Here is an example of the magnitude of TEPCO’s debacle.
Vanguard owned slightly under 18% of Tepco’s stock in 2010
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/tepco-shares-suspended-after-nationalization-report-billions-capital-flux
Dick Cheney, at one time, had millions and millions and millions in Vanguard.
Nothing nefarious about that.
It just shows one example of why information may not have come out in a timely fashion and why this is not a local event. TEPCO had some BIG shareholders.
I don’t know where the share price is right now but it had at one point dropped 80%. THAT IS A HUGE HIT.
Just blame it on an employee, that’s the ticket
http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/17_04.html
Back-up cooling systems at Fukushima
failed
The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has admitted that the reactors’ back-up cooling systems failed to function after the March 11th earthquake and tsunami.
Tokyo Electric Power Company on Monday revealed the plant’s operation records for the period following the disaster on March 11th.
An emergency condenser system at the Number 1 reactor functioned for less than 10 minutes after the earthquake. The failure lasted for 3 hours.
The utility suspects that workers manually shut down the system as pressure inside the reactor became so low that they were afraid of damage.
Another type of back-up cooling system at the No. 1 and 2 reactors lost power when the tsunami engulfed batteries.
TEPCO is still analyzing the data to assess the failure’s impact on fuel rods.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011 07:31 +0900 (JST)