Posted on 03/15/2011 8:13:35 AM PDT by SE Mom
Latest news from Japan:
From the BBC-
1456: Tepco says it may start pouring water from a helicopter over Fukushima Daiichi's reactor four in the next few days, to cool the spent-fuel pool.
1439: A 30km (18 mile) no-fly zone is in place around Fukushima, says the IAEA.
1436: The IAEA says Monday's blast at Fukushima may have affected the integrity of the containment vessel - there are fears of more serious radioactive leaks if happen.
1435: Following earlier reports, it appears there has been more than one strong aftershock in Japan - AP reports two tremors measuring over 6.0 within three minutes of each other.
Twitter-
-US Geological Survey counts 451 aftershocks since the initial earthquake struck Japan Friday. 238 of them registered magnitude 5.0 or more.
-Despite situations in Japan & Libya, spksmn Jay Carney says Pres Obama's 5-day trip to Brazil, Chile & El Salvador starting Fri night is on.
-FLASH: More U.S. military personnel in Japan testing positive for low-levels of radiation, relief missions to continue - Navy 18 minutes ago via web
My thoughts exactly.
They may be hitting the wall now, however, because of another national trait, which is extreme reluctance to pass bad news up the line.
Managers may not be getting the information necessary to handle the situation.
From Reuters Live Blog:
The U.N. nuclear watchdog chief said there might be limited core damage at the No. 2 unit of the Fukushima power plant.
Yukiya Amano, director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, told a news conference that there was a “possibility of core damage” at unit 2. “The damage is estimated to be less than 5 pct.”
5%?? Is that the amount of the core they believe may have melted?
Looking at all of the video over the last few days has caused me to imagine how they'll go about disposing of all the wreckage. I see big holes in the ground, and even whole valleys being filled in with debris, and salted with lime.
Comes a point where you have to protect the living, and do what must be done.
We will surely see a similar thing happen in this disaster. With that much carnage and destruction, it's a certainty that many bodies will never be found.
ping to #45
Waters in the easter Pacific do not get warm enough to support tropical cyclones.
I'm not sure they're exactly the same thing Bunny. In 2004 the earthquake happened far out at sea, indonesia? Then the tsunami hit.
Here the earthquake hit, brought down the buildings on a lot of people that can't be gotten to now, then the wave hit.
Just saying that there might be a lot of bodies under all that rubble that won't be found for weeks or months yet.
From WIKI:
Dose Benchmarks
* Living near a nuclear power station = less than 0.01 mSv/year
* Chest x-ray = 0.04 mSv[1]
* Cosmic radiation (from sky) at sea level = 0.24 mSv/year[1]
* Terrestrial radiation (from ground) = 0.28 mSv/year[1]
* Mammogram = 0.30 mSv[1]
* Natural radiation in the human body = 0.40 mSv/year[1]
* Brain CT scan = 0.8–5 mSv[2]
* Typical individual’s natural background radiation: 2 mSv/year; 1.5 mSv/year for Australians, 3 mSv/year for Americans[3]
* Radon in the average US home = 2 mSv/year[1]
* Chest CT scan = 6–18 mSv[2]
* Average American’s total radiation exposure: 6.2 mSv/year[4]
* New York-Tokyo flights for airline crew: 9mSv/year [3]
* Smoking 1.5 packs/day = 13 mSv/year[5]
* Gastrointestinal series X-ray investigation = 14 mSv[1]
* Current average limit for nuclear workers: 20 mSv/year[3]
* Background radiation in parts of Iran, India and Europe: 50 mSv/year[3]
* Lowest clearly carcinogenic level: 100 mSv/year[3]
* Criterion for relocation after Chernobyl disaster: 350 mSv/lifetime[3]
Symptom Benchmarks
Effects to humans of acute radiation (within one day):[6]
* 0–0.25 Sv: None
* 0.25–1 Sv: Some people feel nausea and loss of appetite; bone marrow, lymph nodes, spleen damaged.
* 1–3 Sv: Mild to severe nausea, loss of appetite, infection; more severe bone marrow, lymph node, spleen damage; recovery probable, not assured.
* 3–6 Sv: Severe nausea, loss of appetite; hemorrhaging, infection, diarrhea, skin peels, sterility; death if untreated.
* 6–10 Sv: Above symptoms plus central nervous system impairment; death expected.
* Above 10 Sv: Incapacitation and death.
Temperatures appeared to be rising in the spent fuel pools at two other reactors at the plant, No. 5 and No. 6, said Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary.
It's very sad, but crews working these areas are probably going to have to do what they can to bury or cremate the bodies that turn up, right where they find them.
The infrastructure to handle this just doesn't exist.
And not just people. How many dogs, cats, fish washed in, cows and chickens are laying around as well?
Japan’s earthquake happened at sea and was shallow. But Japan was far more prepared and the buildings were more stable.
The scenario in quake/tsunamis is that the quake breaks up or destablizes the building. But the tsunami does the major damage by denuding the landscape.
I see them as very similar but the point being that there will probably be about the same percentage of missing persons in the end. But, there are definately a lot of deceased in all the debris.
That is the best summary of the situation I’ve seen. Repeating the link here: http://bravenewclimate.com/2011/03/15/fukushima-15-march-summary/
http://english.pravda.ru/news/hotspots/14-03-2011/117189-0/
Japanese rescue workers run out of body bags
14.03.2011 | Source: Pravda.Ru
A tide of bodies has washed up along Japan's coastline, crematoriums are overwhelmed and rescue workers have run out of body bags as the nation faces the grim reality of a mounting humanitarian, economic and nuclear crisis after its tsunami and earthquake. Millions of people were facing a fourth night without water, food or heating in near-freezing temperatures in the north-east devastated by an earthquake and the tsunami wave it spawned.
Meanwhile, a third reactor at a nuclear power plant lost its cooling capacity and the fuel rods at another were at least briefly fully exposed, raising fears of a meltdown. The stock market plunged over the likelihood of huge losses by Japanese industries including big names such as Toyota and Honda, The Press Association says.
In Japan most people opt to cremate their dead, a process that, like burial, requires permission first from local authorities. But the government took the rare step today of waiving the paperwork to speed up funerals.
A Health Ministry spokesman said: “The current situation is so extraordinary, and it is very likely that crematoriums are running beyond capacity.
This is an emergency measure. We want to help quake-hit people as much as we can.”, Independent reports.
Good point. Many of the areas that were decimated are farming communities. There's a chance that the animal population outnumbered the humans in those areas.
The Japanese authorities going to have to make some hard choices about this issue very soon.
If Yellowstone blows you probably won't even have time to bend over and kiss your a$$ goodbye! ;^)
Note that the spent fuel pool seems to be the most significant problem.
I also note that American nuclear plant have to keep their spent fuel in spent fuel pools because the Obama administration stopped all work on an underground storage facility at Yucca mountain
News media - see, I can play the game of opportunism too.
There is one thing nobody has talked about, I know for a fact that Japan has created tsunami berms, gates and flood channels as it was on several documentaries, but was there any of this type of infrastructure built along the bays in this area?
The images I saw were of massive tall flood gates at least 30 feet tall, these I don’t know where were built, my guess is they were further south.
Thanks- I’m all for learning all sides of this story- I’m just furious at the Henny Penny Gang and the It’s Nothing Gang because their agendas block the truth and it’s immoral to provide the public (uneducated about nuclear energy as many of us are) with distorted information.
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