[Scape]

Oh it gets worse...



In other words we are waiting for the other shoe to drop. There will be another explosion it is only a matter of time.

It appears that for the first time, the containment system around one of the Fukushima Daiichi reactors has been breached.

$1:

Officials have referred to a possible crack in the suppression chamber of reactor 2 - a large doughnut-shaped structure, also known as the torus, below the reactor housing.

That would allow steam, containing radioactive substances, to escape continuously.

The industry newsletter World Nuclear News reports that a "loud noise" came from the reactor chamber, and that "the pressure... was seen to decrease from three atmospheres to one atmosphere after the noise, suggesting possible damage".

[BartSimpson]

ruh-roh...

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiap ... ar/?hpt=T2

[martin14]

Scape Scape:

Oh it gets worse...

$1:

Officials have referred to a possible crack in the suppression chamber of reactor 2 - a large doughnut-shaped structure, also known as the torus, below the reactor housing.

That would allow steam, containing radioactive substances, to escape continuously.

The industry newsletter World Nuclear News reports that a "loud noise" came from the reactor chamber, and that "the pressure... was seen to decrease from three atmospheres to one atmosphere after the noise, suggesting possible damage".

The suppression chamber is part of the process of condensing steam vapor back to water,
and the water in there would be radioactive. And the pressure drop confirms
it has been compromised.


Hope the Regean brought some radiation suits..... they are going to need them.

[BartSimpson]

martin14 martin14:

Hope the Reagan brought some radiation suits..... they are going to need them.

The USS Ronald Reagan enjoys the advantage of being ridiculously mobile with a top speed in excess of fifty knots*. When the radiation detectors on the ship went off the captain ordered flank speed and hauled @ss to a safe area.

*In 2008 when the Reagan raced to meet up with the MV Dawn Princess to help a little girl with an emergency appendectomy I posted in this forum the math on the intercept and it worked out to something like 52 knots for the Reagan given that the Dawn has a posted top speed of 19 knots.

[PublicAnimalNo9]

Holy crap that's fast for a ship that size

[martin14]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

martin14 martin14:

Hope the Reagan brought some radiation suits..... they are going to need them.

The USS Ronald Reagan enjoys the advantage of being ridiculously mobile with a top speed in excess of fifty knots*. When the radiation detectors on the ship went off the captain ordered flank speed and hauled @ss to a safe area.

*In 2008 when the Reagan raced to meet up with the MV Dawn Princess to help a little girl with an emergency appendectomy I posted in this forum the math on the intercept and it worked out to something like 52 knots for the Reagan given that the Dawn has a posted top speed of 19 knots.

CNN just reported 3 other ships ( no names ) being moved to different areas,
due to encountering radiation.

Helicopter pilots as well being exposed.

[djakeydd]

Situation now nearing severity of chernobyl, reports that stored fuel rods are burning..

http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/0 ... n.nuclear/

[EyeBrock]

Like I said previously. Radiation. Never good. Gets into the atmosphere, comes back as rain, the radioactive rain gets everywhere.

This is a nightmare for the people of Japan. I wish the media would shut the fuck up. Panicked people added to the mix is down to the TV media finding a new story to over expose.

It's too much to ask them to be responsible and consider the panic they are sowing. Wankers.

[djakeydd]

Not to mention the monday morning quarterbacking. Apparently this particular GE reactor design is 1960's technology and was in question as early as '72 due to hazards posed in the event of loss of coolant. The prevailing thought at that time was the cost prohibition of beefing it up would put in question the feasibility of nuclear power generation. The only option left is to mitigate this and go from there.

[BartSimpson]

Brock, I'm leaning with the media here. Over the past few days as this nuclear thing has progressed it seems the government (any government) has been deliberately understating this thing while the media, so far, has been calling the game pretty well.

When the first reactor went sideways the media talking heads said that would complicate efforts to contain the remaining reactors...and they were right.

Then they said the domino-effect could cause fires in the storage ponds...and they were right.

Then they said the radiation levels were not safe while the Japanese government said not to worry and while they and the USN hauled ass out of there.

Only now, with the IAEA calling this a Level 6 disaster and on its way to Level 7 is anyone starting to act like this is serious.

This morning the notion of evacuating Tokyo seemed absurd. Now I'm hearing it coming from all directions as if it's a prudent consideration.

I don't know, but this time last week anyone proposing that those reactors were vulnerable to a 9.0 earthquake and tsunami would have been laughed at as paranoid and forcibly medicated.

We're faced with the unthinkable and it's time we started thinking about it.

[martin14]

BREAKING NEWS: Fire breaks out again at 5:45 a.m. at Fukushima's No. 4 reactor

[martin14]

EyeBrock EyeBrock:

Like I said previously. Radiation. Never good. Gets into the atmosphere, comes back as rain, the radioactive rain gets everywhere.

I would tend to agree with Bart here.

TEPCO has done a piss poor job with this crisis, yesterday one of the reporters
at a press conference started to get pissed off with the dodges.

The government is too worried about losing face, but there are reports
of the PM learning about an explosion from the TV, not TEPCO.


What bothers me is even the MSM is not willing/able to get more information
about what radiation is where, and where it is going.

In spite of it all, even Harper is busy saying " dont worry " The reaction
of people in Vancouver and Victoria was to clean out the pharmacies of iodine...
not a sign people trust the government.

I have noticed after the second explosion, we no longer get video or pictures from
the reactor site. I wonder why

[martin14]

martin14 martin14:

BREAKING NEWS: Fire breaks out again at 5:45 a.m. at Fukushima's No. 4 reactor

Tepco has confirmed that a fire broke out at reactor four in the early hours of Wednesday morning. Smoke is pouring from the reactor, a spokesman told reporters.

[Scape]

Radiation: When to worry

For reference Chernobyl, Europe's Largest Wildlife Refuge

$1:

Some riveting nuggets:

- "Soldiers were offered two years off their service in exchange for just two minutes shoveling nuclear waste."

- "The first the rest of the world knew of the Chernobyl disaster was when workers at a Swedish power station more than 1,000 miles away reported for work two days later, checked themselves with a Geiger counter, and found they were highly radioactive. By the following day, April 29, radioactive clouds had been carried by prevailing winds right across Western Europe and into Scandinavia, and The New York Times ran a front-page story about the catastrophe. The Soviet newspaper Pravda devoted a full eight lines to the 'accident' that day—on its third page. It wasn't till May 15, three weeks later, that General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev finally announced what had happened."

- "Thousands of people won medals for bravery and were declared Heroes of the Soviet Union but at the same time picked up cancer and thyroid problems that would dog them for the rest of their lives. Thousands of evacuated ­locals and cleanup workers are said to have died in the ensuing years from radiation doses, and it's reckoned that some 2.7 million people alive today in Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia have been directly affected by it."

- "There are still parts of Wales where the sheep farmers can't sell their meat, and last summer thousands of wild boars hunted in Germany were declared dangerously radioactive."

- "A dangerous dose [of radiation] is hard to pin down. Worldwide, for most people, those daily microrems add up to about 360 millirems per year. Scientists agree that humans can safely handle 1,000 a year. Astronauts on the International Space Station receive 18,000 millirems of cosmic radiation over six months—but it's once in a lifetime, so it's seen as an acceptable, voluntary risk. But edge that up to 30,000 millirems and you're looking at what caused increased cancer rates among the blast survivors of Hiroshima and Naga­saki. And yet animals can handle even more than this: large mammals and birds are generally safe with 36,000 per year, small ones with even higher doses, and reptiles with higher still. The more complex the animal, the more sensitive it is."

[Brenda]

$1:

The more complex the animal, the more sensitive it is."

So some people have nothing to worry about?