issues ???

My brother was correct to spot the fiscal band-aide applied to keep those with money (the bond investors) whole, and the need transformation to an outsourced model for clean up and management from outside Japan, that is now getting underway.    Both mitigate loss exposure for the Japanese people,  which is probably appropriate at this time as well.

Should the damaged fuel masses, manage to pass in compromise out a reactor control rod mechanism and down into the dryness of the containment space,  the resultant lack of cooling will usher their release through the containment barrier  with relative ease.   This will morph the accident into a major release.   While the probabliy is low -  I remains a risk issue, as long as fuel rods remain exposed in air.    The H2 explosion factor as well remains a tangible risk, causing a large breach.   Getting adequate water levels on the fuel remains TEPCO's Achillies heal in this continued drama.

----------


## harrybarracuda

One of the reactors at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi power plant did suffer a nuclear meltdown, Japanese officials admitted for the first time today, describing a pool of molten fuel at the bottom of the reactor's containment vessel.

Engineers from the Tokyo Electric Power company (Tepco) entered the No.1 reactor at the end of last week for the first time and saw the top five feet or so of the core's 13ft-long fuel rods had been exposed to the air and melted down.

Previously, Tepco believed that the core of the reactor was submerged in enough water to keep it stable and that only 55 per cent of the core had been damaged.

Now the company is worried that the molten pool of radioactive fuel may have burned a hole through the bottom of the containment vessel, causing water to leak.

"We will have to revise our plans," said Junichi Matsumoto, a spokesman for Tepco. "We cannot deny the possibility that a hole in the pressure vessel caused water to leak".

Tepco has not clarified what other barriers there are to stop radioactive fuel leaking if the steel containment vessel has been breached. Greenpeace said the situation could escalate rapidly if "the lava melts through the vessel".

However, an initial plan to flood the entire reactor core with water to keep its temperature from rising has now been abandoned because it might exacerbate the leak. Tepco said there was enough water at the bottom of the vessel to keep both the puddle of melted fuel and the remaining fuel rods cool.

Meanwhile, Tepco said on Wednesday that it had sealed a leak of radioactive water from the No.3 reactor after water was reportedly discovered to be flowing into the ocean. A similar leak had discharged radioactive water into the sea in April from the No.2 reactor.

Greenpeace said significant amounts of radioactive material had been released into the sea and that samples of seaweed taken from as far as 40 miles of the Fukushima plant had been found to contain radiation well above legal limits. Of the 22 samples tested, ten were contaminated with five times the legal limit of iodine 131 and 20 times of caesium 137.

Seaweed is a huge part of the Japanese diet and the average household almost 7lbs a year. Greenpeace's warning came as fishermen prepared to start the harvest of this season's seaweed on May 20.

Inland from the plant, there has been a huge cull of the livestock left inside the 18-mile mandatory exclusion zone with thousands of cows, horses and pigs being destroyed and some 260,000 chickens from the town of Minamisoma alone. The Environment ministry has announced, however, that it will attempt to rescue the thousands of pets that were left behind when residents were ordered to evacuate. At least 5,800 dogs were owned by the residents of the zone, although it is unclear how many remain alive, two months after the earthquake struck.

----------


## MakingALife

I saw a Japanese broadcast today, which included footage of a TEPCO representative discussing their latest information.   

TEPCO concluded that a major meltdown had taken in the reactor core, with fuel rods melted and puddled up in the bottom of the pressure vessel.  They further indicate that this hot fuel, at some point was able to penetrate through the pressure vessel.   Further that the perforation of the pressure vessel has been the cause of significant water leakage into the containment.    TEPCO further indicated that the containment vessel has been compromised as well,  and has resulted in leakage of this highly radioactive water -  outside the containment, where it is now confirmed to have flooded the lowest level of the reactor building.     

TEPCO indicates that the radiation level measures from that water is 2000 milli Sieverts,   making this the highest level of radiation measured on site  to date.

So there remains no question about Reactor 1 having undergone a meltdown more severe than TMI.   At least with TMI - the pressure vessel remained in tact and never was breached.   Fukashima No. 1 has suffered a much worse casualty than TMI suffered.

TEPCO's spoke person has remarked that they have to consider another strategy with regard to Unit 1.   That makes some sense.    The area is too hostile to allow any degree of repairs to take place.  It's impossible to put men in a position to attempt to seal the containment vessel (which is the larger outer barrier).    

TEPCO states that they are considering an option of just recycling the water from the basement of the turbine building  back through the Pressure vessel circuit -  to use it for continued cooling purposes.   Talk as well for getting some kind of nuclear contamination filter in place to help clean up this water as it is circulated.   

Nice idea, sounds good on paper.  Water that passes through the reactor and melted fuel - is going to exit at its leakage points very radiactive from the many contaiminations found there.   So It remains unlikely that any contamination filter is going to improve the quality of the water in this pathway, as it will continue to pick up radiation on each pass through.

One thing remains pretty certain -  They have continue to feed water in - to remove heat.    It also is important that they get what ever remains of the fuel core submerged by this process.    

Another valid question TEPCO needs to review, is whether leakage is taking place from the turbine building puddled water to outside the building...   

It becomes very hard to tell, exactly what is happening  - if any such leakage never rises to the ground service, but instead enters ground water.  TEPCO will have to consider a strategy to make these kind of determinations.   

Carefully monitoring sump water levels,  pressure vessel water level, what accumulated in the containment space and the water pump in rate,   Correlating this information will determine if  the volume entering the system correlates with the volume that retained in spaces or the basement area.    

A second option is to dose the water basement with an efflorescent dye, and make it easier to spot (even in very low concentrations) as surfacing on their property.

Both kinds of review on this problem can be done at the same time.  Even simply adding the dye with the water pumped into the pressure vessel, will eventually build up the dye concentration in the basement pit to allow for area screening (If there is currently no easy way to add and mix the dye in the basement area).

At any rate..  Without any question TEPCO's has got some serious issues to contend with.   If they dont maintain sufficient cooling and sufficient levels -  The possibility of continued deterioration and significantly higher releases of radiation contaimanents are almost certain.

The second issue becomes the risk exposure for breaching of the bottom and lowest walls of the No. 1 turbine building.   Higher levels only raise the static pressure against those walls.    Seismic activity can easily cause those walls to crack and leak  (as we have already seen with other wall and concrete trenchs there).    

I forget the number discussed on todays broadcast, Believe it was given in Ton's of water accumulation in the basement.   I worked out on my i phone, while listening and it was somewhere around 3 million gallons.    And its giving off 2000 milli Sv / hr. 

This makes the collected pool - Thus far the largest concentration of radioactive contaimination in one point.   

Common sense would suggest that whats in the No.1 reactor basement is significant radioactive spill risk -  because those basement walls have leakage risks associated with them.  

It will remain to be seen if TEPCO - is going to do the dilligence to determine if that basement area leaking or not....   Instead of waiting for a major drop in basement water levels - to then announce that another leak is now suspected.   Following up on what is now ongoing (based on their latest discovery) is the proactive path.   Waiting for some other significant activity related to the waterlevel status - to investigate further is the reactive approach.     

On a positive note  TEPCO news indicates they are bringing in air cooled heat exchangers - that are going to be set up to provide a closed loop cooling for their other reactor (2, 3) and other sensitive items.   This helps them to come closer to a stabilized closed cooling model, into play - since it appears they have tabled the idea of getting any of the normal cooling systems into service.

I still believe that getting the reactors with water above the existing fuel -  remains a major priority that needs to be kept in focus and put in play.    The decay heat only drops a fraction of a percent -  throughout the entire  next year in total...  Cooling and fuel immersion remain important issues for TEPCO to manage.

----------


## Mid

> Originally Posted by harrybarracuda
> 
> With the transport and communications infrastructure damaged so severely, what would you rather they did?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ...


_MARK COLVIN: The company that owns the Fukushima nuclear plant, Tepco,  has finally admitted what many have long suspected, that one of their  reactors underwent a full meltdown after the tsunami that hit Japan's  east Coast._

PM - Tepco reveals nuclear meltdown 12/05/2011

----------


## good2bhappy

keep having 6+

----------


## robuzo

Knock-on effect:

Japan consumer confidence dives at record pace
(AFP) – 5 hours ago
TOKYO — Japanese consumer confidence fell at the fastest pace on record in April from the previous month, data showed Monday, after March's earthquake, tsunami and a nuclear crisis cast a shadow on the economy.
The data showed consumer sentiment worsening to a two-year low of 33.1 in April from 38.6 in March, when the index plunged after Japan's biggest recorded earthquake and a tsunami on March 11 that devastated the northeast coast.
Readings below 50 indicate pessimism outweighing optimism.
The 5.5 point drop month-on-month was the sharpest since records began in April 2004, according to the government.

----------


## MakingALife

Please note....  In my last post -  I kept referring to the No.1 turbine building....  for water in the basement etc.  What I meant instead was to refer to the water now puddled up in the basement of the No.1 reactor building...     Sorry any confusion it may have caused.

----------


## MakingALife

> Knock-on effect:
> 
> Japan consumer confidence dives at record pace
> (AFP)  5 hours ago
> TOKYO  Japanese consumer confidence fell at the fastest pace on record in April from the previous month, data showed Monday, after March's earthquake, tsunami and a nuclear crisis cast a shadow on the economy.
> The data showed consumer sentiment worsening to a two-year low of 33.1 in April from 38.6 in March, when the index plunged after Japan's biggest recorded earthquake and a tsunami on March 11 that devastated the northeast coast.
> Readings below 50 indicate pessimism outweighing optimism.
> The 5.5 point drop month-on-month was the sharpest since records began in April 2004, according to the government.


Japan has a long road  ahead to make full infrastructure and economic recovery from the Tsunami impact.  As well they beginning to frame the realignment of their future energy mix, and the major adjustments to their nuclear energy and nuclear safety policies.   These are all major costly initiatives  that are going to be undertaken at the same time.   My guess is that the Tsunami reconstruction recovery will take 4 years, when value is given to relocation not just rebuilding in the same location .  Overhauling Nuclear safety, Plant risk assessments, Implementing risk mitigation strategies will require 5 years at a minimum and will result in small nuclear footprint even with the high cost of their safety upgrades.   This process will impact generation capacity over that span of time, producing impact to industrial users.   Their realignment of their remaining energy mix (with some diversification away from Nuclear in areas deemed to high a risk) will be a 10 year adjustment period to see other alteratives in production to replace some of the lost grid capacity.    

These are strong reasons to hold a negative sentiment.   I dare say a very large portion of the population will be impacted in some way by the short term  and medium term impacts to their economy.    

The Japanese are above all else - smart survivalist's, capable of self sacrifice.   They are perceptive enough to see what is coming, and are going to belt tighten and make sacrifices.  So Japan's competitive position in the world will be hurt directly from the higher energy costs that are unavoidable.  All these changes are coming at a bad time for Japan,  because of their populations age metrics, This trend  suggests their is little resiliency to forge ahead positively for those who must weather this as they will enter retirement during this period.   So conservative belt tightening will likely continue to expand over the next several years and beyond.  This trend puts a damper on optimism - until these adjustments are worked out and funded.

The nuclear crisis has yet to turn the corner.  The full impacts of contamination released to date is not completely clear.    The fishing season and rice season are beginning to ramp up and it will be interesting to see what the early indications are for potential damage impact from Fukshima events.  These uncertainties as well dampen optimism. 

Future recovery costs and other extra costs are unavoidable,  Because Japan will rebuild, and are smart enough to address issues that mitigate future risk factors against the adversity they have just suffered.  Change is not cheap.

----------


## robuzo

I think other reasons people are pessimistic are A) People expected the news from Fukushima to be turn out worse than portrayed by TEPCO, and continue to expect bad news, and B) There is strong expectation of another large earthquake coming soon.

----------


## MakingALife

> I think other reasons people are pessimistic are A) People expected the news from Fukushima to be turn out worse than portrayed by TEPCO, and continue to expect bad news, and B) There is strong expectation of another large earthquake coming soon.


I saw bits and pieces of the Japanese PM speaking about the assessment plans to be put in play for their nuclear industry and some general comments about looking to the future to examine a mix of alternative to diversify their electric power options.    He spoke with confidence and was quick to say that very best strategy will take time to develop.  I believe that Japan will deliver on those promises, and I think his words were a great comfort to his citizens.

Most of my posts are critical of the tracks taken to manage the issues at their striken Fukshima facility.   No question its easy to look from a distance, its a lot harder to live it and meet challenges daily.   Ive been in a leadership position to deliver mitigation strategy and deliver answers surrounding complex issues and its hard to sit there and watch what seems to continue to happen.   They had a window of time to reduce impact and were unable to best capitalize on it,  now they are in for the long haul, there are no easy pathsways out of their compounding issues.   I remain hopeful that nothing further flares up that becomes crippling for Fukshima's mitigation management.

----------


## robuzo

Ongo | Japanese Officials Ignored or Concealed Dangers
Japanese Officials Ignored or Concealed Dangers
NORIMITSU ONISHI and MARTIN FACKLER
THE NEW YORK TIMES
May 16, 2011 ET
OMAEZAKI, Japan — The nuclear power plant, lawyers argued, could not withstand the kind of major earthquake that new seismic research now suggested was likely.

If such a quake struck, electrical power could fail, along with backup generators, crippling the cooling system, the lawyers predicted. The reactors would then suffer a meltdown and start spewing radiation into the air and sea. Tens of thousands in the area would be forced to flee.

Although the predictions sound eerily like the sequence of events at the Fukushima Daiichi plant following the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, the lawsuit was filed nearly a decade ago to shut down another plant, long considered the most dangerous in Japan — the Hamaoka station.

It was one of several quixotic legal battles waged — and lost — in a long attempt to improve nuclear safety and force Japan’s power companies, nuclear regulators, and courts to confront the dangers posed by earthquakes and tsunamis on some of the world’s most seismically active ground.

The lawsuits reveal a disturbing pattern in which operators underestimated or hid seismic dangers to avoid costly upgrades and keep operating. And the fact that virtually all these suits were unsuccessful reinforces the widespread belief in Japan that a culture of collusion supporting nuclear power, including the government, nuclear regulators and plant operators, extends to the courts as well. [see link for remainder]
---
This is the result of deeply ingrained corruption in Japan's political culture.

----------


## MakingALife

> Ongo | Japanese Officials Ignored or Concealed Dangers
> Japanese Officials Ignored or Concealed Dangers
> NORIMITSU ONISHI and MARTIN FACKLER
> THE NEW YORK TIMES
> May 16, 2011 ET
> OMAEZAKI, Japan  The nuclear power plant, lawyers argued, could not withstand the kind of major earthquake that new seismic research now suggested was likely.
> 
> If such a quake struck, electrical power could fail, along with backup generators, crippling the cooling system, the lawyers predicted. The reactors would then suffer a meltdown and start spewing radiation into the air and sea. Tens of thousands in the area would be forced to flee.
> 
> ...


Its becoming a real black eye for Japan, that such a perceived risk, articulated through the court process, Is part of history's record.  Indeed it points to corruption, dogmatic & elitist  views unwilling to respond with a desire to study the issue in more detail, for the sake of public good.   

A pretty big injustice has been placed upon the Japanese people by the failures of their "Captains in industry"  and their public safety and regulatory bodies, for failure to evaluate and respond to the risk factors articulated in those suits.   Very shameful performance.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Tomoyuki Kaya / EPA
Women  buy vegetables produced in Fukushima at the Shinjuku station in  Tokyo,  Japan on May 24. Fukushima's vegetables are sold and promoted in  Japan  as being safe amid fear of nuclear contamination. 

*Japanese shoppers buy Fukushima vegetables in show of solidarity*

David R Arnott writes

The  full consequences of the disaster at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi  nuclear  power plant are still being determined. Just today, the plant's  operator  confirmed there had been meltdowns of fuel rods at three of its reactors in the early days of the crisis.

Local farmers have been badly affected, despite tests having proven that the soil outside a 30 km zone around the plant is safe for farming. As we reported on April 1st:  The Fukushima farm sector, which  once proudly put the prefecture's  name on its rice, fruits and  vegetables that went to market, will face  the burden of trying to sell  its products now that the Fukushima name  is synonymous with nuclear  disaster.The scene above, then,  represents a glimmer of hope. At a  market stall in Tokyo's Shinjuku  train station, the vendors proudly  proclaimed that their vegetables had  been grown in the Fukushima  region, and shoppers - at least some  shoppers - appeared happy to  purchase them in a spirit of solidarity.

----------


## Thormaturge

Another 6.3 aftershock this morning.

Perhaps this is the new "norm" for Japan.

----------


## StrontiumDog

___
AP_
_In  a series of photos, parts of Japan hit by the earthquake and  tsunami  are shown shortly after the disaster, then after nearly three  months of  cleanup efforts. In this combo, in the first picture, taken  March 11,  2011, tsunami waves surge over a residential area in Natori,  Miyagi  Prefecture, northeastern Japan. Then on June 3, 2011, power  shovels are  at work on reconstruction in the same area. On Saturday,  June 11, 2011,  Japan marks three months since the earthquake and  tsunami._

__
_AP_
_March  13, 2011: Destroyed houses and debris fill a parking lot of a  shopping  center in Otsuchi, Iwate prefecture, northeastern Japan, two  days after  the disaster. 

 June 3, 2011: Houses and debris are cleared._

__
_AP_
_March  14, 2011: Tsunami survivors walk with plastic containers and  kettles to  carry drinking water through a street blocked by a fallen  tank and  other debris in Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern  Japan 

June 3, 2011: Only one damaged house, center, stands along the same street._

__
_AP_
_April 6, 2011: A sightseeing boat sits on a building in Otsuchi, Iwate prefecture, northeastern Japan. 

June 3, 2011: The same area with the boat gone._

__
_AP_
_March  19, 2011: Vehicles park on the ground of a junior high school  serving a  refugee center in Rikuzentakata, Iwata prefecture,  northeastern Japan. 

June 3, 2011: The same area with temporary houses set up for survivors._

__
_AP_
_March 13, 2011: A group of firefighters head for a rescue operation in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern Japan. 

June 6, 2011: A truck goes by the same road lined with electric poles._

__
_AP_
_March 16, 2011: Buildings are surrounded by debris in Onagawa, Miyagi prefecture, northeastern Japan. 

June 3, 2011: The debris is almost cleared._

__
_AP_
_March 12, 2011: A ship swept away by tsunami lies among other debris in Miyako, Iwate Prefecture, northeastern Japan. 

June 4, 2011: A man on a bicycle pedals past a pedestrian on the same road._

__
_AP_
_March  18, 2011: Fire engines park among the debris as a search for  missing  people goes on in Rikuzentakata, Iwate prefecture, northeastern  Japan. 

June 6, 2011: The debris is almost cleared._

__
_AP_
_March 20, 2011: A damaged house stands in a flooded residential area in Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture. 

June 3, 2011: The sun shines over the same area._


Lots more at the link 



Japan: Tsunami clean-up - Picture Stories- msnbc.com

----------


## robuzo

Hot particles. Sheesh:
CNN&#039;s John King interviews Arnie Gundersen about the Hot Particles discovered in Japan and the US. | Fairewinds Associates, Inc

----------


## Mid

_Operator of Japan's stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant, says  it has suspended operation to clean up radioactive water only hours  after it has begun as radiation levels rose faster than expected
_
Operator of Japan's stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant, says it has suspended

----------


## Neo

It's now relagated to 'not important' on the mainstream media. I haven't seen any info regarding the state of the nuclear clear up for a couple of weeks now on the UK news channels, even though it is obviously still a disaster.

----------


## Mid

> It's now relagated to 'not important' on the mainstream media.


welcome to the 24hr news cycle , thought to be fair it did manage to go round a couple of times which is more than most .

we are all punch drunk whether we acknowledge it or not  :Sad:

----------


## Neo

Even Channel 4 news which has the best coverage imo has dropped it. 
Obviously a lot going on in the world, but still would expect periodic updates on such a catastrophic event.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Newsnow still have a dedicated crawler for this subject:

Japan Nuclear Crisis

----------


## harrybarracuda

The owner of Japan’s Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant plans to construct a barrier around one of its reactors that The Telegraph  in London describes as a “concrete sarcophagus.” The structure, to  contain radiation resulting from the plant's meltdown after the deadly  earthquake and tsunami in March,  will be similar to the one built  around the reactors at Russia’s Chernobyl plant in 1986.

The Tokyo Electric Power Co. will begin construction on June 27, using  remote-controlled equipment in order to protect workers. The structure  will be outfitted with filters that clean the air inside, allowing  workers to enter the facility.

The company is expected to do the same with the other reactors if this move proves effective, the Telegraph reports.

The Japanese government also approved a bailout that could help save the  company from collapse in the face of its estimated $100 billion bill  stemming from the Fukushima meltdown in March. Shares in the company  rose after the announcement. Under terms of the bailout, the government  will become the company’s temporary manager.

The bailout still faces major criticism and political obstacles.
Read more on Newsmax.com:  Japan Nuke Reactor to Be Sealed in Concrete 
Important: Do You Support Pres. Obama's Re-Election? Vote Here Now!

----------


## Neo

> Newsnow still have a dedicated crawler for this subject:
> 
> Japan Nuclear Crisis


Cheers Harry, bookmarked  :Wink:

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## good2bhappy

Oh the poor sods
had a 7.1 at 9.45 this morning
Tsunami of 10 inches!

----------


## crippen

Japan set to ban Fukushima cattle shipments after radioactive meat scare
Government expected to suspend movement of cattle as fears mount over contaminated straw in region hit by nuclear crisis


Cattle are fed at a farm where officials declared the straw safe, in Fukushima, Japan. Photograph: AP
Japan is poised to impose a ban on shipments of cattle from Fukushima prefecture – the scene of its worst ever nuclear crisis – after discovering that meat containing abnormally high levels of radioactive caesium had been processed and consumed.

The cows had been fed on rice straw containing high levels of the radioactive isotope that was harvested after the 11 March tsunami triggered a core meltdown at Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

While officials said consuming the meat did not present an immediate threat to health, the incident has highlighted concerns over food safety in the wake of the crisis, which has caused contamination in milk, tea, leaf vegetables, fish and water.

The government is expected to announce the suspension of cattle shipments from Fukushima, and possibly other areas nearby, on Tuesday.

"The most likely outcome is that we will ban beef shipments," Goshi Hosono, a special adviser to the prime minister on the nuclear clean-up, said on a TV programme. "We are discussing the matter along these lines. We have to ensure food safety."

Authorities in the prefecture confirmed that 84 head of cattle from five affected farms had been shipped to eight locations, including Tokyo and Osaka, between late March and mid-July.

Local media reported that the contamination risk could be more widespread, affecting farms 60 miles from the power plant. Kyodo news agency said it had calculated that as many as 143 cows sent to all but 10 of Japan's 47 prefectures may have been exposed to radiation via feed.

"We may need to increase our response by checking the distribution of contaminated straw," said Kohei Otsuka, the senior vice-minister for health. "We are currently considering Fukushima prefecture, but we may have to consider the need for a further response by checking the distribution of contaminated straw."

Retailers said it was highly likely that some of the contaminated beef had already been eaten.

On Sunday, the Aeon chain of supermarkets said 319kg (703lb) of beef from a farm in Asakawa in Fukushima, had been sold at 14 of its stores in Tokyo and the surrounding area between late April and the middle of last month.

Tests on straw at a farm in Koriyama city in Fukushima prefecture showed caesium levels as high as 500,000 becquerels per kg. Those readings are about 378 times the legal limit set by the government.

Farmers in the area said they had not been told about a government warning, issued days after the nuclear accident, not to give their animals feed that had been stored outside.   http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011...ve-meat-cattle

----------


## Thormaturge

> While officials said consuming the meat did not present an immediate threat to health,


There they go again.

By including the word "immediate" they are virtually admitting there is, or may be, a long term threat to health.

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## BaitongBoy

^ The people will grow horns ultimately...but this MAY be a good thing...we just don't know...

Fish are ok at the moment... :Smile:

----------


## Thaihome

> Originally Posted by crippen
> 
> 
> While officials said consuming the meat did not present an immediate threat to health,
> 
> 
> There they go again.
> 
> By including the word "immediate" they are virtually admitting there is, or may be, a long term threat to health.


Worth noting that the meat contained levels at about 2,400 becquerels per kg, five times the government-set safety limit of 500 becquerels per kg.  You need to eat many thousands of kg to get anything close to a serious dose of radition.

Even if you had eaten the straw directly you would not have died. Experiments with cesium 137 has shown that dogs given a dose of 140,000,000 Bq/Kg died in about 3 week. You would have had to have eaten about 280 kg of the straw or 58,000 kg or the meat to reach that level of exposure.
TH

----------


## Takeovers

> You need to eat many thousands of kg to get anything close to a serious dose of radition.


That is right. I would see it from two sides.

Given the choice I would probably not eat it.

Finding out after eating it I would not be worried at all. The real risk is close to zero. Not to talk about radiation sickness but of long term cancer, which would be the issue. One pack of cigaretts would be a similar risk probably.

----------


## robuzo

^Big scandal right now because apparently Yokohama city schools found out what a bargain this beef was, and have been serving it in the school cafeterias. It was extra cheap because the supermarkets weren't having it.

----------


## harrybarracuda

Since this thread is now active again, here are the current casualties as updated on 14th July:

*IMPORTANT UPDATE 14/07 – 12:00 UTC :* official Japanese statistics
*Miyagi* : 9217 dead, 2803 missing
*Iwate* : 4587 dead, 2221 missing
*Fukushima* : 1760  dead, 198 missing
*Other  prefectures* : 68 dead, 4 missing
*TOTAL: 20,858 dead or missing* (official numbers from Japan are approx. the CatDat Earthquake-Report.com  estimate numbers – see other series of articles).

----------


## harrybarracuda

Out of interest, I loaded up Google Earth and took a look at Fukushima. The image there still has the roof on!

However, look at it on maps.google.com and the image is obviously a lot newer.

----------


## Tom Sawyer

^
Yes - Google Earth isn't quite as good as it's advertised. Still glad to have it..

----------


## MakingALife

Yes,  This thread has been interesting and long standing. The newest summation of the Tsunami death tole drives home the loss of life and personal suffering for those left behind.    

Tainted beef ending up in the school system is unfortunate, but like many have commented it would take a lot consumption to register a risk.  Ending up on the table for youngsters should precipitate a large vocal response.  It shows dereliction of duty to provide healthy meals.    In my high school years I did some part time institutional food service work, at a resort,  and it always struck me that most who managed those operations would cut what ever corners they could get away with.  It seems to be true the world over.    If they bought the beef without the disclosures, another middle man facilitated those transactions are responsible parties.    The truth will come out and a loss of face and sanctions will be put in place.

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## harrybarracuda

Disaster zone rattled by new quake

Saturday, 30 July 2011
Another strong earthquake has struck north-eastern Japan

A strong earthquake has rattled northeastern Japan, leaving seven people injured.

No tsunami warning was issued.

The US Geological Survey said the magnitude-6.4 earthquake struck at 3.54am on Sunday (1854 GMT Saturday) off the coast of Fukushima, a region struck by the March 11 massive quake and tsunami. The epicentre was 27 miles below the sea surface.

Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power said the quake caused no further damage to its Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power complex, which was crippled by the March disasters.

Seven people in nearby cities were slightly injured.

The March disasters left about 23,000 people dead or missing across Japan's northeast coast and forced 80,000 others to evacuate their homes due to the radiation threat.

Read more: Disaster zone rattled by new quake - World news, News - Belfasttelegraph.co.uk

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## robuzo

^Woke me in Tokyo, some stuff fell over in the kitchen.

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## harrybarracuda

I wonder if they have contigency plans for Fukushima in case it happens again? Or are they simply in a race against an unknown clock?

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## Wally Dorian Raffles

> ^Woke me in Tokyo, some stuff fell over in the kitchen.


woke me too - i almost ran outside in my batman pyjamas..

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

> I wonder if they have contigency plans for Fukushima in case it happens again? Or are they simply in a race against an unknown clock?


I'd say the latter.

We are lucky we had a relatively mild wet season, otherwise the contaminated water had no place to go, besides the ocean, in the case of a heavy down-pour ...  :Confused:

----------


## robuzo

Niigata and the western part of Fukushima are flooded now by the heavy rains that inundated Korea. Looks like the rainy season might be a bit late this year.

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

^let's hope we will not have too much more rain  :Confused:   - anything mildly _queenslandesque_ could be a real worry.

i'm in setagaya-ku robuzo. you?

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## Tom Sawyer

^ He's in the capital..




> ^*Woke me in Tokyo*, some stuff fell over in the kitchen.

----------


## robuzo

> ^let's hope we will not have too much more rain   - anything mildly _queenslandesque_ could be a real worry.
> 
> i'm in setagaya-ku robuzo. you?


Katsushika Shibamata, Tora-san land. WDR is in a much flashier part of town. The Edogawa is as high as I have ever seen it.

Actually, September is just as rainy June in normal years, init.

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## Wally Dorian Raffles

^it's been overcast in city central for over a week now, but not a real lot of rain. i have just been reading the japan times, and the heavy rain in the fukushima area is front page news. let's hope the contaminated water is contained - i'm supposed to be going surfing in ibaraki this week  :Confused:

----------


## robuzo

> ^it's been overcast in city central for over a week now, but not a real lot of rain. i have just been reading the japan times, and the heavy rain in the fukushima area is front page news. let's hope the contaminated water is contained - i'm supposed to be going surfing in ibaraki this week


You could try surfing in a lead suit, but otherwise I think you might want to skip surfing in Iba-rucky. Maybe try the west coast of Japan instead.

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

i have some very keen surfer friends in ibaraki, who have their own geiger counters, and have been doing independent tests ever since the crisis started. they say there was a couple of days very early in the piece, when levels were higher than usual, but since then levels have been normal. that said, apparently the sand is 'radiated' according to some media reports, so the trick will be getting to the water without touching the sand!  :Confused:

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## BaitongBoy

Sad to think that this is the way we are going to be forced to live on this planet...necessity is the mother of invention...make sure you get a patent on your method...




> so the trick will be getting to the water without touching the sand!

----------


## BaitongBoy

Double post

----------


## robuzo

> Sad to think that this is the way we are going to be forced to live on this planet...necessity is the mother of invention...make sure you get a patent on your method...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by Wally Dorian Raffles
> 
> so the trick will be getting to the water without touching the sand!


Definitely a metaphor in there somewhere.

----------


## Hampsha

Today from RT

Christopher Busby: Chernobyl-like radiation found in Tokyo

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

*Fukushima kids give silent officials an earful on crisis*


By *MIZUHO AOKI*
     Staff writer
             Four children from Fukushima Prefecture on  Wednesday met with government officials in Tokyo and urged them to do  their utmost to help them rebuild their lives following the March 11  disasters and ongoing nuclear crisis.
     Ten officials from the nuclear emergency response  headquarters and the education ministry attended the meeting, organized  by citizens' groups including the Fukushima Network for Saving Children  from Radiation. The kids, aged between 9 and 13, either live in or were  evacuated from Fukushima Prefecture.
*Kaya Hashimoto, 13,* said she evacuated with  her family from the town of Miharu in June due to concerns over  radiation exposure. The family now lives in Tokyo, and she said she  misses her friends in Fukushima and worries about them. *"Can you  understand the feelings of people who left their hometowns in  Fukushima?"* she asked the officials.
*"I can't trust a government that insists on  describing Fukushima as safe when children there wear masks to go to  schools and can't use swimming pools,"* she said.
*The officials mostly listened in silence, heads bowed.*


Fukushima kids give silent officials an earful on crisis | The Japan Times Online

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> Four children from Fukushima Prefecture on Wednesday met with government officials in Tokyo and urged them to do their utmost to help them rebuild their lives following the March 11 disasters and ongoing nuclear crisis.


Its the young kids who will have to live with this disaster long term not the crooked businessmen or the politicians. 

They (the politiciians & greedy / crooked businessmen) agreed the construction of nuclear power installations which were built near or on earthquake fault lines all must have known the real possibility of a Tsunami.

Finally, add to that Tepco's lax operating procedures and there's the real recipe for this disaster.

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

> They (the politiciians & greedy / crooked businessmen) agreed the  construction of nuclear power installations which were built near or on  earthquake fault lines all must have known the real possibility of a  Tsunami.


it really is mind boggling. the original site of the fukushima plant was much much higher than what it is now, but they 'shaved' the earth off to make is much lower to sea level  :Confused:     if they had built it at the original height of the land, the tsumani would not have reached it. 

i suspect it is another example of japan doing uneccessary infustructure work, purley so they can spend the massive budget allocated by the government - the same as all of the highways to nowhere , and uneeded dams they built during the bubble years....  :Sad:

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> i suspect it is another example of japan doing uneccessary infustructure work, purley so they can spend the massive budget allocated by the government - the same as all of the highways to knowhere , and uneeded dams they built during the bubble years....


What was interesting early into this thread was the number of posters quick to defend Japanese expertise, planning and the technical skills (no names of course but we know who they were).

However since the saga has slowly unfolded its apparent that risks were ignored and safety systems were and are flawed. Has anything actually been done in Japan to rectify these errors? Or are the politicians just wringing their hands and blowing hot air like they usualy do?

Personally I'm not a fan of the Japanese (apart from their food) but I do feel sorry for the innocent parents and young kids who have suffered because of the crooked c*nts who have lined their pockets!

----------


## robuzo

The Mainichi in Japanese said a couple days ago that half the kids in Fuku have thyroid problems from radiation. Maybe in English news now. Will try to find article when not on handheld device. Very disturbing.

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

^ please post link robuzo.

finding clear information on the situation is not easy  :Sad:

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

> Personally I'm not a fan of the Japanese (apart from their food)


i  find it hard to understand opinions like this.

the japanese are so much better to be around than many other races of people IMO. they are deeply cultured and sophisticated.

do you feel this way because of their past military aggression? the truth is, through no fault of their own, the current generation are quite ignorant of that period of their history, and have embrassed the pacifist constitution given them by the yanks.

should current day poms be blamed for autrocities commited by aggressive colonists in the past? should all americans be blamed for their military aggression? ect. etc ....

let it go man. most current day japanese are peace loving people, and it is unfair to blame them for the actions of their ancestors.

also, having travelled asia, and other areas of the world, the japanese are a much less xenophobic race than many other places. they may not always like you, but they are generally very polite, honest people. after 12 years here, i am still amazed by the kindness i receive on a daily basis. 

what exactly is your grief with them?

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> Personally I'm not a fan of the Japanese (apart from their food)
> 			
> 		
> 
> i find it hard to understand opinions like this.
> 
> the japanese are so much better to be around than many other races of people IMO. they are deeply cultured and sophisticated.
> 
> do you feel this way because of their past military aggression? the truth is, through no fault of their own, the current generation are quite ignorant of that period of their history, and have embrassed the pacifist constitution given them by the yanks.
> ...


I think you're the one who should "let it go Wally" everyone is entitled to their personal opinions (in my opinion that is) and I don't have any grief with them not least because unlike you they don't factor in my everyday life.

Nothing to do with their military aggression of the past, if you really want to know I don't particularly like the way they treat their women and their women have too much hair on their pussies.

As far as them being ignorant of their past history...that's by their design and their choice but of course they paid a serious price for that and that's in their history.

Judging by your expression "poms" I'll not bother to comment other than to say "Wally" by name and certainly "Wally" by nature!  :smiley laughing:

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

^hmmmm ....so you don't like a race of people _because they have hairy pussies, and you think that you treat women better then them_ - even though you don't understand them.

1. not all pussies are hairy - infact, you can count the pubes on my current.

2. there isnt a protocal on how to treat women here, and like wherever it is you come from, there are nice people - aswell as cVnts.


i don't think i will bother debating you anymore rodney. your opinions appear pretty ignorant  :Ugh:

----------


## robuzo

> ^ please post link robuzo.
> 
> finding clear information on the situation is not easy


WDR- go here first: Radiation at Thyroid Gland Found in 45% of 1,000 Children Tested in Fukushima | EX-SKF

Whoever is running that blog is working overtime. Very good translator also. After you finish that blog entry, go to the latest. That blog operator also runs a blog entirely in Japanese: EX-SKF-JP which is very good.

Don't waste your time responding to Rodney.

----------


## robuzo

> ^hmmmm ....so you don't like a race of people _because they have hairy pussies, and you think that you treat women better then them_ - even though you don't understand them.
> 
> 1. not all pussies are hairy - infact, you can count the pubes on my current.


It isn't that they are hairy, it is that hairs are long, straight and incredibly thick. Rodney will never find this out for himself, despite giving it his all.

----------


## Gerbil

> 1. not all pussies are hairy - infact, you can count the pubes on my current.


That's very kind of you. Would Saturday be alright?

 :bunny3:

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

thanks for the links robuzo.

nice one gerbil  :Smile:

----------


## The Bold Rodney

> i don't think i will bother debating you anymore rodney. your opinions appear pretty ignorant


That's fine with me "wally" but what about the hair counting exercise?

Split the air fare 50 - 50?  :Smile:

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

i have just spend the last hour reading the blog posted by robuzo (thanks again)

it really is disturbing that this information is not in the mainstream media here. 

here is the most recent article:



> *Thursday, August 18, 2011*
> 
> * Japanese Government Will Lift Shipping Ban on Cows from Fukushima and Miyagi (Hello #Radioactive Beef Again)* 
> 
>     Nothing coming out of Japan makes sense any more, so this news is simply adding to that growing list. 
> 
> The national government will lift the ban on sales and shipment of meat cows raised in Fukushima and Miyagi Prefectures *because the government is satisfied that the radioactive rice hay is now separated from other feed* - either under the tarp or buried - so that it will not be fed to the cows. 
> 
> If I remember right, the worry was not the rice hay but the meat  itself, which tested high in radioactive cesium all over Japan as the  cows from these two prefectures (and several more in Tohoku) had been  sold far and wide because of the suddenly "affordable" price. They were  particularly favored by certain cost-conscious municipalities (most  notably Yokohama City) that fed the suspected meat to the  kindergarteners and school children in school lunches, ignoring protests  from the parents. 
> ...

----------


## robuzo

Good article about anger in Japan post-Fukushima:
Japan's silent anger - Le Monde diplomatique - English edition
This year, on 28 February, Tepco submitted a report to the Japanese Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (Nisa) about the Fukushima plant, _admitting that it had submitted fake inspection and repair reports_ (3). Tepco had failed to inspect more than 30 technical components of the six reactors, including power boards for the reactor’s temperature control valves, as well as components of cooling systems such as water pump motors and emergency power diesel generators. These generators were knocked out by the tsunami, leading to the crisis with the cooling system.

----------


## StrontiumDog

Fukushima fallout said 30 times Hiroshima's | The Japan Times Online

Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2011

*Fukushima fallout said 30 times Hiroshima's*

*Expert paints dire picture of decontamination zone, slams government for foot-dragging*

By *JUN HONGO*
     Staff writer

      Video footage of Tatsuhiko Kodama's impassioned  speech before a Diet committee in July went viral online recently,  showing the medical expert's shocking revelation that the Fukushima No. 1  nuclear plant spewed some 30 times more radioactive materials than the  fallout from the Hiroshima atomic bombing.

 *
Tatsuhiko Kodama *  

     Kodama, a professor of systems biology and  medicine at the University of Tokyo, used clear-cut terms to get his  message across. His ruthless criticism of the government's slow response  has been viewed at least 1 million times.

        "It means a significantly large amount of  radioactive material was released compared with the atomic bomb," he  told the Diet committee.

     "What has the Diet been doing as 70,000 people are forced to evacuate and wander outside of their homes?"

        Despite a hard-nosed image, the expert on  radiology and cancer briefly showed a softer side while speaking to The  Japan Times about his two grandchildren and their summer in the Tokyo  heat.

     "A lot of people ask me this, but Tokyo is safe  from radiation now," Kodama, who heads the university's Radioisotope  Center and the Research Center for Advanced Science and Technology, said  Aug. 12.

        "My two grandchildren swim outside in the pool, and there is no concern with the safety of food at this point."

     But his expression became grave when discussing  the 20-km no-go zone in Fukushima, explaining that decontamination of  such areas will take not years but decades.

        There are places he wouldn't let his grandchildren spend time outdoors freely, even in areas outside of the restricted zone.

     "Cesium has been detected from urine and breast  milk from those residing in Fukushima Prefecture, and the cause for that  is still not specified," he warned.

        Kodama said he can't give an estimate of how  many people will suffer from cancer symptoms due to exposure to  radiation, or how long it will take for signs to surface.

     There simply isn't enough epidemiological statistics to do that, he said.

        But the government and scientists shouldn't be wasting time playing guessing games, he stressed.

     "My theory is this — instead of trying to decide  what is safe and what isn't at this point, we should focus on properly  measuring the level of contamination in each area and on how to cleanse  them."

        According to Kodama, the Radioisotope Center  estimates that radioactive materials released from Fukushima No. 1  amount to about 29.6 times of that released by the atomic bomb dropped  on Hiroshima.

     The group also found out that radiation from  Fukushima will only decrease by one-tenth per year, which is about 100  times slower than radiation from the bomb.

        The most difficult problem for the scientists trying to cope with the situation is that the Fukushima crisis is unprecedented.

     "There are a lot of unknown (factors) regarding  how this level of radiation will affect children and pregnant women,"  Kodama said, pointing out that the 1986 Chernobyl accident suggests the  government should be on alert for any signs of bladder and thyroid  cancer.

        But apart from the aftermath of the Chernobyl  incident, not many statistics are available to predict what may  transpire, he said.

     Still, that doesn't justify the government's slow response to Fukushima, he added.

        For starters, the Diet has been extremely inept in updating laws on controlling radiation contamination.

        While the Radiation Damage Prevention Law was  created for handling small amounts of highly radioactive materials,  specifically to handle accidents on site at nuclear plants, the Tohoku  region is experiencing radioactive contamination in a radius beyond 200  km.

        The situation calls for a completely different approach, yet the Diet has failed to update the prevention law.

        That alone has been a major hindrance for  scientists trying to diminish the damage in Fukushima, including Kodama,  who pays visits to the prefecture every weekend to conduct  decontamination efforts with his peers.

        Another sign of a lax government can be seen  in how local governments appear to be short of equipment to measure  radiation contamination in food and other produce.

        Considering that contamination will be a  major problem for the next couple of decades, the central government  shouldn't hesitate to invest in and develop, even mass-produce,  equipment that can allow checks for radiation.

        Some companies have told Kodama it would only take three months to develop a system for efficient radiation measurement.

        Kodama advised the government to take two different approaches in decontaminating Fukushima.

        The first step should focus on creating a  rough map of the wider area and the level of contamination, possibly  using remote-control helicopters and Japan's advanced GPS system.

        For emergency decontamination procedures,  each community should have a call-in center that conducts quick cleanups  once a request is made from residents.

        Kodama said the government has spent  approximately ¥800 billion to decontaminate land after a mass cadmium  poisoning broke out in Toyama Prefecture in 1912.

        Contamination from radiation in the current  crisis has spread to about 1,000 times that area, and the final cleanup  cost is expected to be astronomical.

        But both time and money should not be  considered an issue, because it is the responsibility of this generation  not to pass on the contaminated land to the next, Kodama said.

        "I am aware that there are many opinions  regarding nuclear power. However, I believe all of us can agree that  Fukushima and the surrounding area needs to be decontaminated as soon as  possible," he said.

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

there is no doubt that Japan is going to see a rise in cancer, birth defects, etc., in the future. the question is, how many? it will take decades to find out, and by then all of the government and TEPCO officials will be long gone. It makes me sick the way they just apologise at a media conference, before retiring and leaving the problem for somebody else. meanwhile kids are playing in contaminated areas, and many of the people are still living in evacuation centre 5 months later. not enough tests are being done regarding testing of foods, and radiation hot spots. the more i read, the angrier i get!

on a different note, is there anybody out there who knows anything about thorium? i heard a radio program that is an alternative to uranium, and has very small amounts of radiation. is this true? if so, why isn't it being used?

----------


## robuzo

I think the Chinese are using thorium or saying they will.

----------


## Takeovers

> on a different note, is there anybody out there who knows anything about thorium? i heard a radio program that is an alternative to uranium, and has very small amounts of radiation. is this true? if so, why isn't it being used?


Wikipedia is quite interesting on Thorium as a nuclear fuel. I recommend reading it.

edit: for "Thorium mines" refer to "World of Warcraft". Lots of hits there. :Smile:

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

> I think the Chinese are using thorium or saying they will.


the radio documentary i heard said the chinese are leading the way for it's mainstream use. it also said that it was being researched just as much as uranium was, until they figured out it that uranium could be used for weapons, and thorium cant. thorium apparently produces 4 fold the energy of uranium, and an the much 'greener' option of the 2...

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

> Originally Posted by Wally Dorian Raffles
> 
> on a different note, is there anybody out there who knows anything about thorium? i heard a radio program that is an alternative to uranium, and has very small amounts of radiation. is this true? if so, why isn't it being used?
> 
> 
> Wikipedia is quite interesting on Thorium as a nuclear fuel. I recommend reading it.
> 
> edit: for "Thorium mines" refer to "World of Warcraft". Lots of hits there.


thanks for the link. it seems i was wrong about the chinese leading the thorium way..



> India's Kakrapar-1  reactor is the world's first reactor which uses thorium rather than  depleted uranium to achieve power flattening across the reactor core.[31] India, which has about 25% of the world's thorium reserves, is developing a 300 MW prototype of a thorium-based Advanced Heavy Water Reactor (AHWR). The prototype is expected to be fully operational by 2011, after which five more reactors will be constructed.[32]  Considered to be a global leader in thorium-based fuel, India's new  thorium reactor is a fast-breeder reactor and uses a plutonium core  rather than an accelerator to produce neutrons. As accelerator-based  systems can operate at sub-criticality they could be developed too, but  that would require more research.[33] India currently envisages meeting 30% of its electricity demand through thorium-based reactors by 2050.[34]

----------


## Takeovers

> thanks for the link. it seems i was wrong about the chinese leading the thorium way..


BTW actually thanks for pointing to Thorium. I had not been aware of that technology.

I am sure though, that environmentalists will point out that long term radioactive waste is also produced, if less, like convetional reactors. So safe long term storage will still be needed. But the risk of nuclear disasters from power plants would be vastly reduced or zero depending on technology used.

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

> BTW actually thanks for pointing to Thorium. I had not been aware of that technology.


you're welcome! - i don't think many people are aware of thorium as a fuel and energy source.

i have managed to find the radio segment on it Thorium: a future energy source? - Counterpoint - 22 March 2010

----------


## Thormaturge

Just to put things into perspective, I have a picture of devastation caused by the recent 5.8 earthquake in the US.  



Humanitarian aid may be sent via the usual channels, and the lack of cutlery and food on the table should be noted.

----------


## Marmite the Dog

> and the lack of cutlery and food on the table should be noted.


The British PM promised to send aid workers over to show them how to use a knife and fork correctly.  :UK:

----------


## robuzo

Getting really disturbing for those of us who live and/or work in Japan:
Why the Fukushima disaster is worse than Chernobyl - Asia, World - The Independent
Why the Fukushima disaster is worse than Chernobyl
Japan has been slow to admit the scale of the meltdown. But now the truth is coming out.

[Excerpt:]
Caught in a blizzard of often conflicting information, many Japanese instinctively grope for the beacons they know. Mr Ichida and his colleagues say they no longer trust the nuclear industry or the officials who assured them the Fukushima plant was safe. But they have faith in government radiation testing and believe they will soon be allowed back to sea.

That's a mistake, say sceptics, who note a consistent pattern of official lying, foot-dragging and concealment. Last week, officials finally admitted something long argued by its critics: that thousands of people with homes near the crippled nuclear plant may not be able to return for a generation or more. "We can't rule out the possibility that there will be some areas where it will be hard for residents to return to their homes for a long time," said Yukio Edano, the government's top government spokesman. "We are very sorry."
---
I'm not sure those of us familiar with Japan ever really expected anything other than "a blizzard of often conflicting information."

----------


## Mr Lick

Just received this via e-mail - scary

http://fragg.me/video/japan-tsunami-inside-car

----------


## mobs00

BBC News - Japan quake: Images of then and now

----------


## ENT

Been watching eqs globally 4 a few yrs.

They're increasing in frequency and magnitude over time, esp last 5 yrs.

Recent (today) rash of M6+ eqs are very interesting, indicating lots of movement simultaneously around ring of Fire and corresponding Atlantic plates.

----------


## ENT

^ World has just now entered a "quiet" EQ phase.

Much energy build up has been released recently (<5yr phase).

Expect energy from heating to cause further pressure within Earth's structure.
Accumulated energy released through further crustal expansion and eruption.

Measure expected EQ.  behaviour from major magnitude, frequency and depth points.

Follow /track events on published seismographs.

----------


## bsnub

Let me guess Larry Silverstein was behind the earthquake too?

----------


## ENT

> Let me guess Larry Silverstein was behind the earthquake too?



Why waste your time stalking ,bsnub?

ANSWER

Because yu iz a jerk, and a prolly 1 of dem USA monkeys working fo' da big Uncle.

Fuck off nerd, or fall over or something.

----------


## nostromo

> ^ World has just now entered a "quiet" EQ phase.
> 
> Much energy build up has been released recently (<5yr phase).
> 
> Expect energy from heating to cause further pressure within Earth's structure.
> Accumulated energy released through further crustal expansion and eruption.
> 
> Measure expected EQ.  behaviour from major magnitude, frequency and depth points.
> 
> Follow /track events on published seismographs.


I saw a Japanese movie on this. My Japanese reading comprehension being what it is -but I think in English it is Sinking of Japan

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by ENT
> 
> 
> ^ World has just now entered a "quiet" EQ phase.
> 
> Much energy build up has been released recently (<5yr phase).
> 
> Expect energy from heating to cause further pressure within Earth's structure.
> Accumulated energy released through further crustal expansion and eruption.
> ...


Perhaps I did not make myself clear. I am all the way supporting the Japanese, in the most serious way

----------


## robuzo

Are you referring to the 2006 "The Sinking of Japan" (日本沈没)?

----------


## nostromo

> Are you referring to the 2006 "The Sinking of Japan" (日本沈没)?


Yes, looks like the film. No spoilers but sad.

----------


## misskit

Thursday, Oct. 13, 2011

Yokohama finds high strontium-90 levels
Kyodo
YOKOHAMA — Radioactive strontium exceeding normal levels has been detected in sediment from atop an apartment building in Yokohama, some 250 km from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, city officials said Wednesday.

Yokohama finds high strontium-90 levels | The Japan Times Online

----------


## misskit

Let's go!


The Japan Tourism Agency said Tuesday that 10,000 foreigners will be given free round-trip tickets to the country in the next fiscal year as part of a campaign to reverse the plunge in tourists since the March 11 disasters and amid a prohibitively high yen.

Tourism blitz: 10,000 to get free flights to Japan | The Japan Times Online

----------


## misskit

TOKYO (Kyodo) -- High radiation doses were reported Thursday in spots in  Tokyo and neighboring Chiba Prefecture, both over 200 kilometers away  from the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, with their readings  found to exceed current dose levels in some evacuation zones around the  plant.

more
High radiation dose readings marked in spots in Tokyo, Chiba - The Mainichi Daily News

A government map displaying radiation levels in 10 prefectures  relatively close to the Fukushima No. 1 Nuclear Power Plant. Areas in  red show over 3 million becquerels of cesium per square meter, whereas  those in light brown show less than 10,000. (Data as of Sept. 18. Image  courtesy of the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and  Technology)

----------


## ENT

^ I'm not going there in a hurry, cheap tickets, what a joke!

Government must be desperate.

Lotsa countries now emphasizing tourism as a major (almost the only prime income earner) for their ailing economies.

How the hell we survived a generation ago without tourism must be a mystery, (especially to these new economists).

Too bad, the world economic structure is a load of crap, desperately held together by bribe and bonus seeking wannabees with not one day's experience as an independent free trader, totally out of touch with real trade and exchange values as experienced by traders on the street and open Real value markets.
They are all simply speculators and manipulators, parasites who eat the profits of the poor.

Well, happily, now, we are walking into a total global financial collsapse as a result of these clever financial managers, thieves, the lot of them.

Then what?

We eat the rich.

Bring it on, I've been looking forward to this for years.   

 :Smile:

----------


## MakingALife

*Here is a recent clipped article from Bloomberg, which highlights a french study done on the radioactive release attributed to this accident in Japan.   Very chilling information that is centered on Cesium which has a 30 year half life.*




*Fukushima Plant Released Record Amount of Radiation Into Ocean*

                                                                                   Q
                                By                     Beth Thomas                  -                                  Oct 31, 2011 3:47 PM GMT+0700                             
inShare14 More Print        Email
                     Enlarge image                       
                     Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s  (Tepco) Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power station in Fukushima, Japan.  Source: Tokyo Electric Power Co. via Bloomberg 



                                The destroyed Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan was responsible for the biggest discharge of radioactive material into the ocean in history, a study from a French nuclear safety institute said. 
 The radioactive cesium that flowed into the sea from the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant was 20 times the amount estimated by its owner, Tokyo Electric Power Co., according to the study by the Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety, which is funded by the French government. 
 It’s the second report released in a week calling into question estimates from Japan’s government and the operator of the plant that was damaged in the March earthquake and tsunami. The Fukushima station may have emitted more than double the company’s estimate of atmospheric release at the height of the worst civil atomic crisis since Chernobyl in 1986, according to a study in the Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics journal. 
 The oceanic study estimates 27,000 terabecquerels of radioactive cesium 137 leaked into the sea from the Fukushima plant, north of Tokyo. 
 Tepco is aware of the estimate from the institute through media reports and has no comment, spokesman Hajime Motojuku said today by phone. 
 The three melted reactors and at least one damaged spent- fuel pool may have emitted 35,800 terabecquerels of cesium 137 into the atmosphere, according to Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics journal. The estimated amount is about 42 percent of that released into the atmosphere in the Chernobyl explosion in 1986, according to the study. 
 Japan’s nuclear regulator in June said 15,000 terabecquerels of cesium 137 was discharged. 
 Cesium 137 is a source of concern for public health because the radioactive isotope has a half-life of 30 years. 
 A becquerel represents one radioactive decay per second and involves the release of atomic energy, which can damage human cells and DNA. Prolonged exposure to radiation can cause leukemia and other forms of cancer, according to the World Nuclear Association. A terabecquerel is 1 million times 1 million becquerels. 
 To contact the reporter on this story: Beth Thomas in Hanoi at  bthomas1[at]bloomberg.net 
 To contact the editor responsible for this story: Peter Langan at  plangan[at]bloomberg.net

----------


## CaptainNemo

> Let's go!
> 
> 
> The Japan Tourism Agency said Tuesday that 10,000 foreigners will be given free round-trip tickets to the country in the next fiscal year as part of a campaign to reverse the plunge in tourists since the March 11 disasters and amid a prohibitively high yen.
> 
> Tourism blitz: 10,000 to get free flights to Japan | The Japan Times Online


Hmmm... there's bound to be some catches... it's not as though they need any more Israeli and Iranian street schmutter vendors in Tokyo. 
Regarding news coverage on " 10,000 FREE FLIGHTS TO FOREIGNERS" | 2011 | Topics | Press Releases | Japan Tourism Agency

----------


## ENT

^ the site linked tells us it's all a con.

----------


## hazz

*24 Hours at Fukushima*
A blow-by-blow account of the worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl
IEEE Spectrum

Sometimes it takes a disaster before we humans really figure out how to design something. In fact, sometimes it takes more than one.
Millions of people had to die on highways, for example, before governments forced auto companies to get serious about safety in the 1980s. But with nuclear power, learning by disaster has never really been an option. Or so it seemed, until officials found themselves grappling with the world's third major accident at a nuclear plant. On 11 March, a tidal wave set in motion a sequence of events that led to meltdowns in three reactors at the Fukushima Dai-ichi power station, 250 kilometers northeast of Tokyo.

Unlike the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 and Chernobyl in 1986, the chain of failures that led to disaster at Fukushima was caused by an extreme event. It was precisely the kind of occurrence that nuclear-plant designers strive to anticipate in their blueprints and emergency-response officials try to envision in their plans. The struggle to control the stricken plant, with its remarkable heroism, improvisational genius, and heartbreaking failure, will keep the experts busy for years to come. And in the end the calamity will undoubtedly improve nuclear plant design.

True, the antinuclear forces will find plenty in the Fukushima saga to bolster their arguments. The interlocked and cascading chain of mishaps seems to be a textbook validation of the "normal accidents" hypothesis developed by Charles Perrow after Three Mile Island. Perrow, a Yale University sociologist, identified the nuclear power plant as the canonical tightly coupled system, in which the occasional catastrophic failure is inevitable.

On the other hand, close study of the disaster's first 24 hours, before the cascade of failures carried reactor 1 beyond any hope of salvation, reveals clear inflection points where minor differences would have prevented events from spiraling out of control. Some of these are astonishingly simple: If the emergency generators had been installed on upper floors rather than in basements, for example, the disaster would have stopped before it began. And if workers had been able to vent gases in reactor 1 sooner, the rest of the plant's destruction might well have been averted.
The world's three major nuclear accidents had very different causes, but they have one important thing in common: In each case, the company or government agency in charge withheld critical information from the public. And in the absence of information, the panicked public began to associate all nuclear power with horror and radiation nightmares. The owner of the Fukushima plant, the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), has only made the situation worse by presenting the Japanese and global public with obfuscations instead of a clear-eyed accounting.

Citing a government investigation, TEPCO has steadfastly refused to make workers available for interviews and is barely answering questions about the accident. By piecing together as best we can the story of what happened during the first 24 hours, when reactor 1 was spiraling toward catastrophe, we hope to facilitate the process of learning-by-disaster.

..... (read more)

----------


## ENT

Interestingly, Thailand's nuclear plant is under threat from flood water now.

If the water flow around the plant increases sufficiently, the sub soil around the plant will be at risk, weakening the foundation soil through saturation, then, later, drying and cracking of the ground if followed by a very hot new year.

----------


## Mid

*Radioactive caesium detected in baby formula in Japan*
December 6, 2011

*Tokyo - A major Japanese food company said Tuesday  it would recall 400,000 cans of baby formula after radioactive material  was found in the powered milk.*

Radioactive caesium of up to 30.8 becquerels per kilogram was detected  in baby formula manufactured and sold by Meiji Co, local media reported.

Meiji suspected a link with the radiation leaks from the Fukushima  Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, which was hit by the March 11 earthquake  and tsunami, Kyodo News reported, citing unnamed sources.

This is the first time since the disaster that radioactive caesium has  been found in baby formula, according to the Health Ministry.

The level of radioactive caesium contained in the product was below the official limit of 200 becquerels per kilogram.

But babies are more vulnerable to harmful effects of radioactive material than adults.

nationmultimedia.com

----------


## ENT

Yes, it's not just us adults, but the future generations who will be paying for our mistakes.

Radioactive baby milk formula following the melamine laced baby milk formula in China and SE Asia has and will affect all of this latest generation of infants "privileged" enough to drink the stuff.

A generation of problem kids for SE Asia?
You bet.

----------


## robuzo

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/05/wo...&smid=fb-share

TOKYO — At least 45 tons of highly radioactive water have leaked from a purification facility at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station, and some of it may have reached the Pacific Ocean, the plant’s operator said Sunday.
- - -
But don't worry, they're pretty sure it is only strontium in that water, the cesium was washed out before they flushed it. . .I mean, before it leaked.

----------


## Tom Sawyer

> Yes, it's not just us adults, but the future generations who will be paying for our mistakes.
> 
> Radioactive baby milk formula following the melamine laced baby milk formula in China and SE Asia has and will affect all of this latest generation of infants "privileged" enough to drink the stuff.
> 
> A generation of problem kids for SE Asia?
> You bet.


The last thing Japan can afford with its ageing population is to kill off or gimp up the few babies being born these days!

----------


## ENT

^ Dominoes, cause and effect.

Pity it's the kids, pity it's Japan.

Wish it was China or some such place instead.

----------


## misskit

> The last thing Japan can afford with its ageing population is to kill off or gimp up the few babies being born these days!


Isn't that the truth.

----------


## WujouMao

Google street view before and after -
BBC News - Google Street View explores post-tsunami Japan

----------


## crippen

BBC News - Google Street View explores post-tsunami Japan


Unbelievable!


OOPS.

----------


## robuzo

This is of huge significance: Real cause of nuclear crisis | The Japan Times Online

----------


## WujouMao

> BBC News - Google Street View explores post-tsunami Japan
> 
> 
> Unbelievable!
> 
> 
> OOPS.


Go and download the Channel 4 Documentary on the Tsunami. Ive given the links in the tv programme dl section. 

The force of the water is quite amazing. Never saw a documentary on Tsunami and i missed the one we saw in Thailand although we all saw the news footage on tv.

The chap in Japan video recording the event while stuck in traffic in his car is also open jawed.

----------


## robuzo

December 16, 2011
Skepticism Greets Japan's Announcement of 'Cold Shutdown' at Crippled Nuclear Plant
Japan Declares Stricken Nuclear Plant Stable | Asia | English
---
No shit the world is skeptical, probably because TEPCO and the J-gov't are proven liars.

----------


## robuzo

Kan Administration Declared the Fukushima Accident Worst-Case Scenario Report "Didn't Exist" After Reading It | EX-SKF
The news of the worst-case scenario report submitted to the Kan administration by the Japan Atomic Energy Commission in March last year has already been reported, as I wrote on my January 2 post, but a little bit more information is coming from Kyodo News now.

It turns out that the Kan administration not only sat on the report detailing the worst-case scenario of the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant accident, but it declared the report wouldn't exist from then on, and didn't even officially recognize its existence as part of the government documents until December last year when the news of the report finally leaked. On the New Year's Eve.

So the core administration officials did the "three monkeys" - see no evil, say no evil, hear no evil - on the worst nuclear accident in the country, if not in the world while telling the citizens and the world everything was under control, that it was safe to play outside, that there was no meltdown at Fukushima, and attacking people who said otherwise as "fear-monger".

Kyodo News has a slightly different description of this incident in Japanese than in English. In the English version, the news agency simply says the administration kept the worst case scenario under wraps for months. But the Kyodo Japanese News reveals more.

From Kyodo News Japanese (1/21/2012):

東京電力福島第１原発事故で作業員全員が退避せざるを得なくなった場合、放射性物質の断続的な大量放出が約  １年続くとする「最悪シナリオ」を記した文書が昨年３月下旬、当時の菅直人首相ら一握りの政権幹部に首相執  務室で示された後、「なかったこと」として封印され、昨年末まで公文書として扱われていなかったことが２１  日分かった。複数の政府関係者が明らかにした。

The document that detailed the "worst-case scenario" in which radioactive materials would be released intermittently in large quantities for about a year if all the workers at Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant were to be evacuated was shown to a handful of officials in the Kan administration, including Prime Minister Naoto Kan, in the Prime Minister's Office in late March. But the report, after being shown to the administration officials, was sealed as "the report did not exist", and was not even treated as part of the official government documents until the end of last year. It was revealed by the multiple government sources on January 21.

　民間の立場で事故を調べている福島原発事故独立検証委員会（委員長・北沢宏一前科学技術振興機構理事長）  も、菅氏や当時の首相補佐官だった細野豪志原発事故担当相らの聞き取りを進め経緯を究明。

The Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission (Commissioner Koichi Kitazawa, former chief of Japan Science and Technology Agency) , a private-sector panel looking into the nuclear disaster plans to probe how the government was handling the crisis, by interviewing then-Prime Minister Naoto Kan and Goshi Hosono, who was the adviser to Kan and was in charge of handling the nuclear accident at that time.

----------


## robuzo

Thread bump. Extremely disturbing video from Japanese tv, interview with a Kyoto University professor about the effects on spent fuel rods in the event of another quake. Has subs:

----------


## robuzo

How do you hide a 35-ton "machine" (I'm guessing the word for it is probably "crane")? Drop it in a spent-fuel pool!
Machine fell into MOX spent-fuel pool: Tepco | The Japan Times Online

----------


## misskit

^^What's that about. My connection is s-l-o-w today.

The end of WHAT?

----------


## Cujo

> ^^What's that about. My connection is s-l-o-w today.
> 
> The end of WHAT?


Yes, and I can't get youtube.
What's the gist of it?

----------


## robuzo

Here, a transcript at this blog post. The end of, among other things, Tokyo.
Fukushima Dai-Ichi No. 4: An earthquake before spent fuel rods are moved to safe storage would be “the end” « naked capitalism

----------


## Mid

*Boys soccer ball lost in tsunami found in Alaska*
Apr 23, 2012 

*TOKYO* (AP)  Good thing Misaki Murakamis name was on his  soccer ball. It was lost in last years tsunami in Japan but has been  found across the Pacific on a remote Alaskan island.

  Kyodo News agency says the 16-year-old from the devastated town of  Rikuzentakata is surprised and thankful that the ball has been found.

 Officials from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration  say the ball is one of the first pieces of debris that can be traced  back to Japan after the March 11 tsunami.

 David Baxter, who spotted the ball on Middleton Island, says his Japanese wife, Yumi, talked with Murakami over the phone.

 They plan to send the ball back to the boy soon

asiancorrespondent.com

----------


## harrybarracuda

5 mayo 2012 Last updated at 08:28 GMT     	       	*Japan closes last nuclear reactor in Tomari*

 

The last of the three reactors at the Tomari nuclear plant is being switched off


                       Japan  is switching off its last working nuclear reactor, as part of the  safety drive  since the March 2011 tsunami triggered a meltdown at the  Fukushima plant.
         The third reactor at the Tomari plant, in Hokkaido prefecture, is shutting down for routine maintenance. 
         It leaves Japan without energy from atomic power for the first time for more than 40 years.
         Until last year, Japan got 30% of its power from nuclear energy. 
         Hundreds of people marched through Tokyo, waving banners to  celebrate what they hope will be the end of nuclear power in Japan.  
   Power shortages 	      Since the Fukushima disaster, all the country's reactors have  been shut down for routine maintenance. They must withstand tests  against earthquakes and tsunamis, and local residents must give their  consent in order for plants to restart. 
         So far, none have. 
         Ministers have warned Japan faces a summer of power shortages. 
         The BBC's Roland Buerk, in Tokyo, says the government could  force the issue, but so far has been reluctant to move against public  opinion. 
         Organisers of the anti-nuclear march in the capital estimated turnout at 5,500. 
         Demonstrators carried banners shaped as giant fish. The  "Koinobori" banners, traditionally the symbol of Children's Day, have  been adopted by the anti-nuclear movement. 
         "There are so many nuclear plants, but not a single one will  be up and running today, and that's because of our efforts," campaigner  Masashi Ishikawa told the crowd.
         Engineers began the process of shutting down the final Tomari  reactor, inserting control rods to bring the fission process to an end.
         All operations at the plant will have stopped by 14:00 GMT, a spokesman told Associated Press. 
         Japan will then be without nuclear power for the first time since 1970. 
         Businesses have warned of severe consequences for manufacturing if no nuclear plants are allowed to re-start. 
         In the meantime, Japan has increased its fossil fuel imports, with electricity companies pressing old power plants into service.
         If the country can get through the steamy summer without  blackouts, calls to make the nuclear shutdown permanent will get louder,  our correspondent says. 
         The six-reactor Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant was badly damaged by the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. 
         Blasts occurred at four of the reactors after the cooling  systems went offline, triggering radiation leaks and forcing the  evacuation of thousands of people. 
         A 20km (12m) exclusion zone remains in place around the plant.

----------


## Jesus Jones

> *Boys soccer ball lost in tsunami found in Alaska*
> Apr 23, 2012 
> 
> *TOKYO* (AP)  Good thing Misaki Murakamis name was on his  soccer ball. It was lost in last years tsunami in Japan but has been  found across the Pacific on a remote Alaskan island.
> 
>   Kyodo News agency says the 16-year-old from the devastated town of  Rikuzentakata is surprised and thankful that the ball has been found.
> 
>  Officials from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration  say the ball is one of the first pieces of debris that can be traced  back to Japan after the March 11 tsunami.
> 
> ...


Along with lots of other shit, no doubt.  But it's a ball and it's journey is most interesting!

----------


## robuzo

A Harley Davidson washed up, too. The owner was identified and I think it is already back in Japan. The guy lost a number of family members, but got his bike back (it was in a container).

----------


## harrybarracuda

Bloody hell, there could be two more floating around, not good to hit one of those.




> 7 June 2012 Last updated at 08:29 GMT     	       	*Japan's tsunami dock washed up in US state of Oregon*
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The BBC's Tim Allman says the dock was mistaken for a barge at first
> 
> 
> ...

----------


## Mid

*Japan PM orders nuclear restart*
16/06/2012

 Japan ordered nuclear reactors back online on  Saturday, defying public sentiment against atomic power following last  year's meltdowns at Fukushima sparked by the quake-tsunami, reports  said.

 
_Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda (R) greets Fukui Governor  Issei Nishikawa (L) at his official resicence in Tokyo, on June 16. Noda  ordered nuclear reactors back online on Saturday, defying public  sentiment against atomic power following the quake-tsunami that sparked  last year's meltdowns at Fukushima._

 Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, seeking to head off a summer energy  crunch, told Kansai Electric Power (KEPCO) to re-fire two idled reactors  at its Oi plant serving the industrial heartland of western Japan, the  Jiji news agency and the Nikkei online news said.

 Noda on Saturday received approval for the restarts from Issei  Nishikawa, the pro-nuclear power governor of central Fukui prefecture,  which hosts the plant.

 The premier then met three ministers -- the minister of economy,  trade and industry, the minister in charge of the nuclear accident and  the chief cabinet secretary.

 "Now that we have the approval from the autonomous body where the  reactors are relocated, the four ministers (including Noda) concerned  made the decision to restart the reactors," Noda said, according to Jiji  and Nikkei.

 Nishikawa told the prime minister he was happy with the restarts  after he received safety assurances on Friday from the operator.

 "We reached the agreement to help stabilise livelihoods and industry in Kansai (western Japan)," Nishikawa told reporters.

 The controversial move comes amid fears that electricity demand will  outstrip supply as temperatures soar and air-conditioners get cranked  up, further crimping Japan's wobbly economic recovery.

 The nod from Nishikawa was the final link in the chain for Noda, who  has become a vocal advocate of nuclear power being brought back into the  energy mix for resource-poor but electricity-hungry Japan.

 The country's 50 working reactors -- which along with the four  crippled units at Fukushima contributed around a third of Japan's  electricity before the disaster -- have been offline since the last one  was shuttered in early May.

 Public opposition in the aftermath of the tsunami-sparked meltdowns  at Fukushima in March 2011 left Japan's political classes tip-toeing  around the issue of restarts.

 Radiation was spread over homes and farmland in a large area of  northern Japan when the massive tsunami swamped cooling systems at  Fukushima Daiichi.

bangkokpost.com

----------


## BobR

Turn off their lights and they will be begging to have the nuclear plants restarted, especially if they do not have electricity to recharge their cell phones and hand held whatevers.   California had an electricity crisis in 2001 that was actually bogus, but when the lights went out and the air conditioners stopped working, all that green energy crap went down the toilet quite quickly. 
The electricity crisis was one of the main causes of the then present Governor being  recalled and Schwartzenegger becoming Governor.

----------


## FailSafe

30% of their electricity comes from nuclear plants- there was no way they could just shut them off without years of preparation to use other sources to make up for the loss- the summer in Japan can be brutal, and they need it for air conditioning- nothing like a few brown-outs to change people's minds.

----------


## pattayardm

Fukushima...radiation so high - even robots not safe - YouTube

----------


## ltnt

> Turn off their lights and they will be begging to have the nuclear plants restarted, especially if they do not have electricity to recharge their cell phones and hand held whatevers.   California had an electricity crisis in 2001 that was actually bogus, but when the lights went out and the air conditioners stopped working, all that green energy crap went down the toilet quite quickly. 
> The electricity crisis was one of the main causes of the then present Governor being  recalled and Schwartzenegger becoming Governor.


Unspeakable word,"ENRON."

Japanese being "pragmatic," return to what they know works, not to developing something to replace it.  They are years away from a substitute for Nuclear Power.  I'm sure they are performing multiple studies on how to reinforce their reactors insitu for a 12 on the richtor scale right now.  They are also developing sea walls 100 feet tall that curve the tide away from the land.  Japan soon to be called "Fortress Nippon."

I'm sure they never fully shut down, but had the plant on by-pass to the hot reheat and as soon as they got word they opened the main steam valve to the turbine generators and we're back on line in less than 24 hours.  Now, I call that superior management.

----------


## nostromo

Japanese Govt has made a good decision. Problems were caused by factors that are not here any more, and have now been taken into account. The country needs electricity, and using other sources of energy available now except nuclear power would be unresponsible for future, considering the global warming.  






> *Japan PM orders nuclear restart*
> 16/06/2012
> 
>  Japan ordered nuclear reactors back online on  Saturday, defying public sentiment against atomic power following last  year's meltdowns at Fukushima sparked by the quake-tsunami, reports  said.
> 
>  
> _Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda (R) greets Fukui Governor  Issei Nishikawa (L) at his official resicence in Tokyo, on June 16. Noda  ordered nuclear reactors back online on Saturday, defying public  sentiment against atomic power following the quake-tsunami that sparked  last year's meltdowns at Fukushima._
> 
>  Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda, seeking to head off a summer energy  crunch, told Kansai Electric Power (KEPCO) to re-fire two idled reactors  at its Oi plant serving the industrial heartland of western Japan, the  Jiji news agency and the Nikkei online news said.
> ...

----------


## tuktukdriver

I don't understand how they've been surviving without it.

----------


## misskit

Talking to Japanese the last few weeks, I found several felt as though their government still  isn't telling them the truth about the radiation coming from the damaged plants. 

They also didn't want any of the reactors started again. 



Antinuclear protesters block road to Oi plant ahead of restart

TSURUGA (Kyodo) -- A group of about 100 antinuclar protesters on Saturday blocked a road outside the front gate of the Oi nuclear plant in western Japan, ahead of the planned reactivation of a reactor there on Sunday.

The protesters, part of 650 people who took part in a rally against the reactivation, sought to block the entrance to the plant in Fukui Prefecture with more than a dozen vehicles in an attempt to prevent workers from entering the facility.

The group is set to remain at the site until Sunday night when the process of reactivating the No.3 reactor is scheduled to begin. The plant operator, Kansai Electric Co., said the protest will not affect the reactivation process.

Earlier Saturday, the 650 protesters presented an official of the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency with a petition addressed to senior vice industry minister Seishu Makino, who is expected to stay near the plant for about a week to monitor the reactivation process until the reactor reaches its full output capacity. The petition urged the immediate halt to the reactivation process.

The Oi plant on the Sea of Japan coast is the first to come back online since all commercial reactors in Japan ceased operating amid concern about their safety following last year's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disaster.

----------


## robuzo

I don't think I've talked to any who believe the government is telling the truth. Which it hasn't been.

----------


## misskit

Right, but how much radiation are they really taking? 

My husband claims the people living around that area are getting the same radiation dose as an x-ray everyday. I've not known him to exaggerate, but can that really be true?

(I took photo of a tanuki for you, robuzo, in Harajuku. It's on China-Japan travel thread.)

----------


## ENT

Heart attacks affect Fukushima kids, similar to Chernobyl child victims.

----------


## ENT

Fukushima radioactivity flow rate update.

Fukushima Update 6-9-2012 - YouTube

----------


## ENT

Extinction.

----------


## BobR

> Talking to Japanese the last few weeks, I found several felt as though their government still  isn't telling them the truth about the radiation coming from the damaged plants. 
> 
> They also didn't want any of the reactors started again. 
> 
> 
> 
> Antinuclear protesters block road to Oi plant ahead of restart
> 
> TSURUGA (Kyodo) -- A group of about 100 antinuclar protesters on Saturday blocked a road outside the front gate of the Oi nuclear plant in western Japan, ahead of the planned reactivation of a reactor there on Sunday.
> ...



From the Japanese Prime Ministers point of view, he likely determined he would suffer more political damage from lights going  out and factories closing than he will from ordering a restart.

----------


## ENT

He's lost the battle already. The population is dying prematurely and could become non-existent within two generations if the rate of contamination and radiation spread continues as it is.
Many people are demoralised and have lost all hope and trust in their government .
They are in shock, in fact they're suffering from PTSD.

----------


## BobR

> Extinction.


I Googled Plume Gate and there are some fascinating and frightening articles there, one even claiming 39,000 Americans have already died because of radiation from Japan.  

The problem reading this is my own ambivalence since the none of the websites discussing it have any established credibility, but on the other hand if it was a high level cover-up it's reasonable to suspect the corporate news media might quash the stroy.

This is the website claiming 39,000 premature deaths in the USA    http://freepdfhosting.com/37cc0eae6b.pdf   but I'm not sure if it is legitimate or a hoax.

----------


## ENT

You can visit any uni and make an appointment to talk with an EAOS (earth and ocean studies) lecturer on the subject. They are primarily geologists, climatolgists and biologists.
Nice folk who can explain in layman's terms.
The other option is to visit your local university and as a member of the public you can read about or watch documentaries on the subject in the uni library.
Just go to the uni reception desk and ask. They are very helpful and encourage interested self education.
There might also be a series of talks given on the subject, open to the public, but little publicised as they're often well attended by students and alumni.

----------


## Cujo

> This is the website claiming 39,000 premature deaths in the USA    http://freepdfhosting.com/37cc0eae6b.pdf   but I'm not sure if it is legitimate or a hoax.


looks like nonsense to me, no explanation of how the deaths occured or how it is determined they are due to radiation poisoning.

----------


## misskit

^Maybe suicides are up due to the economic situation.

----------


## ENT

^^I suppose it would seem like nonsense to someone in denial. There's more info out there if you care to look.
My previous posted vid in this thread (page 59) on the topic of premature deaths explains how the young victims' hearts undergo irreparable damage ending in premature death from heart failure, long before cancer can kill them.

----------


## robuzo

(This had been up on NHK News but for some reason they took it down. . .)
Highest Radiation Detected In Japan's Fukushima Reactor
(RTTNews) - The highest level of radiation to date has been detected inside the No.1 reactor at the tsunami-wrecked Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan.

The plant's operator Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) said on Thursday it used endoscopes and dosimeters to examine the interior of the reactor. A record level of 10,300 millisieverts per hour was detected in the internal measurement carried out for the first time since the March, 2011 accident. The measurement was taken 20 centimeters above the surface of a contaminated water puddle in the reactor's suppression chamber. This high level of radiation would be fatal for humans within 50 minutes.

A measurement of 1,000 millisieverts per hour was detected about four meters above the water surface, which is ten times higher than measured in the No.2 and No.3 reactors, Japanese media reported.

TEPCO official Junichi Matsumoto said he suspected that a higher radiation level in the No.1 reactor was caused by more fuel rods melting down than in other reactors.

He said robots would be used for damage assessment because it was unsafe for humans to work on the site.

Meanwhile, Officials from the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency apologized to Kawauchi village mayor Yuko Endo and communities around the plant for failing to release maps showing dangerous radiation areas. Residents of the village were forced to evacuate after the government designated 20-kilometer radius of the plant as no-entry zone.

----------


## Cujo

> ^^I suppose it would seem like nonsense to someone in denial. There's more info out there if you care to look.
> My previous posted vid in this thread (page 59) on the topic of premature deaths explains how the young victims' hearts undergo irreparable damage ending in premature death from heart failure, long before cancer can kill them.


And yet no statistics as to the causes of these deaths.

----------


## ENT

Since the Fukushima disaster was only just over a year ago, data is obviously only starting to be recorded and is ongoing, so no fully definitive statistics can be published yet, only preliminary findings are possibly available.

----------


## Cujo

> Since the Fukushima disaster was only just over a year ago, data is obviously only starting to be recorded and is ongoing, so no fully definitive statistics can be published yet, only preliminary findings are possibly available.


Ridiculous, so they can tell us that 39,000 additional deaths can be attributed to radiation from Fukishima but they can't tell us the cause of deaths of those people (heart attack, cancer etc).
If they can't tell us that then they sure can't determine whether or not the deaths were attributable to Radiation from Fukishima.

----------


## Cthulhu

^ Oh, I'm sure it's the usual ENTplanation:

"Because I said so"

Popularized "truth" by the likes of Calgary, Boon Mee, ENT, etc...

"Because I said so"

----------


## ENT

Get lost **.

----------


## ENT

Discussions in Japan about increased abortion rates related to fears concerning the high uptake of cesium 137 that concentrates in the heart muscles of developing foetuses.
This is the apparent cause of the increasing rate of congenital heart problems in neonates there.

Fukushima Woman: Many are aborting their babies

----------


## koman

I looked at my alarm clock last night and the fucking thing was glowing in the dark......holy shit....now what..should I start a suit against TEPCO?   I have scientific proof that the wind blows from the direction of Japan at times....

----------


## Blue water dreaming

It's a terrible disaster which in the decades to come will claim the lives of many thousands. It is bigger than Chernobyl in 1986. The only positive news is that the Japanese are not Russians. They will work unceasingly to limit the damage and to help make the area safe. If there is one race of people in the world who will never give up, its the Japanese. Ultimately, we will all benefit from their clean up work.
In the meantime...don't drink the water!

----------


## ENT

^^You'e also believe that the government can do no wrong.

----------


## ENT

Charcoal and clay can be used to remove radioactive particles from contaminated water.
Water hyacynth also soaks up the radioactive particles.
Other plants can be used also, including *marijuana*. 

PURIFY, CLEAN RADIO ACTIVE WATER. CLEANING RADIATION FROM WATER. REMOVE IRRADIATED PARTICLES

----------


## Cthulhu

^ wow, I see the idiot has found a new home and a new cause - YAGC. (Yet Another Government Conspiracy)





> Charcoal and clay can be used to remove radioactive particles from contaminated water.
> Water hyacynth also soaks up the radioactive particles.
> Other plants can be used also, including *marijuana*. 
> 
> PURIFY, CLEAN RADIO ACTIVE WATER. CLEANING RADIATION FROM WATER. REMOVE IRRADIATED PARTICLES


Enjoy dying by following his "advice" - I'd be highly suspect of any sources that ENT suggests, particularly one that can't seem to spell "radioactive" or "radioactivity".

----------


## ENT

^ *Professional*  :dont feed the troll:

----------


## Blue water dreaming

Oops!
Made a mistake.
Apologies ENT.

----------


## Blue water dreaming

Jeez, I'm glad I'm not an expert. I'd give _myself_ the shits!

----------


## ENT

You misunderstood.That post was aimed at koman, not you, mate, that's why the ^^ :Smile:

----------


## Cthulhu

> I also believe that you shouldn't take lessons from Calgary when determining what other people think.  It makes people think similar things of you, as they do of him.


Wise, wise words -- of course, I also think ENT is beyond that advice already. WAY beyond that advice.

----------


## MakingALife

Here is an interesting short piece related to recent restarts and other proceedings related to the Japan Nuclear industry. What is most intersting is TEPCO pattern of negligience fits well with many other regional nuclear power producers there. This post below summarizes some conclusions of a report on Fukushima give to the DIET by and accident investigation group, who's full report is almost 700 pages.

Enjoy 

Wolf Richter www.testosteronepit.com

On July 5, Japan brought its first nuclear reactor back on line, after having been nuclear-power free for two months. Its 50 functional reactors had been taken off line for maintenance but were not restarted due to a groundswell of opposition. The trailblazer is reactor number 3 at the Oi power plant owned by Kansai Electric Power Co. After stress-testing the reactor, which had been idle for over 15 months, the government had declared it safe and had given permission for the restart. It’s expected to reach capacity in a few days. Oi reactor number 4 is scheduled to start generating power later in July. The reactors will bring some relief to Osaka and surrounding areas that might otherwise get hit by a 15% power shortfall this summer.
Alas, an old pattern came to light: KEPCO concealed from the government some of its studies on faults near the Oi power plant. Scientists were ignored though they argued that a fault ran between reactor 1 and 2, and that it and two other nearby faults could beconnectedduring an earthquake and produce far greater shaking than the government had estimated in its stress tests, raising the risk of another major nuclear disaster. And they claimed that the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) hadn’t properly investigated the fault lines. Under pressure, NISA called for more studies on the faults near Oi and other power plants. But that was it.
And if there were an accident, the escape route would be “a winding, cliff-hugging road often closed by snow in winter or clogged by summer beachgoers”; and radioactivity could contaminate Lake Biwa which supplies drinking water to more than 14 million people.
Ironically, on the day that Oi started generating electricity again, the Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission submitted its report on the Fukushima disaster to the Japanese Diet—and it’s a doozy.
The accident “was a profoundly manmade disaster - that could and should have been foreseen and prevented,” wrote Chairman Kiyoshi Kurokawa (88-page summary of the 641-page report). The report found a “multitude of errors and willful negligence” that left the power plant unprepared for the earthquake and tsunami. It blamed the “ingrained conventions of Japanese culture,” such as “our reflexive obedience, our reluctance to question authority, our devotion to ‘sticking with the program’, our groupism, and our insularity.” The report laments that “nuclear power became an unstoppable force, immune to scrutiny by civil society,” where regulators and promoters were one and the same.
A “tightly knit elite with enormous financial resources” and “the collective mindset of Japanese bureaucracy” conspired “to resist regulatory pressure and cover up small-scale accidents.” A mindset that led to the “disaster made in Japan.” In 2006, for example, the government updated its standards for earthquake resistance, but when TEPCO refused to bring its power plant into compliance with seismic upgrades, NISA did nothing [Read....A Revolt, the Quiet Japanese Way].
The report warned that reactor number one may have been severely damaged by the earthquake itself—that the shaking broke some pipes and caused a loss of cooling—before the arrival of the tsunami. TEPCO’s whitewash has so far insisted that reactors had proven their earthquake resistance, and that it was the collapse of the power supply to the cooling system that had caused the accident. And so the report cast even more doubt on the safety of the Oi reactors.
There have been critical voices in Japan, among them Koide Hiroaki, a nuclear scientist, who for forty years has been pointing out the flaws in the nuclear power industry. For that, he was condemned to remaining a lowly assistant professor his entire career, toiling without much recognition at Kyoto University’s Research Reactor Institute.
But when the Fukushima reactors melted down, he became an instant media darling, and his new book, “The Lie of Nuclear Power,” became a bestseller. He was even asked to address the Diet. In his presentation, he spelled out how nuclear policymakers decided to deal with the possibility of catastrophic accidents: they labeled that possibility an “inappropriate assumption” and _therefore_ considered nuclear power plants "safe under any circumstance whatsoever.”
So, as the Oi stress tests and safety declarations show, the same tricks are still being played, but they don’t work as well anymore. What has changed is that the nuclear power industry and its regulators are no longer the omnipotent entity but are on the defensive, struggling to stay relevant in face of popular opposition and protests. And Friday night, anotherprotest against the restart of the Oi reactors eruptedoutside the official residence of Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda—150,000 people, Japan’s largest demonstration in 50 years! Video of the protest: polite Japanese venting their anger.
And here's something ... lighter. And cynical. And in a deeper sense, very truthful.... Nuclear Contamination As Seen By Japanese Humor (mostly visuals).
To compensate for the loss of nuclear power generation, Japan has feverishly ramped up alternatives, largely fossil fuels—just as a new worldwide Cold War has broken out, this time between the US and China. Over oil. Read.... “The New Cold War” by Marin Katusa

----------


## ENT

An excellent post.

----------


## nostromo

Good impressive post, but I strongly disagree. Japanese Nuclear power is extremely safe, and - this is important - vital for this planet to survive global warming, and that goes for China and other countries deploying nuclear power. US is very important, EU is divided.

----------


## robuzo

The Japanese nuclear power industry has a terrible record and is corrupt as hell. You don't know what you are talking about, as usual.

----------


## nostromo

> The Japanese nuclear power industry has a terrible record and is corrupt as hell. You don't know what you are talking about, as usual.


Please point me to relevant information, if you had anything. I trust and you should as well trust Japanese power

----------


## ENT

> Originally Posted by robuzo
> 
> 
> The Japanese nuclear power industry has a terrible record and is corrupt as hell. You don't know what you are talking about, as usual.
> 
> 
> Please point me to relevant information, if you had anything. I trust and you should as well trust Japanese power


*
The appalling track record of Japan's nuclear industryMar 15, 2011, 12:30*


There has been much talk since the beginning of the continually shocking crisis in Japan about the stoicism of the population, their discipline and their unselfishness. If this had to happen anywhere, say the columnists, Japan is the place best socially able to cope from it.

I have no idea if this is true or not. I suspect that it is a piece of fairly feeble stereotyping in that were a similar crisis to hit here we too would queue rather than fight at the supermarket. History shows the vast majority of people becoming better people in the face of crisis  in the immediate term at least.


But there is one section of Japan that really is working all too well to type. The nuclear industry. In 1995, there was a major leak at Monju, a fast breeder reactor. The authorities (as represented by Donen which managed Japan's nuclear programme) said it was "minimal." It wasn't. Instead it was the largest accident of its type ever. In the world.

Still as Alex Kerr points out in his excellent Dogs and Demons that was nothing that couldnt be dealt with by "hiding the evidence." Donen staff edited the film of the accident, taking out the 15 minutes that showed the actual damage and releasing only five minutes of very innocuous material.

However this level of secrecy was nothing next to what happened in 1997. Then drums filled with nuclear waste exploded at the Tokai plant just north of Tokyo. This was  or should have been  a particular worry given that only three years earlier it had been discovered that 70kgs of plutonium (enough for 20 bombs) had been lost in the plant's pipes at some point.

Yet Donen simply pretended everything was fine. Managers pressurized workers to say the fire was under control when it was not and mis-stated the amount of material leaked by a factor of 20. But that's not all. Incredibly, says Kerr, "on the day of the explosion, 64 people including science and engineering students and foreign trainees toured the complex and no one ever informed them of the accident."

The list of the madness is almost endless. There was the later accident at the Tokai plant which degenerated into uncontrolled fission (something it took the authorities seven hours to figure out as they couldn't find a neutron measurer) and revealed that for years workers had been disposing of nuclear materials with buckets (rather than dissolution cylinders).

Then there were the 2,000 drums of radioactive waste stored in drums in pits filled with rainwater, and most surreal of all perhaps, a PR video produced by Donen to show that plutonium is not as dangerous as the activists say. Kerr quotes the storyline: "A small character named Pu gives his friend a glass of plutonium water and says it is safe to drink. His friend, duly impressed, drinks no less than six cups of the substance before declaring 'I feel refreshed!'"

Many secrets on (included 11 leaks of tritium in two and a half years) Donen was sort of shut down. I say sort of because it actually just carried on as before. Same staff and same ethos. Just with a different name  Genden.

For more on all this I strongly suggest reading Kerrs book (it was written in 2001 but remains one of the best books I have ever read on Japan). But for now we should just note that it isnt particularly reassuring. That's particularly the case given that officials now say that current levels of radiation are "hazardous to human health." When even the Japanese government is telling people "Please do not go outside. Please stay indoors. Please close windows and make your homes airtight," it seems reasonable to worry.
The appalling track record of Japan's nuclear industry - MoneyWeek

----------


## robuzo

If you claim to know something about Japan and don't see how dangerous ministry/industry collusion and _amakudari_ are when it comes to nuclear power, you don't deserve to be taken seriously. Go read the statements Kan has made recently. Go read the Diet commission report. Here is a link to BBC analysis: BBC News - Fukushima report: Key points in nuclear disaster report Nostromo, since you claim to understand Japanese, check this out: $B!VJ!Eg!&O29>D.D9!"ElEE$N2sEz=q$K7cE\!W!!(BNews i - TBS$B$NF02h%K%e!<%9%5%$%H(B

Not to mention that no country, including Japan, has really figured out what to do with waste. Any ideas about what to do with the spent fuel rods in the jerry-rigged pool on the roof at Fuk? The ones that are being kept company by many tons of gear and other crap? No? Well, you are in good company. TEPCO doesn't know wtf to do, either, but they know full well the whole thing is just one good shake from coming a-tumbling down.

----------


## nostromo

> ^China puppet.


I am happy we can disagree on some things and agree on others. Possibly, and probably having seen your posts, in the end, we are on the same side. If not, you are on the losing side I believe...

Now. As for China puppet. I am proud to be with strongest economy in the world. And I hate euro, commie driven (11 of 27 are "ex" communist leaders) commissars, commissars that are not elected by anyone, read me: not elected by anyone. the "boss man" of eu barroso is ex-leader of portuguese communist party.

Euro will break europe and bring it to its knees so they will ask for anything for guidance. What it is, neonazi whatever, lets keep our nukes warm

Now some richer countries in the far north have said they would rather exit euro (the netherlands and finland) that go on forever paying PIIGS south euro fokers. If indeed  those richest in europe AAA rated countries (only a few left in the world now - AUS is one) choose to exit euro then what is left? To some point - if Germany was not sensible and followed Merkel, - germany pays it all as far as she can, but even all the money of Germany is not enough, the continent is too huge, the debt is too huge - this is like titanic -, and then the money is no more, germany is bankrupt and lights go off in germany and europe -  except in the northern rich countries that left euro or never joined euro, which are richer than ever. As of today german electorate is not happy, they are angry with this waste of their future social security and hospitals and pensions money - exactly like with the other northern europeans. Now what is left in europe. Debt, only debt. 

However we live on, here in Thailand, or in UK or US, Canada, Australia and NZ, just a bit of pinch or a huge one on GDP but we do not pay for their euroshite debts and we will not die and shall prosper in future. UK is most at risk here, badly chosen location for the country but can not be helped. Hope political leaders in the UK steer as far as poss from eurozone, as they are doing.

Euro is now 23 year low to Australian dollar, can I rephrase that, 23 year low, I mean twenty-three year low, euro again 4 year low to British Pound, and hit the lowest against USD despite poor nfp. 

Just like I said 6 months ago. By the my book.

----------


## robuzo

> For more on all this I strongly suggest reading Kerrs book (it was written in 2001 but remains one of the best books I have ever read on Japan). But for now we should just note that it isnt particularly reassuring. That's particularly the case given that officials now say that current levels of radiation are "hazardous to human health." When even the Japanese government is telling people "Please do not go outside. Please stay indoors. Please close windows and make your homes airtight," it seems reasonable to worry.
> The appalling track record of Japan's nuclear industry - MoneyWeek


The Kerr book is good (and depressing), even if he is a Kyoto-lover who after publishing _Dogs and Demons_ moved to Thailand- and he is definitely not a '1-2-3 hole lover.' Here is something interesting he had to say not long after the disaster occurred:
Are the Japanese different? - Page 3 - CNN
The Fukushima plant problems points toward Japan's "information problem ... the unwillingness to openly discuss bad news and to play down, disguise or even lie about unfortunate or embarrassing news," said Alex Kerr, an American who has spent much of his life in Japan. "That has been absolutely endemic in the nuclear industry here, and in other domestic industries.

"There's been a lot in the international press at this point at the lack of clarity (in the Fukushima situation),"said Kerr, a cultural critic and author of "Lost Japan" and "Dogs and Demons," the latter which focused in part on Japan's nuclear problems. "What they may not be aware is its endemic and built into the system -- they simply know no other way."

That sentiment can even be found in Japanese art. "They talk about the shinkei of Mount Fuji," Kerr said. "This is the perfect shape that Mount Fuji should have, the truth, an ideal -- not the actual look of Mount Fuji."

Part of the blame, critics says, lies within the tangled government bureaucracy which holds sway over many of Japan's domestic industries, like nuclear power. This is evident in the aftermath of the quake. Hannah Beech, in an article this week for Time, points to Japan's fondness for red tape choking relief efforts: drugs, logistic companies and helicopter aid were rebuffed for lack of proper licenses.

----------


## Cthulhu

> Originally Posted by ENT
> 
> 
> ^China puppet.
> 
> 
> I am happy we can disagree on some things and agree on others. Possibly, and probably having seen your posts, in the end, we are on the same side. If not, you are on the losing side I believe...
> 
> Now. As for China puppet. I am proud to be with strongest economy in the world. And I hate euro, commie driven (11 of 27 are "ex" communist leaders) commissars, commissars that are not elected by anyone, read me: not elected by anyone. the "boss man" of eu barroso is ex-leader of portuguese communist party.
> ...


I was going to point out how determined you seem to appear wrong consistently, but after reading the above I stand corrected. Instead, you are just bat-shit crazy!

----------


## ENT

^* Professional troll*  :Trolling:

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by ENT
> ...


Did you actually read my post - or you are from south europe, where germany and northern europe sinks money every day enough to build a hospital

----------


## Cthulhu

:rofl: 

You're obviously not from a country where English is the native language. 

Sprechen sie Deutsch?

Parlez vous français?

Parla Mussolini?

Czevapcziczi?

----------


## nostromo

> you seem to appear wrong consistently


Hey man, I said this very thing about euro, eurusd, half a year ago, on this website. I did not give advice for gold or insurance. I told what I thought would happen on fx. And it happened. Want to know more? Federal Network will be back with you after these executions. Keep watching.

----------


## nostromo

I know of this troll... has been tried number of times when likes of you are on the losing side. So why not just face the facts




> You're obviously not from a country where English is the native language. 
> 
> Sprechen sie Deutsch?
> 
> Parlez vous français?
> 
> Parla Mussolini?
> 
> Czevapcziczi?

----------


## ENT

^^^He's a Sheisskopf from the Austrian Republic of Kohlgarten.

----------


## nostromo

and I do speak german - ich spreche deutsch
and I do speak french - je parle francais 

I believe you wanker do not, and that is because you are limited

----------


## nostromo

> ^^^He's a Sheisskopf from the Austrian Republic of Kohlgarten.


You should better not get me angry with you. I support you on important issues. I don't like the sound of this.

----------


## ENT

I was talking about quack quack, but if the cap fits.......

----------


## robuzo

There's already an MKP thread starting with a totally off-topic and generally unacceptable post by nostromo, why not try to keep this about the Great East Japan Earthquake and its aftermath?

----------


## ENT

Good idea.

----------


## nostromo

austrian republic or konnengargen.... 
and i am a tethered goat  :Smile: 
i like this -  gives me quite a bit of laugh. actually still laughing

----------


## ENT

Some cosmetics for Fukushima.


Bonito, Hula Girls on menu as Noda makes fourth visit to Fukushima
Jiji
IWAKI, Fukushima Pref. — Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda visited Fukushima Prefecture on Saturday, sampling local fish produce and catching a performance by hula dancers.



Arriving in the tsunami-hit coastal city of Iwaki in the morning, Noda visited a fish market at the port of Onahama, where he tasted freshly caught bonito, and enjoyed a show by a group of Hula Girls from the local Spa Resort Hawaiians.

"I'm really impressed," Noda told the dancers after the show, asking them to continue performing "as a symbol of (the city's) revitalization and reconstruction."

He also spoke with disaster victims at a temporary housing complex in Iwaki.

In the afternoon, Noda traveled to the village of Kawauchi, where partial residency restrictions remain in place due to radioactive contamination emitted by the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.

It was Noda's fourth trip to the prefecture since being appointed prime minister last September.
Bonito, Hula Girls on menu as Noda makes fourth visit to Fukushima | The Japan Times Online

----------


## nostromo

> There's already an MKP thread starting with a totally off-topic and generally unacceptable post by nostromo, why not try to keep this about the Great East Japan Earthquake and its aftermath?


You will find above that this thread went off the track when ENT called me "China puppet".

----------


## Cthulhu

> and I do speak german - ich spreche deutsch
> and I do speak french - je parle francais 
> 
> I believe you wanker do not, and that is because you are limited


Es ist natürlich natürlich weiterhin amüsant wie sehr Du darauf bestehst Unrecht zu haben, ob in English, in Deutsch ou, si tu préfère, en français. Je m'en fous vraiment en quelle langue nous bavardons, mais c'est quand même exquisitement amusant comme tu maintient d'être totalement incorrect internationalement. 

You really might want to get your facts straight, or at least learn a bare minimum was Deine Gegenseite betrifft, um weitere Blamage zu verhindern. C'est probablement une bonne idée. Qu'est ce que t'en pense?

Ciao!

----------


## nostromo

nuclear power at least stops us from killing ourselves, alternatives are bad. and do not mention wind or solar - they are not ready yet, i wish they were, but they are not

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> and I do speak german - ich spreche deutsch
> and I do speak french - je parle francais 
> 
> I believe you wanker do not, and that is because you are limited
> 
> 
> ...


I never said I speak Italian. And you do speak other languages quite poorly. Can see about 10 errors in one second scan. I rather think you copied that from some website but ignored the endings and beginnings. 

Have you lived in Asia?

----------


## ENT

Japanese consensus style of selecting leaders can lead to a very closed door style of management where cronyism rules. Corruption from the top down is tolerated by the Japanese who tend to put up with their leaders with stoic acceptance.
Survivors of last year's earthquake have quietly born the burden of bureacratic ineptitude, sharing what little resources they have in more or less communal responsibility, often unsupported by government assistance.

There is now a growing grass roots feeling of resentment towards the Diet's handling of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, arising from the initial effects of shock. As the people slowly recover their sense of moral strength, protests against the bureaucracy and TEPCO are on the increase.

The latest report on the cause of the Fukushima disaster has given more fuel to a fire slowly smouldering in the hearts of the people, as they debate their loyalties among themselves 


*
Fukushima Disaster Was Man-Made, Investigation Finds*
%th July 2012.
Fukushima Nuclear Meltdown Leaves Families Divided

The Fukushima nuclear disaster was the result of “man-made” failures before and after last year’s earthquake, according to a report from an independent parliamentary investigation.

The breakdowns involved regulators working with the plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. to avoid implementing safety measures as well as a government lacking commitment to protect the public, the Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investigation Commission said in the report.

The March 11 accident, which set off a wave of reactor safety investigations around the world, “cannot be regarded as a natural disaster,” the commission’s chairman, Tokyo University professor emeritus Kiyoshi Kurokawa, wrote in the report released yesterday in Tokyo. It “could and should have been foreseen and prevented. And its effects could have been mitigated by a more effective human response.”

The report dealt the harshest critique yet to Tokyo Electric (9501) and the government. The findings couldn’t rule out the possibility that the magnitude-9 earthquake damaged the Fukushima Dai-Ichi No. 1 reactor and safety equipment. This is a departure from other reports that concluded the reactors withstood the earthquake, only to be disabled when the ensuing tsunami slammed into the plant.

Fukushima Disaster Was Man-Made, Investigation Finds - Businessweek

----------


## Cthulhu

> nuclear power at least stops us from killing ourselves, alternatives are bad. and do not mention wind or solar - they are not ready yet, i wish they were, but they are not


Hydroelectric is an endlessly renewable resource, particularly with tidal powered hydro-electric generation it just requires a turbines facing both directions and an appropriate location. There's also exploiting thermal venting near volcanic sources to generate steam for electric generation. Both in plenty supply around Japan. 

Personally, though, I'm in favor of nuclear energy. What to do with spent fuel? 

Put it back where it came from, dump it into the overlap of tectonic plates, to be carried into the mantle and the liquid magma by tectonic motion.

----------


## Blue water dreaming

> nuclear power at least stops us from killing ourselves, alternatives are bad. and do not mention wind or solar - they are not ready yet, i wish they were, but they are not


I think wind and solar power are closer than governments would have us believe. Most cruising yachts these days are totally self sufficient for their power using wind and solar generation especially in the warmer climes. Many developed countries now offer householders and businesses the option of generating their own solar power which is fed back into the power grid and 'winds back' the electricity meters as it generates excess during the days. The problem does not so much rest upon generation, but upon storage and power loss in the conversion between 12v and 240/110v:10-15amps.
Then there is the developing industry which is awaiting the efficient release of hydrogen from water to make hydrogen cells cost efficient, not to mention their eco neutral generation status.

----------


## nostromo

ENT we are not done. I supported you on serious issues. You stabbed me in the back.
Falklands does not need a wnkr like you. Or Gibraltar. Shame on you. What we do with turncoats. I can tell you. We make you listen specific Abba record over and over again. Much more effective than the old waterboarding thing.

----------


## Cthulhu

> I never said I speak Italian. And you do speak other languages quite poorly. Can see about 10 errors in one second scan. I rather think you copied that from some website but ignored the endings and beginnings.


Dude, give it up. Seriously. 

You continue to ridicule yourself with your very sad efforts at one-upmanship, and desperate effort to continue to be wrong - hint: you just incorrectly corrected a native speaker of both languages. Sure, it's all fun and games, but at some point it starts to be embarrassing ... for you. 

Go on ... continue en n'importe quel language. Allons y.

----------


## ENT

The idea of dumping nuclear waste in subduction zones wouldn't work, as the sedimentary "sill" that forms on top of the subducted plate would effectively hold the dumped waste back, unless the waste is actually buried deep in the sedimentary floor, where it may then glide under the sill and lithosphere into the asthenosphere where it could metamorphose into lava. 

Sending nuclear waste as a payload on a rocket into the sun is pobably the cheapest method of safely removing it from the biosphere.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> nuclear power at least stops us from killing ourselves, alternatives are bad. and do not mention wind or solar - they are not ready yet, i wish they were, but they are not
> 
> 
> I think wind and solar power are closer than governments would have us believe. Most cruising yachts these days are totally self sufficient for their power using wind and solar generation especially in the warmer climes. Many developed countries now offer householders and businesses the option of generating their own solar power which is fed back into the power grid and 'winds back' the electricity meters as it generates excess during the days. The problem does not so much rest upon generation, but upon storage and power loss in the conversion between 12v and 240/110v:10-15amps.
> Then there is the developing industry which is awaiting the efficient release of hydrogen from water to make hydrogen cells cost efficient, not to mention their eco neutral generation status.


That is true, but it still does not come near the required capacity. People use huge amounts of energy. Conversion always comes with a cost. For personal use, with solar panels you need batteries, and some other equipment. I was out in the field some 300 years ago and did it...

----------


## Cthulhu

> The idea of dumping nuclear waste in subduction zones wouldn't work, as the sedimentary "sill" that forms on top of the subducted plate would effectively hold the dumped waste back, unless the waste is actually buried deep in the sedimentary floor, where it may then glide under the sill and lithosphere into the asthenosphere where it could metamorphose into lava. 
> 
> Sending nuclear waste as a payload on a rocket into the sun is pobably the cheapest method of safely removing it from the biosphere.


Go check the cost per kilo for sending something into orbit - not that it's that difficult for you to further make a fool of yourself. "Cheapest method" - what a goon!

Oh, and nice copy/paste from web sources. I think LD is right - you are incapable of original writing.

----------


## nostromo

I dont give a fuck what you think. Bastard. I think you will find what that means in German.... Right then have you been to Asia?





> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> I never said I speak Italian. And you do speak other languages quite poorly. Can see about 10 errors in one second scan. I rather think you copied that from some website but ignored the endings and beginnings.
> 
> 
> Dude, give it up. Seriously. 
> 
> You continue to ridicule yourself with your very sad efforts at one-upmanship, and desperate effort to continue to be wrong - hint: you just incorrectly corrected a native speaker of both languages. Sure, it's all fun and games, but at some point it starts to be embarrassing ... for you. 
> ...

----------


## robuzo

Partial restarts of some plants in Japan, with an eventual total phase-out as Japan is able to make up the difference through conservation, natural gas, geothermal, solar and wind, etc. (there are other possibilities in the works in Japan, such as tidal generation) makes sense. The problem is that as the government's and TEPCO's bumbling incompetence, corruption and venality become ever more clear the credibility of the decision makers has been almost entirely lost. The Japanese people simply don't believe a word the government says, and the fact is, they've been poorly led, actually misled, and lied to up to now. The news just gets worse all the time, to the point now that crisis of confidence tends to overwhelm the possibility of compromise or practical moves that would to some extent require a few unpopular decisions. It will be an interesting summer in Japan.

----------


## ENT

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> nuclear power at least stops us from killing ourselves, alternatives are bad. and do not mention wind or solar - they are not ready yet, i wish they were, but they are not
> 
> 
> I think wind and solar power are closer than governments would have us believe. Most cruising yachts these days are totally self sufficient for their power using wind and solar generation especially in the warmer climes. Many developed countries now offer householders and businesses the option of generating their own solar power which is fed back into the power grid and 'winds back' the electricity meters as it generates excess during the days. The problem does not so much rest upon generation, but upon storage and power loss in the conversion between 12v and 240/110v:10-15amps.
> Then there is the developing industry which is awaiting the efficient release of hydrogen from water to make hydrogen cells cost efficient, not to mention their eco neutral generation status.


If all households took personal responsibility in generating domestic use energy via wind and solar panels, we would not need nuclear power.

Bulk electricity supplies can be met by tidal, wind and solar generation.

Hydro-electric supplies via mega dams are an environmental disaster, and always have been.

Hydrogen as a fuel is also coming on stream.

NASA considers that liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen is the most cost effective fuel for moving payloads into space one past the initial phase of the launch, powered by kerosene.

Contrary to some thinkers, hydrogen is a fuel, not a "carrier".

It can be easily generated via hydrolysis of water, producing both hydrogen and oxygen in the exact proportion for combustion to form water.

A totally renewable and clean, carbon free energy source for internal combustion motors, cooking and heating as well as for industrial use.

----------


## nostromo

> The idea of dumping nuclear waste in subduction zones wouldn't work, as the sedimentary "sill" that forms on top of the subducted plate would effectively hold the dumped waste back, unless the waste is actually buried deep in the sedimentary floor, where it may then glide under the sill and lithosphere into the asthenosphere where it could metamorphose into lava. 
> 
> Sending nuclear waste as a payload on a rocket into the sun is pobably the cheapest method of safely removing it from the biosphere.


That would be the most expensive, and financially impossible method. Much easier to put it deep down. I don't see any problem with that - there are thousands of chemical factories doing just as harmful things, at least nuclear industry is regulated.

----------


## ENT

> Originally Posted by ENT
> 
> 
> The idea of dumping nuclear waste in subduction zones wouldn't work, as the sedimentary "sill" that forms on top of the subducted plate would effectively hold the dumped waste back, unless the waste is actually buried deep in the sedimentary floor, where it may then glide under the sill and lithosphere into the asthenosphere where it could metamorphose into lava. 
> 
> Sending nuclear waste as a payload on a rocket into the sun is pobably the cheapest method of safely removing it from the biosphere.
> 
> 
> Go check the cost per kilo for sending something into orbit - not that it's that difficult for you to further make a fool of yourself. "Cheapest method" - what a goon!
> ...


You talk a heap of shit quack quack.
That was all my own writing you second class troll.

Go find something I copied it off, you can't.

----------


## ENT

> Originally Posted by ENT
> 
> 
> The idea of dumping nuclear waste in subduction zones wouldn't work, as the sedimentary "sill" that forms on top of the subducted plate would effectively hold the dumped waste back, unless the waste is actually buried deep in the sedimentary floor, where it may then glide under the sill and lithosphere into the asthenosphere where it could metamorphose into lava. 
> 
> Sending nuclear waste as a payload on a rocket into the sun is pobably the cheapest method of safely removing it from the biosphere.
> 
> 
> That would be the most expensive, and financially impossible method. Much easier to put it deep down. I don't see any problem with that - there are thousands of chemical factories doing just as harmful things, at least nuclear industry is regulated.


Talk to any geologist and he will tell you pretty much what I've said about subducting anything under the crust.

NASA states unequivocally that HHO is the cheapest method of sending anything into space.


*Feb 27th 2012.*
We're in a very constrained budget environment, so it's going to have to come in on mark and show up in time for that first flight," May said. "We're in an environment these days where all of those things are important. We're thinking, in order to come in on budget, you're not going to want to have to do a lot of development to get it there for the first flight. We're really looking for something that is an existing capability with really only minor [changes]."

NASA's requirements state the interim upper stage must be hydrogen-fueled, rated for human launches, and capable of at least three ignitions with power the change the 26.5-ton Orion spacecraft's velocity by more than 6,800 mph.

Spaceflight Now &#0124; Breaking News &#0124; NASA's huge rocket needs engine with flight heritage

----------


## nostromo

> If all households took personal responsibility in generating domestic use energy via wind and solar panels, we would not need nuclear power.


That would give you approx 6 minutes of aircon. Per day. If it is sunny. I did the math working out energy required for laptop, satellite terminal, and a lamp. Solar panel mat we needed just happened to be out of stock as US army bought all of them (it was during the war). We did get couple by threats and bribery though, and say, 70 watts on broad sunshine - and at that time these were the absolute top end - can charge and run essentials. but need batteries and things in between. Now the reality is, current commercial solar panels are just not yet capable to produce energy required by common household








> Hydro-electric supplies via mega dams are an environmental disaster, and always have been.





> Hydro-electric supplies via mega dams are an environmental disaster, and always have been.

----------


## ENT

> ENT we are not done. I supported you on serious issues. You stabbed me in the back.
> Falklands does not need a wnkr like you. Or Gibraltar. Shame on you. What we do with turncoats. I can tell you. We make you listen specific Abba record over and over again. Much more effective than the old waterboarding thing.


What are you on about "stabbing you in the back"? When, where?

I referred to Cthulhu (aka quack quack, le canard), as a Sheisskopf.

----------


## nostromo

Sadly, NASA has quite much closed the doors, there is the future gone




> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by ENT
> ...

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> ENT we are not done. I supported you on serious issues. You stabbed me in the back.
> Falklands does not need a wnkr like you. Or Gibraltar. Shame on you. What we do with turncoats. I can tell you. We make you listen specific Abba record over and over again. Much more effective than the old waterboarding thing.
> 
> 
> What are you on about "stabbing you in the back"? When, where?
> 
> I referred to Cthulhu (aka quack quack, le canard), as a Sheisskopf.


OK. I am happy to hear that. I thought you called me some austrian schweisse as I actually do speak german or did when I was in uni.

Misunderstanding then - we still fok argies together.

----------


## Cthulhu

> I dont give a fuck what you think. Bastard. I think you will find what that means in German.... Right then have you been to Asia?


In German? Which part of that sentence was allegedly in German, or did you just make an attempt to call me Hurensohn? Sehr declassé. 

OK, so you don't really speak any language well.. So be it. Just stop ridiculing yourself, at least.

Yes, I have been to Asia. Have you?

----------


## ENT

> Originally Posted by ENT
> 
> If all households took personal responsibility in generating domestic use energy via wind and solar panels, we would not need nuclear power.
> 
> 
> That would give you approx 6 minutes of aircon. Per day. If it is sunny. I did the math working out energy required for laptop, satellite terminal, and a lamp. Solar panel mat we needed just happened to be out of stock as US army bought all of them (*it was during the war*). We did get couple by threats and bribery though, and say, 70 watts on broad sunshine - and at that time these were the absolute top end - can charge and run essentials. but need batteries and things in between. Now the reality is, current commercial solar panels are just not yet capable to produce energy required by common household



"it was during the war"

Which one?

It must have been a while back.

PVP's these days are far more efficient than the old silicon jobs.

TiO2 nano tech. chlorophyl PVPs are the new way.
Cheaper to produce, work at  very low light levels, thus effective all day as well as overcast days and don't rely on peak sunlight hours at mid-day for maximum effect.

----------


## ENT

> Originally Posted by ENT
> 
> 
> I referred to Cthulhu (aka quack quack, le canard), as a Sheisskopf.
> 
> 
> OK. I am happy to hear that. I thought you called me some austrian schweisse as I actually do speak german or did when I was in uni.
> 
> Misunderstanding then - *we still fok argies together.*


Cool, I'll take the women, you can do what you like to the men.   :Smile:

----------


## Cthulhu

> OK. I am happy to hear that. I thought you called me some austrian schweisse as I actually do speak german or did when I was in uni.


Let me help you out here - no, you don't speak German. At all. If you interpreted what ENT said as directed *at* you, then you don't speak it (or, read it) with any reasonable expectation of comprehension. Not even close. 

... and you tried to imply that you could proofread what I wrote??? And detect "errors"??? Please, don't be silly. That's like Butterfly expecting people to believe that he's French.

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> OK. I am happy to hear that. I thought you called me some austrian schweisse as I actually do speak german or did when I was in uni.
> 
> 
> Let me help you out here - no, you don't speak German. At all. If you interpreted what ENT said as directed *at* you, then you don't speak it (or, read it) with any reasonable expectation of comprehension. Not even close. 
> 
> ... and you tried to imply that you could proofread what I wrote??? And detect "errors"??? Please, don't be silly. That's like Butterfly expecting people to believe that he's French.


Butterfly is Belgian. Ich spreche deutsch but as I said, very very long time in uni. It was 800 years ago, other details do escape me but I do recall the specific day, the smell of the flowers.... and the ladies in white. And the ladies in white. And there were the ladies in white. And while we went inside, the ladies in white did....

----------


## nostromo

> Originally Posted by nostromo
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  Originally Posted by ENT
> ...


Shoot them? I much rather like the ladies.... say we divide the country to north and south. I like south, so you can have north. Excluding any rights to any oil fields in south or north which are to be shared between us and BP. And there is an Astute class sub about, greatest sub in the world, could kill half a world. as John Lennon said.... nothing about this, but I still do listen to him

----------


## ENT

OK, if you throw in Patagonia too. I've got family who run beef there, so I'll chuck ya a few steak every so often. Cool?  :Smile:

----------


## ENT

I feel happy for the Nips, I just hope it goes well for them, I like them a lot.
In my mind's eye I see them eating and know how they feel ..... :Smile: 

*The first seafood caught off the Fukushima coastline since last year's Japanese nuclear disaster has gone on sale.*

The first fishing catch from Japanís Fukushima coastline since last yearís nuclear disaster went on sale Monday, but was limited to octopus and marine snails because of persisting fears about radiation Photo: AP
7:58AM BST 26 Jun 2012
Octopus and whelk, a kind of marine snail, were chosen for the initial shipments because testing for radioactive caesium consistently measured no detectable amounts, according to the Fukushima Prefectural fishing co-operative. They were caught on Friday.
Flounder, sea bass and other fish from Fukushima cannot be sold yet because of contamination. It was unclear when they will be approved for sale as they measure above the limit in radiation set by the government. The government is testing for radioactive iodine as well, but its half-life is shorter than caesium and thus is less worrisome.
"It was crisp when I bit into it, and it tasted so good," said Yasuhiro Yoshida, who oversees the seafood section at York Benimaru supermarket in Soma, which sold out of about 65 pounds of the snails and 90 pounds of the octopus that had been shipped to the store.
First seafood caught off Fukushima since Japan nuclear disaster sold - Telegraph

----------


## ENT

Dbl. post deleted.

----------


## nostromo

> OK, if you throw in Patagonia too. I've got family who run beef there, so I'll chuck ya a few steak every so often. Cool?


OK with condition. You better take me to best South Am steak dinner. If we are agreed with that, we have a deal.

----------


## ENT

Ok, it's a deal, but ya gonna have to speak Welsh.

----------


## nostromo

Right I, I, will do my best. And while in Swansea Vehicle Licensing Centre I was very much in touch with the.... Is that OK?

----------


## nostromo

But this Astute class (UK) sub can kill half the world - if that was required, hope not - but 
She is beautiful as much as powerful and capable of killing. Highest end in everything. 100 light years above LA class.
http://www.naval-technology.com/proj...-submarine.jpg

----------


## nostromo

Should have posted that to Falklands thread?

----------


## ENT

Probably.    :Smile:

----------


## nostromo

Funny thing is, some bloke send me a red, for what? Argie shite?
idiot shit in news	08-07-2012 04:52 PM	robuzo	You piece of shit coward.

----------


## robuzo

^Go ask me in the MKP thread you are responsible for, clown.

----------


## Cthulhu

> Butterfly is Belgian. Ich spreche deutsch but as I said, very very long time in uni. It was 800 years ago, other details do escape me but I do recall the specific day, the smell of the flowers.... and the ladies in white. And the ladies in white. And there were the ladies in white. And while we went inside, the ladies in white did....




As if there was any doubt ... no wonder you feel such kinship to ENT (you do realize ENT is clinically insane, right?)

----------


## Cthulhu

> ^Go ask me in the MKP thread you are responsible for, clown.


I'd give you a green for that.

----------


## robuzo

In case anyone is still interested in Japan and the ongoing catastrophe that is Fuk, here is a good opinion piece from Bloomboig:
A Disaster Made in Japan - Bloomberg
What must be admitted, very painfully, is that this was a disaster Made in Japan, [Dr.] Kurokawa wrote. Its fundamental causes are to be found in the ingrained conventions of Japanese culture: our reflexive obedience; our reluctance to question authority; our devotion to sticking with the program; our groupism; and our insularity.

Kurokawa might as well have been talking about the economy 20 years after Japans asset bubble burst. Here we are in 2012 and Japan still thinks the key to prosperity is a weaker yen, more aggressive central-bank action, limited immigration and excluding women from the corporate and political power structure. Talk about a world view thats stuck in time.
---
Change doesn't come in dribs and drabs in Japan- a look at history shows that it usually happens in a rush, after a cataclysmic event. Some of us were hoping that might be the silver lining of the GEJE. A year later I was thinking that such hope was misplaced, but lately I am not so sure.

----------


## guyinthailand

Wind, solar, hydroelectric, nuclear, hydrogen...sounds good in theory.

But when the oil runs out how are you going to:

make tires to go on the 'alternative energy' cars
make the oil to lubricate the 'alternative energy' cars
makes pesticides & fertilizers to grow enough food 
make roads (asphalt: oil based)
make medicines, antibiotics, etc (many of them petrochemical based)

_"the truth is that no combination of solar, wind, nuclear power, ethanol, biodiesel, tar sands and used French-fry oil will allow us to power ... the interstate highway system – or even a fraction of these things – in the future...our quandary: the American public's narrow focus on keeping all our cars running at any cos_t."
James Howard Kunstler 
author of, among others, "The Long Emergency: Surviving the Converging Catastrophes of the 21st Century"

----------


## Mid

*Japan workers 'told to lie' about radiation*
21/07/2012

*A subcontractor at Japan's crippled Fukushima  nuclear plant told workers to lie about possible high radiation exposure  in an apparent effort to keep its contract, reports said Saturday.*

 
_A subcontractor at the crippled Fukushima plant, shown here in May,  reportedly told workers to shield their dosimeters with lead when  working in  high-radiation areas._

 An executive at the construction firm Build-Up in December told about  10 of its workers to cover their dosimeters, used to measure cumulative  radiation exposure, with lead casings when working in areas with high  radiation, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper and other media said.

 The action was apparently designed to under-report their exposure to  allow the company to continue working at the site of the worst nuclear  disaster in a generation, media reports said.

 A 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami on March 11, 2011 crippled  cooling equipment at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, triggering  meltdowns that spewed radioactivity and forced tens of thousands of  residents to flee.

 The Asahi urged plant operator Tokyo Electric Power to strictly manage the safety of work crews.

 The influential daily also called on the government to conduct a  thorough survey of work conditions at the site, which has been off limit  to the public, except for occasional visits by journalists guided by  TEPCO officials.

 Several workers at Build-Up told the Asahi that a senior official  from the firm who served as their on-site supervisor said in December he  used a lead casing and urged them to do the same.

 Without faking the exposure level, the executive told the workers  they would quickly reach the legally permissible annual exposure limit  of 50 millisieverts, according to the Asahi.

 The workers had a recording of their meeting, the newspaper said.

 "Unless we hide it with lead, exposure will max out and we cannot  work," the executive was heard saying in the recording, the Asahi  reported.

 Some workers refused to wear it and left the company, the Asahi said.

 The workers were hired for about four months through March to insulate pipes at a water treatment facility, Kyodo News said.

 The ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare was starting to investigate the matter, newspapers and Jiji Press reported.

 Health ministry and Build-Up officials could not be reached for comment.

bangkokpost.com

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## robuzo

^Depressing, and believable.

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## harrybarracuda

> An executive at the construction firm Build-Up in December told about   10 of its workers to cover their dosimeters, used to measure cumulative   radiation exposure, with lead casings when working in areas with high   radiation, the Asahi Shimbun newspaper and other media said.


A shame the Japanese culture is to bow and be obedient.

If think if he'd tried that in another part of the world they'd probably have to pull the workers off him.

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## robuzo

They get desperate guys to do those jobs. Yaks recruit for contractors.

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## nostromo

> In case anyone is still interested in Japan and the ongoing catastrophe that is Fuk, here is a good opinion piece from Bloomboig:


I think many are very much interested in what happens in Japan.

But as for your article, I just wonder, if the Japanese are that bad, why come they are within the the top nations?

(I usually trust Bloomberg, but they have individual writers like this anti-nuclear lobby member) 





> Here we are in 2012 and Japan still thinks the key to prosperity is a weaker yen, more aggressive central-bank action


Yen is hardly weak and BOJ just fights it getting too strong to prevent, should we say, unnecessary loss of competitiveness. While Japanese companies get more and more productive with strong yen. And back to square one. Why then is Yen strong and getting stronger? Because the market believes in Japan. It is a safe haven. They believe Japan is safe and can be trusted and the Japanese can handle their problems. As they can. 

Like, for example, assuming you are continental european like your mate cthulhu, EURJPY, value of euro currency to yen, is now as of yesterday, lowest since year 2000. About 12 years. 

Those euro nuclear reactors are  (unscientifically for the purposes of this post) about 100000 times more likely to cause catastrophe than Japanese ones - now unfortunately Japan was faced with natural disaster. 

This all despite what the good doctor and you say about Japan :Smile:  and counting in all the problems.

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## nostromo

> A subcontractor at the crippled Fukushima plant, shown here in May, reportedly told workers to shield their dosimeters with lead when working in high-radiation areas.


This is bad. But this was just a subcontractor - not the government or TEPCO.

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## robuzo

^TEPCO will be relieved to be informed they are not responsible for their contractors, you should call them right away.

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## nostromo

TEPCO and the Government can not prevent subcontractor being unsound. Before they know it. I am sure the usual checks were made, but this kind of catastrophe just brings out unknown responses.

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## robuzo

^Bwahaha. None of this news. Merely saying "TEPCO and the government" relieves you of any further responsibility to pretend to be informed. Also, do you know anything about contractor relationships in Japan? Ever been in one?

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## nostromo

Have you ever been in Japan?

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## robuzo

Ahem. Interesting article from FT about the rising resistance to restarting the nukes. They make a comparison to the protests, and eventual riots, of the 1960's against support for the US war in Vietnam, which may be true in terms of actual numbers of people in the streets, but that in itself is not a hopeful sign because the mistakes made by the left in the '60's resulted in Japan have virtually no viable opposition in politics to the right-wingers, a situation that persists to some extent today. The article also points out that these are citizen protests (since there is no viable left. . .), and as such different, but by the same token, at some point they need to gel around some kind of organizing force. Right now it would seem the government is just trying to let people blow off steam, although from what I have seen in the J-media and heard from people there, the cops are out in force at the protests and very forceful about restricting the movements of the demonstrators:

Japan nuclear protesters take to streets - FT.com

It has been slow for a chain reaction, but more than a year after the biggest nuclear crisis in a quarter century, Japanese demonstrations against atomic power are beginning to generate serious steam.
A string of some of Japan’s biggest protests in decades – each attended by tens of thousands of people – have in recent weeks given voice to a wave of anti-nuclear sentiment caused by the failure of the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi plant on March 11, 2011.

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. See our Ts&Cs and Copyright Policy for more detail. Email ftsales.support@ft.com to buy additional rights. Japan nuclear protesters take to streets - FT.com

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## misskit

The protest photos show the crowd is made up mostly of older people, something I find rather striking.

The other development I find surprising is the newspaper, Asahi Shimbun, seems to have a pro-protest stance where in the past has been supportive of business.

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## robuzo

Lots of people with kids, too. 

Asahi is generally viewed as the more left-leaning of the papers; Yomiuri is right-wing, Mainichi a bit to the left of the Yom, and Sankei is hard right.

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## misskit

^ Oh my, I needed more coffee before I posted! My bad, I had Asahi and Yomuri confused this morning.

I am no longer surprised. Yomuri is still pro-business and backing the prime minister to start all the reactors.

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## nostromo

Get all reactors online asap, I fully support Japanese govt on this, country needs power. And the most important thing is, global warming is not a joke. Think about your children or their children. Now these erratic weather patters - flooding here, drought there, cold and hot in wrong places, apparently do not have anything to do with that. But no one really knows.

About using that power, Japan is efficient, but not efficient enough according to the editorial in JTO below. US report found UK, Germany and (surprisingly) Italy ahead of Japan. Still a good ranking.

The Japan Times Online
Sunday, July 22, 2012

EDITORIAL
Japan as number four
A new report on how the world's major powers use electricity found that Japan ranks fourth out of the top 12 countries in energy efficiency. While this result is not bad, it is still not good enough.



Inefficient use of energy poses a serious obstacle to economic recovery as money that could be used in meaningful areas is instead wasted on energy. The government and the private sector must do all they can to increase energy efficiency.

The new report, from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, looked at the world's 12 largest economies, which account for more than 78 percent of global gross domestic product, 63 percent of global energy consumption and 62 percent of the global carbon footprint.

The report found that the United Kingdom came first, followed by Germany and Italy, with Japan in fourth place. America ranked ninth, while France, Australia and China followed closely behind Japan.

Japan's ranking came from being second place in national effort and second place in industrial energy use, though it was ninth in buildings and eighth in transportation.

Those results point in the direction of a better energy policy, one that relies on many means of achieving increased efficiency. The national effort to reduce energy usage following the Fukushima nuclear disaster was quite successful, but without stricter regulations on buildings and transportation, Japan is unlikely to make headway.

Energy efficiency should be a more integrated part of building codes and appliance standards, although updating older buildings will be difficult. Improving Japan's electric grid infrastructure is another important element. All of these possibilities are better than simply restarting dangerous nuclear power plants.

Japan's public transportation is rather efficient, but the use of heavy-duty and passenger vehicles as well as reliance on air travel accounts for the relatively low eighth-place ranking in transportation. The Japanese government should understand how much public transportation contributes to a dynamic economy. The efficient movement of people is a double benefit if done properly because it saves energy and gets people into activities that contribute to the economy.

Improving energy efficiency is just as important to the economy as banking or financial policies. In one sense, energy is where the economy meets the reality of the material world.

Japan ranked relatively high on its overall commitment and general performance, but it must be re-emphasized that efficient energy use means an efficient economy. The government needs to help encourage better energy usage. The future of the economy depends on it.

Japan as number four | The Japan Times Online

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## Mid

*Japan utility gets $12.8bn nuclear crisis bailout*
Jul 31, 2012

*TOKYO* (AP)  The Japanese utility that operates the nuclear  power plant sent into meltdown by last years tsunami says it has  received a trillion yen ($12.8 billion) public bailout.

  Tokyo Electric Power Co. apologized Tuesday for the inconvenience  and anxiety from the disaster at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant in  northeastern Japan, and for raising electricity charges to cover the  costs of dealing with the crisis.

 The company, now under government control, still faces massive  compensation demands from those forced to evacuate and whose land and  products were contaminated by spewing radiation following the disaster  that began March 11 last year.

 TEPCO must also shoulder the enormous costs of decommissioning three  reactors at Fukushima Dai-ichi that went into meltdown. It must also put  nuclear fuel at a fourth reactor there into safe storage.

asiancorrespondent.com

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## robuzo

^Getting bailed out by the taxpayers and raising rates. Nice reward for their failure.

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## ENT

No amount of Bailing out is going to help Japan. The damage is already done, and the Daichi plant at Fukushima is the biggest nuclear disaster to date, up tp 4 times worse than the Chernobyl disaster.

_____
A number of seismologists, engineers and policy makers say they believe last year’s magnitude-9 quake may have played a part in damaging the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant and contributing to massive radioactive releases there—despite the government’s view that such a scenario is “unlikely.”

“The possibility of the quake contributing to the Fukushima disaster should not be ruled out,” said Sumio Mabuchi, a senior ruling-party lawmaker, who calls for new safety guidelines on the assumption that a major quake could strike anywhere in Japan.

The area around Fukushima Daiichi sank half a meter after the March 2011 quake. But data received so far indicate the ground movement didn’t significantly damage key parts of the plant 

Critics say the earthquake may have damaged some of the myriad pipes that circulate water through the reactors.

Cumulative radiation doses for workers at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant over the one-year period since the start of the disaster increased roughly 16-fold from the previous year, data compiled by the plant operator showed Wednesday.

The surge is partly attributed to an increase in the number of workers at the Tokyo Electric Power Co. plant who engaged in containing the nuclear disaster, and to the elevated levels of radiation in which the workers had to work in doing so.

An executive from a Tokyo Electric Power Co. subcontractor tried to force its workers at the crisis-hit Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant to cover their radiation monitoring meters with plates made of lead in an apparent attempt to underreport radiation exposure, sources close to the matter said Saturday.

The executive in his 50s, who works for a company based in Fukushima Prefecture, told around 10 plant workers to attach the plates to the alarm pocket dosimeters that the utility known as TEPCO had provided them with to monitor their radiation exposure, the sources said. The ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare has started investigating the matter.

The workers were hired for about four months through last March to wrap pipes at a water treatment facility with heat insulators.

The data apparently point to the need for measures to reduce workers’ radiation exposure, such as by making increased use of robots
____http://enenews.com/just-in-fukushima-daiichi-workers-ordered-to-cover-dosimeters-with-lead-plate

Radiation released by the Daiichi plant and its prevalence in the environment.
Radiation in daily life.
Who cares? Helen Caldicott and Kate Orff in conversation 04-02-12 - YouTube!

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## robuzo

^It's all about the MOX. The difficulty of dealing with spent fuel has always been the Achilles heel of nuclear power. Someone came up with the brilliant idea of reprocessing it for reuse, and the industry went for it like a cat on a day-old sardine. I suppose storing hundreds of tons of spent fuel on the roof of a nuclear reactor in one of the most geologically unstable locations on the planet (not to mention on a beach in the country that invented the word tsunami) showed a lot of moxie, if "moxie" means "hubris."

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## Mid

*#Fukushima Peaches to Be Exported to Thailand, Starting Late August 
* Friday, August 10, 2012

Buyers from Thailand say they are satisfied with the testing procedure that the Fukushima prefectural government has in place.

To recap that testing method (for more details about peaches in Fukushima, see my previous post about Fukushima peaches offered to the Imperial Family):
Take a small amount of sample from each peach farmer.Test it using the NaI scintillation survey meter with high detection limit (probably 25 becquerels/kg).If the sample registers more than 50 becquerels/kg, then test it  with the germanium semiconductor detector that the prefectural  government owns, again with relatively high detection limit (about 10  becquerels/kg).If the sample tested using the germanium semiconductor detector has less than 100 becquerels/kg, all clear!

Looking  at the pictures of how they test using the NaI scintillation survey  meter (click to enlarge), the sample size looks no more than 100  milliliters. Testing laboratories run by the citizens' groups in Japan  and by private companies require at least 1 liter (1,000 milliliters) of  samples to be effective, and they use the same or better NaI  scintillation survey meters.

The article below from Fukushima Minpo says one additional thing and  that's troubling; rice from Fukushima has been exported overseas AFTER  the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant accident. I wasn't aware of that  news.

From Fukushima Minpo (8/10/2012):
県産モモ、今月下旬輸出　タイのバイヤーが県庁訪問

Peaches produced in Fukushima to be exported, starting late August; Buyers from Thailand visit the prefectural office

日本貿易振興機構（ジェトロ）がタイのバイヤーを招いた福島県産モモの商談会で９日、県産モモを今月下旬か  らタイへ輸出することが決まった。東京電力福島第一原発事故後、県産農産物を海外に輸出するのはコメに続き  ２例目で、モモは初めて。

It was agreed in the meeting with the buyers from Thailand invited by  JETRO (Japan External Trade Organization) that peaches grown and  harvested in Fukushima Prefecture will be exported to Thailand starting  late August. This will be the second case of Fukushima produce to be  exported overseas, after the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant accident,  following the rice; it will be the first for peaches.

輸入を決めたのは、タイの百貨店やスーパーのバイヤー。県北地区の果樹園で収穫されるモモを中心に、１０月  上旬ごろまで輸出する予定。量は今後調整する。タイ政府が指定する日本国内の検査機関で放射性物質を検査し  、安全性が確認され次第、空路で輸出する。

The buyers for department stores and supermarkets in Thailand decided to  import [the peaches]. Peaches harvested mostly in the orchards in the  northern district of Fukushima will be exported till early October. The  amount of export will be determined between the parties. The peaches  will be tested for radioactive materials at a laboratory in Japan  designated by the Thai government, and as soon as the safety is  confirmed they will be delivered by air.

バイヤー一行は９日、県庁を訪れ、担当者から放射性物質検査の状況や味の特徴の説明を受けた。バイヤーの一  人は「福島での検査体制を視察し安全性を確信できた。タイでは日本の商品への信頼度が高い。おいしいモモな  ので、よりアピールしてたくさん売りたい」と意欲を語った。

The group of Thai buyers visited the prefectural government office on  August 9, and was briefed on the situation of testing for radioactive  materials and on the characteristics of the taste [of the peaches]. One  of the buyers was eager to sell the peaches in Thailand, saying "I'm  convinced of the safety after seeing the testing process in Fukushima.  People in Thailand trust goods made in Japan. Peaches are delicious, and  I'm looking forward to promoting and selling a lot of them."

バイヤーらは８日、伊達市の果樹園や郡山市の百貨店、県農業総合センターを訪れ、販売現場の様子や放射能問  題への取り組みに理解を深めた。

On August 8, the buyers had visited an orchard in Date City, a  department store in Koriyama City, and the prefectural agricultural  experiment station. They observed how [the peaches] were sold, and how  the testing for radioactive materials was done.

原発事故後、中国、韓国、台湾など東アジア各国は県産品の輸入を停止している。タイは震災前、県産のモモを  輸入していた。

After the Fukushima nuclear accident, East Asian countries including  China, Korea and Taiwan have stopped importing the produce from  Fukushima Prefecture. Before the March 11, 2011 disaster, Thailand had  been importing the peaches from Fukushima.
ex-skf.blogspot.com.au

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## robuzo

Normally they priced for the local J-community, which won't want them if they are accurately labeled, so if the price is low enough to appeal to Thais we'll know they are just being dumped. 

Probably beside the point, but I'm not sure how much more toxic fruit from at least the western part of Fukushima Pref (the western part of the prefecture suffered very little exposure) would be than apples and other produce from China- my guess would be probably less when it comes to pesticides.

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## ENT

Any product from Fukushima is going to be contaminated by radioactivity.

The "safe" level of contamination is an estimate determined by scientists. It  does not mean that testing is done according to strict guidelines. Take the case of ground level tests for radiation at the Daiichi plant, where clean top soil was used to replace contaminated soil. then tests taken to "prove" that radiation levels were within acceptable limits. 

There are no contamination free products in Fukushima or its environs.

I also think that greedy Thai businessmen will buy the peaches cheap as they'd otherwise be dumped.

The Japs don't want them, they know the peaches are contaminated, and they know that their government is lying to them.

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## ENT

Eighteen months after an earthquake and tsunami caused the Fukushima reactor to break down and spew radioactive contamination reaching most of SE Asia and Ameirca, a decision has been made to cease nuclear energy production in Japan.

*Japan to abandon nuclear power by 2030*
Last updated 16:56 14/09/2012

Asia Britain considers earlier withdraw from Afghanistan Murder inquiry over factory fire deaths Sister-in-law of Pol Pot 'unfit for trial' Baby heals as plans made to farewell grandmother More than 270 killed in Pakistan factory fires  China sends patrol ships to disputed isles Company offered free sex with car washes Indian cartoonist jailed for corruption drawings Bus veers off road, kills 27 China no-shows down to injury
Japan is expected to propose abandoning nuclear power by the 2030s, a major shift from policy goals set before last year's Fukushima disaster that aimed to increase the share of atomic energy to more than half of electricity supply.

But Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda's unpopular government, which could face an election this year, also looks set to call in the meantime for the restart of reactors idled after the 2011 disaster if they are deemed safe by a new atomic regulator.

Japan's growing anti-nuclear movement, which wants an immediate end to atomic power, is certain to oppose any such proposal to secure electricity supplies.

A shift from nuclear means Japan should seal its position as the world's biggest importer of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and third-largest purchaser of oil to feed its power stations.

The government estimated last week it will need to spend about 3.1 trillion yen more on fuel imports a year if it abandons nuclear power immediately.

Japan's hunger for energy has helped sustain an investment boom in gas projects from Australia to new export terminals in the United States, where a shale gas revolution is in full swing. LNG prices also soared earlier this year as Japan scoured the world for supplies.

Japanese ministers were due to meet on Friday afternoon (local time) and media said a decision was expected then with the cabinet likely to sign off on the new energy policy as early as next week.

A new policy would comes 18 months after a March 2011 earthquake and tsunami devastated Tokyo Electric Power Co's  Fukushima Daiichi plant, triggering meltdowns, spewing radiation and forcing some 160,000 people to flee.

The new strategy, which would strictly apply a rule limiting the operation of reactors to 40 years, will also call for a push to reduce energy consumption by raising efficiency but leaves unclear the fate of Japan's troubled programme to reprocess nuclear waste, according to a source familiar with a draft.

Read more;Japan's Nuclear Disaster: Report 'Blamed Japanese... | Stuff.co.nz

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## ENT

In this latest announcement on nuclear policy, the incumbent Democrat government, led by unpopular PM Yoshida Noda, of Japan have announced the phasing out of nuclear power by 2040.
This appears to be an attempt to appease both the anti-nuclear lobby and the powerful business group, Keidanren, which warns of energy shortfalls and loss of profits if nuclear energy is phased out.

*Japan Sets Policy to Phase Out Nuclear Power Plants by 2040*
 Published: September 14, 2012

Protesters unhappy with Japan’s nuclear energy policy chanted slogans outside Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda’s official residence in Tokyo on Friday.

TOKYO — Japan said Friday that it would seek to phase out nuclear power by 2040 — a historic shift for a country that has long staked its future on such energy, but one that falls far short of the decisive steps the government had promised in the wake of the world’s second-largest nuclear plant disaster last year.

While important for setting a tone, the announced strategy is subject to vast change, not only because of the long lead time, but also because the unpopular prime minister, Yoshihiko Noda, and his governing Democratic Party are likely to lose the next national election, which could be called within the next several months.unreachable,” according to its chairman, Hiromasa Yonekura.

With the long-term energy plan set, the political battle is set to refocus on the struggle by the government to build consensus for reopening the vast majority of the country’s reactors, which were idled after the nuclear catastrophe, amid public opposition to restarts until better safety regulations were in place.

The government has sought repeatedly to regain the public’s trust, most recently by scrapping its former nuclear regulatory agency and creating a new one. But that plan has already come under fire, with criticism focusing on Shunichi Tanaka, the head of a committee that would set nuclear policy and retain oversight over the new agency and its leadership. Mr. Tanaka is considered suspect by those who favor tighter regulation because he helped lead a former government commission tasked with building a strong nuclear industry — raising fears that the new regulator will be as lax as the old.

In announcing the energy plan, Motohisa Furukawa, the minister of state for national policy, said there was no change to the government’s quest to restart those reactors. And although *the long-term plan stipulates that no new reactors will be built,* it leaves open the possibility that seven reactors at varying stages of construction could be activated. That decision would be left up to the new nuclear committee headed by Mr. Tanaka.

And although the government said reactors would be closed after life spans of 40 years, it also said that exemptions could be granted, suggesting that the 2040 deadline was flexible. *(By comparison, Germany, which in 2010 relied on reactors for 26 percent of its electricity, was rattled enough by the Fukushima disaster to announce a move away from nuclear power by 2022.)*

At an unusually lively news conference, seemingly exasperated reporters pressed for whether any firm decisions had been made. One reporter for a Japanese newspaper suggested that if reactors under construction are allowed to come on line and get exemptions for operating more than 40 years, “then we could still have reactors running in the 2070s.” Mr. Furukawa did not dispute that possibility.

If idled reactors were permanently closed this year, power companies would be hit with losses totaling $55.9 billion, making at least four of the utilities insolvent, according to the government’s Agency for Natural Resources and Energy. Because the industry is tightly regulated, allowing almost no competition, the country relies on those power companies and can ill afford to have them go bankrupt.

The 2040 time frame would allow most of the existing reactors to live out their 40-year life span, heading off costly losses for their operators. Japanese utilities have already been saddled with the huge costs of buying oil and natural gas to meet the nuclear shortfall since the reactors were taken offline, a burden that would be alleviated once their reactors are restarted.

With *only two reactors operating,* Japan struggled through a sweltering summer after parts of the country were asked to conserve electricity use by as much as 15 percent, the second year such requests were made. Power companies fired up old gas- and oil-powered stations and scrambled to secure imported fossil fuels.

Despite fears of widespread blackouts, however, none materialized, strengthening nuclear critics’ argument that Japan could do without nuclear energy.

But the *Keidanren business federation* and others have insisted that the higher energy costs are crippling the country’s economy. Tokyo Electric, Japan’s largest utility and the operator of the Fukushima Daiichi plant, has increased rates for both homes (an average of more than 8 percent) and businesses (an average of about 15 percent).

Businesss leaders warn that such costs will prompt more companies to move their operations overseas. And costly fuel imports already contributed* last year to Japan’s first annual trade deficit in more than 30 years* and made the nation more dependent on oil and natural gas from the volatile Middle East and Russia.

Whatever its choices, *Japan is set to significantly increase its investment in clean energy sources,* in part to avoid enlarging its carbon footprint.

The balancing act that the government is attempting with its new energy policy made little impression on the antinuclear protesters who now gather every Friday night in Tokyo.

*Many had expected the government to at least phase out the reactors by 2030,* a date that had initially been discussed, and some were angry that the time frame was at least a decade longer.

“They’re ignoring the terror that many of us feel toward nuclear power,” said Kumi Tomiyasu, an employee at a Tokyo-based printing company who attended a rally in front of the prime minister’s office on Friday. *“By sticking with nuclear for so long, the government has put the interests of power companies and big business above those of the Japanese people.”*
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/15/wo...oc.semityn.www

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## Mid

*US sailors sue Japanese utility over radiation*
Dec 29, 2012

*SAN DIEGO* (AP)  Eight U.S. sailors are suing the Tokyo utility that  operates the Fukushima nuclear power plant, charging that the company  lied about the high level of radiation in the area where they were  carrying out a humanitarian mission after the tsunami that triggered the  reactor crisis.

 The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court in San Diego last week  against Tokyo Electric Power Co., which is owned by the Japanese  government. Plaintiffs include the infant daughter of two of the sailors  who was born seven months after the March 2011 disaster.

 The sailors served on the San Diego-based aircraft carrier USS Ronald  Reagan, which was carrying out Operation Tomadachi ferrying food and  water to citizens in the city of Sendai in the wake of the earthquake  and tsunami.


_The Fukushima power plant seen before the devastating tsunami struck._ Pic: AP.

 The sailors claim the Japanese government repeatedly said there was  no danger to the carrier crew all the while lying through their teeth  about the reactor meltdowns so rescuers would rush into an unsafe  area.

 The U.S. Navy, the suit said, relied on information from the Japanese  government, which only belatedly admitted that radiation had leaked  into the atmosphere from the damaged power plant.

 An email seeking response from the utilitys corporate office in Tokyo was not immediately returned.

 The 37-page suit, which cites numerous reports about the Fukushima  crisis and response, said that after discovering the truth of how much  radiation they were exposed to, the sailors have undergone extensive  medical testing and will be required to undergo periodic examination in  the future.

 They say they are at risk for developing cancer and a shorter life  expectancy, and are undergoing considerable mental anguish as a result.

 The sailors are suing for more than $100 million in damages.

asiancorrespondent.com

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## taxexile

So the American army dont carry their own geiger counters when entering a potential radioactive zone.

They should be suing their own government.

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## slackula

> American army


It's Navy




> a shorter life expectancy


Isn't a potentially shorter life expectancy kind of one of the occupational hazards of being in the military?

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## Mid

*Increased obesity rates among Fukushima kids*
Graham Land 
Dec 29, 2012

Nearly two years after an earthquake and tsunami resulted  in the second worst nuclear accident in history, Fukushima is still  grabbing headlines around the world. Meanwhile, local residents are  still suffering from the aftermath.

 A nationwide health survey of Japans school children has revealed  that Fukushima prefecture has the highest rates of obesity for kids aged  5-9 and the second highest for those aged 10 and 11. A local official  for Fukushimas board of education ascribes this downturn in health to  the disruption in the lives of the children resulting from the disaster.  Children housed in shelters have suffered more stress and had less  opportunities to play outside, meaning they havent gotten enough  exercise. Half of the primary schools in the prefecture also limited  outdoor play due to concerns about radiation.

 From The Daily Yomiuri:_In comparison with figures from the 2010 academic year,  the prefectures rate of 6-year-old obese boys increased to 11.4  percent, the highest observed, from 6.2 percent, or ninth place just two  years ago. The age group containing 8-year-old girls in the prefecture  also showed the highest obesity rates, standing at 14.61 percentnearly  double the 8.1 percent recorded in 2010, or 17th in the rankings._Obese children are defined as weighing 20 percent more  than standard weights according to age and height. Five-year-olds in  Fukushima had more than double the rates of the national average,  according to the Asahi Shimbun. The paper also states that the obesity rates of 14 and 17-year-olds in Fukushima are the highest in Japan.

_
Fukushima Clean-Up,_ 
pic: Hajime Nakano (Flickr CC)

 In a related story, Fukushima victims have banded  together to state their grievances with the Japanese government in the  form of a non-binding human rights declaration. Many residents feel that  they have been treated unfairly and denied information. Many also  continue to feel unsafe.
 From the declaration, as quoted in the Asahi Shimbun: _We want Fukushima to return to the way it was, where we  can eat tasty rice, vegetables, fruit, fish and meat without the  slightest fear._Meanwhile, on the other side of the Pacific, California  residents have been spotting Fukushima debris. There have been around  1,400 sightings reported to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric  Administration, but only 17 pieces of debris have actually been traced  by the NOAA. News reports of a football and a crate containing a  motorcycle (both found in Canada) have fueled a bit of tsunami debris  fever in the Golden State, alongside some fears of contamination.

 Read more on that story in Russia Today.

asiancorrespondent.com

----------


## Mid

*Japan’s ‘Long War’ to Shut Down Fukushima*
KIYOSHI TAKENAKA and JAMES TOPHAM
Writing and additional reporting by Linda Sieg and Aaron Sheldrick; additional reporting by Maki Shiraki
March 6, 2013

_
Workers  wait for transportation to the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi  nuclear power plant at J-Village near the plant in Fukushima Prefecture._  (Photo: Reuters)

*TOKYO* — Just months after Quince was deployed to inspect Japan’s  tsunami-devastated Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, the $6 million robot  got trapped in its dark and winding pathways.

 Seventeen months later, the high-tech soldier is still missing in  action—a symbol of a daunting decommissioning project that will take  decades, require huge injections of human and financial capital and rely  on yet-to-be developed technologies.

 “It’s like going to war with bamboo sticks,” said Takuya Hattori,  president of the Japan Atomic Industrial Forum and a 36-year veteran of  Fukushima plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co, known as Tepco.

 The war began after a massive 9.0 magnitude earthquake struck  northeast Japan on March 11, 2011, triggering a huge tsunami. Walls of  water 13 meters (43 feet) high smashed into the Fukushima plant north of  Tokyo, knocking out its main power supply, destroying backup generators  and disabling the cooling system. Three reactors melted down as a  series of hydrogen explosions rocked the plant.

 In the ensuing weeks, hundreds of Japanese workers and soldiers  battled to contain the crisis. Their arsenal of weapons was often  improvised, low-tech and underpowered. Helicopters dumped buckets of  water over the plant to cool it. Electricians laid a cable to connect  the plant to a power source miles away in what may have been the world’s  longest extension cord.

 The world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl a quarter century  earlier called into question Japan’s vaunted reputation for bureaucratic  competence and leading edge technology.

 The reactors were declared to be in a stable state called cold-shut  down in December 2011. But now Japan faces an unprecedented clean-up  that experts say could cost at least $100 billion for decommissioning  the reactors and another $400 billion for compensating victims and  decontaminating areas outside the plant.

 Tepco said in November the costs of compensation to residents and  decontamination of their neighborhoods might double to 10 trillion yen  ($107 billion) from a previous estimate. That did not include a forecast  for decommissioning.

 Two years after the disaster, cleanup of communities around the plant  is haphazard. Much of the work has been handed to Japanese construction  companies with little relevant experience. Townships around the plant  say the cleanup is behind schedule, while contaminated dirt, leaves and  rubble removed by cleaning crews pile up all over Fukushima with no  government decision in sight over its final storage space.

 The Japan Center for Economic Research, a Tokyo-based think tank, has  estimated that decontamination costs alone in the Fukushima residential  area could balloon to as much as $600 billion.

 Shutting down the 40-year-old Fukushima plant itself poses unique  challenges. A Tepco-government roadmap envisages starting to extract  spent fuel from the most badly damaged of the station’s seven storage  pools, which contain 11,417 new and used fuel assemblies, only later  this year. Melted fuel debris is to be removed from the reactors from  2021 and the entire project wrapped up within 30 to 40 years.

 Officials say the project is mostly on schedule and Prime Minister  Shinzo Abe’s government wants to speed up the timetable. Experts,  however, say it may already be too ambitious.

 “It’s a pipe dream,” Michio Ishikawa said of the four-decade target  shortly before he retired last year as chief adviser at the Japan  Nuclear Technology Institute, adding it could take decades more.

 Reuters reporters visited the plant three times since February 2012  and interviewed dozens of experts, officials, engineers, workers and  industry executives to compile the first comprehensive report on the  decommissioning project.

 Many of those interviewed expressed serious concerns about a lack of  vital technology, a potential labour shortage and the vast amount of  funds Japan’s heavily indebted government will need to spend.

 At the leafy campus of Chiba Institute of Technology’s Future  Robotics Technology Center east of Tokyo—nerve center for Fukushima  robotics projects—students and engineers are working flat out to create  machines to go where none has gone before.

 Some nap on make-shift beds surrounded by robot parts at the Center’s  airy loft-like building while others slurp noodles as they stare at  computer screens or fiddle with smartphones.

 A slim 20-something research scientist uses a simple joystick to make  an advanced version of the lost Quince robot climb stairs, turn around  in a narrow landing, and descend.

 Quince was first deployed in June 2011 and was carrying out a survey  of one of the reactors when the operators lost contact with the machine  later that October. Attempts to retrieve the robot have failed, though  developers conjecture one day they will find Quince and it could give  them valuable information about the effects of prolonged radiation on  electronics.

 The new version, called “Sakura” or Cherry Blossom, can navigate  narrower spaces and, unlike its predecessor, plug into a battery  charging station on its own.

 Technology, however, must still be developed to accomplish even the  most basic first step—the ability to find and repair leaks in the  reactors and fill them with water to shield human workers from high  radiation emitted by the debris.

 “It’s like the fog of war,” said John Raymont, president of US-based  Kurion Inc, which supplied a water treatment system briefly used to  filter contaminated water at the plant. “They are only now getting to  know what the problem looks like.”

 So far, Tepco has only managed to insert remote controlled cameras,  similar to endoscopes, into outer vessels of the reactors. The effort  has obtained little useful data on the fuel debris, a vital first step  before technology to remove it can be developed.

 One potential device being considered is a fish-like swimming robot  that would glide inside the doughnut-shaped suppression chambers filled  with water to create detailed maps.

 A key reason for the belated effort to develop such technology was  Japan’s reluctance to acknowledge the possibility of atomic disasters.  Doing so would have contradicted a decades-old myth of nuclear safety.  Robots developed after a 1999 nuclear accident at Tokaimura near Tokyo  ended up in science museums after research was abandoned.

 “The government didn’t spend more money after that to develop robots.  That’s because people were obviously going to ask, ‘Wait, is there  going to be a situation so dangerous that humans can’t enter the  plant?’,” said Eiji Koyanagi, vice director of the Future Robotics  Technology Center.

 The first robots into the plant were US-made Packbots, which were  deployed just after the disaster to enter areas heavy with radiation.

 Tepco’s most immediate challenge is to remove spent fuel from pools  at the plant, starting with reactor No.4, where more than 1,500 rods  rest inside a pool that was exposed to the atmosphere after an explosion  blew off the top of the unit’s building.

 Debris from the top of the reactor building, where radiation levels  are too high for humans, has had to be removed painstakingly using  cranes and other lifting equipment to get to the spent fuel pool.

 That project has a special sense of urgency given concerns another  big quake could further damage the building, although Tepco says the  structure was reinforced to withstand shaking as intense as in the March  2011 quake.

 Another fraught task is to treat and store the contaminated water  that results from cooling the reactors to keep them in a stable state at  below 100 degrees Celsius. The contaminated water is flooding reactor  building basements and threatening to seep into the ocean and  groundwater.

 Fukushima Daiichi plant sits like a carbuncle on Japan’s northeast  coast 240 km (150 miles) from Tokyo. Its damaged reactors still seep  radiation, although at a rate of 10 million Becquerel per hour for  cesium versus about 800 trillion right after the disaster.

 Becquerel per hour measures the amount of radiation emitted or the  rate of radioactive decay. As atomic isotopes decay, they spin off  energized particles that can penetrate human organs and damage human  cells, potentially causing cancer. To minimize the dangers to human  health from radiation, the government is enforcing a 20-km no-go zone  around the plant.

 Every day the roughly 3,000 workers who will enter the plant assemble  at a base camp—a former sports complex called J-Village—on the edge of  the exclusion zone.

 There, they don full-body protective suits, rubber gloves and plastic  shoe guards. Once at the plant, they put on face masks to keep from  inhaling radioactive particles.

 Front-line workers, who spoke to Reuters on condition of anonymity,  complain about working in the stifling protective gear, the relatively  low pay, loneliness—and stress.

 About 70 percent of a sample of workers surveyed by Tepco late last  year made more than 837 yen ($9) per hour, while a day laborer in that  part of Japan can earn as much as 1,500 yen per hour.

 Wages are lower than those offered locally for other jobs requiring  similar skills, including decontaminating and rebuilding areas further  from the plant, said Junji Annen, a professor at Chuo University who  last year chaired a panel on Tepco’s finances.

 “The money is getting worse and worse, and who would want to come and  work under these conditions?” a heavy machinery operator in his 40s  said as he unwound in the Ai Yakitori bar in Hirono, a town about 40 km  from the plant, where dormitories have sprouted up for workers.

 “I get stomachaches. I am constantly stressed. When I’m back in my  room, all I can do is worry about the next day,” added the worker,  employed by a small subcontractor. “They should give us a medal.”

 Mental health experts compare the stress to that suffered by soldiers  at a battle front. Moreover, public outrage at Tepco has spilled over  into attitudes toward workers.

 “Tepco workers are at risk of following in the steps of Vietnam  veterans, many of whom were rejected by society on their return, became  homeless, committed suicide or got addicted to alcohol and drugs,” said  Jun Shigemura, a lecturer in the psychiatry department of the National  Defense Medical College who conducted a survey of 1,500 Tepco nuclear  workers.

 The decommissioning plan says authorities can supply enough workers  through the decades ahead, but signs of potential shortages are evident,  partly because workers are “burning out” by reaching their radiation  limits.

 As of the end of December 2012, 146 Tepco workers and 21 contract  workers had exceeded the maximum permissible exposure of 100  millisieverts in five years, Tepco data showed.

 Eight workers have died at the plant, including two on the day of the tsunami. None of the deaths were caused by radiation.

 The industry faces a shortage of nuclear engineers as well as  blue-collar workers in the decommissioning work for both Fukushima  Daiichi and other ageing reactors.

 Abe’s conservative Liberal Democratic Party-led government has  scrapped its predecessor’s plan to exit atomic energy by the 2030s but  has yet to map out an alternative energy program. Public safety concerns  persist—a recent poll showed 70 percent want to abandon atomic power  sooner or later—clouding the industry outlook.

 For example, at the University of Tokyo, applications for advanced  nuclear engineering degrees fell about 30 percent for the year from  April from the previous year and Tokyo City University saw a similar  decline in applicants for its undergraduate nuclear engineering program  in the academic year starting in April 2012 from 2010.

 “Who will clear up the mess after the accident? It will be young  people like us,” said Yuta Shindo, a 25-year-old master’s student at  Tokyo City’s nuclear engineering department. “We are the ones who will  be working on this decades from now.”

 Cleaning up the mess will mean total demolition of the four damaged  reactor facilities and disposal of the nuclear waste in a yet-to-be  determined site, an end-game likely to face opposition from potential  host communities.

 Japan has rejected the “sarcophagus” option used at Chernobyl, where  the damaged reactor was encased in a massive concrete envelope. This is  partly because of the difficulty of monitoring an entombed facility to  ensure safety, said Kentaro Funaki, director of the industry ministry’s  office in charge of decommissioning.

 Estimates for total costs are mostly guesswork. “Only God knows,” said Chuo University’s Annen.

Whatever the final bill, Japanese consumers are likely to end up paying  much of it, either through taxes, higher electricity rates or both, even  as Japan’s government struggles with massive public debt and the costs  of an ageing population.

 That may be unpopular but also inevitable.

 “This kind of job has never been done,” said Keiro Kitagami, a former  lawmaker who headed a government task force overseeing R&D for the  project. “The technology, the wherewithal, has never been developed.  Basically, we are groping in the dark.”

irrawaddy.org

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## robuzo

"A Tepco-government roadmap envisages starting to extract spent fuel from the most badly damaged of the station’s seven storage pools, which contain 11,417 new and used fuel assemblies, only later this year."

Even that is ambitious considering they have accomplished practically nothing in this aspect of the cleanup, which is the most critical. So long as there are no more major quakes in the area and/or no tsunami, no problem.  :mid:

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## Mid

*US military members suing over Japan nuke disaster*
15 Mar 2013

   US service members are suing the Tokyo Electric  Power Co. for more than $2 billion on grounds the utility lied about  the dangers of helping clean up the nuclear disaster that struck two  years ago, a newspaper reported Thursday.

 
_A  police officer searches for missing people near the stricken Fukushima  Dai-ichi nuclear plant on March 11, 2013. US service members are suing  the Tokyo Electric Power Co. for more than $2 billion on grounds the  utility lied about the dangers of helping clean up the nuclear disaster  that struck two years ago, a newspaper reported Thursday. _  

The  case was first filed by nine plaintiffs in December but has now  expanded to 26, and another 100 are in the process of joining the suit,  said Stars and Strips newspaper.

The new complaint was filed  Tuesday in US District Court in California, a day after the two year  anniversary of the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster that hit the  eastern coast of Japan. It left nearly 15,881 people dead and 2,668  others still unaccounted for.

The plaintiffs include active duty  and retired shore-based Marines, shore-based dependents and sailors from  ships that operated in the disaster area.

The newspaper said  peers of the plaintiffs complain the latter are seeking an easy payoff  and that the Pentagon insists the radiation they were exposed to did not  pose a major health risk.

The plaintiffs says the have suffered a  number of ailments that they say are linked to their exposure,  including headaches, difficulty concentrating, rectal bleeding, thyroid  problems, cancer, tumors and gynecological bleeding.

bangkokpost.com

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## robuzo

(OK, rat eating TEPCO, that's just wishful thinking, but. . .) A rodent may have caused a power failure that put all Fukushima NPP cooling systems out of action. Power has now been restored at the plant as Japan returns to the use of nuclear power halted after the 2011 disaster: One step from meltdown: Rat may have caused dangerous outage at Fukushima NPP ? RT News

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## Mid

* A sort of shellfish disappears in Japan* 
 April 1, 2013
*
   Japanese  researchers announced recently that a sort of shellfish called Thais  clavigera disappeared in a 30-km coastal area near Japan's crippled  Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.*

 _Thais clavigera._ 
[File photo]

Researchers  from Japan's National Institute for Environmental Studies and National  Institute of Radiological Sciences conducted the study last April on  shellfish's living status in 43 places from Japan's Chiba to Iwate  Prefectures for four months. 

The team found that the Thais clavigera  was extinct in eight of ten places within the 20-km-radius alert zone of  the nuclear plant, which was damaged by tsunami in March 2011 and  triggered the world' s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986.

 Other shellfish species, such as Cellana  grata, were found in the alert zone but the amount of them declined,  with high dose of radioactive materials inside their bodies, according  to the researchers.

 Thais clavigera, a kind of shell that  widely lives across Japan, was found in most places that had been  surveyed, including 25 of 33 places outside the alert zone, said the  researchers.

 Toshihiro Horiguchi, a researcher from  the environmental institute and the head of the team, said that it is a  rare occurrence that Thais clavigera entirely disappeared from a 30-km  long area, adding the extinct was probably caused by the nuclear crisis.

 The link between the disappearance and  the catastrophic tsunami was excluded as the shell was also found in  other areas that affected by the disaster, according to the team.

 The researchers made the report in an  annual meeting of the Japanese Society of Fisheries Science last  Wednesday and will further study links between the extinct and nuclear  crisis.

china.org.cn

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## Mid

* New radioactive leak at Fukushima* 
Sunday, April 07, 2013

  Some radioactive water may have leaked into  the ground from a  storage tank at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi  nuclear power plant, its  operator says, the latest in a series of  troubles at the facility.

The  fresh leak comes a day after Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO)  said up  to 120 tonnes of contaminated water may have escaped from  another of  the seven underground reservoir tanks at the  tsunami-damaged plant.

But it said the contaminated water was unlikely to flow into the  sea.

The  tanks store water used to cool down the reactors after  radioactive  caesium is removed but other radioactive substances  remain.

TEPCO said radioactivity was detected in water outside a tank in  the latest leak.

'We  have determined that a minimal amount of water was feared to  have  leaked from the tank although there was no decline in the  level of  water inside the tank,' it said in a statement

The series of  leakages came after one of the systems keeping  spent atomic fuel cool  at the plant temporarily failed on Friday,  the second outage in a  matter of weeks, underlining the precarious  fix at the plant.

Nuclear  fuel, even after use, has to be kept cool to prevent it  from  overheating and beginning a self-sustaining atomic reaction  that could  lead to meltdown.

The plant was hit by the giant tsunami of March  2011 as reactors  went into meltdown and spewed radiation over a wide  area, forcing  tens of thousands of people from their homes and  polluting  farmland.

bigpondnews.com

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## Neo

Published time: May 18, 2013 08:18



An earthquake with a magnitude measured at 5.9 by Japan’s  Meteorological Agency has struck the northeast of the country. The  epicenter was close to the Fukushima coast and only 200km from Tokyo,  causing buildings in the capital to shake.

The quake struck at 2:48 pm (05:48 GMT) in the Pacific Ocean, approximately 50km (31 miles) from land. The United States Geological Survey recorded the earthquake as being of magnitude 6.1, with a depth of 33km (20.5 miles).

No tsunami warning has been issued, despite the offshore quake’s close proximity to Fukushima prefecture, where the magnitude 9.0 quake in March 2011 instigated the Tsunami, which led to the deaths of at least 16,000 people and nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.

Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s two nuclear plants in the prefecture reported no immediate irregularities as a result of the quake, according to the local Kyodo news agency.

Miyagi prefecture, further north, suffered the strongest impact from the quake. No information has been released on potential injuries. However, its Onagawa nuclear plant also recorded no irregularities, according to its operator Tohoku Electric Power Co.

_“We have received no reports of damage so far,”_ an official from Fukushima prefecture told AFP.

5.9 earthquake strikes Japan off Fukushima coast ? RT News

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## Mid

*Japan set to restart reactors after nuclear crisis*
Jul 07, 2013

*TOKYO*  (AP) — Japan is moving a step closer to restarting nuclear reactors as  utilities are set to ask for safety inspections at their idled reactors,  the clearest sign of Japan’s return to nuclear energy nearly two and a  half years after the Fukushima disaster.

  With all but two of its 50 reactors off line since the crisis, Japan  has been without nuclear energy that once supplied about a third of its  power.

 Four of nine Japanese nuclear plant operators — supplying the regions  of Hokkaido, Kansai, Shikoku and Kyushu — will apply for safety  inspections by the Nuclear Regulation Authority for a total of 10  reactors at five plants Monday, when new safety requirements take  effect. Kyushu Electric Power Co. is expected to apply for two more  reactors at another plant later in the week.

 The new standards are stricter than in the past and for the first  time compulsory, and only reactors that pass the inspections will be  allowed to reopen — possibly early next year. Each inspection could take  several months, according to the watchdog, plus obtaining local consent  may take another few weeks. Critics say the rules have loopholes,  including grace periods for some safety equipment.

 Hit by soaring gas and oil costs to run conventional power generation  plants to make up for the shortfall, Japanese utility companies have  desperately sought to put their reactors back online.

 Nearly all the utilities owning nuclear power plants reported huge  losses last fiscal year due to higher costs for fuel imports. Hokkaido  Electric Power Co., for example, said it has been hit with additional  daily fuel costs of 600 million yen ($6 million) to make up for three  idled reactors. Nuclear operators have already requested rate hikes or  plan to do so.

 Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who took office in December, scrapped a  phase-out plan set by the previous government. Resumption of nuclear  power plants is part of his ruling party’s campaign platform in  parliamentary elections in two weeks.

 The new requirements specify for the first time that plants must take  steps to guard against radiation leaks in the case of severe accidents,  install emergency command centers and enact anti-terrorist measures.  Operators are required to upgrade protection for tsunamis and  earthquakes, as well as tornadoes and aviation accidents.

 Safety was previously left up to the operators, relying on their  self-interest in protecting their own investments as an incentive for  implementing adequate measures. Tokyo Electric Power Co. came under fire  for underestimating the risk of a tsunami and building a seawall that  was less than half the height of the wave that hit the Fukushima  Dai-ichi plant on March 11, 2011, knocking out power and cooling  systems, which led to meltdowns in three of its reactors. About 160,000  evacuees still cannot return to their homes.

 “We decided to apply because we’re confident about the safety  measures we’ve taken,” said Shota Okada, a spokesman at Hokkaido  Electric Power Co., filing for the triple-reactor Tomari plant. “We’ll  do everything to accommodate a smooth inspection process.”

 Hokkaido Electric hopes to restart them in time for the long, cold  winter on the northern main island, said company president Katsuhiko  Kawai recently.

 Critics say the requirements still have loopholes that make things  easier for operators, including a five-year grace period — given to  reactors known as PWRs that come with larger containment chambers  considered less likely to suffer from pressure buildup than ones like  those ravaged at Fukushima — for installing some mandated new equipment  and a full-fledged command center. This means about half of the 48  reactors that are PWRs, or pressurized water reactors, could operate  without the safety features up to five years.

 All 10 reactors set for inspections are PWRs, and filtered vents and  command centers are reportedly still under way at many of them.

 Opponents say the approvals are aimed at resuming reactor operations,  although nearby communities lag in enacting needed emergency and  evacuation procedures.

asiancorrespondent.com

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## Balance

Masao Yoshida: Fukishima Hero Dies Of Chancer - Business Insider

Masao Yoshida, the manager of the Fukushima Daiichi power in Japan during its meltdown in  2011, has died of cancer, the New York Times reports. He was 58 years old.

The plants operator, Tokyo Electric Power, said that Yoshida died of esophageal cancer. Experts have denied a link to the nuclear meltdown due to the speed of his illness.

Yoshida is best known for a series of key decisions made after the plant began melting down after a powerful earthquake and tsunami crippled the plant's cooling systems, including using seawater to cool overheating fuel rods.

Importantly, the first day after the earthquake, Yoshida ignored a requests from both Prime Minister Naoto Kan and senior Tepco officials to stop injecting seawater into the reactors. While there were fears that the seawater might cause fission chain reaction, Yoshida's plan proved successful and he was never reprimanded for his disobedience.

In a video released last year, Yoshida is shown disagreeing with an unnamed company official at Tepco headquarters two days after the quake. The official wants to use fresh water to cool the remaining fuel rods, hoping that they might be reused. Yoshida responded, "We don't have the option to use fresh water. That will cause further delays."

While Yoshida has faced some criticism for failing to prepare the plant for the risk of tsunami, his solemn response to handling the disaster led to a reputation as a hero. He reportedly asked staff left at the plant to write their names on a blackboard to keep a record of who was there, and had to be dissuaded from leading a "suicide mission" to try and pump more water in to one of the reactors himself.

If Yoshida wasnt there, the disaster could have been much worse, Reiko Hachisuka, the head of a business group in Okuma town and one of a panel that investigated the accident, told Bloomberg today. Former Prime Minister Naoto Kan also tweeted a tribute, saying, I bow in respect for his leadership and decision-making.

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## robuzo

^This guy did his best after the fact, and did far too little before it (see link below).

Btw, looking back over this thread, not naming any names but I see a few posters who should be feeling a bit sheepish.

TEPCO is finding it harder and harder to get workers because there is a shortage of construction workers and laborers in Japan as well as many other projects going in Tohoku and elsewhere that pay as much. The situation at Fukushima is not improving, and is in fact far from under control- it is getting worse. The only mitigating factor is that mercifully there have been no major quakes in the area since the event, which was, let's be clear, a man-made disaster: Fukushima nuclear disaster not result of earthquake: expert | Latest | FOCUS TAIWAN - CNA ENGLISH NEWS (maybe this should go in the main Fuk thread). We might all pray that there are none for the next couple of years (at least) if praying did any good, which it don't.

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## Mid

*SKorea bans fish from NE Japan on radiation fears*
Sep 06, 2013

*SEOUL,* South Korea (AP)  South Korea announced Friday that  it was banning all fish imports from along Japans northeastern coast  because of what officials called growing public worry over radioactive  water leaking into the Pacific Ocean near the crippled Fukushima  Dai-ichi nuclear power plant.

  Fisheries in Fukushima prefecture (state) are closed, and fish caught  in nearby prefectures are sold on the market only after tests have  shown them to be safe for consumption.


_Fisherman  Choji Suzuki sorts out fish he caught aboard his boat Ebisu Maru in the  waters off Iwaki, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of the  tsunami-crippled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant, Japan._ 
Pic: AP.

 However, South Koreas ban applies a total of eight prefectures with a  combined coastline of more than 700 kilometers (430 miles), regardless  of whether the fish pass safety standards or not.

 The South Korean government made the move because of insufficient  information from Tokyo about what steps will be taken to address the  leakage of contaminated water from the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power  plant, according to a statement by the Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries.

 Tokyo Electric Power Co., the plants operator, acknowledges that  tons of radioactive water has been seeping into the Pacific from the  plant for more than two years after the March 2011 earthquake and  tsunami led to meltdowns at three reactors at the plant. Recent leaks  from tanks storing radioactive water used to cool the reactors have  added to fears that the amount of contaminated water is getting out of  hand.

 Japans chief Cabinet secretary, Yoshihide Suga, said Friday that  fish and seafood that go to market are tested for radiation and shown to  be safe. Suga also stressed that the contaminated water flowing into  the ocean is limited to a small area off the coast of the Fukushima  plant.

 There is an international standard on food, including fish, and we  are carrying out stringent safety controls based on those standards. We  ask South Korea for a response based on science, he told reporters.

 South Korea Vice Fisheries Minister Son Jae-hak said in a briefing  that the eight prefectures in 2012 exported to South Korea 5,000 metric  tons of fishery products, or about 13 percent of the 40,000 total tons  imported last year from Japan. Fish will be banned from the following  prefectures: Aomori, Iwate, Miyagi, Fukushima, Ibaraki, Gunma, Tochigi  and Chiba.

 Hisashi Hiroyama, a Japanese Fisheries Agency official, said Japan  exports about 9.2 billion ($92 million) of fish a year to South Korea.  The most common fish exported from Japan to South Korea was Alaskan  Pollock.

 Scientists have long believed that contaminated water was reaching  the ocean, based in part on continuing high levels of radioactive cesium  found in fish living at the bottom of the sea. Scientists have also  noted a rise in strontium-90 and tritium levels in the past few months.  Strontium accumulates in fish bones and remains longer than cesium in  fish and the humans that eat them.

 Hiroshi Kishi, chairman of the Japan Fisheries Cooperatives, called  on Energy Minister Toshimitsu Motegi Friday morning to tackle the  contamination issue as soon as possible, and to release appropriate  information to international community to avoid the further negative  groundless reputation over Japan fishery products.

 This is a structurally difficult and complex issue. We will not rely  on TEPCO, but the government will come to the forefront in resolving  the issue, Motegi said.

 Earlier this week, the Japanese government announced that it would  spend 47 billion yen ($470 million) to build an underground ice wall  around the reactor and turbine buildings and develop an advanced water  treatment system in an attempt to contain the leaks and limit the amount  of contaminated water.

asiancorrespondent.com

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## ENT

I suppose they've got seven years to clean things up before the olympic games.

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## Wally Dorian Raffles

Disturbing article: Fukushima: At the Very Least, Your Days of Eating Pacific Ocean Fish Are Over

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## billy the kid

Wally D R ,thanks for the Helen video. first one i've seen explaining this disaster and fallout.

a disaster like this has always been a possibility.
nowhere left to hide now.
what a mess.
The House is burning. and calling the fire brigade will only pour more flames onto it.
Man is a fucking idiot.

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## Wally Dorian Raffles

> I suppose they've got seven years to clean things up before the olympic games.


Prolly take more like 700.

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## ENT

Japan tells 300,000 households to evacuate
20:25 Mon Sep 16 2013AAP

Typhoon Man-yi has battered central Japan, forcing the evacuation of almost 300,000 households amid fears the storm could go on to hit the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant.
The typhoon made landfall in Toyohashi, Aichi prefecture, shortly before 8.00am (0900 AEST) on Monday, packing gusts of up to 162 kilometres an hour, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.

Public broadcaster NHK said four people were missing in landslides or floods, while at least 65 people were injured and more than 860 houses flooded.

The typhoon was moving north-northeast at a speed of 55km/h, with the eye of the storm passing within 50 kilometres north of the capital around noon.

The meteorological agency issued the highest alert for "possibly unprecedented heavy rain" in Kyoto and neighbouring prefectures, while Kyoto and other local authorities advised a total of some 291,000 households to evacuate.
Japan tells 300,000 households to evacuate

----------


## Thormaturge

> I suppose they've got seven years to clean things up before the olympic games.


Probably not.

Seismic activity of this magnitude causes rock to melt at great depths below the surface.  Gradually over the coming years that molten rock makes its way to the surface, eventually releasing through existing volcanoes.

I believe Japan has an even bigger horror story coming between now and the Olympics.



Fuji is dormant ... not extinct.

----------


## robuzo

^Seismologists seem to expect Fuji to blow as a kind of cherry-on-top for the coming Nankai Trough event:  Nankai Trough quake predicted to cause more damage than 2011 disaster - The Japan Daily Press

Not if but when.

----------


## Thormaturge

Roughly six years between the big Indonesian quake (2004) and the eruptions of Murapi (2010) and Lokon (2011) so we may well see Fuji blow around 2017 - 2018.

----------


## Mid

*New leak at Japan nuke plant due to tank overflow*
Oct 03, 2013       

*TOKYO* (AP)  Japans crippled nuclear plant has a new leak  of highly radioactive water entering the Pacific Ocean after a storage  tank overflowed.

  Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. said Thursday that workers  detected the water dripping from the top of a tank when they were  patrolling the site the night before.

Pic: AP.

 TEPCO estimates 430 liters (110 gallons) of water leaked outside a  concrete barrier surrounding the tank and four others. TEPCO believes  the water reached the sea via a ditch next to the barrier.

 Massive amounts of water have been used to cool the reactors and fuel  rods since the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami destroyed the  Fukushima Dai-ichi plants cooling system. Leaks of the contaminated  water are causing concerns over the plants stability.

asiancorrespondent.com

----------


## robuzo

Apparently the problem is it rained a lot and they never expected it. I mean, hoocuddanode it rains a lot in Japan this time of year?: Tepco Finds New Foe in Rainfall as Fukushima Tank Overflows - Bloomberg
By Jacob Adelman, Chisaki Watanabe & Yuji Okada - Oct 3, 2013 2:58 PM GMT+0700
Contaminated water overflowed from a storage tank at the Fukushima station as heavy rains compounded Tokyo Electric Power Co. (9501)’s difficulties managing irradiated water at the wrecked atomic plant.
The estimated 430-liter leak occurred as crews transferred rainwater that had collected at the plant into a storage tank, Masayuki Ono, an official at the utility’s plant siting department, said today at a press conference in Tokyo.

----------


## Thormaturge

Ineptitude beyond comprehension.

----------


## robuzo

^Well, like I always say, they built a reactor complex near the beach in the country that invented the word _tsunami_ (also ignoring stone markers left by people centuries ago on hills saying "Don't build anything you want to keep below this point"). Not Japan's most genius thinkers. Now they want to build an ice wall, which will take years and of course there won't be another M8+ quake in the meantime, no way.

----------


## Mid

*High levels of toxic water leaks at Japanese nuclear plant*
October 21, 2013

*Tokyo - Highly  radioactive water overflowed 12 barriers around storage tanks at the  Fukushima nuclear plant, the operator said Monday.*

            Some of the contaminated water might have flowed into the Pacific Ocean  from the tanks at the plant, Tokyo Electric Power Co said.

 More than 100 millimetres of rain was recorded at the plant over four hours on Sunday afternoon, public broadcaster NHK said.

 The overflows are the latest in a string of radiation-contaminated water problems at the plant.

 Prime Minister Shinzo Abe reiterated that the situation "is under  control."   Tokyo Electric has built about 1,000 storage tanks to  contain contaminated water from three reactors that suffered meltdowns  after the complex was struck by the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

 The operator has been battling with leaks from the tanks as it  continues to inject water into the three reactors to keep them cool.

 In late August, about 300 tonnes of radiation-contaminated water leaked  from a storage tank, some of which could have reached the sea, the  operator said.

nationmultimedia.com

----------


## billy the kid

> some of which could have reached the sea


Oh my Cod.

----------


## Mid

*Magnitude-7.1 hits north-eastern Japan, tsunami observed*
October 26, 2013

*Tokyo - A magnitude-7.1  earthquake struck early Saturday off the coast of north-eastern Japan,  prompting authorities to urge residents to evacuate prefectures and  issue a tsunami warning.*

            The tremor occurred at 2:10 am (17:10 Friday GMT) and its epicenter was  located off Fukushima prefecture at a depth of 10 kilometres, the Japan  Meteorological Agency said.

The quake prompted the agency to issue tsunami warning and thousands of residents were urged to evacuate in the prefectures of Iwate and Miyagi. Tsunami waves of up to 0.4 metres were observed on the coast of north-eastern Japan after the quake, the agency said.

There were no reports of casualties or damage, and no abnormalities  were detected at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station,  where three nuclear reactors suffered meltdowns after a tsunami swept through the plant in March 2011.

nationmultimedia.com

----------


## ENT

Small tsunami reaches Japan after earthquake
map
A small tsunami triggered by a quake has hit Japan's eastern coast - where the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is located - but no damage is reported.



The 30cm (1ft) waves reached the region after the 7.1 magnitude tremor struck at a depth of 10km (six miles), about 320km off the coast.

A tsunami alert issued for several areas was later lifted.

Workers at the Fukushima power station had been told to leave waterfront areas for higher ground.

But a Fukushima spokesman later said there was no damage or change in readings at radiation monitoring posts around the plant, according to Reuters news agency.

The Japan Meteorological Agency had warned that a small tsunami - up to one metre (3.3ft) - could reach the eastern coast after the tremor in the Pacific Ocean.

The agency had also issued a "yellow" advisory for Fukushima and the prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi, Ibaraki and parts of Chiba.

But it added: "Though there may be slight sea-level change in coastal regions, no tsunami damage is expected."
BBC News - Small tsunami reaches Japan after earthquake

----------


## billy the kid

too many adverts on tv now advising what to do about cancer.
don't be afraid to tell your doctor,,,  :Roll Eyes (Sarcastic):

----------


## ENT

The heart-breaking news from Fukushima just keeps getting worse…a LOT worse…it is, quite simply, an out-of-control flow of death and destruction. TEPCO is finally admitting that radiation has been leaking to the Pacific Ocean all along. and it’s NOT over….






It now appears that anywhere from 300 to possibly over 450 tons of contaminated water that contains radioactive iodone, cesium, and strontium-89 and 90, is flooding into the Pacific Ocean from the Fukushima Daichi site everyday.                                    

To give you an idea of how bad that actually is, Japanese experts estimate *Fukushima’s fallout at 20-30 times as high as as the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombings in 1945.*

*There’s a lot you’re not being told. Oh, the information is out there, but you have to dig pretty deep to find it, and you won’t find it on the corporate-owned evening news.*

Read more at Fukushima Radiation: Your Days of Eating Pacific Ocean Fish Are Over, Or Worse


----
A can of Canadian Brunswick sardines used to cost $2 or thereabouts in NZ, all dropped 50 cents in price in the last week, strange, as the Canadian Pacific sardine fleet didn't catch a single sardine this year!!! 


----
*The Vancouver Sun:*

The commercial disappearance of the small schooling fish is having repercussions all the way up the food chain to threatened humpback whales.

Jim Darling, a Tofino-based whale biologist with the Pacific Wildlife Foundation, said in an interview Monday that humpbacks typically number in the hundreds near the west coast of Vancouver Island in summer. They were observed only sporadically this year, including by the commercial whalewatching industry.

“Humpbacks are telling us that something has changed,” he said. “Ocean systems are so complex, it’s really hard to know what it means. For one year, I don’t think there’s any reason to be alarmed, but there is certainly reason to be curious.”

Humpbacks instead were observed farther offshore, possibly feeding on alternative food sources such as herring, sandlance, anchovies, or krill, but not in the numbers observed near shore in recent years.

Canadian Pacific Fishermen Catch No Sardines in 2013 - Truthdig

----------


## Wally Dorian Raffles

They are pulling the rods out of the reactors this week. Tepco has contracted the job out to uneducated laborers as they don't want to send their own people in. 

Some of my friends here fear for the worst and have said to have your cash , backpack  and a good pair of walking shoes ready for a Long walk in the opposite direction to the nearest airport .

There was an interview with an expert in the field who was asked what would happen if they happen to drop the rods, or the unstable containers housing them were to collapse. His answer was short and to the point " mo owari des " - which means " we are all finished". 

Meanwhile here in Tokyo the locals really don't know what is going on, and are carrying on their lives as if nothing is out of the ordinary ,..

----------


## Troy

Some more photos of the damage to the plant:

Fukushima Update: Fuel Rods to Be Removed from Pool at Nuclear Plant | Weather Underground

I would have thought the start of rod removal was a good sign since it means they have cooled down sufficiently. 1500+ fuel rods...going to be a slow process....

----------


## ENT

*The Problems of Fukushima*

*There are three major problems at Fukushima:*  

(1) Three reactor cores are missing;                                                                                                                                                                                                           

(2) Radiated water has been leaking from the plant in mass quantities for 2.5 years; and                                                                                                                      

(3) Eleven thousand spent nuclear fuel rods, perhaps the most dangerous things ever created by humans, are stored at the plant and need to be removed, 1,533 of those are in a very precarious and dangerous position. Each of these three could result in dramatic radiation events, unlike any radiation exposure humans have ever experienced.  We’ll discuss them in order, saving the most dangerous for last.

*Missing reactor cores:*  Since the accident at Fukushima on March 11, 2011, three reactor cores have gone missing.  There was an unprecedented three reactor ‘melt-down.’ These melted cores, called corium lavas, are thought to have passed through the basements of reactor buildings 1, 2 and 3, and to be somewhere in the ground underneath. 

......the possibility of a multiple meltdown, but that is what occurred at Fukushima. ...It is an unprecedented situation to not know where these cores are.                                                                                                                                                           

TEPCO is pouring water where they think the cores are, but they are not sure. There are occasional steam eruptions coming from the grounds of the reactors, *so the cores are thought to still be hot.*

*The concern is that the corium lavas will enter or may have already entered the aquifer below the plant.*                            That would contaminate a much larger area with radioactive elements. Some suggest that it would require the area surrounding Tokyo, 40 million people, to be evacuated.                                                                                                                                   

*Another concern is that if the corium lavas enter the aquifer, they could create a "super-heated pressurized steam reaction beneath a layer of caprock causing a major 'hydrovolcanic' explosion."*

A further concern is that a large reserve of groundwater which is coming in contact with the corium lavas is migrating towards the ocean at the rate of four meters per month. This could release greater amounts of radiation than were released in the early days of the disaster.




*Radioactive water leaking into the Pacific Ocean:*  

TEPCO did not admit that leaks of radioactive water were occurring until July of this year.......  The Japanese government finally admitted that the situation was urgent this September – an emergency they did not acknowledge until 2.5 years after the water problem began.

How much radioactive water is leaking into the ocean? An estimated 300 tons (71,895 gallons/272,152 liters) of contaminated water is flowing into the ocean every day. 

One month after ..... has been contaminated with radiation that originated in Fukushima. ,,,... the FDA announced it was going to stop testing fish in the Pacific Ocean for radiation.......every bluefin tuna tested in the waters off California....... "The tuna packaged it up (the radiation) and brought it across the world’s largest ocean..... see it in every one we measured.....every one of them had comparable concentrations of cesium 134 and cesium 137."

In addition, Science reports that fish near Fukushima are being found to have high levels of the radioactive isotope, cesium-134. The levels found in these fish are not decreasing,  which indicates that radiation-polluted water continues to leak into the ocean. At least 42 fish species from the area around the plant are considered unsafe.  South Korea has banned Japanese fish as a result of the ongoing leaks.

The half-life (time it takes for half of the element to decay) of cesium 134 is 2.0652 years. For cesium 137, the half-life is 30.17 years. Cesium does not sink to the ocean floor, so fish swim through it. What are the human impacts of cesium?
.
...."*dilution is no solution.*"  The fact that the Pacific Ocean is large does not change the fact that these radioactive elements have long half-lives.  Radiation in water is taken up by vegetation, then smaller fish eat the vegetation, larger fish eat the smaller fish and at the top of the food chain we will find fish like tuna, dolphin and whales with concentrated levels of radiation. Humans at the top of the food chain could be eating these contaminated fish.

Each day TEPCO injects 400 tons of water into the destroyed facilities to keep them cool; about half is recycled, and the rest goes into the above-ground tanks..... The tanks being used for storage were put together rapidly and are already leaking. They expect to have 800,000 tons of radioactive water stored on the site by 2016.  

The Asia-Pacific Journal concludes:* "So at present there is no real solution to the water problem."*
The most recent news on the water problem at Fukushima adds to the concerns. On October 11, 2013, TEPCO disclosed that the radioactivity level spiked 6,500 times at a Fukushima well.  "TEPCO said the findings show that radioactive substances like strontium have reached the groundwater. High levels of tritium, which transfers much easier in water than strontium, had already been detected."



*Spent Fuel Rods:  *  

As bad as the problems of radioactive water and missing cores are, the biggest problem at Fukushima comes from the spent fuel rods.  The plant has been in operation for 40 years. As a result, they are storing *11 thousand spent fuel rods on the grounds of the Fukushima plant.* These fuel rods are composed of highly radioactive materials such as plutonium and uranium. They are about the width of a thumb and about 15 feet long.

*The biggest and most immediate challenge is the 1,533 spent fuel rods packed tightly in a pool four floors above Reactor 4. *  

Before the storm hit, those rods had been removed for routine maintenance of the reactor.  But, now they are stored 100 feet in the air in damaged racks.  They weigh a total of 400 tons and contain radiation equivalent to 14,000 times the amount released by the Hiroshima atomic bomb.

*The building in which these rods are stored has been damaged.* TEPCO reinforced it with a steel frame, but the building itself is buckling and sagging, vulnerable to collapse if another earthquake or storm hits the area. Additionally, the ground under and around the building is becoming saturated with water, which further undermines the integrity of the structure and could cause it to tilt.

How dangerous?....the fuel rods are clad in zirconium which can ignite if they lose coolant. They could also ignite or explode if rods break or hit each other.....this could result in a fission explosion like an atomic bomb,........ others say that is not what would happen, but agree it would be "a reaction like we have never seen before, a nuclear fire releasing incredible amounts of radiation," 

These are not the only spent fuel rods at the plant, they are just the most precarious.  *There are 11,000 fuel rods scattered around* the plant, *6,000 in a cooling pool* less than *50 meters from the sagging Reactor 4.* 

If a fire erupts in the spent fuel pool at Reactor 4, it could ignite the rods in the cooling pool and lead to an even greater release of radiation. *It could set off a chain reaction that could not be stopped.*

*There is no question that the 1,533 spent fuel rods need to be removed*.  But  "They are going to have difficulty in removing a significant number of the rods." 

*"If you think of a nuclear fuel rack as a pack of cigarettes, if you pull a cigarette straight up it will come out — but these racks have been distorted. Now when they go to pull the cigarette straight out, it’s going to likely break and release radioactive cesium and other gases, xenon and krypton, into the air.                                                                                                                                                                                              

I suspect come November, December, January we’re going to hear that the building’s been evacuated, they’ve broke a fuel rod, the fuel rod is off-gassing."*

... it is "worse than pulling cigarettes out of a crumbled cigarette pack." It is likely they used salt water as a coolant out of desperation, which would cause corrosion because the rods were never meant to be in salt water.  The condition of the rods is unknown. There is debris in the coolant, so there has been some crumbling from somewhere. Gundersen  adds, 

"The roof has fallen in, which further distorted the racks," noting that if a fuel rod snaps, it will release radioactive gas which will require at a minimum evacuation of the plant. They will release those gases into the atmosphere and try again.
The Japan Times writes: "The consequences could be far more severe than any nuclear accident the world has ever seen. If a fuel rod is dropped, breaks or becomes entangled while being removed, possible worst case scenarios include a big explosion, a meltdown in the pool, or a large fire. Any of these situations could lead to massive releases of deadly radionuclides into the atmosphere.

*This is not the usual moving of fuel rods.*  TEPCO has been saying this is routine, but in fact it is unique – a feat of engineering never done before.  As Gundersen says:

"Tokyo Electric is portraying this as easy. In a normal nuclear reactor, all of this is done with computers. Everything gets pulled perfectly vertically. Well nothing is vertical anymore, the fuel racks are distorted, it’s all going to have to be done manually. The net effect is it’s a really difficult job. It wouldn’t surprise me if they snapped some of the fuel and they can’t remove it."

Gregory Jaczko, Former Chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission concurs with Gundersen describing the removal of the spent fuel rods as "a very significant activity, and . . . very, very unprecedented."
Wasserman sums the challenge up: "We are doing something never done before – bent, crumbling, brittle fuel rods being removed from a pool that is compromised, in a building that is sinking, sagging and buckling, and it all must done under manual control, not with computers."  And the potential damage from failure would affect hundreds of millions of people.



*The Solutions*

The three major problems at Fukushima are all unprecedented,... There are no clear solutions but there are steps that need to be taken urgently to get the Fukushima clean-up and de-commissioning on track and minimize the risks.

The first thing that is needed is to end the media blackout. ..Tepco’s management of the stricken power plant has been described as a comedy of errors...Indeed the entire Fukushima catastrophe could have been avoided:

"Tepco at first blamed the accident on ‘an unforeseen massive tsunami’ triggered by the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011. Then it admitted it had in fact foreseen just such a scenario but hadn’t done anything about it."

Then, the meltdown itself was denied for months, with TEPCO claiming it had not been confirmed.  Japan Times reports that "in December 2011, the government announced that the plant had reached ‘a state of cold shutdown.’

"The plant is being run on makeshift equipment and breakdowns are endemic. Among nearly a dozen serious problems since April ......... a rat that chewed enough wires to short-circuit a switchboard, causing a power outage that interrupted cooling for nearly 30 hours. Later, the cooling system for a fuel-storage pool had to be switched off for safety checks when two dead rats were found in a transformer box." 



*Facing Reality*

Facing reality is a common problem throughout the nuclear industry and those who continue to push for nuclear energy. 

..."unnecessary, uneconomic, uninsurable, unevacuable and, most importantly, unsafe." ....there are nuclear plants in the US that are near earthquake faults, among them are plants near Los Angeles, New York City and Washington, DC.  And, Fukushima was based on a design by General Electric, which was also used to build 23 reactors in the US. [/I][/B] 

*If we faced reality, public officials would be organizing evacuation drills in those cities.*  If we did so, Americans would quickly learn that if there is a serious nuclear accident, US cities could not be evacuated. Activists making the reasonable demand for evacuation drills may be a very good strategy to end nuclear power.

....as bad as Fukushima is, it is not the worst case scenario for a nuclear disaster. Fukushima was 120 kilometers (75 miles) from the center of the earthquake. If that had been 20 kilometers (12 miles), the plant would have been reduced to rubble and caused an immediate nuclear catastrophe."

Excerpted from;
Fukushima - A Global Threat That Requires a Global Response

----------


## Troy

It all looks relatively simple in the video....

TEPCO : News | Photos and Videos Library - Videos

What alternatives are there from the Doom and Gloom merchants?

----------


## ENT

Doesn't it?
A good PR job by TEPCO. Looks straightforward.

If only the spent fuel rod carrier frames and rods weren't buckled or damaged or misaligned in any way.

----------


## ENT

*US to help TEPCO with dangerous Fukushima fuel rods removal*
 Nov 04, 2013 

The removal of the nuclear fuel rods from the cooling pool of the disaster-stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant is* touted to be one of the most dangerous processes in the decommissioning of the nuclear facility* – dangerous enough that it could spark a whole new nuclear disaster if done wrong.                                                                                                                                                             

*It must come as a small relief that Naomi Hirose, president of Fukushima operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), has announced that he has agreed to accept the help of the United States Department of Energy with the fuel rod removal process.*

Hirose revealed that he had agreed to accept the offer of help during talks with U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz when they visited Fukushima No. 1 on Friday to inspect preparations to remove fuel rods from the reactor 4 storage pool.                                                           

TEPCO has had to endure a long string of highly-publicized gaffes – with power issues and radioactive waste water leaks – that the Japanese public has questioned the operator’s capability to undergo the highly risky process on their own.* Following huge public criticism of the country’s reluctance to accept foreign assistance,* Japan has recently begun to show more willingness to do so.                     

“*As Japan continues to chart its sovereign path forward* on the cleanup at the Fukushima site and works to determine the future of energy economy, the United States stands ready to continue assisting our partners in this daunting yet indispensable task,” Moniz said in a statement late Friday.                                                                                                                                 

Hirose also said in an interview that, “We will work together to tackle many challenges toward decommissioning. I have high hopes that we will be able to benefit from U.S. experience and expertise at Fukushima No. 1.”

Moniz revealed that a Japan-U.S. commission will meet in Washington this week to strengthen cooperation in civil nuclear research and development, as well as the Fukushima cleanup and decommissioning, including the evaluation of emergency response and regulatory issues.                                                                                                                                                        

Moniz also added that he expects atomic power to remain a crucial part of the energy mix around the world as nations try to battle global warming. In a speech Thursday in Tokyo, he said “the success of the cleanup also has global significance. So we all have a direct interest in seeing that the next steps are taken well, efficiently and safely.”

US to help TEPCO with dangerous Fukushima fuel rods removal - The Japan Daily Press

Talk about face saving!!

It looks as if the only reason TEPCO didn't act promptly in avoiding a whole series of disasters within the Fukushima complex was because of feared "loss of face", as in,"As Japan continues to chart its sovereign path forward...." etc, by Moniz re. Japan.

----------


## ENT

*FUEL ROD REMOVAL ATTEMPT AT FUKUSHIMA UNIT 4 DELAYED, POSSIBLY FOR WEEKS                                             NOVEMBER 5, 2013*

*Reactor-No.4-Fukushima-Daiichi-fuelvia Nov. 5, 2013*                                                                                                  The utility had intended to start removing the fuel rods from the unit’s packed cooling pool as early as Friday.

The test was requested by the Japan Nuclear Energy Safety Organization. The government-affiliated agency called for an initial test that would include transporting a protective fuel cask from the No. 4 storage pool to another pool in a different building about 100 meters away, to provide more stable conditions for cooling spent fuel, the sources said.

The agency has already inspected the equipment to be used in the operation on behalf of the Nuclear Regulation Authority. It has also urged Tepco to have its work evaluated by a group of Japanese and overseas experts formed by the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning, a Tokyo-based organization founded by Japanese government agencies, nuclear facility manufacturers and electric power companies.

Of the four reactors in use at the time of the March 2011 disasters, *only the No. 4 unit avoided meltdown because it had been defueled for maintenance and all its rods were sitting in its spent fuel pool.*

The building housing the No. 4 reactor and the storage pool, however, was hit by fires and a hydrogen explosion after the station lost power, disrupting the pool’s cooling system. More than 1,300 spent fuel assemblies and more than 200 fresh ones, including some containing plutonium-infused mixed-oxide fuel, remain in the pool.

A crane has been installed to carry a protective cask into and out of the pool. The spent fuel will be placed in the cask and moved to a nearby storage pool by trailer.

*The work at unit 4 will mark a new stage in the decommissioning process for the four damaged reactors.*

In the meantime, efforts continue to secure the massive amount of highly radioactive water accumulating at the plant from the perpetual cooling operations at the reactors. Ground water creeping into the premises has been compounding the problem, with leaky storage tanks raising public fears of ocean contamination.

*Tokyo Electric Power Co. will conduct a fuel removal test at the No. 4 reactor building of the stricken Fukushima No. 1 power plant, delaying the start of the actual operation by up to two weeks, sources close to the matter said Monday.*

Fukushima Update | Fuel rod removal attempt at Fukushima Unit 4 delayed, possibly for weeks

----------


## Retro

Here's a story they can't explain now. Fukushima's radiation probably is coming down along the west coast by now. Who knows if there is any relation. 

Disease Ravaging West Coast Starfish - Business Insider

----------


## Mid

*High thyroid cancer rates detected in Fukushima children*
Mark Willacy
Tuesday, November 5, 2013 

TONY EASTLEY: One of the terrible legacies of the radioactive fallout  from the Russian disaster at Chernobyl is now being visited upon people  in Japan.

Researchers in Fukushima are uncovering higher than expected rates of thyroid cancer in children.

One  prominent former thyroid surgeon - a veteran of the Chernobyl disaster -  has told the ABC's Foreign Correspondent program that the number of  cancer cases in Fukushima are emerging faster than expected.

But  another cancer specialist says that the high rate is simply a product  of widespread, sensitive screening and no-one should be alarmed.

The ABC's North Asia correspondent Mark Willacy reports from Fukushima.

(Sound of child crying) 

MARK  WILLACY: Two-year-old Yuta Koike is having none of it. Every time the  nurse tries to run the probe over his neck he cries, kicks, and tries to  slide off the bed.

His mother, Tomoko Koike, has brought Yuta  and his four-year-old sister Saki in for a thyroid gland screening  because she fears the fallout from the nearby Fukushima nuclear plant.

(Sound of Tomoko Koike speaking in Japanese).

"I am worried," she tells me, "but I believe they're okay. I am hoping they're okay," she adds. 

Before  the nuclear meltdowns, health authorities estimated thyroid cancer  rates among Fukushima's children at between one and two cases in every  million.

Since the disaster the Fukushima local government has  carried out a large-scale screening program and with about 200,000  children tested, there have been 18 confirmed cases of thyroid cancer  and 25 more suspected cases - an unexpectedly high rate.

Akira  Sugenoya is the mayor of Matsumoto City in Nagano but he's also a  respected thyroid surgeon who spent five years treating children in  Ukraine and Belarus who developed thyroid cancer after the Chernobyl  disaster. 

(Sound of Akira Sugenoya speaking in Japanese). 

"When  I look at Fukushima now the number of thyroid cancer cases in kids is  quite high," says Dr Sugenoya. "The doctors in Fukushima say that it  shouldn't be emerging this fast, so they say it's not related to the  accident. But that's very unscientific, and it's not a reason that we  can accept," he says.

But other experts believe there's nothing to fear.

GERALDINE THOMAS: Following Fukushima I doubt that there'll be any rise in thyroid cancers in Japan. 

MARK WILLACY: Professor Geraldine Thomas is a specialist in the molecular pathology of cancer at Imperial College London.

She  also helped establish the Chernobyl Tissue Bank, which analyses samples  from people exposed to radiation after the nuclear disaster in 1986.

She argues that there's a simple reason for the higher than expected incidence of thyroid cancer among Fukushima's children.

GERALDINE  THOMAS: If you look for a problem, especially if you use an incredibly  sensitive technique, which is what the Japanese are actually doing, you  will find something.

MARK WILLACY: Everyone agrees that what's  most important is detecting thyroid cancers early because if found in  the early stages it's almost always successfully treated.

But as  Foreign Correspondent discovered, Fukushima's health authorities are  acting almost in secret, even refusing our request for a simple age  breakdown of the thyroid cancer victims, citing privacy reasons.

This refusal to share basic data has aroused the suspicions of thyroid specialist Akira Sugenoya.

(Sound of Akira Sugenoya speaking in Japanese)

"I'm  still very angry," says Dr Sugenoya. "I think they have this data, so  it's very strange why they won't release it," he says. 

And it's  not just the thyroid data that has been kept secret, so too were the  initial meetings of the Fukushima panel charged with screening the  region's children.

For parents like Tomoko Koike, who are  worried about the effect of the fallout on their young children, it  smells like a cover up.

(Sound of Tomoko Koike speaking in Japanese)

"I  do not think they're telling us everything," she says. "I cannot trust  what they say. So it makes me worry about my kids' future. It depresses  me," she says.

Adding to that worry for Tomoko Koike has been the discovery of cysts on the thyroid gland of her four-year-old daughter Saki. 

While not regarded as malignant, the cysts will have to be monitored in the months and possibly years to come.

xxx.xxx.xx

----------


## ENT

A lengthy article, I found it quite informative.
Excerpts below.

*Endless Fukushima catastrophe: Many generations’ health at stake*

"Bio-accumulation of radioactive elements around Fukushima will devastate many future Japanese generations, while the Pacific Ocean is also being contaminated by leaking radioactive water. Yet there is still no good solution from the Japanese government."



"There were three nuclear reactors undergoing fission at the time while one, unit four, had just been emptied of its radioactive core, which was now situated in an unprotected cooling pool on the roof of the building, 100 feet (30 meters) above the ground.                                                                                                                                     

As the power supply to the reactors was disrupted during the earthquake, and the auxiliary diesel generators in the basements of the reactors failed because they were flooded, the *pumps** which supplied up to 1 million gallons of cooling water to each reactor failed.*

*Within hours the intensely hot radioactive cores in units one, two and three started to melt.* As they melted, the zirconium metal cladding on the uranium fuel rods reacted with water to produce hydrogen which exploded with overwhelming intensity in the buildings of units one, two, three and four releasing huge amounts of radioactive elements into the air.

*Over a period of time two-and-a-half to three times more noble gases were released into the air than at Chernobyl.*......Noble gases are very high energy gamma emitters similar to x-rays,                                                                                                             

But over 100 other radioactive elements were also released.....thousands of people were exposed to clouds of radiation. *The damaged reactors continue to emit radioactive airborne releases to this day.* 

Luckily the wind was blowing* east across the Pacific* in the first several days, *taking 80 percent of the fallout with it*....deposited in the Pacific Ocean.....wind changed..... large areas of Japan, ..Tokyo..severely contaminated. Approximately 2 million people are still living in highly contaminated areas in the Fukushima Prefecture and elsewhere,                                                                                    

*...unprecedented quantity of highly radioactive water was also released into the Pacific Ocean. .. hasn’t stopped*. ... 300 tons of this water has been leaking into the Pacific every day since ...30 months ago...so far 270,000 tons of water.

..*..three molten cores, each weighing 120 to 130 tons....melted.*.through 6 inches of steel in the reactor vessels...now either sit on concrete floors of ..cracked containment buildings or..melted their way into the earth..... ‘A Melt Through to China Syndrome                                                                                                                                                             

..*reactor complex was built upon an ancient river bed l*ocated at the base of a mountain range,.. water..from the mountains (1,000 tons daily) are circulating around..cores absorbing..radioactive elements.

..concrete dam near the sea front to prevent this radioactive water from entering the sea....*continuous flow of water built up..overflowed into the Pacific Ocean.                                                                                           * 

*Each reactor core contains as much radiation as that released by 1,000 Hiroshima-sized bombs* and contains more than 200 different radioactive elements, which variously last seconds to millions of years.


*Children are 10 to 20 times more sensitive to the carcinogenic effects of radiation than adults, fetuses are thousands of times more so.* *One x-ray to the pregnant abdomen doubles the likelihood of leukemia in the baby.* Females are also more sensitive than men at all ages. *Radiation is cumulative,* there is no safe dose and each dose received by a person adds to the risk of developing cancer. 

*Of great concern is the fact that 18 cases of childhood thyroid cancer in children under the age of 18 have already been diagnosed and 25 more are suspected in Fukushima.* This is a *remarkably short incubation time for cancer,* indicating that these children almost certainly *received a very high dose* of iodine 131 plus other carcinogenic radioactive elements that were and are still being inhaled and ingested. 

Thyroid cancer in Chernobyl victims did not appear for four years. *Thyroid cancer is rarely found in young children.* 

*Food in the contaminated zone will remain radioactive for hundreds of years* ...continue to bio-accumulate radioactive elements from the soil, thus ...an increased incidence of cancer ..future Japanese generations.

*Medical doctors in Japan are reporting that they have been ordered by their superiors not to tell the patients that their problems are radiation related.*

*Water and the Pacific Ocean*
....TEPCO is still pumping hundreds of tons of salt water over molten reactor cores daily as another 1,000 tons of underground water also flows through the damaged reactors. .....TEPCO is pumping 300 to 400 tons of this highly contaminated water on a daily basis into 1,060 huge holding tanks adjacent to the reactor complex. These tanks now contain 350,000 tons of water and more tanks are being added each week to accommodate this endless flow of water....highly radioactive water is leaking and contaminating the tank site. 

.*.the government will .. construct a wall of ice* 0.9 miles (1.45km) in length and 100 feet deep behind and around the complex to prevent the mountain aquifer from rushing in to engulf the damaged cores.....*the ice wall may not even be deep enough to block the water.*....Not a good solution as the ice must remain intact for over 100 years.

... *The whole reactor site sits on sodden ground,* which has now become unstable, muddy and possibly liquefied......minor earthquakes each day..............quake greater than 6 or 7 on the Richter scale occur, it is likely that one or several of the buildings could collapse with absolutely disastrous consequences.

Endless Fukushima catastrophe: Many generations? health at stake ? RT Op-Edge


It's already gone through an M7+ EQ a few days ago, it might last long enough for the core removal job, but, I dunno....

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## ENT

*At Fukushima Daiichi, amateurs left to clean up the mess
Jenny Uechi Posted: Nov 4th, 2013*

Fukushima Daiichi workers interviewed in Gendai Business, a Japanese business magazine,  remained anonymous for safety reasons as they expressed deep anxiety about being under-qualified and overworked at the Fukushima Daiichi disaster site. They said that the nuclear reactor situation is not under control, that amateurs and yakuza are working on the site without adequate guidance from the Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco).

Below are some excerpts I translated from the interview.

[B]Amateurs and yakuza at the plant[/B]

*Worker A:* Just the other day, we had six people exposed to radiation when contaminated water leaked while people were exchanging hoses, but the leaks are mostly due to really basic mistakes. *I’d say 80 – 90 per cent is about human error.*

*Worker B:* Worker morale at the site is really low. Especially because of the high turnover, there’s not really a sense of responsibility here. The people I’m working with right now, their jobs before coming to Fukushima Daiichi were positions like working at a pub in Shinjuku (a district in downtown Tokyo), a pool lifeguard, a cram-school teacher, and a truck driver. *They’re all amateurs. There’s not one expert among them.*

*Worker B:* They've got to increase the number of workers here. In particular, they've got to bring experienced workers back to Fukushima.

*Worker C:* There was *one company* partnering with Tepco that *made a ridiculously low bid*, and that triggered a *huge deflation of Fukushima Daiichi's labour costs*. Among the workers, there are guys who were sent in because *they owe money to the yakuza,* and some others are desperately *poor yakuza without option*s. At the worksite, t*here's nothing but yakuza and total amateurs.*..

*Worker B:* There was a *journalist** who wrote in his book that *a tenth of the workers at Fukushima Daiichi were yakuza, but it's certainly true that yakuza types have been increasing...it's a reality that you can't get people gathered here without the help of gangs.* 

*Worker D:* In the first place, it's a mistake to let this company that never had a proper preparation plan to deal with the aftermath of the accident. Plus, t*hey have a lot of pride, so they (the company) can't bow  their heads and admit that the situation is untenable.* Even though the contaminated water keeps increasing, the workers keep decreasing.  Plus, even if there are policies to support children and victims of the earthquake disaster, there's nothing for the workers who have been exposed to radiation, so eventually,* even the amateurs and yakuza will leave Fukushima Daiichi too.* 

*Worker C:* Among the workers, there are the commuters and the ones who stay overnight, but once you enter a small subcontracting company, you can get held back at the site for 16 hours a day. It's a place of long hours, low wages, no overtime pay.

**Tomohiko Suzuki, Yakuza to Genpatsu (The yakuza and the nuclear power plant) Bungei Shunju, 2011.*


*A lack of direction* 

*Worker A:* And even at the actual site, it’s incredibly rare that Tepco gives any kind of direct order. Or even if they do, it’s just like “Hurry up” or “We have no time.

Recently, Prime Minister Abe came here, but that was a huge inconvenience. Basically, Tepco told us, “We can’t let Mr. Abe see how dirty the site is. Clean up the rubble!” So we had to spend a whole week cleaning up. How stupid it is that we had to stall our work because of cleaning? What the Prime Minsiter saw isn’t the real Fukushima Daiichi.

I know at the time we got the Tokyo Olympics, Prime Minister Abe said, 'We’ve got the situation under control,' but I really wonder what he’s talking about. On the contrary, I think the workers that the general contractors have assembled (at Fukushima Daiichi) will eventually be taken away for Olympic-related construction. *Prime Minister Abe is really too irresponsible.*

*Worker B:* As for contaminated water leaking from the tank, there's no way to tell once it starts raining. I can't tell the difference if it's leaked water or just rainwater. As for the underground water, I can't even imagine. There's a lot of water in the gutter that clearly looks irradiated, but at first glance, it just looks like regular water.

Often I see the news report how many tons of contaminated water was leaking, but the number reported in the news is too low. When the hurricane recently landed, the huge amount of rain nearly caused the water in the gutter to leak, so we dumped all that in the ocean.* I was chastised for not measuring the radiation levels first, but we purposely don't measure that. Depending on how high that registers, it would be a crime.*
At Fukushima Daiichi, amateurs left to clean up the mess | Vancouver Observer

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## ENT

*TEPCO Finally Admits Landslide At Fukushima Daiichi 10 Days Later*
October 26th, 2013                                                                                                                                                     

TEPCO is now admitting publicly, a landslide at the plant that happened 10 days ago. We first heard of the landslide last week from former workers at the plant. The landslide happened as typhoon Wipha passed over the plant dumping considerable rainfall. The blocked road is one of the main roads into the plant. This shows not just the considerable vulnerability at Fukushima Daiichi, but at nuclear plants around Japan.

Nuclear plants such as Oi have only one road in and out of the plant. A landslide could make those plants inaccessible. In September a landslide did just that at the Monju nuclear plant.

This risk is largely unaddressed at Japan’s nuclear reactors, a plant could have access completely cut off during a disaster. This long delay in admission by TEPCO is another reminder how there is an utter lack of transparency and that much goes on at the plant without public knowledge.
TEPCO Finally Admits Landslide At Fukushima Daiichi 10 Days Later | SimplyInfo

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## ENT

Just to follow on from the shortage of sardines this year along the west coast of America;


----
Stunning vision has emerged of more than 2000 sea lions as well as about 30 humpback whales feasting on schooling anchovies off California's central coast.
The video filmed by Captain Tiffany Thomas on a Marine Life Studies expedition in Monterey Bay this week captured the humpbacks feeding cheek-to-cheek with about 2000 sea lions on the local delicacy.

In the footage, the sea lion pack moves quickly, surfacing and diving below the water again in near-perfect synchronisation.

Meanwhile, their giant counterparts lay their claim nearby, sending spurts of water tall into the air as they calmly navigate the water.

"This is so cool," an unidentified woman squeals in the background, as "Whiskie" the whale-spotting dog barks warily at the pack.

Marine Life Studies founder Peggy Strap said the bay had seen an influx of whale activity over recent months, with as many as 50 to 100 humpbacks calling in on any given day, along with thousands of sea lions.

"[Tuesday] was the most sea lions grouped together that we had observed," she said.

"It appeared as if you could walk across them they were so tightly bunched. It was an amazing sight to behold."

Marine Life Studies is a non-profit group advocating the protection of whales and dolphins, according to its website.

Whale, sea lion feeding frenzy filmed

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## ENT

*Fukushima nuclear plant set for risky operation*


A task of extraordinary delicacy and danger is about to begin at Japan's Fukushima nuclear power station.
Engineers are preparing to extract the first of thousands of nuclear fuel rods from one of the wrecked reactor buildings.

This is seen as an essential but risky step on the long road towards stabilising the site.

The fuel rods are currently in a precarious state in a storage pool in Unit 4.
This building was badly damaged by an explosion in March 2011 following the Great Tohoku earthquake and tsunami.

Moving the rods to safety is a high priority but has only become possible after months of repair work and planning.
One senior official told me: "It's going to be very difficult but it has to happen."

When I visited Fukushima eight months ago, reactor building 4 was in a terrible state: a shattered concrete skeleton, terrifying to look at.
Today it has been transformed. A massive steel structure now envelopes the old building. Inside, I was able to look down into the deep green water of the cooling pool.

Clearly visible were the 1,500 uranium fuel rods - packed tightly together. Engineers have spent months carefully removing rubble and other debris from inside the pool.

Last month they did their *first test, successfully pulling out one of the four-metre-long fuel assemblies*. Now they say they are nearly ready to begin removing the rest.

It will be a difficult and delicate task and will take at least a year. But getting the 400 tonnes of radioactive fuel out of here into safe storage will be the first major step on the long road to making Fukushima safe.
The fuel rods are four-metre long tubes containing pellets of uranium fuel and the fear is that some may have been damaged during the disaster.

When the tsunami struck the Japanese coast, the flood swamped the diesel generators providing back up power to the reactors. Three of the reactors went into a state of partial meltdown.
By coincidence, Unit 4 was undergoing maintenance, so all of its fuel rods were being stored. But the meltdown of a neighbouring reactor led to a build-up of hydrogen which is believed to have led to the explosion in Unit 4.

In the days after the tsunami, there were fears that the blast had damaged Unit 4's storage pool and, in desperation, the authorities used helicopters and fire hoses to keep it filled with water.
A guiding principle of nuclear safety is that the fuel is kept underwater at all times - contact with the air risks overheating and triggering a release that could spread contamination.

So the operation to remove the rods will be painstaking.

A senior official in the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) told me that the rod assemblies will be lifted out in batches of 22 and in casks filled with water.
This will be done with a new crane, recently installed in the wrecked building, after the original one was destroyed.

*Unit 4*
Moving the rods has only become possible after months of repair work and planning
The task of removing each batch will take 7-10 days, I understand.

Two critically important issues are whether the rods themselves are damaged and therefore likely to leak and whether the casks remain watertight to ensure the rods have no contact with the air.
The METI official acknowledged the risks including a possible "release of radiation" from the fuel or if the casks holding the fuel are dropped.

He said that "countermeasures" have been prepared - including back-up wires to hold the loads and mechanisms to hold the fuel in the event of a power failure.

A briefing document released by the site's owners, Tepco, spells out a series of safety systems designed to minimize the dangers.
For example, the fuel pond itself has been strengthened while the new crane can handle loads of one tonne while the fuel cask only weighs 450kg.

*Previous Fukushima problems*

21 Oct: Radioactive water overflows a containment barrier after heavy rain
7 Oct A plant worker accidentally switches off power to pumps used for cooling damaged reactors
3 Oct Tepco says there is a radioactive water leak after workers overfill a storage tank
21 Aug Japan's nuclear agency upgrades Fukushima alert level
20 Aug Tepco says 300 tonnes of radioactive water has leaked from a storage tank into the ground
July Tepco for the first time admits radioactive water is going into the sea
June Tepco says radioactive water leaking from a storage tank to the ground
April Tepco suspects a fresh radioactive water leak at Fukushima
March Tepco suspects a rodent may have been behind a power cut that shut down cooling systems
Dec 2011 Contaminated water leaks from a treatment system, caused by a crack in the foundation
Collision tests, it is said, have shown that even if the fuel cask is dropped, it may be deformed but its seals will not be broken.

*The fuel rods will then be deposited into a new "common" pool with a cooling system.*

According to the METI official, "*the common pool is planned to be used over a long period, supposedly for 10 to 20 years, and will be reinforced against possible future earthquakes and tsunamis".*

The Tepco document says the rods will be checked for signs of damage - large amounts of debris fell into the pool during the disaster so the risks are real.
It says that checks for corrosion have found only minor signs so far - with "no corrosion affecting fuel integrity".

But only when the operation begins will engineers get a detailed look at the rods and a chance to assess their state.

One senior figure in Japan's nuclear watchdog told me: "Inspections by camera show that the rods look OK but we're not sure if they're damaged - you never know."
He said Unit 4 presented particular dangers because its entire stock of fuel rods was in the pool at the time of the accident.

If the operation goes as planned, attention will then focus on the massive challenges posed by Units 1, 2 and 3.

According to the METI official, the latest investigations have shown that despite the meltdowns experienced by each reactor, their temperatures have now stabilised.

In Units 1 and 2, readings show the presence of water in what's called the primary containment vessel - suggesting that the melted fuel rods have not penetrated that safety barrier.
*The radiation level is too high in Unit 3 for that kind of examination to be carried out* but using data from the reactor pressure vessel the official assumes that water is also present in the primary containment.

*Meanwhile, the site continues to be plagued by leaks of radioactive water flowing into the Pacific Ocean.*

Tepco will not confirm the precise timing of the fuel rod operation but after so much public outrage at the company's handling of the crisis so far, scrutiny of this latest episode will be intense.

BBC News - Fukushima nuclear plant set for risky operation

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## Mid

*Plumes of Mysterious Steam rise from Crippled Fukushima Nuclear Reactor*
Russia Today
 January 03, 2014

 
_Fresh plumes of most probably radioactive steam have been  detected rising from the reactor 3 building at the crippled Fukushima  nuclear plant, said the facilitys operator company._

_The steam has been detected by surveillance cameras and appeared  to be coming from the fifth floor of the mostly-destroyed building  housing crippled reactor 3, according to Tokyo Electric Power Co  (TEPCO), the plants operator._ 

 The steam was first spotted on December 19 for a short period of time, then again on December 24, 25, 27, according to a report TEPCO published on its website.

 The company, responsible for the cleanup of the worst nuclear  disaster since Chernobyl, has not explained the source of the steam or  the reason it is rising from the reactor building. High levels of  radiation have complicated entry into the building and further  inspection of the situation.



Three of the plants reactors suffered a nuclear meltdown in March  2011 after the Great East Japan Earthquake and resulting tsunami hit the  region. The plant is comprised of six separate water boiling reactors.  At the time of the earthquake, reactor number 4 had been de-fueled and  reactors 5 and 6 were in cold shutdown for planned maintenance, thereby  managing to avoid meltdowns.

 Unlike the other five reactors, reactor 3 ran on mixed core  containing both uranium fuel and mixed uranium and plutonium oxide, or  MOX nuclear fuel. The Reactor 3 fuel storage pond still houses an  estimated 89 tons of the plutonium-based MOX nuclear fuel composed of  514 fuel rods.

 In a similar incident, small amounts of steam escaped from the  reactor 3 building in July 2013, Asahi Shimbun reported. However it was  unclear where the steam came from. TEPCO said that radiation levels did  not change, adding that the steam could have been caused by rain that  found its way to the primary containment of the reactor, and because  this vessel was still hot, the water evaporated. On 23 July the steam  was seen again coming out of the fifth floor just above the reactor  containment, the Japanese newspaper reported.

 In November, TEPCO, responsible for the decommissioning of the plant,  began the highly risky removal of over 1,500 potentially damaged  nuclear fuel rods from reactor 4. The reactor is the most unstable part  of the plant as it was offline at the time of the 2011 catastrophe and  its core didnt go into meltdown. Instead, hydrogen explosions blew the  roof off the building and severely damaged the structure.One of the most  dangerous operations attempted in nuclear history was a success as a  total of 22 assemblies containing 50 to 70 fuel rods have been  transported to a new storage place. While the extraction of the fuel  rods is a significant challenge for TEPCO, a more complex task of  removing the cores of the stricken reactors is yet to come.

globalresearch.ca

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## Troy

^ More scaremongering?

*Fukushima Daiichi Unit  3 is not going to explode*

Steam heat?  What is happening at Fukushima Daiichi?
 Beginning on Monday December 30, 2013, the Internet has been flooded  with conjecture claiming that Fukushima Daiichi Unit 3 is ready to  explode.  Fairewinds Energy Education has been inundated with questions  about the very visible steam emanating from Fukushima Daiichi Unit 3.   Our research, and discussions with other scientists, confirms that what  we are seeing is a phenomenon that has been occurring at the Daiichi  site since the March 2011 accident. 
 It is winter and it is cold through out much of the northern  hemisphere.  Hot water vapor has been released daily by each of the four  Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plants since the accident.  We believe  that is one of the reasons TEPCO placed covers over Daiichi 4 and 1.   Sometimes the steam [hot water vapor] is visible and sometimes it is  not.  If you have been outside on a cold winter day, you have personally  experienced that phenomenon when you see the breath you exhale form a  cloud in the cold air.  The technical explanation is that hot water  vapor becomes visible when it comes in contact with cold air and  condenses.  During the winter months in the Fukushima Prefecture, the  sea air is cold and moist, thus forming the ideal conditions to see the  released steam.


Fukushima Daiichi Unit 3 is not going to explode | Fairewinds Energy Education

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## Neo

February 22, 2015 4:26 AM                         *

Crippled Fukushima Plant Just Leaked Radiation 70 Times What is Normal*

Fukushima is Japan's radiation nightmare that just  won't go away. Ever since March 11th, 2011, the damaged plant has been  riddled with leaks and cleanup setbacks. Now Tepco, the operator of the  damaged facility, says they've recorded spikes between 50-70 times above  average readings in the gutters that pour water into a nearby bay.

Tepco detected the readings yesterday at about 10am local time, or one in the morning for us. The Japan Times has more of the finer details and eye-popping numbers behind this new leak:The  levels of beta ray-emitting substances, such as strontium-90, measured  5,050 to 7,230 becquerels per litre of water between 10:20 a.m. and  10:50 a.m. Tepco requires radioactivity levels of groundwater at the  plant discharged into the sea to remain below 5 becquerels.Officials  say they've shut the gutter so contaminated water won't leak into the  Pacific Ocean as they continue monitoring the situation. Later in the  day, the leak continued but fell dramatically to only 10 to 20 times  regular readings. AFP reports that this new problem joins a litany of other leaks (seriously, it's been a bunch) as Japan and Tepco continue to struggle with decommissioning the damaged plant.

Not all hope is lost. The International Atomic Energy Agency recently gave Tepco a thumbs up for its clean up efforts just four days ago, but clearly some vulnerabilities remain. [AFP]

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## misskit

*Japan’s Nuclear Reactors Remain Offline 4 Years After Fukushima Meltdown*

SEOUL—
In Japan thousands of people are still homeless and all of the nation’s nuclear reactors are still offline, four years after a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami caused the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl. Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has promised a five-year reconstruction plan for the areas still devastated by the disaster, but he remains a nuclear energy advocate despite strong public opposition.

More than 120,000 residents who lived within 20 kilometers of Japan’s Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Fukushima were evacuated in March of 2011 after the damaged nuclear plant started leaking radiation.

These nuclear refugees still cannot return home because of high radiation levels, and they still worry about suffering from long-term health implications like cancer due to the radiation exposure.

Professor Jeff Kingston, the director of Asian Studies at Temple University Japan, said they have come to symbolize the danger of nuclear power.

“These people all understand very well about the myth of safety that the government and utilities have propagated over preceding decades,” said Kingston.

Prime Minister Abe vowed this week to come up with a new-five year plan to rebuild the Pacific coastal region that was ravaged by the tsunami. The government has reportedly already spent $50 billion in the hardest hit areas.

Japan has allocated more than $15 billion for a project to lower radiation in towns near the plant where radioactive trash is being kept in 88,000 temporary storage facilities.

Tokyo also plans to build a more permanent nuclear storage facility near the plant, despite opposition from some residents.

After the Fukushima disaster, all of Japan’s 48 nuclear reactors were shut down.  They remain closed because of safety concerns and because opinion polls indicate more than 60 percent of the public now oppose nuclear energy.

Yet Abe, who recently won re-election by a wide margin, remains a nuclear power supporter. Professor Kingston said the prime minister’s unpopular stand was somewhat calculated in that it garnered him the support of business leaders with vested interests in the nuclear industry.

“Some people will suffer a great deal if the nuclear power plants are not restarted.  And those people are extremely influential in the corridors of power, and Prime Minister Abe is their man,” said Kingston.

Since 2012 solar energy production has increased to the point that it now produces the equivalent of 11 nuclear reactors. But the country now relies on imports of fossil fuels for 90 percent of its electricity production. Oil and gas until recently were significantly more expensive than nuclear power.

Tomoko Murakami, a nuclear energy analyst with the Institute of Energy Economics Japan, said the nation’s reliance on fossil fuels is a grave energy security concern, given the wide-ranging price fluctuations of these fuels and concerns over stability in many oil-producing countries.

“Too much import of natural gas would be quite high risk for, quite a high risk exposure for Japanese utilities,” said Murakami.

She said despite the risks, nuclear energy gave Japan a sense of energy security.  But for a majority of Japanese, in the wake of the Fukushima disaster, the costs and risks of nuclear power appear to outweigh the security of energy independence.

Japan?s Nuclear Reactors Remain Offline 4 Years After Fukushima Meltdown

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## BobR

^  Japan is lucky oil has collapsed in price at about the same time the Yen has fallen 30-40% against the petro Dollar.  With no oil of their own, it's only a matter of time before they have to put them back online.

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## Hans Mann



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## rickschoppers

We continue to do a good job of fvcking up the world. There is still radioactive material leaking into the ocean from the disabled power plant. Sad.

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## billy the kid

have noticed tuna steaks in supermarkets in UK at half their usual price.

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## Storekeeper

https://www.stripes.com/news/pacific...0#.WXU7t4iGPcs

*Robot finds likely melted fuel heap inside Fukushima reactor*

"Images captured by an underwater robot showed massive  deposits believed to be melted nuclear fuel covering the floor of a  damaged reactor at Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant. 

The robot found large amounts of solidified lava-like rocks and lumps  in layers as thick as 1 meter (3 feet) on the bottom inside of a main  structure called the pedestal that sits underneath the core inside the  primary containment vessel of Fukushima's Unit 3 reactor, said the  plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co.

On Friday, the robot spotted suspected debris of melted fuel for the  first time since the 2011 earthquake and tsunami caused multiple  meltdowns and destroyed the plant. The three-day probe of Unit 3 ended  Saturday.

Locating and analyzing the fuel debris and damage in each of the plant's  three wrecked reactors is crucial for decommissioning the plant. The  search for melted fuel in the two other reactors has so far been  unsuccessful because of damage and extremely high radiation levels.

During this week's probe, cameras mounted on the robot showed extensive  damage caused by the core meltdown, with fuel debris mixed with broken  reactor parts, suggesting the difficult challenges ahead in the  decades-long decommissioning of the destroyed plant.

TEPCO spokesman Takahiro Kimoto said it would take time to analyze the  debris in the images to figure out debris removal methods".

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## misskit

Spooky

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