We don't have supermen who can go through many feet of concrete and steel and with their bare hands pick up tens of tons of molten, radioactive goo that would kill you in seconds.
According to available information, repeated explosions made the plant uncontrollable and inaccessible. This is big, heavy stuff; you can't send a volunteer with a crowbar to lift a 30" steam pipe and weld it, while it is spewing 1,000 psi of radioactive, superheated steam right in your face. This is when robots come into play - exactly as it happened at Chernobyl. At very least you need bulldozers with lead shielding and a large number of workers, so that they can be swapped out before they get too much radiation damage.
I agree that more effort is required than 50 men for 6 reactors working 72 hr shifts.
IMHO, the owners of the facility have been grossly insufficient in supporting those running the plant or if those operating the plant have insufficiently reported their situation, those to whom they report have failed to take remedial action.
I have no problem with those operators backing out. They appear to have been performing at superhuman levels. IMHO, proper management would have been taking measures to have a proper turnover to the next crew to manage the situation.
The impression given in the press is that they all have now just walked away from a mess.