"Under control"? Give me a break.
Here are some aerial infrared photos of the four most damaged nuclear reactors at Fukushima Daiichi. Reactor no. 3 is the most wasted, and its spent fuel pool looks the hottest from above -- 62 Celsius, or 144 Farenheit. Over where the reactor vessel sits, the temperature is more than twice that -- 128 Celsius, or 262 Farenheit. The top of the reactor vessel may have been crushed or broken off, and the spent fuel pool is probably leaking or missing a wall.
They have thrown away the manuals and are now winging it. Restoring electricity to the plant after more than a week is nice, but the reactor buildings and the equipment within them have been trashed. No one is trained to deal with this level of destruction. It is still an extremely dangerous, high-stakes experiment, despite what the nucle-heads are braying about it being "under control."
| Posted at 10:37 PM | Permalink |
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Comments (8)
Can someone explain this to me?
Back in the 1950's,60's and the early 1970's The United States detonated HUNDREDS of ABOVE GROUND nuclear bombs!
The clouds produced from those bombs were miles high and had to circle the globe many times.
At that time the so called experts, were not concerned about fall-out as they continued to detonate bombs. As I stated hunderds of time NOT INCLUDING the formor USSR and China. But let's add those nations to the mix and now we are talking THOUSANDS of above ground tests.
With all that radiation releases into the food chain, we should have all been dead long ago!!!
Times have changed and I'm not downplaying the risk of radiation, however, why are we concerned about exposed rods from Japan, when the planet has survived all other nuclear tests?
Did someone change the recipe somewhere down the line?
Just a thought.
Posted by Jeff | March 22, 2011 7:02 AM
It's nice to know that Charlottesville, VA has sophisticated radiation detection equipment because that has long been our planned evacuation, rendezvous point in the event of a nuclear incident in or around the nation's capital.
Posted by Newleaf | March 22, 2011 7:30 AM
Jeff, even big bombs are tiny compared to fuel assemblies. Remember what a warhead is, it's the payload for an ICBM, kinda like the tiny capsule the lab rats sit in atop a Saturn V rocket. Reactors burn through tons of fuel assemblies. The fuel pellets are tiny, but a critical mass is larger and a critical mass that will stay critical for 18 months while the neutron-absorbing poisons produced from fission build up is much, much larger still.
Worse yet, when you expose spent fuel, you are letting loose all the nasties that built up for months or even years. A big nuke going off is a very brief event, without a lot of time available for things like Cesium to build up.
Posted by George Anonymuncule Seldes | March 22, 2011 8:45 AM
Oh, and yes , plenty of people were concerned about fallout at the time. We can reliably date some things just by dental strontium levels.
Posted by George Anonymuncule Seldes | March 22, 2011 8:47 AM
George, your kidding right? You actually believe that?
Posted by dman | March 22, 2011 9:53 AM
ABOUT FALLOUT 1955
Posted by al m | March 22, 2011 12:00 PM
Duck and cover!
Yeah,...right!
Posted by portland native | March 22, 2011 1:17 PM
http://www.rawstory.com/rawreplay/2011/03/lieberman-mccain-insist-u-s-nuclear-power-is-safe/
Yes, all is under control in the states anyway as Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) and John McCain (R-AZ) are insisting that nuclear power is safe in the U.S.
Have no confidence in them, their motivations or judgment.
As for others, have no confidence in statements coming from any with vested interests. Is Wall Street invested in nuclear power?
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Americas/2011/0321/US-agrees-to-help-Chile-go-nuclear-despite-Japan-disaster
Yesterday, some 2,000 people marched through the capital to protest a new US-Chile nuclear power cooperation agreement signed Friday as radiation leaked from Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant. The agreement promises cooperation in operating research reactors, handling civilian nuclear training and safety measures.
Below are some excerpts:
That, as well as the US's hunt for new markets for its nuclear technology, could keep Chile on a nuclear course......
In a November report, the US General Accounting Office called on the Commerce Department to identify new markets, saying the US has lost much of its share in the global nuclear marketplace.
Posted by clinamen | March 22, 2011 1:23 PM