Japan quakes

[saaya]

They will use a watercannon to refill the pool of no4 now
And they are installing power lines to restart the normal cooling system of the plant

[Kal-EL]

Wuts the worst case scenario here for the entire Japan in regards to effected area and environment?

[vitaminc]

Wuts the worst case scenario here for the entire Japan in regards to effected area and environment?

1. It will not have an nuclear bomb type explosion.
2. All 1-6 melt down. Get some French or Russian guys to seal off those melt down completely with cement, lead and steel. Probably 100 miles radius evacuation.

Environment damage is done. Fall out will be regional. Financial implication is much worse. Mizuho (1st or 2nd largest Jp bank) ATM machine stopped working just now.

[Kallenator]

That depends entirely on you Superman!


The worst kind of scenario would probably be radiation leaking into groundwater which is impossible to rinse out and stop?. And more dangerous gasses with particles with a longer halflife being thrown into the air, but that also depends on the weather and how the winds are blowing.

[dctokyo]

The U.S. Embassy in Japan has asked American citizens living within an 80-kilometer radius of the quake-hit Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant in Japan to evacuate as a precautionary measure.

‘‘We are recommending, as a precaution, that American citizens who live within 50 miles (80 kilometers) of the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant evacuate the area or to take shelter indoors if safe evacuation is not practical,’’ the embassy said in the advice issued Thursday.

[FischOderAal]

Yes it is dangerous to drop stuff from helicopter, but in the absence of a better way, it is the only way.

As for the death toll from that incident, the internationally agreed figure is 4000. That 4000 includes people who have not died yet. Greenpeace have said 90,000+ will die/have died but they have an agenda. Some other people put far higher figures but the data has yet to show strong enough trend. Now, birth defects and general sickness... well that is another issue. I could imagine huge numbers all around Europe have been effected.

The number of 4.000 is BS (imho) and was defined in the first Tschernobyl conference in Vienna in August of 1986 by the Western governments. Based on the Hiroshima model they (the russians) estimated 40.000 people dying of cancer as a result of the accident. And the radiation in Hiroshima was less than in Tschernobyl. Of course, the estimation of the russians might not be right but I find it hard to believe that only 4000 people died when some of the workers had bleeding noses after a few minutes and they have been exposed for hours if you add the short intervals.

1. It will not have an nuclear bomb type explosion.

And what happens if the molten core with 2000 °C (or whatever its temperature is) hits ground water? What do you think will happen if a large amount of water gets vapourized in an instance? It might not be like a nuclear bomb, but it still can cause hell of an explosion.

[Loque]

New update from Michio Kaku.. "We're Very Close to the Point of No Return"

He's been right so far :\

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rlZhUi1nhtE

[Neoclasiccl]

cracks in all three; Michio Kaku doesn't look optimistic in that video at all. He definately knows what he is talking about too.

[[XC] riptide]

The number of 4.000 is BS (imho) and was defined in the first Tschernobyl conference in Vienna in August of 1986 by the Western governments. Based on the Hiroshima model they (the russians) estimated 40.000 people dying of cancer as a result of the accident. And the radiation in Hiroshima was less than in Tschernobyl. Of course, the estimation of the russians might not be right but I find it hard to believe that only 4000 people died when some of the workers had bleeding noses after a few minutes and they have been exposed for hours if you add the short intervals.

http://www.unscear.org/unscear/en/chernobyl.html

It's all there mate. hard to argue with. They now say 4000 was overestimate. Latest update is year 2008.

[dctokyo]

Finally some good news

Tokyo Electric is planning to install a temporary electric power source in a bid to recover the function of pumps that send water to the reactor cores and pools, with an official saying the plan has a ‘‘high potential’’ to be successful.

Power supply to the plant may partially resume in the afternoon.

[vitaminc]

And what happens if the molten core with 2000 °C (or whatever its temperature is) hits ground water? What do you think will happen if a large amount of water gets vapourized in an instance? It might not be like a nuclear bomb, but it still can cause hell of an explosion.

Well when you pure water/seawater onto the cores they also fission into hydrogen/oxygen. Except, in open space, there will be no pressure buildup hence less chance of 'explosion' vs. plant 1/3 internal pressure buildup from gas and explode.

But there will be more fall out I guess.

I am never an nuclear expert so its just speculation with my very limited understanding.

[saaya]

they are dropping water on reactor3 with helicopters now
every time water hits the reactor there is steam coming from the building... its HOT down there :S

they will start shooting water at reactor3 and the spent rod pool of reactor4 in a few hours now wtih a water cannon truck...
the pool is 15meters deep and can hold 2000 tons of water, so refilling it will take a long time.
helicopters can drop 7.5tons at a time and are very inaccurate.

i dont get why they didnt repair the electric grid to power on the regular ac driven cooling system right after the tsunami hit...
why are they STARTING to do this now?
they probably could have restored at least partial power to the normal cooling system days ago... :/

and man, that ABC interview is scary...
all 3 reactors have cracks, if there is a steam or hydrogen explosion they will blow, the water will run out, the rods will melt and burn and release a lot of cr4p into the air...
but im really worried about the spent rod pool... if those get too hot and start burning again and release material... thats gonna be a lot worse than whats in the reactors now...

how many tons of fuel rods exactly are we talking here?
the pool holds 2000 tons of water, thats a LOT... even if those pools have a lot of space between the rods in them... thats a lot of rods you can fit in there :S

EDIT: there are 11 firetrucks and 1 police watercannon truck on the way to fukushima now

[dctokyo]

OMG, this just in

The United States authorized the first evacuations of Americans out of Japan, taking a tougher stand on the deepening nuclear crisis and warning U.S. citizens to defer all non-essential travel to any part of the country as unpredictable weather and wind conditions risked spreading radioactive contamination.

Senior State Department official Patrick Kennedy said chartered planes will be brought in to help private American citizens wishing to leave. People face less risk in southern Japan, but changing weather and wind conditions could raise radiation levels elsewhere in the coming days, he said.

[dctokyo]

News update of 14.40 Tokyo
Radiation level unchanged despite choppers dousing nuclear reactor

The radiation level remained unchanged at the troubled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant Thursday morning even after Self-Defense Force helicopters dropped tons of water onto the hardest-hit reactor there, Tokyo Electric Power Co said.

Two copters dumped seawater onto the No. 3 reactor four times shortly before 10 a.m., but the radiation level was unchanged past 10 a.m., the utility said.

[coolhandluke41]

I think some of you may be overacting just a bit...i have lived around 400 miles from
Tschernobyl when that happened and left the country three years later and here I am reading about another human disaster
I hope they get this crap under control ,it's sad that some country's keep building this power plants specially in an earthquake affected areas

[Generic user #2]

And what happens if the molten core with 2000 °C (or whatever its temperature is) hits ground water? What do you think will happen if a large amount of water gets vapourized in an instance? It might not be like a nuclear bomb, but it still can cause hell of an explosion.

lol, less damage than the tsunami and earthquake, thats what....

and they're not that hot atm btw(i'm actually pretty sure thats almost the melting point of the containers).

EDIT: actually, i just realized how weird of a statement that is....dude, they're not going to freaking melt through the ground...

[Loque]

why aren't all nearby countries sending all their available helicopters capable of dumping water ?

[PaganII]

They are using helicopters because there is almost nothing else they can do and they missed the target 3 out of 4 attempts. The firetrucks hopefully will put some nearby cold water on each of the 6 reactors and also the spent fuel storage area one of which (the fuel storage) caught fire because the water leaked out to below the fuel rod level. The concern is 1 of the reactors may get so hot (radioactive) that they won't be able to work on the reactor next to it creating a domino effect.
In Chernobyl they used miners to tunnel underneath the melting core and create a blockage to prevent it from melting thru the earth. And they only had 1 core to deal with.
What they really need is a Dredging Barge to really pump some water on those things. I sincerely hope those fire trucks can help.

[nunchucka]

umm thats like pissing into a bathtub. each tank holds 2000 tons of water... helicopter can drop about 3 tons of water each time? even if they need to do 1/3 of tank to fill it, thats 250 helicopter dumps, each one completely on aim... and thats 1 cooling tank...

[PaganII]

See how high the helicopters drop the water from and how fast they are moving? Not safe for accurate drop. It is a last ditch effort.

News now says they finished power line to the plant.

[p2501]

actually, i just realized how weird of a statement that is....dude, they're not going to freaking melt through the ground...

IF they don't manage to keep up with cooling the molten fuel rods WILL melt through just about anything and ofc will be diluted by this process. Since the steel and concrete at the bottom of the reactor are too thin there's no stopping this goo from reaching ground water. Did you see what happened to the fuel rods in Chernobyl? By the point the liquidators had cleared away enough rubble to check the reactor directly they welded a hole into it's side to check fuel status inside the core. Well, it just wasn't there anymore. It had flown through meters of steel and concrete, lying there as a pile on the bottom plate of the plant, still flowing. The rods will only stop when diluted enough.

This luckily didn't happen yet in Fukushima since they seem to be able to at least keep water flowing to the reactors, but they're working blind as it seems all pressure and water level gauges are now broken.

New power lines reaching the plant are really good news, IF the pumps are still working.

[saaya]

New power lines reaching the plant are really good news, IF the pumps are still working.

they arent, they have to set up new pumps they said on NHK tv... : /

[dctokyo]

Radiation Levels for Fukushima Dai Ichi


Radiation Levels for Tokyo

[Generic user #2]

i'm sure the explosions didn't do any damage to the ground....

i'm also not sure if we're even thinking of chernobyl in the same way. sources i have read said that that chernobyl was STILL RUNNING when the meltdown occured. that is definitely not the case in japan.

[PaganII]

3 of the 6 reactors were running in Japan. Reactor 4 while not running at the time has 130 tons of spent fuel that is dry now. Spent fuel container of reactor 3 is leaking. There is estimated to be over 1,000 tons of fuel ,more spent than unspent, among the 6 reactors. There was only 180 tons of fuel at Chernobyl.