Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster

[elbows]

Meanwhile they released a second batch of video recordings of the teleconferencing between the site, TEPCO HQ and some other locations. Obviously its in Japanese so I have to rely on journalists to provide information. Check this out in relation to workers:​

​

oh I cannot get the link working right now, site error, will have to post it another time. But in a nutshell it was the site manager getting upset with HQ some days after the disaster for failing to get new staff in to help with the work, complaining about how much radiation some had been exposed to and how long they had been working day & night.​

OK the link is working again for me.

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201212010043

​

Exasperated by his superiors, the manager of the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant rejected orders to send workers back into the crippled plant a week after the disaster struck.​

“My people have been working day and night for eight straight days,” Masao Yoshida barked at officials of Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s head office in Tokyo during a teleconference on March 18, 2011. “And they’ve been going to the site a number of times. They pour water, make checks and add oil periodically. I cannot make them be exposed to even more radiation.”​

​

“All workers are approaching 200 (millisieverts) in exposure or have even topped 200,” Yoshida said. “I cannot tell them to go and connect wires under high radiation.”
Yoshida had asked for an increase in manpower since the accident began. His frustrations over TEPCO’s lack of progress in providing additional support boiled over in the teleconference with the head office.
“If we do the work under a plan with no feasibility, it will end in failure. We cannot do it unless we have thorough help,” he said.
Sakae Muto, an executive vice president at the Tokyo office, could not provide a specific plan for extra help.
“We are now seeking people from a wide range, including former employees, and are planning to figure out the necessary manpower by tomorrow morning,” Muto said. “We will prepare to send those people to you as soon as possible.”

 

[elbows]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-20707753

In the immediate aftermath of the disaster, the foreign media, including the BBC, hailed the men as the "Fukushima 50".

In fact there were never 50 of them. Hundreds of workers stayed at the plant, braving high levels of radiation to bring the reactors under control. Many are still there today.
And yet almost nothing has been heard from them. No awards, no newspaper articles or TV interviews. We don't even know their names.
It took us weeks to track one man down and persuade him to talk to us. Even then, he insisted we could not photograph him or use his name.
We meet on a rainy day at a Tokyo park, far away from any crowds. The young man describes how he and a group of other nuclear workers were sent back in to the plant after the first reactor explosion.
"The person who sent us back didn't give us any explanation," he says. "It felt like we were being sent on a death mission."
I put it to him that what he and his colleagues did was heroic, that they should feel proud. He shakes his head, a slightly anguished look on his face.
"Ever since the disaster, I haven't had a day when I felt good about myself," he says.
"Even when I'm out with friends, it's impossible to feel happy. When people talk about Fukushima, I feel that I am responsible."

His research suggests that half of those who fought the reactor meltdowns are suffering from depression and post-traumatic stress symptoms.
"The workers have been through multiple stresses," Dr Shigemura says.
"They experienced the plant explosions, the tsunami and perhaps radiation exposure. They are also victims of the disaster because they live in the area and have lost homes and family members. And the last thing is the discrimination."
Yes, discrimination. Not only are the workers not being celebrated, they are facing active hostility from some members of the public.
"The workers have tried to rent apartments," says Dr Shigemura. "But landlords turn them down, some have had plastic bottles thrown at them, some have had papers pinned on their apartment door saying 'Get out Tepco'."

"They are not heroes for us," she says. "I feel sorry for them, but I don't see them as heroes. We see them as one block, they work for Tepco, they earned high salaries. The company made a lot of money from nuclear power, and that's what paid for their nice lives."
And that is the final point. Japan is a country where people identify very closely with the company they work for. People here will often introduce themselves with their company name first, and their own only second.
But those close ties between the Fukushima nuclear workers and Tepco are exacting a terrible psychological toll on the men who saved Japan from a much worse nuclear disaster.

 

[two sheds]

Interesting, ta.

People here will often introduce themselves with their company name first, and their own only second.

and slightly scary.

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

Thank you again Mr Elbows, interesting stuff.

Interesting, ta.
and slightly scary.

It's not quite as bad as it sounds. This is usually only the case when on business or something at least related. You can put it on a par with saying "Hi I am from ITV, it's Bob, I'm here to see Mr Lizard."
Or at a convention.
"Hi nice to meet you, I'm bob, I'm from ITV"
Or a dinner party.
"Nice to meet you, my names Bob." . . . a little later.
"So what do you do Bob?"
"I work at ITV."

Not that I am denying that company loyalty and salarymen & Women being worked into the ground in Japan doesn't exist. It does in spades.

 

[two sheds]

This might concentrate Tepco's minds somewhat.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20856051

Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), owner of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, has been sued by eight US sailors over radiation exposure.

They claim that Tepco lied about the threat posed by the leaks after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami damaged the plant.

The sailors were involved in relief operations after the natural disasters.

They have each sought $10m (£6m) in compensatory damages and $30m in punitive damages from Tepco.

The eight, who have filed the case in a US Federal Court in San Diego, also want Tepco to set up a $100m fund to pay for their medical expenses.

Some Japanese workers might want to start their own.

 

[elbows]

There are many small details I could have commented on since I fell silent on this thread but I'm afraid I've been lacking in time this year, and presumed none of them were interesting enough.

However since I've never been afraid to point out aspects that are absurd or worthy of facepalms, here is something that happened earlier this month...

They are testing a new water treatment system that can remove a greater range of nuclear elements from the cooling water than the existing systems can. But they had to temporarily suspend the system due to an error. Turns out the error was caused by...

The “Operation Switch” was selected by mistake when trying to select the “Common Facility Screen” which is used for operation data collection
The reaction scope of the touch pen used to operate the touch panel was too large due to its big tip.
Then, upon screen transition, the “C Tank” switch in the sample tank selection menu used to select the destination of treated water was selected by mistake.
Since there was a time lag from button selection to screen transition, the tank switching button was selected by mistake at the moment of screen transition.




(from http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/nu/fukushima-np/handouts/2013/images/handouts_130404_02-e.pdf )

 

[ATOMIC SUPLEX]

Wow.

 

[xes]

I've been meaning to bump this as there has been a couple of stories recently which are saying that one oor more of the reactors are melting through the concrete. Didn't want to bother you with internet roumer any more than I already have. May post link later

 

[mwgdrwg]

120 Tons of contaminated water leaked....somewhere.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/20...second-pit-leaking-in-fukushima/#.UWZqvUqS-8E

 

[elbows]

I've been meaning to bump this as there has been a couple of stories recently which are saying that one oor more of the reactors are melting through the concrete. Didn't want to bother you with internet roumer any more than I already have. May post link later

To the best of my knowledge there has been nothing new recently that would support such conclusions. There have been a few different studies which try to establish, mostly using the limited available data and core melt models, the extent of core-concrete reactions. They tend to conclude that at at least one of the reactors there was some eating away of concrete, but not by anything like a significant enough depth to support the more hysterical 'china syndrome' wibblings. However due to the lack of real data & observations as opposed to theoreticals, and a number of other uncertainties regarding things such as how much water was pumped into the reactors at various crucial times, I'm unwilling to make any confident claims about the precise state & location of fuel(= melted core) in any of the reactors. Certainly some of the original assumptions about how much water reached the cores via fire engines were deeply flawed and overly optimistic, but that still doesnt mean something worthy of a new horror story has happened.

 

[elbows]

120 Tons of contaminated water leaked....somewhere.

http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/20...second-pit-leaking-in-fukushima/#.UWZqvUqS-8E

Yes I've just started reading about this. Sounds like TEPCO got a subcontractor to make some below ground storage systems for water. The problem was the spec is only suitable for solid waste, not liquid. And these pits were intended to store water after it had been through a decontamination process to remove a range of radioactive substances. But this decontamination system, which was designed to vastly reduce the beta radiation emitters in the water (as opposed to gamma emitting substances which are already being removed by existing water treatment systems) was running very far behind schedule. Its only just being tested now. So in the meantime they used these pits to store water before it had been decontaminated, and now multiple pits have leaked.

Its a disgrace, but its not terribly surprising given the corporate & safety culture, the scale of the contaminated water thats building up on site, and the unprecedented nature of what they are facing when trying to clear up the mess. Thats not supposed to be an excuse though, there have been plenty of scandalous decisions and acts post-disaster, exasperated by certain aspects of Japanese culture it seems.

 

[elbows]

Anybody interested in the details of the leaky pits could do worse than this blog, and these posts in particular:

http://ex-skf.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/4112011-update-on-in-ground-storage.html

http://ex-skf.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/4102013-update-on-never-ending-pond.html

http://ex-skf.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/latest-on-ever-changing-fukushima-i.html

 

[elbows]

So then, the media have a reason to write another Fukushima article as the IAEA have stated the obvious, that TEPCO need to improve the systems & measures taken to deal with the site.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22246464

To be honest I'm not that bothered by the temporary loss of cooling to spent fuel pools, which usually gets media attention, because the pools can last many days without cooling before the situation gets bad. But it is a demonstration of how delicate the site remains. I'm more bothered by the leaks of contaminated water, and the number of things that can go wrong over the decades-long clean-up process. Frankly its still far from clear that they will ever manage to remove the melted cores from what remains of the reactors, but barring some new disaster on site I expect it will be some decades before they either admit defeat on that one or manage to get robots & other tech that isnt laughably unsuitable for the task. In the meantime its the existing contamination both on and off site that bothers me most. The main good news that could/should happen in the next couple of years will be the removal of the fuel from the reactor 4 spent fuel pool, which is the most worrisome of the pools due to the amount of decay heat that remains in that one.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Fukushima radioactive water leak an 'emergency

Japan's nuclear watchdog has said the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is facing a new "emergency" caused by a build-up of radioactive groundwater.

A barrier built to contain the water has already been breached, the Nuclear Regulatory Authority warned.

This means the amount of contaminated water seeping into the Pacific Ocean could accelerate rapidly, it said.

There has been spate of water leaks and power failures at the plant, devastated by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami.

Its operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco), has been criticised heavily for its lack of transparency over the leaks.

'Weak sense of crisis'
Tepco admitted for the first time last month that radioactive groundwater had breached an underground barrier and been leaking into the sea, but said it was taking steps to prevent it.

However, the head of a Nuclear Regulatory Authority task force, Shinji Kinjo, told the Reuters news agency on Monday that the countermeasures were only a temporary solution.

Tepco's "sense of crisis is weak," Mr Kinjo said. "This is why you can't just leave it up to Tepco alone"

"Right now, we have an emergency," he added.

If the underground barrier is breached, the watchdog warns, the water could start to seep through shallower areas of earth.

Once it reaches the surface, it could start to flow "extremely fast", says Mr Kinjo.

Contaminated water could rise to the ground's surface within three weeks, the Asahi newspaper predicted on Saturday.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-23578859

 

[elbows]

It's no surprise that they've had numerous water-related problems. It's been getting a lot more attention this year and especially in recent months, although the reporting on it can be a bit confusing and most of the press reports are simply variations of a story from one news agency.

For example in the stuff quoted above they say the barrier has already been breached, but then later it says 'if the underground barrier is breached'. And the BBC are certainly not the best source, since they manage to mangle some info. e.g. 'The contaminated water is thought to have come from the 400 tonnes of groundwater pumped into the plant every day to cool the reactors.' This is so inaccurate. What actually happens is that 400 tonnes of groundwater flows down into the basements due to the nature of the site, and mixes with the highly contaminated water that they use for cooling. Because TEPCO have massive problems storing all the contaminated water, they wanted to prevent some of that groundwater from mixing with the highly contaminated water in the first place, instead diverting it and were aiming to get approval to dump the groundwater in the ocean. For more info on this, their plans, and how predictable the current cockup was, see this article from May:

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201305080062

Water used to cool the fuel in the No. 1 to No. 4 reactors that were damaged during the accident has accumulated in the basements of the reactor buildings. Under TEPCO’s recycling system at the plant, this water has been pumped out, treated, and used again to cool the fuel.
However, about 400 tons of groundwater flow into the reactor buildings on a daily basis and mixes with the radioactive water.
According to calculations, 300 tons of groundwater would still flow into the reactor buildings every day even after TEPCO starts pumping up the water through the wells.
A general contractor on April 26 proposed building a wall to block the inflow of the groundwater. However, a similar proposal was dropped immediately after the nuclear accident over fears the water-shielding wall would cause contaminated water in the buildings to flow into groundwater at lower levels.

You can probably join the dots between then and now and guess what happened since that article. Yes, they built some kind of barrier anyway, and then surprise surprise various readings of groundwater radioactive contamination levels started to rise, along with the height of the water itself in certain places

 

[elbows]

And thats just the latest problem, other water-related issues they've had besides ones directly related to groundwater:

Very highly contaminated water that flowed into the ocean soon after the meltdowns, some of which still remains in trenches near to the sea.

Repeated problems with the systems that decontaminate the water that they are using to cool the reactors.

Running out of storage space for contaminated water.

Totally botching up the spec of some of the contaminated water storage areas. Including making pits to store it in that were actually only of a spec suitable for landfill, which then started to leak their contents into the ground. So they had to pump all the water back out of those. Besides rodents temporarily messing up the power supply on site, this is the main cockup this year that got some press attention.

 

[elbows]

A bit more detail on the groundwater becoming more contaminated recently:

http://ajw.asahi.com/article/0311disaster/fukushima/AJ201308060059

Radioactivity levels soared 47-fold over just five days in groundwater from a monitoring well on the ocean side of the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, the plant operator said Aug. 5.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. said 56,000 becquerels of radioactive substances, including strontium, were detected per liter of groundwater sampled on Aug. 5 in the “No. 1-5” monitoring well, which is adjacent to the turbine building for the No. 1 reactor. The previous measurement for the well water was made on July 31.
Highly radioactive water has been detected for some time in groundwater near reactor and turbine buildings of the nuclear plant. A record high level of 900,000 becquerels per liter was found in early July in water taken from a different monitoring well.

However I doubt this tells the whole story either, and in fact some of the timing I mentioned in a previous post may not have been quite right either. Especially as it can sometimes be hard to tell what are really rising contamination levels as opposed to actually recently bothering to test for contamination properly.

As far as I can tell, what actually happened is that quite some time ago various readings from the port and the ocean showed that radioactive levels had not fallen as much as they should of if no new contamination was reaching the ocean. Some experts pointed this out, and then TEPCO belatedly bothered to do a bit more groundwater testing than they had before, as well as taking another look at various trenches which contained contaminated water from early in the disaster, including the reactor 2 one which caused massive ocean contamination in 2011. The results were alarming so in July they built the barrier that is now in the headlines. This was done by injecting chemicals into the ground. Lots of detail in this document from July:

http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/nu/fukushima-np/handouts/2013/images/handouts_130722_07-e.pdf

 

[Stanley Edwards]

Just in case anyone interested hasn't seen this yet:
http://www.independent.co.uk/enviro...cean-at-a-rate-of-300-tons-a-day-8750780.html

 

[elbows]

You can probably join the dots between then and now and guess what happened since that article. Yes, they built some kind of barrier anyway, and then surprise surprise various readings of groundwater radioactive contamination levels started to rise, along with the height of the water itself in certain places

For the sake of correctness it's possible I've been somewhat misleading there. From what I can tell the barrier they hastily erected recently is between the buildings and the ocean, whereas the barrier plan thats previously been considered and decided against was probably for areas between the buildings and further inland. Either way the entire thing is a mess, and not just because of the approach of using large amounts of cooling water and botching the water decontamination & storage facilities.

Take for example the geology of the site. As far as I am aware when they built the nuclear power plant, they wanted to save money by having the reactors closer to sea level so they bulldozed cliffs. And the area between the buildings and the ocean, where the counterproductive groundwater barrier was recently constructed, was previously a sandy beach before the plant was constructed. When they built the plant, they reclaimed that land by piling mudstone and sandstone on top of the beach.

And if we look at the water-related causes of the disaster in the first place, I seem to remember it wasn't just the tsunami. They investigated the pylon that fell-down and contributed heavily to the loss of AC power to the site, and seemed to conclude that the pylon had been placed on land that had an underground spring. So when the earthquake happened, the land under the pylon was not as sturdy as it needed to be.

 

[xes]

http://rt.com/op-edge/japan-fukushima-contamination-environment-229/

water leaks could contaminate entire Pacific Ocean, according to that.

 

[elbows]

That guy knows little and is just speaking of global catastrophe because of his agenda. Even RT are prepared to point out, in a little grey box within that article, that Chris Busby disagrees. And as can be seen from Busby's article and his track record, he is not exactly pro-nuclear or afraid of hyping up certain risks.

http://rt.com/op-edge/tepco-fukushima-sea-water-reactor-194/

I've criticised him before, and his article certainly has some flaws. For example he speaks only of sea-water and not groundwater, and his description of exactly how the water cooling works is probably misleading since he doesn't mention that they re-circulate the cooling water through a system that involves some (unreliable but somewhat effective) decontamination equipment, and some other details that kind of matter.

In any case I link to his article because he is aware that even if the entire water-soluble radioactive portions of Fukushima nuclear fuel end up in the Pacific eventually, it doesn't create an ocean radioactive enough to support the global doomsday scenarios some wankers like to shout about.

The main risks are far more localised than that, although again the detail Busby provides on this should come with a disclaimer. The contamination of sea creatures we use for food certainly shouldn't be dismissed just because he has a different area he likes to emphasise, especially in Japan where seafood is a rather important part of the diet. I cannot evaluate how accurate the magnitude of his sea air cancer claims are, and again he has history of hyping this stuff. The problem is that establishment science may well have a history of downplaying this stuff, so we end up back in a kind of 'guess for yourself without enough quality research pointing in either direction' when it comes to nuclear stuff and cancer. He is right to point out how bad the contamination from nuclear testing was back in the day, and I don't think it is unreasonable for us to attribute nuclear stuff to the cancer picture we face today. But there are other aspects of our lives that have likely increased the cancer burden, including various uses of a range of other substances that don't automatically draw the same attention because they are not directly linked to the spectre of invisible radiation.

Fukushima will pose a range of short, medium and long-term problems, the exact nature of which will often be hard to grasp and the impact on human lives will remain a very contentious issues thats easily subject to both hysterical hype and disgusting official denials and incompetence. For example the way the authorities in Japan have dealt with food contamination has been a disgrace that has tended not received proper attention, but again is subject to the murk that comes from the difficulty of establishing actual effects on human health. Short of any dramatic new developments on the site, the story will likely play out via contentious statistics over many decades, interspersed with tales of cockups and setbacks at the site itself that generally don't have big implications for the world.

 

[spacemonkey]

http://rt.com/op-edge/japan-fukushima-contamination-environment-229/

water leaks could contaminate entire Pacific Ocean, according to that.

I interviewed people in central Pennsylvania a year after the accident and discovered tremendous health impacts among the people there.

 

[elbows]

Indeed. I haven't researched Wasserman properly yet but as he has been an anti-nuclear activist for decades its probably safe to say that he comes with a large dose of built in bias.

Returning to the water leaking into the ocean, its worth pointing out that the water currently escaping into the ocean is not contaminated in anything like the magnitude that the water was that leaked into the ocean in the first month+ after the meltdowns. This important detail can get lost in the most dramatic stories.

Meanwhile another cockup on site:

At 12:33PM today (August 12), an alarm went off from the continuous dust monitoring system installed in front of the Anti-Seismic Building, indicating radioactive density was high.

At 12:48PM, we instructed workers to put in masks in the areas where workers are no longer required to put on full-face (and half-face) masks. We are currently observing the continuous dust monitoring system and carrying out measurement using portable dust sampler. We will let you know as soon as we know more.

In order to prevent heatstroke, we've been spraying workers with water mist in front of the Anti-Seismic Building. Bodily contamination was found on 10 people who were waiting for the bus in front of the Anti-Seismic Building.

The cause of contamination may be the mist from the mist generator. We are conducting detailed investigation.

The water used in the Anti-Seismic Building and Reactors 5 and 6 (in toilets, etc.) comes from the same source as the water used in the mist generator which is likely to be the cause of contamination on the body. So we stopped the use of water in the toilets at 1:16PM, and notified the workers by the simultaneous broadcasting system.

At 1:40PM we closed off the master valve of the pipe that feeds water to the mist generator and to the Anti-Seismic Building and Reactors 5 and 6.

10 workers with bodily contamination have maximum 10 Bq/cm2 of contamination on their heads/faces. We have instructed them to undergo WBC.

We are conducting the nuclide analysis of the water in the mist generator, and will let you know the result as soon as possible.

Translation is from this site: http://ex-skf.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/latest-from-fukushima-i-nuke-plant.html

 

[Treacle Toes]

 

[elbows]

Another leak hits the news I see, although the BBC remain incapable of clearly stating even the most basic details.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-23764382

A Tepco official told a press conference on Tuesday that the water probably leaked from a tank after escaping a concrete barrier.

No, it leaked from the tank and then escaped the concrete barrier that surrounds the ground area around the tank. A photo of this is available in this independent story:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...clear-plant-springs-another-leak-8775962.html

 

[mwgdrwg]

Grim.

 

[Barking_Mad]

Fukushima bay radiation levels highest since measurements began

Reports from Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), operator of the disaster-stricken Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, say that measurements of radioactive tritium in seawater – seeping out of the nuclear complex via groundwater into the sea – show levels at 4700 becquerels per liter, the highest tritium level in the measurement history. The highest tritium levels have come in the past 15 days, the same reports show.

TEPCO also revealed that the highest levels of radiation in seawater were detected near reactor 1. Previous measurements showed the levels at 3800 becquerels per liter near reactor 1, and 2600 becquerels per liter near reactor 2, but the measurements have been showing increased radiation levels in the past 2 weeks. This increase in the harbor’s seawater has been continuously rising since May, reports said.

Also on Monday, another leak of highly contaminated water was discovered from the valve of a tank dike on the premises of the nuclear plant, adding to the multiple leak issues that the plant has had since TEPCO started the cleanup job on the facility. With this leak, radiation levels at the site again increased to 100 millisieverts per hour. The safe level of radiation is 1-13 millisieverts per year. The valve was said to have been left open so that rainwater can flow through, helping the TEPCO workers spot any radioactive leaks. TEPCO has since closed the valve as soon as it was discovered that radioactive water was flowing through it, instead of just surface and rainwater.

http://japandailypress.com/fukushima-bay-radiation-levels-highest-since-measurements-began-2034175/

 

[Barking_Mad]

I'd strongly recommend reading this article by Christopher Busby from the European Committee on Radiation Risks who estimates the nuclear accident has 50 to 100 times the amount of potential radiation leakage than Chernobyl did.

Worse than Chernobyl: The inner threat of Fukushima crisis

The operation involves the kind of game that we are all familiar with in those machines in penny arcades. You know the ones. You stick in some coins. You have levers which manipulate a claw which you position over a teddy bear or a doll and then you let this down, pick the item up and drop it down a chute to win it. In the TEPCO version of this game, you build a crane over the spent fuel tank (or what’s left of it) and manoeuver a grab down into the rubble to deftly pick out a spent fuel assembly, like a 4.5meter long and 24cm square birdcage containing the zirconium metal clad fuel elements, each unit weighing about one third of a ton.

Of course, to make the game more interesting, they are not just sitting there like they were when the tank was being used. They are under water (sea water), covered in debris, corroded, busted, twisted, intertwined and generally impossible to deal with. And here is the really scary thing: if you manage to bust a fuel element, the best outcome is that huge amounts of radioactivity escape into the air and blow over Japan, just like before. The worst outcome is when two of these things get too close, perhaps because in pulling one out it breaks and falls against another one in the tank. Because then you suddenly have lots of fission, a lot of heat, a meltdown, possibly a big blast like before, and the destruction of the entire cooling pond. Or else the water boils off and the whole thing catches fire.

Then what happens? Not quite Armageddon, but as far as Japan is concerned, almost. I bet they have contingency plans to evacuate the northern island to Korea, China, anywhere. A lot of this radiation will end up in the USA, a long way downwind, admittedly, but then there is an awful lot of radioactivity involved.......

 

[Barking_Mad]

From Twitter:

Reuters reporting that Japan raised severity of Fukushima leak to Level 3 on intern'l scale. That's a "serious radiation incident" #cdnpoli

 

[elbows]

That Chris Busby stuff you quoted is a good example of why I can be critical of him. The operation to remove the fuel from reactor 4 spent fuel pool is not trivial, but there is no need to hype it up further by using such a collection of strong words to describe the state of the fuel. For example there is no evidence that any of the fuel bundles at reactor 4 are intertwined or twisted. And as for debris in the pool, reactor 3's pool is worse in that regard and hard to deal with due to the high levels of radiation on the refuelling floor of the reactor 3 building.

Anyway largely due to errors made when analysing the situation at reactor 4 pool at the height of the crisis, its long been a favourite of those for whom the terrible disaster was not enough, and more hype must be found. Traditionally these included the pool running dry and all the fuel burning, or the reactor 4 building falling over, but since Tepco completed the construction of the structure that sits alongside the building and extends over the pool area, they seem to have moved on to perils faced during the fuel removal operation itself. And make no mistake, there are perils, but not ones that deserve that level of scaremongering.