Was Fukushima a China Syndrome?
http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2011/05/16/was-fukushima-a-china-syndrome/
“Eight months after the Three Mile Island accident, “an Oak Ridge National Laboratory scientist declared, ‘Little, if any, fuel melting occurred, even though the reactor core was uncovered. The safety systems functioned reliably.’ A few years later, robotic sorties into the area revealed that half the core — not ‘little, if any’ — had melted down.””
Btw, the core in Reaction 1 melted down before the venting and the explosion..imagine what was released when those two events happened.
The Tsunami killed 30,000 or so.....what's the toll for the radiation? Make sure to link it....
we don't really have to imagine it. The venting was done because of high pressure in the containment vessel. That high pressure was a clear sign that the fuel was exposed and melting. So we know there was radioactive elements in the steam.
The venting led to an explosion, because there was also hydrogen gas in the vapor. So, we know that the explosion released radiocative particles and isotopes from within the containment vessel, and a good supply of hydrogen gas. A lot of the hydrogen gas was burned off in the explosion.
The venting and explosion were always known to be a result of a meltdown. The only difference is that we now know the meltdown started earlier in the process. It doesn't change what happened in the explostion.