Crisis in Japan - Page 156

On March 16 2011 14:39 Mafs wrote:
Once a meltdown occurs, there is almost no way of stopping it. You can only reduce the effects I think. That is why France gave it some number on the scale. The are just predicting what the aftermath of event is going to be like. Japan needs to take action now, from what i've seen on the news that are doing nothing. USSR sent 600k people to deal with chernobyl, with over 50k dieing. Japan is afraid to lose a couple people to avoid a global catastropie. Yes, the tsunami did alot of damage, but the nuclear radiation is 1000x more important and siginificant then any flood of water.

On March 16 2011 14:47 furymonkey wrote:
Does anyone know what protection is made for the central control room of a nuclear power plant, I'd imagine some sort of radiation shielding is probably exists, but not enough for catastrophic radation leak, and that is why it isn't safe to stay in the control room right now.

If some 6 inch of lead is shielding the control room, would it make any difference? If so do you think it's not implemented to avoid high cost?

On March 16 2011 14:39 Mafs wrote:
Once a meltdown occurs, there is almost no way of stopping it. You can only reduce the effects I think. That is why France gave it some number on the scale. The are just predicting what the aftermath of event is going to be like. Japan needs to take action now, from what i've seen on the news that are doing nothing. USSR sent 600k people to deal with chernobyl, with over 50k dieing. Japan is afraid to lose a couple people to avoid a global catastropie. Yes, the tsunami did alot of damage, but the nuclear radiation is 1000x more important and siginificant then any flood of water.

User was temp banned for this post.

On March 16 2011 15:11 IntoTheWow wrote:


Most nuclear plants are different from each other (in core design, cooling design, etc). So it's hard to answer this question without first hand info from the people in the plant itself.

In terms of security, nuclear plants usually don't try to avoid high costs since there's much too much at stake to do stuff like this.

I visited one two of the nuclear plants in my country and the level of security / line of defenses the plant has against an accident is outstanding. And I'm in a "3rd world country" so imagine they are the same if not more for a nuclear power plant in Japan (or at least I would like to think).

I supposed that by "central control room" you mean the room where the staff measures the different variables of the plant and has communication to let other parts know so they fix the problem.

On March 16 2011 15:27 furymonkey wrote:


I agree that they wouldn't dare to cut down cost for things like this. But my main concern is how did the radiation get into the control rooms. If controls room are as safe as containment vessel, doesn't that mean even there is radation leak, control room itself should still pretty safe?

So my guess is the radiation shielding of the control room itself isn't as "top notch". Or there could be other causes too like air filtering, it sounded like there is no way to completely filter the radation from the air.

On March 16 2011 15:27 furymonkey wrote:


I agree that they wouldn't dare to cut down cost for things like this. But my main concern is how did the radiation get into the control rooms. If controls room are as safe as containment vessel, doesn't that mean even there is radation leak, control room itself should still pretty safe?

So my guess is the radiation shielding of the control room itself isn't as "top notch". Or there could be other causes too like air filtering, it sounded like there is no way to completely filter the radation from the air.

I have just returned from a conference call held at the British Embassy in Tokyo. The call was concerning the nuclear issue in Japan. The chief spokesman was Sir. John Beddington, Chief Scientific Adviser to the UK Government, and he was joined by a number of qualified nuclear experts based in the UK. Their assessment of the current situation in Japan is as follows:

* In case of a 'reasonable worst case scenario' (defined as total meltdown of one reactor with subsequent radioactive explosion) an exclusion zone of 30 miles (50km) would be the maximum required to avoid affecting peoples' health. Even in a worse situation (loss of two or more reactors) it is unlikely that the damage would be significantly more than that caused by the loss of a single reactor.

* The current 20km exclusion zone is appropriate for the levels of radiation/risk currently experienced, and if the pouring of sea water can be maintained to cool the reactors, the likelihood of a major incident should be avoided. A further large quake with tsunami could lead to the suspension of the current cooling operations, leading to the above scenario.

* The bottom line is that these experts do not see there being a possibility of a health problem for residents in Tokyo. The radiation levels would need to be hundreds of times higher than current to cause the possibility for health issues, and that, in their opinion, is not going to happen (they were talking minimum levels affecting pregnant women and children - for normal adults the levels would need to be much higher still).

* The experts do not consider the wind direction to be material. They say Tokyo is too far away to be materially affected.

* If the pouring of water can be maintained the situation should be much improved after ten days, as the reactors' cores cool down.

* Information being provided by Japanese authorities is being independently monitored by a number of organizations and is deemed to be accurate, as far as measures of radioactivity levels are concerned.

* This is a very different situation from Chernobyl, where the reactor went into meltdown and the encasement, which exploded, was left to burn for weeks without any control. Even with Chernobyl, an exclusion zone of 30 miles would have been adequate to protect human health. The problem was that most people became sick from eating contaminated food, crops, milk and water in the region for years afterward, as no attempt was made to measure radioactivity levels in the food supply at that time or warn people of the dangers. The secrecy over the Chernobyl explosion is in contrast to the very public coverage of the Fukushima crisis.

* The Head of the British School asked if the school should remain closed. The answer was there is no need to close the school due to fears of radiation. There may well be other reasons - structural damage or possible new quakes - but the radiation fear is not supported by scientific measures, even for children.

* Regarding Iodine supplementation, the experts said this was only necessary for those who had inhaled quantities of radiation (those in the exclusion zone or workers on the site) or through consumption of contaminated food/water supplies. Long term consumption of iodine is, in any case, not healthy.

On March 16 2011 16:01 NobleDog wrote:
I've read every page of this thread but I'm not sure I remember it all correctly, so please verify:

The generators were in the basements of some buildings, and were running after the quake and then ruined by the tsunami. (?)

Had they kept running there would have been no problem with cooling and the ensuing issues with the various reactors would not have occurred. (?)

The reactor buildings were not over-topped by the tsunami. (?)

Had the generators been placed higher (say atop the buildings) then the generators could have continued powering the cooling systems, assuming no refueling problems and not including incidental breakdowns that could happen at anytime, not just in the aftermath of such a catastrophe. (?)

On March 16 2011 15:18 oo_xerox wrote:
Its actually in wikipedia i read about it when the reactor number 4 suffered an explosion. I made a quick search about chernobyl and ofc wikipedia was the first entry and the first thing i read. Those guys were called something like Liquidators and a lot died after/in the incident.

It was a different time though an Japan is being waaay more honest than the former soviet union. Sending such an ammount of people to such danger after loosing around 10 000 ppl is not the best reaction imo

On March 16 2011 16:06 Ben... wrote:
On topic, I find it disgusting how the western media is spinning this. I already have read a CNN headline stating that the nuclear incident going on in Japan right now is almost equal to Chernobyl (They were basing it off of the labeling of the disaster as a 5 or 6/7, without explaining what the differences are) and Reuters saying that reactors "exploded" after not being cooled in time. I with they took the time to get their facts straight. I have given up on the media and am now sticking with the IAEA.

On March 16 2011 16:15 Avaloch wrote:

Sensationalising the news is what the reporters are paid for sadly. If the news was reported exactly the way it was, people won't really bother reading it or talk about it. I wish they would report things like that more accurately

Edit: I thought the IAEA gave this incident a 4. Did they upgrade the rating?

On March 16 2011 16:15 Avaloch wrote:

Edit: I thought the IAEA gave this incident a 4. Did they upgrade the rating?

On March 16 2011 14:10 Ryo wrote:

I watched the press conference live. He didn't say they were permanently withdrawn. They are monitoring the radiation levels, when there's a spike past a safe level, they withdraw the workers. If it goes down, they can go in to work on the reactors again.

A lot of selective "quoting" from the media. Best just to watch the live translation of the press conferences for more accurate updates.

On March 16 2011 16:06 Ben... wrote:
Yes the Soviets used liquidators. They were basically soldiers and miners covered head to toe in lead plating and wore gas masks. The goal of the soldiers was to clear debris from around the plant, some of which included highly irradiated graphite from the reactor. They had to work using short time limits in hopes of not taking in to much radiation, though many still received heavy doses.

Here's a fairly decent documentary on what happened during the events of and the cleanup of Chernobyl. It's very sad. There are interviews with people who worked there who had no idea what was going on.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5384001427276447319#


On topic, I find it disgusting how the western media is spinning this. I already have read a CNN headline stating that the nuclear incident going on in Japan right now is almost equal to Chernobyl (They were basing it off of the labeling of the disaster as a 5 or 6/7, without explaining what the differences are) and Reuters saying that reactors "exploded" after not being cooled in time. I with they took the time to get their facts straight. I have given up on the media and am now sticking with the IAEA.