Okay, 50 miles? Say what?
The original radius was 8-10km, and they bumped that up to 20km, which is 12.4 miles. You may not be the source of the hysteria, but it’s still hysteria.
They scanned 19,000 people and found 38 with “higher than average,” but non-hazardous, levels of radiation - 2/10ths of one percent.
I wonder how much useful work in restoring food, water, and shelter could have been done in the time spent on the hysterical scanning of nearly 20,000 people to no meaningful benefit?
That's a really great question. Between the Japanese trying to save face while trying to save their people from two simultaneous catastrophes, and the media absolutely whoring themselves for as much abusive reporting as they could get away with - and completely ignoring getting the necessary facts out to the right people - it is a wonder anybody was recovered or anything was put to rights at all.
Post-catastrophe Japan is a catastrophe. The humans are at fault.
"They scanned 19,000 people and found 38 with “higher than average,” but non-hazardous, levels of radiation - 2/10ths of one percent. I wonder how much useful work in restoring food, water, and shelter could have been done in the time spent on the hysterical scanning of nearly 20,000 people to no meaningful benefit?"The "non-hazardous level of radiation" is likely misleading to a lot of people, because they are probably talking about the equivalent gamma ray dosage the affected people would receive from being contaminated with low-level radioactive contamination. While the equivalent rad exposure from being contaminated can be low, actually ingesting or inhaling radioactive particles can produce significantly higher cumulative exposure over time. Stuff like beta or alpha radiation which is hardmless when it is a particle stuck to your skin, but can be very dangerous if it is embedded in your lungs or other tissues and is irradiating those tissues continuously over years. This is why there was a need to scan these people and properly decontaminate them.
The Americans and the British told their people to evacuate up to 50 miles away. It is other countries leaders that have shown a greater worry in public than the Japanese.
Which is rather unprecedented in crisis situations. It has made for some rather strange international politics if you watch that sort of thing. Things are happening behind the scenes that I would love to know more about...do the EU countries and the Americans know more about how dangerous the situation is or is it just nuclear politics at play.