Major Earthquake & Tsunami in Japan

[Dotini]

MAX-QUAKE MAX?
http://hereticalnotions.com/2011/03/12/max-quake-max/
March 12th, 2011

Of the fifteen strongest earthquakes recorded since 1900, five have occurred in the past seven years. That’s 33% of the total concentrated within about 6% of the time span.

Is it because recording methods have become more sensitive recently? Probably not, since even old-tech seismographs should easily pick up these 8.0+ quakes.

Is it merely a statistical fluke? Hard to say. Others (including the USGS) have suggested that for smaller major earthquakes there is no meaningful pattern.

However, for the 15 “max-quakes” listed here by the USGS, the timing definitely is clumpy, as if the factors that give rise to them do become more intense, for some reason, every so often. Four of the top fifteen occurred during 1957-65 — and if we extend the list to 16, then 5 of these 16 occurred in that period. So purely from these data, it appears that a previous “max-quake max” period occurred about fifty years ago, and we are in another such period now, but perhaps near its end — or grand finale.

 

[alexleighton]

As horrible as it is, sometimes an accident like this is what is needed to get an industry to really up their safety game.

This will likely make nuclear plant people (don't know the proper term) take a step back and say, "Okay, what do we have to do to make sure this never happens again."

 

[Robin]

How exactly are you privvy to such details of the construction of these storage pools? Who told you they are "no stronger than your local swimming pool"? The concrete structure is only there to keep the weather out, everything else is self-contained within that "cube".

The storage pools are not in the containment shell which only houses the reactor. They are just housed in basic concrete buildings.

I never claimed to know the details of their construction but I have seen programs which have shown nuclear power plant storage pools and they are stored in standard sheltered buildings with hardly any radioactive protection because spent rods are not considered a high risk.

As for those 'cubes' they are also a basic concrete structure! they are there just for minimal protection which it why they blew up so easily. The real protection is from the reactor casing.

Stop fabricating things, you're worse than the media.

Ah, so your one of those 'the media is selling us lies' kinda guys...

I'm just contributing whats being reported so if you don't believe it take it up with the BBC.

Robin.

 

[Brett]

Pardon my asking, but I'm curious as to what you'd do with the information.

If you're hoping to be able to infer the level of damage at the site, I wouldn't bother. Several international expert institutions are now involved, so "secrecy" is almost assured.

Nothing really. The technical information would allow me to put a meaning to "the radiation levels are rising". I want a measurable quantity, not some kind of anecdotal information. My processing of information is mostly done in relative or quantifiable numbers, not vague information that give no real perspective on a situation. I want to be able to make a comparison to something I better understand or put the numbers into perspective.

There's several ways of measuring radiation - which compounds the problem.

There's the becquerel (Bq) which measures radioactive decay. How radioactive something is can be measured in becquerels. 1Bq = 1 nucleus decay per second.

There's the curie (Ci) which does the same thing but normalised to the radioactivity of 1 gram of Radium-226. 1 gram of Ra-226 undergoes 3.7 x 10^10 nucleus decays per second - so 1Ci = 37 GBq (Gigabecquerel).

Neither of these things tell you how much danger you're actually in - just how active a source is. More important is the gray (Gy) which measures the amount of radiation required to deposit 1 Joule of energy into 1kg of matter - the "absorbed dose". The gray doesn't account for types of radiation though - a 1Gy dose of alphas is far more damaging to you than 1Gy dose of X-Rays.

For that we have the sievert. The sievert measures the biological effect of radiation, though it uses the same dimensions - J/kg. The sievert is effectively the gray modified by a "relative biological effectiveness" factor depending on the type of radiation (and another depending on what bit of you is exposed).

A dose of 250 millisieverts in one hit is the start of radiation sickness - nausea and varying temporary soft-tissue damage (spleen, lymph nodes, bone marrow). Above 1 sievert is dangerous territory - you may not recover. Above 10 sieverts and you're dead.

For approximation:
1 chest X-Ray = 0.05 millisieverts
1 long-haul flight = 0.1 millisieverts
Cosmic radiation dose = 0.25 millisieverts per year
Average annual dose = 2 millisieverts per year
20-a-day cigarette habit = 10 millisieverts per year
Nuclear industry worker maximum permitted dose = 20 millisieverts per year (that's ten times normal)
Lowest detectable carcinogenic level = 100 millisieverts per year


Now, if they're talking about radiation levels being "ten times higher than normal", they could be counting anything. If they're talking counts per minute, it's largely an irrelevance (counts per minute is simply a detection rate of decays per minute - curie and becquerel). If they're talking in gray, that means there's more stuff around that heats stuff up but it's no help without saying what type it is - ten times as many betas is an irrelevance. If they're talking in sieverts - assuming the background locally to be the average 2mSv/year - then there's ten times as much damaging stuff around, but it's gone up from average background dose to the maximum a nuclear industry worker is permitted to receive (and it's worth a note that they are measured and we are not), or to a 40-a-day cigarette habit. It'd need to be another five times higher than that to be a detectable health risk.

That's just background, of course. The actual site has higher readings than that - I've seen 400mSv/hour quoted, which is pretty ropey. That could, however, be a number arrived at by multiplying "background" by "factor" - without understanding, as Griffith points out, that background on a nuclear power station site is many, many times lower than normal background levels. If you scoop up a handful of dirt outside a nuclear power station, walk onto the power station site and then try to leave, you will be stopped as you are now carrying low-level radioactive waste.

Fantastic post! 👍

 

[Dotini]

AP is reporting some interesting news. Below are some snippets.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_japan_earthquake
SOMA, Japan – Dangerous levels of radiation leaking from a crippled nuclear plant forced Japan to order 140,000 people to seal themselves indoors Tuesday after an explosion and a fire dramatically escalated the crisis spawned by a deadly tsunami.

In a nationally televised statement, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said radiation had spread from the four stricken reactors of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant along Japan's northeastern coast. The region was shattered by Friday's 9.0-magnitude earthquake and the ensuing tsunami that is believed to have killed more than 10,000 people, plunged millions into misery and pummeled the world's third-largest economy.

Japanese officials told the International Atomic Energy Agency that the reactor fire was in a fuel storage pond — an area where used nuclear fuel is kept cool — and that "radioactivity is being released directly into the atmosphere." Long after the fire was extinguished, a Japanese official said the pool might still be boiling, though the reported levels of radiation had dropped dramatically by the end of the day.

Late Tuesday, officials at the plant said they were considering asking for help from the U.S. and Japanese militaries to spray water from helicopters into the pool.

That reactor, Unit 4, had been shut down before the quake for maintenance.

If the water boils, it could evaporate, exposing the rods. The fuel rods are encased in safety containers meant to prevent them from resuming nuclear reactions, nuclear officials said. But they acknowledged that there could have been damage to the containers. They also confirmed that the walls of the storage pool building were damaged.

Experts noted that much of the leaking radiation was apparently in steam from boiling water. It had not been emitted directly by fuel rods, which would be far more virulent, they said.

"It's not good, but I don't think it's a disaster," said Steve Crossley, an Australia-based radiation physicist.

Even the highest detected rates were not automatically harmful for brief periods, he said.

"If you were to spend a significant amount of time — in the order of hours — that could be significant," Crossley said.

Less clear were the results of the blast in Unit 2, near a suppression pool, which removes heat under a reactor vessel, said plant owner Tokyo Electric Power Co. The nuclear core was not damaged but the bottom of the surrounding container may have been, said Shigekazu Omukai, a spokesman for Japan's nuclear safety agency.


Officials said 70 workers were at the complex, struggling with its myriad problems. The workers, all of them wearing protective gear, are being rotated in and out of the danger zone quickly to reduce their radiation exposure.

Another 800 staff were evacuated. The fires and explosions at the reactors have injured 15 workers and military personnel and exposed up to 190 people to elevated radiation.

Temperatures in at least two of the complex's reactors, units 5 and 6, were also slightly elevated, Edano said.

"The power for cooling is not working well and the temperature is gradually rising, so it is necessary to control it," he said.

Fourteen pumps have been brought in to get seawater into the other reactors. They are not yet pumping water into Unit 4 but are trying to figure out how to do that.

 

[Griffith500]

The storage pools are not in the containment shell which only houses the reactor. They are just housed in basic concrete buildings.

I never claimed to know the details of their construction but I have seen programs which have shown nuclear power plant storage pools and they are stored in standard sheltered buildings with hardly any radioactive protection because spent rods are not considered a high risk.

As for those 'cubes' they are also a basic concrete structure! they are there just for minimal protection which it why they blew up so easily. The real protection is from the reactor casing.

I know that. You claimed the casing was "seeping" "radiation" not just venting. Where did you hear that? The only radiation that could escape that casing would be photons i.e. gamma rays, and pretty energetic ones at that. Venting quite happily transports radioactive material outside - that's the real risk.

The "cube" is designed to fold like that in the event of an explosion. Why? To prevent the explosion from concentrating inside the building and doing more damage. To quote Dr. Oehmen: The shell is supposed to keep the weather out, but nothing in.

And you said something about the pool cracking and leaking radioactive material. That's not the concrete shack, is it? That's the pool liner, which is almost certainly multi-layered and far more substantial than they imagine they required. The water itself is also not very radioactive (just the same as the water in the core) and provides about 5 times more protection from radiation than is required! The danger is that the residual heat in the spent fuel (just as in the core) will cause the spent fuel to escape its primary containment (by melting the metal casing in the bundle), by which time the water will be evaporating rapidly. That's why they have backup cooling systems. Sadly, in this case, they seem to have failed. This is, in the long run, no different to the venting already going on in the reactor cores - assuming that's all it is.

Ah, so your one of those 'the media is selling us lies' kinda guys...

I'm just contributing whats being reported so if you don't believe it take it up with the BBC.

Robin.

No, you're adding your own little "flair" to it. I can deal with the selectivity of the media, and I never said they're lying to us.

 

[a6m5]

Hi everyone,

Geez, it seems like forever since I posted something here. For those who were wondering, I'm okay (for now, that is.) I won't retype what I went through but will just link to my site where I already gave my account.

http://www.gaijin-gunpla.com/tohoku-kanto-major-earthquake/

Since I wrote that things haven't gotten better. Still no gas at gas stations, no bottled water at stores, no flashlights or batteries anywhere and the rolling blackouts are supposed to continue until the end of April. I managed to convince my wife to take my daughter (and cat) and get the f%*& out of here, i mean, go stay with her relatives who live far away.

Myself, I had just enough gas to get back into work so I am staying in this area (Tochigi prefecture) until the highways open up and the gasoline supply returns. Or until I die from nuclear radiation. Whichever comes first.

Glad to hear that you & your family's doing OK. I thought you'd be in Izu Shoto, or whichever islands you were considering moving to!

I just got done reading your blog, and kept wondering what "gunpla" was. Then I got to the part about you picking up boxes of "gunpla" in the warehouse, and it hit me. I started looking around the blog, then saw pictures of "gunpla" on the side. I haven't heard that word, probably not since I was a kid.

Regarding the quake, while many are occupied about the nuclear facility, I've been concerned more about the food & shelter situation. You are in Kanto area, and even you are experiencing food, water and gas shortage. Firsthand. I can not imagine what folks in Tohoku-chihou must be going through. I used to have my grandparents in Fukushima, but they've passed away, and they didn't live by the nuclear power plant anyway.

I'm worried about the economy, and rebuilding of size we have not seen since the 1940's, but we can't worry about that now. Right now, we have to put the fires out(literally & figuratively), help out with the immediate needs of the people.

Hey, since you are in Japan. From over there, which relief group seems to be helping out the most over there? I've donated through American Red Cross for the earthquake + tsunami in Japan + Pacific, but if there was any organization that deserves a mention, I'd like to have a link to their page posted in this thread as well.

It's good hearing from you, Speedy!

 

[Touring Mars]

To quote Dr. Oehmen

That renowed nuclear expert... although the original post (that has been repeatedly cited here) is generally OK, I can't say that I agree with one of his bolder statements... "The plant is safe now and will stay safe." I'm not sure how he could possibly say that, presumably not being in any position to check the reality on the ground, or because he seems to be neglecting the danger posed by the spent fuel containers...

While I am all in favour of keeping this incident in perspective, I'm not buying the "chill out, it's fine" story much...

 

[Griffith500]

That renowed nuclear expert... although the original post (that has been repeatedly cited here) is generally OK, I can't say that I agree with one of his bolder statements... "The plant is safe now and will stay safe." I'm not sure how he could possibly say that, presumably not being in any position to check the reality on the ground, or because he seems to be neglecting the danger posed by the spent fuel containers...

While I am all in favour of keeping this incident in perspective, I'm not buying the "chill out, it's fine" story much...

Absolutely. It's more about the detail available in that post, and it is always important to identify and segregate the opinion from "fact".

Here's an update.

EDIT: seems to be a "pro-nuclear" site, but the information presented is reported mostly from TEPCO's own reports.
EDIT: Nice succinct table of the status of both Fukushima plants, posted here - from the same site. May be updated in future, as it is possibly outdated for No. 2 at Daiichi.

 

[Touring Mars]

Add this to the file "Things you don't see every day"... a house adrift in the Pacific Ocean...

 

[Dotini]

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

Live news feed.

 

[Shadow Wulf 2k]

That renowed nuclear expert... although the original post (that has been repeatedly cited here) is generally OK, I can't say that I agree with one of his bolder statements... "The plant is safe now and will stay safe." I'm not sure how he could possibly say that, presumably not being in any position to check the reality on the ground, or because he seems to be neglecting the danger posed by the spent fuel containers...

While I am all in favour of keeping this incident in perspective, I'm not buying the "chill out, it's fine" story much...

The article has some good technical info about what is going on, but it is still a serious issue, none-the-less. I think he downplays things a bit too much.

It gives a better picture, compared to the mainstream media throwing around comparisons to Chernobyl as if the two were alike.

The Fukushima situation is closer to Three Mile Island in terms of what's going on.

 

[Shadow Wulf 2k]

As horrible as it is, sometimes an accident like this is what is needed to get an industry to really up their safety game.

This will likely make nuclear plant people (don't know the proper term) take a step back and say, "Okay, what do we have to do to make sure this never happens again."

I think this will most likey cause plant designers to start incorporating higher seismic requirements, up to at least a 9.0 earthquake level, as well as tsunami protection for critical components outside of containment that are vital to the function of the plant.

What happened in Japan was beyond what would normally be anticipated, but their people over there have done a good job at keeping things contained.

I hear a lot of "Well why wouldn't something like this be anticipated?", but hindsight is always 20/20.

 

[a6m5]

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

Live news feed.

Awesome. Thanks!

I'm still astonished at how bad the translating job is(lol), but it's nice to see the latest from NHK. 👍

 

[CodeRedR51]

Add this to the file "Things you don't see every day"... a house adrift in the Pacific Ocean...

Umm, wow. How exactly is that thing still floating?

 

[Dotini]

NHK are reporting helicopter spraying will commence Wednesday or Thursday.
In the meantime, spraying of the rods will be accomplished by firetrucks through a big hole in the wall.

 

[ironcobra]

http://beforeitsnews.com/story/482/...Tokyo_Levels_80_Times_Higher_Than_Normal.html

Not looking good for japan...Reuters and NHK are reporting radiation is 80x higher in Tokyo then normal. Damn how long are they gonna let it leak before they warn people its getting to dangerous...China has stopped all flights leading into Tokyo

 

[blaaah]

Add this to the file "Things you don't see every day"... a house adrift in the Pacific Ocean...

Does it have a sea view?
I might buy it.
With raising sea levels due to global warming, what's the worst that could happen?

 

[G.T.Ace]

Not looking good for japan...Reuters and NHK are reporting radiation is 80x higher in Tokyo then normal. Damn how long are they gonna let it leak before they warn people its getting to dangerous...China has stopped all flights leading into Tokyo

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ガイガーカウンタ On that Geiger Counter it looks anything but dangerous.
Hm, who to trust?

 

[Wiegert]

Reuters - The radiation plume from a nuclear power plant damaged by Japan's devastating earthquake and subsequent tsunami could reach Tokyo, a U.S. scientists' organization said on Tuesday.

Let's hope that Tokyo doesn't become badly affected by this.

 

[BWX]

Umm, wow. How exactly is that thing still floating?

Wood floats.. It would be hard to sink it.

 

[Shadow Wulf 2k]

Umm, wow. How exactly is that thing still floating?

There could also be pockets of air trapped in various places inside, keeping it afloat.

 

[CodeRedR51]

Wood floats.. It would be hard to sink it.

True, but you think it would soak up enough water and start going under. Would be really weird if researchers in the future found an intact house sitting at the bottom of the ocean.

 

[ironcobra]

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/ガイガーカウンタ On that Geiger Counter it looks anything but dangerous.
Hm, who to trust?

I agree but im wondering how wind and upper atmosphere conditions swing this stuff around there reporting high levels at one time then lower at another?
It definitely moves around according to weather me thinks

 

[ironcobra]

http://live.nicovideo.jp/watch/lv43296023

is reporting higher then normal radiation in tokyo right now live over and over

 

[Morrac32]

Umm, wow. How exactly is that thing still floating?

Surface area?? Or a lot of foam insulation.....a whole lot!

 

[fissionproject]

What's the damage looking like after the 6.0 aftershock in near Tokyo a few hours ago???

 

[G.T.Ace]

Press Release (Mar 15,2011)
Damage to the Unit 4 Nuclear Reactor Building at Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Station


At approximately 6:00am, a loud explosion was heard from within the
power station. Afterwards, it was confirmed that the 4th floor rooftop
area of the Unit 4 Nuclear Reactor Building had sustained damage.

After usage, fuel is stored in a pool designated for spent fuel.

Plant conditions as well as potential outside radiation effects are
currently under investigation.

TEPCO, along with other involved organizations, is doing its best to
contain the situation. Simultaneously, the surrounding environment is
being kept under constant surveillance.

http://www.tepco.co.jp/en/press/corp-com/release/11031504-e.html

 

[HKS racer]

Today news was speaking about a big toxic cloud that will reach Europe in about 15 days. If this situation will be comfirmed we are ALL in some deep s***.

(OT all the world seems to asking themeslves about nuclear only my stupid idiotic country stated "we can't go back from our decisions, we are ready for nuclear" the cliche Italy = mafia seems to be quite true at the moment http://www.tg1.rai.it/dl/tg1/2010/articoli/ContentItem-e50c9cf1-c21e-421a-b72b-dcc48f21f3db.html /OT)

 

[CodeRedR51]

Today news was speaking about a big toxic cloud that will reach Europe in about 15 days. If this situation will be comfirmed we are ALL in some deep s***.

I fail to see exactly how that's going to happen.