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The “burn-it-down” people are good with that until they become part of the kindling.

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New McCarthy, same old McCarthyism.

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You are here: Home / Open Threads / Open Thread

Open Thread

by | 150 Comments

This post is in: 

Ahab passes along these links:

This NHK World feed

http://jibtv.com/program/?page=0

I have no idea how this shit works. The above is the 512k feed, but I’m not sure if it’s a functional lnk.

Below is a link to the NHK World website with the embedded 128k 256k stream:

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/

and the ustream link for same:

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nhk-world-tv

This is not good.

Reader Interactions

150Comments

  2. 2.

    Eastriver

    Meh. Mutation is the spice of life. Literally.

    Everyone go see Rango. Best film of the year!

  3. 3.

    D. Mason

    Soooo what you’re saying is that we’re going to war with japan for using a nukular IED on our rescue troops?

  5. 5.

    Comrade Mary

    It’s not good at all. The Metafilter threads are killing my computer, but I keep reloading them to see what’s happening. I’ll bring back anything useful I can find.

  6. 6.

    Uncle Clarence Thomas

    .
    .
    Obviously, the nuclear industry in Japan needed more loan guarantees from the government.
    .
    .

  8. 8.

    srv

    http://www3.nhk.or.jp/nhkworld/index.html

    #2 plants rods were clearly exposed for awhile and it appears to be getting worse after an interior explosion. The reactor is at 1 atmosphere, so it’s leaking. The 50 or so guys trying to keep the water going into it are getting to exposed to whatever is in there. I’m presuming the cooling effort is going to require manual labor for quite some time.

  10. 10.

    srv

    And they also have on-site storage of fuel rods (uranium and plutonium) elsewhere on the plant and they don’t know if they’re going to maintain water levels there.

  11. 11.

    Uncle Clarence Thomas

    .
    .
    Imagine how much worse the situation would be had the Japanese government not achieved a historic bipartisan compromise with the nuclear industry.
    .
    .

  12. 12.

    Xboxershorts

    The overall impression I get is that they totally lost #2. The outside bldg is gone. The suppression pool (salt water feed) has no cover and is leaching radiation.

    GenIII Nuclear reactors that use dense nuclear fuels have this……shortcoming.

    We have a meltdown with exposed dense nuclear fuel.

    Fuck.

  15. 15.

    patrick II

    According to FDL a problem may exist with spent fuel rods stored on sight. The rods are stored in water filled pools on the upper floor of each reactor. If the water evaporates or the pools are damaged by the explosions, the rods will overheat and burn off radioactive fumes and particles.

    Although the amount of spent fuel is currently unknown, there may be as much as twenty years of radioactive waste still stored in the onsite pools at the nuclear facilities.

  16. 16.

    srv

    So I think it’s time for that vitamin/potassium supplement comment again – what those of us in the left coast should be taking presuming plant #2 is going to be doing a low-level Chernobyl for the next few years.

  17. 17.

    Pigs & Spiders

    I hate to sound like that guy, but I just don’t see this getting farther than a completely ruined reactor site. Exposed rods is bad, but not that bad. A lot of that “secondary” radiation is able to pretty quickly dissipate itself. They still aren’t getting levels of radiation that kill. Someone feel free to point me to news to the contrary, but most of what I’ve read all day on this has been more sensation than anything else.

  18. 18.

    freelancer

    Since this is an OT, Beware Doug Hill, you’re about to agree with Rush Limbaugh in laughing at Bobo:

    Some of these conservative intellectuals were totally smitten with Obama at the outset, remember? Totally smitten with Obama. In the case of David Brooks, it was because of the freaking crease in his pants. He said that. “The crease in his pants made me know he was going to be president.” And these are the intellectuals.

  19. 19.

    Cat Lady

    “Uncharted territory”. Not what you want to hear if you’re in Japan, or anywhere for that matter. Wind is now shifting from offshore to the west, since mother nature has decided that northeastern Japan has not suffered enough. Is there such a thing as karma for an entire population? Holy fucking shit.

  23. 23.

    Mark S.

    @patrick II:

    I don’t know anything about nuclear reactors, but isn’t a little counter-intuitive to store fuel rods in the upper parts of the reactor if they need to be submerged in water?

  26. 26.

    geg6

    Just checking in with more detail on my friend and her sons who live in Japan. Dawn (my friend) is safe but cold and miserable and at a shelter in the base gym at Masawa AFB. Her two sons had left Masawa last Thursday to attend two separate sporting events in two separate parts of Japan, the older, Zach, to a basketball tournament in Tokyo and Alex, only 15, to a soccer tournament in a place I’m not clear on but well south and west of the worst of it. The boys were frantic to get to mom, but travel to the northeast is impossible (and no way can Dawn get out of Masawa at this point. The boys have since found each other and are being housed at a military base (not sure where) and are waiting to either go in to get mom or do what they can to get her out. At least the boys are together and they’ve got contact with mom. A relief all the way around but, if I was them, I’d still be freaking out until my family was all together. My heart goes out to the poor Japanese people. A perfect storm of shit has hit them and it’s just astonishing and too sad and scary for words.

  27. 27.

    Yutsano

    @geg6: My guess considering where they were when everything hit is Yokosuka, assuming there was little to no damage to the harbor or the docks there. Hopefully they all stay well and Mom gets to her kids soon.

  28. 28.

    Martin

    @Pigs & Spiders: Well, in general I think you’re pretty correct, however the radiation levels are going to be high enough that nobody can really go in there to work on it. That’s going to mean dumping concrete on it until the problem goes away. Not easy under the circumstances – and they better fucking pray there isn’t a large aftershock and tsunami to wash away all of that now exposed material.

  30. 30.

    patrick II

    @Mark S.:
    Yes it is. It is from an old design and the idea, as I understand it, was so that a crane could lift spent fuel rods out of the core and quickly place them in the cooling pool. It is not the way it is done anymore.

  32. 32.

    srv

    liveblogging NHK here.

    Fukushima #4 is on fire now. The commentary is contradictory, about whether it just has rods that are in the storage pool or in the reactor itself. But it’s leaking radiation.

    #1, #2, #3 water injection still continuing “smoothly” and cooling.

  33. 33.

    Martin

    @Mark S.: Yeah, actually. But it’s a usable place inside of the containment area.

    These plants were designed with the notion that a way to deal with the waste would be developed. Alas, we’re seeing the outcome the anti-nuke folks were playing for.

  39. 39.

    geg6

    @Yutsano:

    Well, Dawn lives within a mile of Masawa AFB and is a DoD teacher there. So she immediately went to the base and has been there since. Am told conditions are bad there but not nearly what they are seeing in Sendai. I don’t have a clue if anyone will let the boys travel north, though. And based on the video I’ve seen of the infrastructure in the north and the fact that they have not had a bunch of ships or even planes getting civilians off the base, I’m sceptical she’ll get out any time soon. Too many other humanitarian emergencies at the moment, I’m thinking.

  43. 43.

    Yutsano

    @geg6: Best chance is to hope the kids can squeeze on a hop north or she can catch one south at some point. I’m certain there are a few aircraft connections going in between, but if the radiation levels are getting as bad as they fear then they might be separated for some time.

  45. 45.

    Comrade Mary

    PM and Edano speaking on Japanese tv: there’s a spent fuel rod fire at No. 4. Everyone within 19 miles to remain indoors.

    Quoting various people at Metafilter:

    He said that debris from the No 3 reactor appears to have hit the storage pool at No 4, presumably causing the cooling water to get displaced….
    __
    They have measured 400 milliSieverts/hr at the reactor. This is really bad. …

    I have no idea how accurate these quotes are.

    Live NHK in English here.

  52. 52.

    Neutron Flux

    @AhabTRuler: I found a converter to change sieverts to Rem. I am more familiar with REM. 100 milisieverts = 10 Rem. 10 Rem is a big number

  55. 55.

    cyd

    @Pigs & Spiders: Bear in mind that this reactor isn’t situated out in the middle of nowhere—they’ve evacuated 200,000 local residents during this crisis. Those residents won’t be able to safely return if this plant is going to be emitting low-level radiation for the forseeable future. It doesn’t have to be a Chernobyl to be a major fiasco.

  56. 56.

    srv

    Looked it up, the average yearly dose for a human is a couple of milliSieverts/yr (cosmic, crustal, radon, food, etc exposure).

    #4 is at 400/hr.

  62. 62.

    Nerull

    400mSv/hour would cause a dangerous radiation dose within a few hours. 2-6Sv can cause radiation sickness, 30Sv+ can cause death.

  67. 67.

    Arclite

    @Xboxershorts: Are there any pics of building number 2? I can’t find any.

    Also Reactor number 4, which is shut down, still has spent fuel rods that need cooling. Apparently it has caught fire.

  70. 70.

    John D.

    Argh. Guys, everyone is conflating numbers from various reports.

    One of the reports talked about a level 400 times the normal level. Which was 1557.5 uSv on Sunday. The current “1000x normal levels of radiation!” reports after the explosion this afternoon? 8217 uSv (8.217 mSv).

    It’s bad, very bad. But it is not nearly as bad as a whole lot of people seem to think.

  74. 74.

    Martin

    @John D.: Actually I think one of the Japanese officials said it was 400 mSv at the plant due to the fire exposing the spent rods. That came after the 8000 µSv report taken at the gate of the plant.

  75. 75.

    John D.

    @Neutron Flux: If the 400 mSv number is correct, then it is that bad. I have not seen anything approaching that number though. I seen a lot of people CLAIM it, but nobody has provided a link that I can see.

    Like I said, the only confirmed #s I am seeing are the 8 mSv ones after the explosion at #2 today. I’d love to see ones from the gov’t, so I would appreciate links if available.

  76. 76.

    Nerull

    @John D.: I’m watching NHK right now, they were giving radiation levels at the reactors. The numbers you are quoting are at the plant gate, I believe, not the reactors.

  77. 77.

    Comrade Mary

    Guys, that 400 mSv came from me, from the Metafilter thread, based on a transcription of a press conference. It may be in error: I’m still trying to find a link.

    I won’t bring anything else here unless I’ve got a link.

  79. 79.

    Comrade Mary

    BBC says the level is 400 TIMES, not 400 mSv:

    #0303: Radiation is 400 times the annual legal limit near Fukushima’s reactor 3, the Kyodo news agency reports.

    NHK reporting the value has been 5.7 mSv.

    I screwed up. No more quotes without links from me.

  81. 81.

    Comrade Mary

    Oh man, the NHK stream is really choppy, but yeah, I think I heard her say around 400 mSv around No. 3 just a few moments ago. The No. 4 reactor is around 100 mSv.

    I’m still looking for text from a reputable news source instead of trusting my ears, though.

  82. 82.

    Arclite

    Here’s a link to someone broadcasting their geiger counter in Ota ward in Tokyo. It’s at 22 CPM right now. The broadcaster claims 10-20 is normal. Since it’s in the middle of the day, one would expect it to naturally be higher. So 22 CPM isn’t too much above normal.

  83. 83.

    Comrade Mary

    Right, I just found a text source confirming 400 mSv. From Bloomberg, the levels have been very high at the plants themselves, posing danger to workers:

    As of 10.22 a.m. local time, 400 millisieverts of radiation were detected at the No. 2 and No. 3 reactors, [Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio] Edano said. That’s 20 times the annual limit for nuclear industry employees and uranium miners, according to the World Nuclear Association. A radiation dose of 100 millisieverts a year is the lowest level at which any increase in cancer is evident, the London-based WNA said on its website.
    __
    The level of radiation at the plant rose above the legal limit after the latest explosion, Kyodo News reported. The utility will continue to pump water into the unit, a company spokesman said in a briefing broadcast on NHK television.

  86. 86.

    Shadow's Mom

    They are repeating cautions about not hanging laundry outside, not bring hanging laundry in, dust off and clean before reentering a home. Do not open windows or operate anything that would create an air exchange.

    @John D.: They also explained that they had been reporting in microsieverts, now reporting in millisieverts.

  87. 87.

    Comrade Mary

    Jesus Christ. Tired translator lady on NHK is repeating an official’s advice: If your laundry is outside, don’t take it inside because radioactive substances could be on them. And if you think you have radioactivity or ash on you, brush it off.

  89. 89.

    Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther

    @geg6: I keep thinking about all the families going through just this. The notes put up places saying that children are looking for parents, sisters are looking for sisters… I just – at some point, I genuinely can’t begin to fathom it.

  92. 92.

    Yutsano

    @Emily L. Hauser/ellaesther: Duck and Cover?

    In seriousness, there will be a massive human toll from this that we have yet to realize, and that will be played out over the months and years to come. And that’s just the tsunami victims.

  96. 96.

    Comrade Mary

    A smoother translation from a japanese speaker at Metafilter: “The town had 17,000 total inhabitants. 10,000 of those were missing, 1000 dead. Of the 10,000 missing, 9700 have been found. So, out of the 17,000 population, 1000 are confirmed deceased with another 300 still missing.”

  99. 99.

    RalfW

    A Forbes finance blogger just put up some dire news from a Japanese colleague of his.

    Appears there is no gasoline to be had in the Fukushima area.

    “I visited an evacuation camp this morning,” he went on. “Young mothers are trying to protect their infants from radiation by covering them with plastic bags. There are no rescuers here. They may be focusing on Sendai and other areas. People in Fukushima have no choice but to stay here, no matter how dangerous it is. It’s a desperate situation.”

    The evacuation was expanded from the previous 20 kilometer range. Nobody, including officials of the government and power companies, knows how far we really need to be be away from the plant. We are in totally uncharted territory. As Hitoshi points out, for many people near Fukushima, the official pronouncements don’t matter, anyway, because they have no way to evacuate.

    My heart is literally racing with fear for these people half a globe away.

  101. 101.

    mclaren

    Don’t panic. Faux News and the other airheads have wildly overblown this thing.

    Here’s a simple step by step explanation of what happened.

    There is no health crisis, no significant amount of radiation has been released, there is no death cloud of fallout heading across the Pacific to turn us all into radioactive Roger Corman monsters in our sleep (“The Day the World Ended,” 1955), there was no nuclear explosion, no mushroom cloud, people in Japan are not dropping dead in their tracks from radiation, there was no full meltdown of any of the fuel rods, containment was never lost, the explosions occurred outside the crucial reactor containment vessel and never threatened to release any nuclear fuel.

    It’s all a case of our grossly innumerate media panicking in wild hysteria.

    Bottom line?

    The Japanese reactor was designed to survive a Richter 8.2 magnitude quake without releasing any core material or significant (i.e., staying radioactive for more than about 10 seconds) radioactivity into the environment. The quake was Richter magnitude 8.9, which is about 7 times as strong as a magnitude 8.2, and even so, the Japanese reactor held up. No fuel was released, there was no core meltdown, there was no China syndrome, everything operated as it was designed to.

    This incident offers final definitive proof that nuclear power is safe. If a Richter 8.9 quake followed by a tsunami couldn’t cause a core meltdown, then basically nothing can.

  102. 102.

    zoej

    FWIW, I finished up donating some more to Japan Relief, but it felt incomplete without sending something for the animals so I poked around and found this link:
    Japan Animal Earthquake Relief
    At this point, I have no idea whether they are good or bad, but they used paypal so I felt relatively safe handing over the bucks. I sent them this week’s lunch money.

  104. 104.

    RalfW

    mclaren said

    This incident offers final definitive proof that nuclear power is safe. If a Richter 8.9 quake followed by a tsunami couldn’t cause a core meltdown, then basically nothing can.

    Five days of cascading failures post-tsunami says you’re wrong. Which really, really sucks.

  105. 105.

    mclaren

    @srv:

    #2 plants rods were clearly exposed for awhile and it appears to be getting worse after an interior explosion. The reactor is at 1 atmosphere, so it’s leaking. The 50 or so guys trying to keep the water going into it are getting to exposed to whatever is in there. I’m presuming the cooling effort is going to require manual labor for quite some time.

    Every single thing you have said is wrong.

    Wrong, wrong, 100% wrong.

    #2 plants rods were clearly exposed for awhile…

    The tops of the zircalloy rods inside the containment vessel were exposed to the air briefly. The tops of the zircalloy fuel rods partially melted. They melted inside the containment vessel. No radiation from the fuel rods was ever released into the air, it stayed entirely inside the containment vessel, as the engineers designed it to happen. That’s why it’s called a “containment vessel,” because even in the case of a full core meltdown it would contain all the radioactive fuel. There was no full core meltdown. Only the tops of several zircalloy fuel rods partially melted before the engineers vented seawater into the cooling system and the core was cooled down below the melting point of the zircalloy fuel rod casing.

    Second, the explosion occurred outside the containment vessel. It as probably caused when the steam dissociated into hydrogen and oxygen due to extreme heat. The hydrogen ignited and blew apart portions of the outer concrete housing of the reactor building. That outer concrete housing does not serve to keep radiation in; it keeps weather out. No radiation was released as a result of the explosion because even if the concrete housing of the reactor building were reduced to rubble and demolished, the inner steel containment vessel will still keep all the radioactive fuel inside. Once again, that’s why it’s called a ‘containment vessel.’

    Stop panicking, folks.

    …And it appears to be getting worse after an interior explosion.

    No it doesn’t. And the explosion isn’t “interior” to anything but the concrete housing of the reactor building. The actual interior of the reactor is inside the containment vessel, where there has been no explosion of any kind.

    The reactor is at 1 atmosphere, so it’s leaking.

    No, utterly wrong. The reactor is at 1 atmosphere because the engineers vented seawater into the cooling system. The reactor is at 1 atmosphere because it’s cooling down. There is no evidence of any leak whatsoever in the containment vessel.

    The 50 or so guys trying to keep the water going into it are getting to exposed to whatever is in there.

    No, utterly wrong. The containment vessel has not been breached. None of the reactor engineers or technicians are getting “exposed” to anything. The radioactive cesium in the steam that vented has a half life of less than 10 seconds. The uranium, which is the really dangerous stuff, is still mostly contained inside the zircalloy casing of the fuel rods, which themselves are safely contained inside the two-foot-thick steel shell of the containment vessel. No one is being ‘exposed’ to anything other than wildly misinformed garbage news reports and crazy panic.

    I’m presuming the cooling effort is going to require manual labor for quite some time.

    TRANSLATION: The cleanup in the aftermath of this 8.9 magnitude earthquake and tsunami will require a lot of people doing a lot of work.

    No duh.

  106. 106.

    Arclite

    @RalfW:

    My heart is literally racing with fear for these people half a globe away.

    My Japanese wife has been glued to the TV for four days straight. And all her family is safe. It’s just horrifying and riveting.

  107. 107.

    Yutsano

    @Arclite: I have a couple of co-workers with Japanese spouses. I imagine they are beside themselves trying to keep their wives calm even if everyone in their family is fine.

  108. 108.

    Arclite

    @mclaren: And that 400mSv reading between plants 3 and 4 is caused by? And you’re not worried about the fire in plant num 4 caused by the spent fuel rods? Once all that boric acid laced water boils away, what happens then?

  109. 109.

    mclaren

    @RalfW:

    Your gross ignorance says you don’t have a ghost of a clue what you’re talking about.

    Each of these cascading failures was designed for and anticipated and none of them, not one of them, produced any significant release of radiation from the containment vessel, not one of these cascading failures produced a core meltdown, not one of these cascading failures damaged the containment vessel.

    Let’s summarize, shall we?

    Disaster #1: Magnitude 8.9 quake, 7 times larger than the plant was designed to handle. The containment vessel didn’t crack.

    Disaster #2: The reactor loses power to its cooling systems. That was expected, so diesel generators provided backup power to the cooling system.

    Disaster #3: The tsunami wiped out the diesel generators. That also was expected, so the reactor shifted to battery power to run the cooling system.

    Disaster #4: The portable diesel generators that were trucked in had the wrong plugs (!) and wouldn’t interface with the cooling system, so battery power failed.

    Disaster #5: The zircalloy casing of several fuel rods partially melted at the top. This was anticipated and designed for, and the radiation stayed inside the containment vessel.

    Disaster #6: When several fuel rods partially melted, the reactor operators used their last resort and cooled the reactor with seawater. Reactors are normally cooled with distilled water so that no minerals or salts in the water can get irradiated and become radioactive.

    End of the day?

    Big whoop, the reactor core was cooled down using seawater. A tiny amount of radioactivity caused by irradition of salts and minerals in the sea water was produced. Less radioactivity than you’d get in a basement full of radon.

    Everything you’ve said, RalfW, shows you don’t know what you’re talking about.

    Take a chill pill. Everything operated as it was designed to — in fact, better than it was designed to, since the reactor was only designed to withstand a magnitude 8.2 quake.

  110. 110.

    Nerull

    @mclaren: So you know more about the situation than the engineers working on it? Because a lot of this information comes directly from them and a recent briefing by the PM and cabinet.

    Yes, a lot of it is being overblown. That doesn’t mean it isn’t serious. Your information is out of date.

  111. 111.

    Nerull

    @mclaren: So when the guy in charge of containing this mess says it is “Highly likely” that the containment vessel was damaged, that means there was no damage?

    And wow…your ‘end of the day’ comment shows you have no idea what is currently going on. Major problems pumping seawater into reactor #2, a fire a reactor #4. Radiation levels at the reactors that can cause burns in a few hours and death in a day or two. You aren’t paying attention.

  112. 112.

    jheartney

    @mclaren:

    Yeah, stop worrying, y’all! Those buildings were designed to explode.

    not one of these cascading failures produced a core meltdown, not one of these cascading failures damaged the containment vessel.

    mclaren knows these assertions are true because he put on his Kreskin hat and looked inside all four containment vessels.

  113. 113.

    mclaren

    @Arclite:

    And that 400mSv reading between plants 3 and 4 is caused by? And you’re not worried about the fire in plant num 4 caused by the spent fuel rods? Once all that boric acid laced water boils away, what happens then?

    Let’s see some hard evidence of 400 mSv readings between plants 3 and 4. So much gross misinformation has been bruited about that nothing the general media squawks should be taken seriously unless it’s confirmed by multiple knowledgeable reputable scientific experts.

    And you’re not worried about the fire in plant num 4 caused by the spent fuel rods?

    No, I’m not. It’s a fire caused by hydrogen outside the containment vessel. Not inside the containment vessel. The inside of the containment vessel is what counts. That’s where the partially melted fuel rods are located.

    Once all that boric acid laced water boils away, what happens then?

    Let me get this straight: the entire Pacific Ocean is going to boil away. Is that correct?

    Is that what you’re telling me?

  114. 114.

    Nerull

    TEPCO directly contradicts you about the pressure thing:

    The nuclear agency said the explosion at the No. 2 reactor may have damaged the ”suppression chamber,” a facility connected to the reactor’s container which is designed to cool down radiation steam and lower the pressure in the reactor. It said a sharp decline in the pressure level of the chamber suggests damage.

  115. 115.

    Uncle Clarence Thomas

    @mclaren:
    .
    .

    This incident offers final definitive proof that nuclear power is safe.

    Also too, nuclear power is too cheap to meter, as predicted by experts even more expert than mclaren.
    .
    .

  116. 116.

    Nerull

    …so you’re claiming that TEPCO is lying about the radiation levels they are reading. Right. It’s apparent that you haven’t been monitoring the official statements about this incident. Several people here, including me, have been. If you can’t be bothered to keep up with current events, shut the fuck up and stop shouting down people who are.

  117. 117.

    mclaren

    @Nerull:

    Thank you for displaying your gross ignorance and massive incompetence in things scientific and technological.

    There is no evidence that the reactor containment vessel has been breached.

    “Major problems pumping seawater into reactor #2”–of course, the power is still out. They’re working on that. Unless you’re trying to get me to believe that power will never be restored, this is not a doomsday scenario.

    Is that really what you’re trying to tell me? That power will never be restored in any way, shape or form? That no amount of portable diesel generators and no high tension transmission lines strung out there will ever succeed in restoring electric power to the pumps?

    Are you really trying to get us to believe that?

  119. 119.

    mclaren

    @Nerull:

    Now you’re lying. TEPCO is reading radiation levels inside the containment vessel.

    Show us hard evidence that they’re reading those high radiation levels in the outside environment, or stand revealed as an ignorant incompetent liar.

  120. 120.

    mclaren

    @Nerull:

    You’re a typically ignorant sociopath with no clue what’s going on. Keep screaning lies: it will destroy your credibility that much faster.

  121. 121.

    Nerull

    @mclaren: Jesus Fucking Christ. The radiation levels within the reactors are a hell of a lot higher than that, I can assure you. They have quite clearly said those readings are from outside the reactors. You have no idea what you are talking about.

  122. 122.

    Nerull

    @mclaren: You show up screaming with no facts, directly contradicting official statements, and I’m the sociopath? Someone has issues. Just how much credibility do you think you have?

  123. 123.

    RalfW

    @mclaren

    Your ability to shout is, um, so impressive. Howzabout you take your incredibly smart, informed ass and get over to Japan post-haste to fix everything.

    I’m pretty sure they need your expertise more than BJ does.

  124. 124.

    mclaren

    @Nerull:

    No, clearly you’re lying, like the rest of the people on this thread. One the one hand, one of the commenters above hysterically claims that the pressure inside the reactor vessel in at 1 atmosphere which allegedly proves that the containment vessel is venting radiation to the outside environment. Now you hysterically claim that `explosion at the No. 2 reactor may have damaged the ‘’suppression chamber,’’ a facility connected to the reactor’s container which is designed to cool down radiation steam and lower the pressure in the reactor.’

    If that were true, the pressure inside the containment vessel should be much higher than one atmosphere.

    So which is it, ignorant liar? Is the containment vessel pressure high, as TEPCO claims? Which means the containment vessel is still intact and not venting radiation into the environemnt?

    Or is the pressure in the containment vessel at 1 atmosphere, as someone else claims, which allegedly proves that radiation is being leaked?

    You people need to get your lies straight. Make up your minds. Either the pressure is high, or it’s not. You really need to get together and figure out which lies to tell, because you’re not making any sense.

  125. 125.

    Nerull

    @mclaren: Err…okay. That statement was a direct quote from the cabinet member in charge of the cleanup operations. I didn’t write it. Take it up with the people working on the reactor, clearly you know more about it than they do.

    It’s not a difficult concept, really. The surpression chamber is directly connected to the reactor vessel. If the chamber is breached, pressure can escape from the reactor vessel through the chamber. There would also be low pressure in the chamber. This is exactly what TEPCO is saying, and you’re simply making up the claim that it’s at high pressure.

  126. 126.

    srv

    @mclaren:

    The tops of the zircalloy rods inside the containment vessel were exposed to the air briefly.

    The electric company is the provider of the 2.5 meters of exposed rods info on #2. I never said the rods were outside the pressure vessel. That’s #4, not #2. This was all then regurgitated by the PM’s cabinet spokesman on the live feed. Take it up with them. They called it an explosion, and he also said “highly probable” that containment was “leaking.”

    As far as interior – it could be a translation thing, I took it as inside the bldg, outside the containment vessel also. They implied the “noise” subsequent increase in radiation and fall in reactor pressure meant their was a leak and the reason they evacuated more people from the plant.

  127. 127.

    Ash Can

    Let’s see — mclaren contradicts everything the Japanese authorities themselves are saying, from the prime minister on down, then supports his arguments with ad hominem attacks. Yep, that establishes cred, all right.

  128. 128.

    Yutsano

    @Ash Can: Pretty typical response from that one. I notice she used her favorite word in there as well. And her source is ONE ARTICLE from a man who admits he’s not even a nuclear engineer, but his dad is! Hell by that criteria I’m a fucking expert here.

  129. 129.

    srv

    More LIES from Japanese gov’t via NHK:

    Explosion heard at Fukushima No2. reactor
    __
    Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says an explosion was heard early Tuesday morning at the No.2 reactor of the disaster-hit Fukushima No.1 nuclear power plant.
    __
    Agency officials told reporters that the blast was heard at 6:10 AM local time on Tuesday.
    __
    Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano earlier told a news conference that a reactor facility, called the suppression pool, has been damaged.
    __
    But agency officials said they have no detailed information yet about the report.
    __
    They said that depending on where the damage is done, either liquid or air could leak out of the suppression pool.
    __
    The suppression pool is linked to the reactor containment vessel and is designed to prevent radioactive material from leaking outside.
    __
    Experts say a breach to this crucial facility has raised the possibility of a radioactive leak.
    __
    The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency also said that nuclear fuel rods inside the No.2 reactor are exposed above water by about 2.7 meters. That’s about half the length of the fuel rods.
    __
    Agency officials said that radiation levels around the nuclear power plant reached 965.5 microsieverts following the explosive sound.
    __
    They say the figure later dropped slightly to 882 microsieverts.
    __
    The officials said they believe the rise in radiation level is due to the breach in the suppression pool, but that they cannot say for sure. They said they are monitoring the situation closely.
    __
    The officials added that the monitored level of radiation would not immediately pose a health threat.
    __
    Tokyo Electric Power Company that operates the power station briefly evacuated workers from the facility following the sound of the blast.
    __
    Tuesday, March 15, 2011 09:26 +0900 (JST)

    http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/15_13.html

    During the press conference, the reporters were clearly (at least from the translation) asking about the pressure vessel, and not the suppression pool. It’s possible the PM’s guy or translator does not know the difference. But why would their be radiation coming from the suppression pool if containment hasn’t been breached?

  131. 131.

    mclaren

    @Nerull:

    I’ve linked to a variety of facts and you can follow the links. You prefer instead to scream hysterically.

    Among the many facts I linked to, but which you are too ignorant, and apparently too incompetent to bother to click through to are:

    battle to stabilise earthquake damaged reactors

    Media updates on nuclear power stations in Japan

    And so on. But you’d prefer to run around like a chicken with its head cut off, screaming hysterically, rather than studying the facts.

    Let’s take an example of typical media hysteria. this is from the New York Times:

    Inside the plant, according to industry executives and American experts who received briefings over the weekend, there was deep concern that spent nuclear fuel that was kept in a “cooling pond” inside one of the plants had been exposed and begun letting off potentially deadly gamma radiation.

    Oooohhhh! Sounds very impressive. “Deadly gamma radiation.”

    Guess what? Those spent fuel rods have always been releasing “deadly gamma radiation,” it’s just been absorbed by the water in the cooling ponds. So there’s no news here. When the water boils away, the spent fuel rods are no more radioactive than they were months ago, there’s just no water to prevent the gamma radiation from irradiating objects and people nearby.

    So big deal. When spent fuel rods are removed from a reactor, there’s no water to prevent the “deadly gamma rays” from irradiating people or objects nearby. So the spent fuel rods get dumped into water.

    The obvious solution to this non-problem is that water will be dumped back into the ponds where the spent fuel rods are located. This is non-issue. In the meantime, people will stay away from the spent fuel rods, just as people stayed away from while they were removed from the reactor (remote operated machinery was used to move around the spent fuel rods because, as mentioned, they do emit gamma radiation).

    Nerull, you clearly have not a ghost of a clue what you’re talking about. If you take this kind of wildly hysterical misreporting from the New York Times at face value, you’re not only ignorant, you’re a fool to boot.

    When the New York Times says “several workers at the plant have been treated for radiation poisoning,” it’s once again not clear what this means. The hysterically panicking kooks and ignorami on this thread assume it means that workers are dying with skin lesions and their faces are peeling off and they’re glowing from radiation.

    What it most likely means is that health officials took the precaution of giving the workers KI (that’s potassium idoide) dietary supplements to prevent any of the radioactive cesium or iodine from being absorbed into their bodies. As you no doubt know, cesium is chemically similar to potassium and is a bone-seeker (it gets incorporated into the calcium phosphate of human bone if absorbed into the body) and iodine is absorbed by the thyroid gland.

    These are precautions. There is no hard evidence that anyone is seriously ill from radiation.

  134. 134.

    eemom

    so, is it just me — or is everyone else kind of surprised that mcpsycho is apparently pro-nuke?

  135. 135.

    Arclite

    If anything the Japanese government and TEPCo are downplaying the incidents. They both have a history of covering up and lying about nuclear event severity over the years. But this is from the horse’s mouth from ABC news:

    Mr Edano says radiation levels as at 10.22am (local time) were 30 millisieverts between the No. 2 and the No. 3 reactors, 400 millisieverts near No. 3 and 100 millisieverts near No. 4.

    Are you saying they are lying and overstating the case?

    As for your contention that the reactor survived an 9.0 earthquake when it was designed for an 8.2 earthquake, I’d like to point out that the power plant was not the epicenter of the earthquake and did not get hit with the full force of the quake.

  136. 136.

    Comrade Mary

    mclaren, I checked your links.

    Your first goes to a story dates March 12 at @World Nuclear News. I checked some more recent stories and found these:

    Dramatic escalation in Japan
    __
    Loud noises were heard at Fukushima Daiichi 2 at 6.10am this morning. A major component beneath the reactor is confirmed to be damaged. Evacuation to 20 kilometres is being completed, while a fire on site has now been put out.
    __
    Confirmation of loud sounds at unit 2 this morning came from the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA). It noted that “the suppression chamber may be damaged.” It is not clear that the sounds were explosions in the usual sense. …
    __
    The pressure in the pool was seen to decrease from three atmospheres to one atmosphere after the noise, suggesting possible damage. Radiation levels on the edge of the plant compound briefly spiked at 8217 microsieverts per hour but later fell to about a third that.
    __
    A close watch is being kept on the radiation levels to ascertain the status of containment. As a precaution Tokyo Electric Power Company has evacuated all non-essential personnel from the unit. The company’s engineers continue to pump seawater into the reactor pressure vessel in an effort to cool it.

    Is this story a hysterical aberration by your chosen site?

    How about this?

    Loss of coolant at Fukushima Daiichi 2
    __
    Serious damage to the reactor core of Fukushima Daiichi 2 seems likely after coolant was apparently lost for a period. Seawater is again being injected, but coolant level is unknown.
    __
    A spokesman for Tokyo Electric Power Company has appeard on national broadcaster NHK to explain the company’s efforts to control unit 2’s reactor core after its isolation cooling system failed following an increase in containment pressure to some 700 kPa.

  138. 138.

    srv

    Mary, I think that’s a sticky page with updates.

    Y’all will have to play with him tonight, I’m going to bed.

  139. 139.

    Yutsano

    @Mark S.: And not only that, but downright evangelistic about what the “truth” is. Disconcerting doesn’t begin to cover it.

  141. 141.

    Comrade Mary

    More from your second link (a collection of links):

    It includes the IAEA Alert Log, whose top story now is this update from 6:15 CET:

    Japanese authorities informed the IAEA that there has been an explosion at the Unit 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. The explosion occurred at around 06:20 on 15 March local Japan time.
    __
    Japanese authorities also today informed the IAEA at 04:50 CET that the spent fuel storage pond at the Unit 4 reactor of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant is on fire and radioactivity is being released directly into the atmosphere.
    __
    Dose rates of up to 400 millisievert per hour have been reported at the site. Japanese authorities are saying that there is a possibility that the fire was caused by a hydrogen explosion.
    __
    The IAEA is seeking further information on these developments.
    __
    The IAEA continues to liaise with the Japanese authorities and is monitoring the situation as it evolves.

    The story isn’t DOOM DOOM DOOM, but it does back up the findings of 400 mSv readings at the site, not within the reactor vessel itself. It's calm, but not dismissive nor Pollyannaish.

    In short: you found some relatively calm and optimistic stories from a day or two back and have ignored what your linked sources are saying today. Yeah, some stories in the Times and other sources have been ridiculous, but when several media sources echo what we heard on the NHK broadcast directly from government officials: we tend to beleive that these somewhat ominous developments don't mean that we are guaranteed DOOM DOOM DOOM, but it doesn't mean everything is perfectly under control.

  142. 142.

    eemom

    well, let’s look on the bright side: even trolls have the capacity to surprise us…to morph into something new and different, right before our very eyes.

  144. 144.

    Ecks

    @mclaren: You realize this article you are quoting about how everything is fine was written 3 days ago before the latest series of explosions, right? It says so right at the top. The containment was definitively not broken then. Maddow had a guy from Princeton on her show this evening (not 3 days ago) saying that it might be cracked now.

    @Comrade Mary: Ah, I see you found out the same thing and already called her on it. Good show.

    I gave up on Mclaren a few days ago when the discussion was education policy. She made the assertion that research had found teacher quality doesn’t matter. It wasn’t my area, but I did a quick googling and found a couple of large meta-studies which say that it did matter. “Yeah,” Mclaren says, “but they have bad methodology.”
    “That’s interesting,” says I. “And exactly how it their methodology bad, pray tell? I’m skeptical, but am open to your convincing me.”
    “YOU ARE IGNORANT AND FOOLISH AND WANT TO HURT PEOPLE” replies Mclaren (I’m paraphrasing, but that was the general tone). But somehow in all this vitriol she never actually got around to saying what it was that was actually wrong with the studies. You might almost think, if you didn’t know any better, that she had no idea what was wrong with them, other than she didn’t like what they were saying. But that can’t be, because she is on the INTERNET and that makes her an authority. Plus if you don’t believe everything she says, she will call you ignorant, and that PROVES that she knows better.

  145. 145.

    Ecks

    @Ecks: She might reply to this in the morning. If she does I promise you that her message will contain several scathing insults about me, and still zero analysis about the methodological problems with those studies.

    Not that I even care about that issue much, it just establishes lack of credibility when you consistently make strong claims that you can’t back up.

  148. 148.

    AhabTRuler

    @4tehlulz: You’d rather we depended on METI for our information? I’m afraid there are no good sources available, but you go through a nuclear emergency with the sources you have . . .

  149. 149.

    DPirate

    This is not good.

    No doubt. He needs to figure out how that shit works.

    Didn’t we go through this before with him and some whale? Didn’t turn out well, if i remember correctly.

  150. 150.

    Hob

    Pardon the incredibly inappropriately trivial comment, but I just read the Vernor Vinge novel A Fire Upon the Deep (1992) and it’s really spooky how well his depiction of interstellar message boards matches the current discourse. In the book, some careless humans cause a massive disaster where large swathes of the galaxy are now basically possessed by Satan. And various species are sitting at their terminals typing things like “I think all these reports are exaggerated” and “Everyone’s acting like this is the end of the world, LOL” and “See I told you we should wipe out the humans” and “Who are these ‘humans’? They have six legs, don’t they? I believe hexapodia is the key to the whole thing” and “You fucking moron, you don’t know what you’re talking about.” It doesn’t really fill you with confidence about the potential of intelligent life.

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