Update on Japanese nuclear plant disaster

[glenn kangiser]

You got it, Scott.... I am going to keep an eye on them anyway....

[Windpower]

http://counterpunch.org/takashi03222011.html

snip from interview

Yoh: Tepco [Tokyo Electric Power Company, owner/operator of the nuclear plants] says they expect to bring in a high voltage line this evening.

Hirose: Yes, there's a little bit of hope there.  But what's worrisome is that a nuclear reactor is not like what the schematic pictures show (shows a graphic picture of a reactor, like those used on TV).  This is just a cartoon.  Here's what it looks like underneath a reactor container (shows a photograph).  This is the butt end of the reactor.  Take a look.  It's a forest of switch levers and wires and pipes.  On television these pseudo-scholars come on and give us simple explanations, but they know nothing, those college professors.  Only the engineers know.  This is where water has been poured in.  This maze of pipes is enough to make you dizzy.  Its structure is too wildly complex for us to understand. For a week now they have been pouring water through there.  And it's salt water, right?  You pour salt water on a hot kiln and what do you think happens?  You get salt. The salt will get into all these valves and cause them to freeze.  They won't move.  This will be happening everywhere.  So I can't believe that it's just a simple matter of you reconnecting the electricity and the water will begin to circulate.  I think any engineer with a little imagination can understand this.  You take a system as unbelievably complex as this and then actually dump water on it from a helicopter – maybe they have some idea of how this could work, but I can't understand it.

Yoh:  It will take 1300 tons of water to fill the pools that contain the spent fuel rods in reactors 3 and 4.  This morning 30 tons.  Then the Self Defense Forces are to hose in another 30 tons from five trucks.  That's nowhere near enough, they have to keep it up.  Is this squirting of water from hoses going to change the situation?

Hirose:  In principle, it can't.  Because even when a reactor is in good shape, it requires constant control to keep the temperature down to where it is barely safe.  Now it's a complete mess inside, and when I think of the 50 remaining operators, it brings tears to my eyes.  I assume they have been exposed to very large amounts of radiation, and that they have accepted that they face death by staying there.  And how long can they last?  I mean, physically.  That's what the situation has come to now.  When I see these accounts on television, I want to tell them, "If that's what you say, then go there and do it yourself!"  Really, they talk this nonsense, trying to reassure everyone, trying to avoid panic.  What we need now is a proper panic.  Because the situation has come to the point where the danger is real. 

If I were Prime Minister Kan, I would order them to do what the Soviet Union did when the Chernobyl reactor blew up, the sarcophagus solution, bury the whole thing under cement, put every cement company in Japan to work, and dump cement over it from the sky.  Because you have to assume the worst case.  Why?  Because in Fukushima there is the Daiichi Plant with six reactors and the Daini Plant with four for a total of ten reactors.  If even one of them develops the worst case, then the workers there must either evacuate the site or stay on and collapse.  So if, for example, one of the reactors at Daiichi goes down, the other five are only a matter of time.  We can't know in what order they will go, but certainly all of them will go.  And if that happens, Daini isn't so far away, so probably the reactors there will also go down.  Because I assume that workers will not be able to stay there.

[considerations]

Today officials are saying don't let babies drink the tap water in Tokyo....many many miles south of the troubled nuclear plant.

http://www.seattlepi.com/business/1310ap_as_japan_earthquake.html

Things are getting pretty grim I think.

[John Raabe]

Thanks for that article Windpower. It's an eye opener.

[glenn kangiser]

Thanks, Windpower. That is more what I pictured than the stories we usually hear.

I am wondering if the cooling pumps are in a separate building?  Seems I read something about that.

[Sassy]

I get updates - now everyday, from the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists - they are very conservative & pro-nuclear power as you would imagine by the title.  So, you have to keep that in mind on their reports.  They used to only send out a bulletin about once a week until the tragedy in Japan. 

http://www.thebulletin.org/web-edition/columnists/tatsujiro-suzuki/daily-update-japan

[glenn kangiser]

200 foot concrete pump truck headed to Japan, Courtesy China and their Saudi Arabian customer.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2011-03/22/c_13791992.htm

[Windpower]

200 foot concrete pump truck headed to Japan, Courtesy China and their Saudi Arabian customer.

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2011-03/22/c_13791992.htm

About time

I hope it isn't too late

[John Raabe]

That may be the best solution - bury it all in concrete. It's not like you can take that stuff to the recycling yard. 

With nuclear energy when you make a mistake it's not just a little Booboo, it's a planetary level affliction. You kill people you've never met and children yet to be born.

[MushCreek]

I've read that things went badly today, with workers getting burned by water that was highly radioactive. They're now thinking there must be more damage than they first suspected. Not good.

[Sassy]

Also, extending the evacuation area... 

[Texas Tornado]

http://blog.imva.info/medicine/danger-concern-sanity

[Windpower]

I was wondering what was with the blue tarp covering the burned engineers as  they walked them to the ambulance

now I think it was to keep them from filming just how sick they already were --- peeling skin, severe nausea

understandably that could cause panic


I read that those poor workers were exposed to 3 to 6 Sieverts ---

from wiki

Symptoms of acute radiation (within one day):[19]

0 – 0.25 Sv (0 – 250 mSv): None
0.25 – 1 Sv (250 – 1000 mSv): Some people feel nausea and loss of appetite; bone marrow, lymph nodes, spleen damaged.
1 – 3 Sv (1000 – 3000 mSv): Mild to severe nausea, loss of appetite, infection; more severe bone marrow, lymph node, spleen damage; recovery probable, not assured.
3 – 6 Sv (3000 – 6000 mSv): Severe nausea, loss of appetite; hemorrhaging, infection, diarrhea, peeling of skin, sterility; death if untreated.
6 – 10 Sv (6000 – 10000 mSv): Above symptoms plus central nervous system impairment; death expected.
Above 10 Sv (10000 mSv): Incapacitation and death.


It certainly does not look like things are improving

Video of reactor buildings taken 3/27/11

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p_T0M5nz_tg&feature=player_embedded

[Sassy]

We had some Japanese students visit our church over the weekend.  They all said their families were safe & not having any problems where they were at.  Hopefully that is true. 

[Windpower]

This is not improving

I do not understand why they are not entombing these things


http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn20285-fukushima-radioactive-fallout-nears-chernobyl-levels.html

Japan's damaged nuclear plant in Fukushima has been emitting radioactive iodine and caesium at levels approaching those seen in the aftermath of the Chernobyl accident in 1986. Austrian researchers have used a worldwide network of radiation detectors – designed to spot clandestine nuclear bomb tests – to show that iodine-131 is being released at daily levels 73 per cent of those seen after the 1986 disaster. The daily amount of caesium-137 released from Fukushima Daiichi is around 60 per cent of the amount released from Chernobyl.



And this from the New York Times:
 
"A senior nuclear executive who insisted on anonymity but has broad contacts in Japan said that there was a long vertical crack running down the side of the reactor vessel itself. The crack runs down below the water level in the reactor and has been leaking fluids and gases, he said....
 
"There is a definite, definite crack in the vessel - it's up and down and it's large," he said. "The problem with cracks is they do not get smaller." (Thanks to Washington's Blog)

[Windpower]

If I Had the Ear of the Prime Minister, I Would Recommend the "Chernobyl Option"
Michio Kaku on March 15, 2011, 12:17 PM

http://bigthink.com/ideas/31617



then again maybe concrete is not the  answer according to Dr Tom Burnett


"Fukushima is going to dwarf Chenobyl. The Japanese government has had a level 7 nuclear disaster going for almost a week but won't admit it.

The disaster is occurring the opposite way than Chernobyl, which exploded and stopped the reaction. At Fukushima, the reactions are getting worse. I suspect three nuclear piles are in meltdown and we will probably get some of it.

If reactor 3 is in meltdown,  the concrete under the containment looks like lava. But Fukushima is not far off the water table. When that molten mass of self-sustaining nuclear material gets to the water table it won't simply cool down. It will explode – not a nuclear explosion, but probably enough to involve the rest of the reactors and fuel rods at the facility."

more here:

http://hawaiinewsdaily.com/2011/03/when-the-fukushima-meltdown-hits-groundwater/



Here is a radiation dose chart linked in the above news article

http://xkcd.com/radiation/

[peternap]

We had some Japanese students visit our church over the weekend.  They all said their families were safe & not having any problems where they were at.  Hopefully that is true. 

I'm not nearly as well versed as you in medical matters Sassy, but isn't the real danger long term? Those people that feel safe can be soaking up poison in the air, water and food and not know it for a long time, can't they?

I wish I had a nickle for every time the Government says "It's safe"...and it wasn't.

[glenn kangiser]

I have the same thoughts, Peter. 

I don't think they are as safe as their government tells them.  I hope I am wrong.  I talked to a couple of our Japanese student friends this last weekend.  I wish I was sure they are safe.

[Sassy]

Yes, it is long term depending on the amount of radiation they are exposed to.  I read at least a week ago that some of the workers had already died from exposure (don't have the link) - it causes hemorrhaging, blisters, all kinds of nasty stuff - the radiation damages the body faster than it can repair itself.  So, depending on the dose it can be very short-term - a day or 2 to years where many develop cancers - leukemia, lymphomas or other problems.

It is strange, but in our xray dept at the hospital there have been 3 people die suddenly of heart attacks in the last 3 yrs - one was in his 40's, the last one was in his early 60's - they wear radiation detector tags that read the accumulated exposure.  Don't know if there is any connection, but it is rather tragic!

In the ER, they take portable xrays all the time - they step away approx 4-6 ft & call out "Xray!" to warn everyone.  We have to take a class every year that goes over the distance vs the amt of radiation & how even a few feet away, it is negligible depending on dose.  We get kinda lax about it as long as we are 4-6 ft away, we feel safe - hopefully that is true...  I can't remember the exact numbers - I think I will pay closer attention the next time I take the class 

[muldoon]

The situation is getting worse.  The news is atrocious, with fear-mongering to nothing to see here move along.  Both sides are ridiculously slanted and it is darn tough to get a good read on the details of what is and is not actually going on. 

I have lost almost all faith in tepco by now.  I do not see much hope in the Japanese gov here either.  I have a bad feeling they are going to just bulldoze it into the sea....  if they don't mess it up worse before...

[ScottA]

We had some floors x-rayed in a building we where working on once. The company that did the work had to have the entire building cleared and locked up before they would do anything. The box with the source was made of lead and a 50' cable attached to activate it, meaning the operator had to be 50' away not 4-6'.

[Windpower]

On the Beach


On the beach, at night,
Stands a child, with her father,
Watching the east, the autumn sky.

Up through the darkness,
While ravening clouds, the burial clouds, in black masses spreading,
Lower, sullen and fast, athwart and down the sky,
Amid a transparent clear belt of ether yet left in the east,
Ascends, large and calm, the lord-star Jupiter;
And nigh at hand, only a very little above,
Swim the delicate brothers, the Pleiades.




http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQBlnwrffAg

[muldoon]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K74BNWQ0bYs

Directed in 1990 by the same man who directed the first godzilla movie. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreams_%281990_film%29

[glenn kangiser]

http://rt.com/usa/news/japan-radiation-usa-rainwater/

[glenn kangiser]

http://enenews.com/radioactive-iodine-131-in-pennsylvania-rainwater-sample-3300-above-federal-drinking-water-standard

Rainwater radiation in PA 3300% above the safe limits but don't worry.... The EPA is considering raising the safe limits.. then there will be no problem.......