Submitted by R. Cromack (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 21:53.
The "tent solution" is probably the best that TEPCO can do at the moment, given the following facts and modestly informed conjecture:
> Although there is already significant construction going on at Fukushima Daiichi, particularly with regard to the construction of the new, steel "seawall" to mitigate the continued flow of radioactive materials and highly contaminated water into the open sea, there must be prioritization of initiatives... And next on the list is the construction of water tanks and a brand-new water waste treatment facility. With local radiation levels remaining significant, there will necessarily be limits on how many personnel can be on-site at any one time, to maximize efficiency and ensure that all participant private companies, subcontractors and other personnel do not receive maximum yearly dosages too soon, or else they will literally "burn through" all their human capital and there won't be anyone left to clear debris, make repairs, build new systems, or maintain the plant (such as it is).
> There is probably concern about the stability of the ground near and underneath all the affected reactor buildings, 1 through 4, and its ability to sustain new, substantial construction / weight / pressure given the extraordinary forces, in particular seismic ground waves, water and radiation, that have been acting upon it over the course of the past two months. There is also a high probability that said soil, itself, is extremely radioactive, limiting (for the moment, anyway) the ability of construction personnel to significantly enter and move around said soil. Given these limitations, it's highly likely that TEPCO has concluded that, at present, the reactor buildings proper and their immediate surrounds cannot sustain heavy earth-moving, substantial digging and pronounced construction activity, and so they have opted to pursue a course of action with the least probability of making the situation worse. Hence, a relatively low-impact "tent" or canopy solution, that may mitigate the continued release of airborne particulate matter from Reactor 1 while presenting minimum danger and complications to the site, and which also, btw, will require substantially less time to build, placing a far lower burden on the plant's personnel.
> Typhoon season is rising, and they have got to do something to: protect the reactors proper; prevent a potentially calamitous interaction of (nominally) interior electrical systems and additional water; and prevent high winds and whiplash precipitation from blowing what's inside these shattered buildings, outside.
I'm sure that, if they had their druthers, the TEPCO personnel on-site would vastly prefer to surround these buildings with new, far more substantial constructs, but they're out of time, and they must do something, fast, before additional external factors begin to exert their unpredictable, but certainly not helpful, influence on a situation that is only barely being maintained as it is. While the "tent solution" is easy to mock and, against the multitude of far more preferable options, may seem ridiculous, it is also by far the most achievable, for the moment, and in terms of both time and, far more importantly, risk to personnel, it is also far and away the most "cost-effective". And, ultimately, it really is their only option at the moment. Time will tell if this stopgap measure is able to be superceded by a far more permanent, and desirable, course of action down the road. For the moment, we really, really need reliable soil properties, a calm 2011 storm season, and for nothing else to go wrong.
I'm prepared to have these statements challenged, naturally, but I think I'm talking sense, here. BRAWM / UCBNE, do you have an opinion on this?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 22:12.
I agree with your perspective but I don't think the tent would be ready before the typhoon season. We already had the first one coming from the Philipines (it was downgraded to tropical storm before hitting Japan, though) and usually they hit hard around August-September.
Submitted by R. Cromack (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 22:42.
...But, and not to quibble, that only serves to underscore my point: They're manifestly out of time, and they must do something, fast. No one, I suspect, would call this their "ideal" solution. But, in a circumstance where many doors have already -- perhaps, permanently -- closed, and more are apparently swinging shut all the time, it may well be the MOST achievable, LEAST risky, BEST option left to them. Just as aspiring, from this point forward, merely to keep the uranium slag pile sitting at or near the bottom of the Reactor 1 RV, formerly known as the Reactor 1 core, nominally covered with water, appears to now be the only option left to them, the fantastical, mythological "cold shutdown" of Reactor 1 now having been taken completely off the table, it seems, since [A] the RV, and also potentially the CV, not to mention the building that previously enclosed both, has been substantially and irreparably breached; [B] actual "filling" of the Reactor 1 RV can no longer be attained; [C] in order to avoid total structural failure of the critical Reactor 1 architecture, the priority must now be keeping the slag pile as cool as possible while presenting the least possible danger to what remains of the Reactor 1 structures; and [D] it's anyone's guess, at this point, as to what fraction of the former Reactor 1 core is still nominally reaction-capable, what level of public health danger it poses, and how much of it is at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, anyway.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 18:08.
If this accident happened in the US I don't think our response would be much better. Once you let the nuclear genie out of its bottle it is incredibly hard to get it back in.
What this really demonstrates is that we humans are not able to deal with the consequences of nuclear power when it escapes our control.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 22:12.
All nuke plants should have wells bored under each reactor into the mantle of the planet. If a meltdown occurs, you jettison the whole containment back to where it came from.
Submitted by angusmerlin (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 16:24.
And, as an extra advantage of a giant tent covering the damaged Fukushima nuclear reactors, we now no longer will be able to see the leaning tower... I mean the leaning building of Tempco's #4 nuclear reactor.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 12:34.
Without a really detailed and scientific-based explanation of the who, what, why and how on this...seems ridiculous. An aside: great band called "wovengreen" has a song "Rim of the Wheel" - here's a a bit of it:
Watch the stream choke, come watch the river bleed,
Watch the shadow rise to meet you in the circus ring.
Listen to the thunder, thunder without rain
Bird wings paralyzed, and the world cries out in pain.
It's about nuclear apocalypse and human greed, written several years ago. Sounds about right.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 12:24.
Someone with intelligence needs to get on this ASAP. This is some REALLY stupid shite. What's going to happen the the tents fill up with noxious radioactive gasses and fumes? How would it be ventilated? Where does this stuff go?
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 12:19.
Are you kidding? These covers will no doubt be opaque so we can't see anymore what's going on. So this is becoming a shinto shrine of death. I am not surprised. Cover it up. What you can't see can't hurt you.
Submitted by Anonymous (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 12:25.
Why not use a big band-aid? Or huge spools of Saran Wrap?
This would be funny if it weren't so deadly serious. We've been playing with fire since the beginning of the nuclear energy program and we have now been burned - seriously burned.
There are times when I believe that mankind has a death-wish. That we witness otherwise so-called intelligent people doing things such as engaging in an industry that they know is impossible to control indefinitely, and in which they have no idea in how to dispose of the waste, and in which we would build on known fault lines next to the sea, pretty much qualifies this sentiment.
There's no putting this Genie back in the bottle. And our governments won't tell us just how bad this is. But in the next few years we'll start to see sky-rocketing cancer deaths and of course they'll make no connection to this event.
Submitted by David (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 16:49.
12-15 years for the cancers to start showing up. Based on Chernobyl rates worldwide. They will be the lucky ones. The increased morbidity rates of multiple debilitating illnesses, the suffering of slow deaths. The genomic anomalies in the ensuing generations creating not only increased cancers but 'sickly' generations with each generation increasing mortality/morbidity rates. http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/accidents/chernob_report2011webippnw.pdf http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf
And now they seek to blind side us through a MEDIA BLACK OUT so we won't even know when the best time to stay inside is, other than the obvious 'stay out of the rain!' 150 pCi of Iodine-131 here in Jacksonville Florida in rainwater (3pCi=FDA 'acceptable limit' in drinking water) It's still raining radioactive fallout and the industry has managed a world wide media black out stopping all the private prediction services too!
Submitted by HotCaviar (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 22:23.
To David who wrote the below:
We're all living in it and have as a species been living in the aftermath of the release of nuclear material since 1945. How much of a 'BLACKOUT' in terms of making the memory of nuclear history almost non-existent in the consciousness of the public has been going on? Does anyone reading here remember back in the 1950's when Spenger's fish market and others in the Bay Area advertised 'Rad Free Fish' complete with a geiger counter wielding fishmonger and maps showing where in the ocean the fish came from?
What can we do in the meantime? Me and my husband live in a small apartment in Reno, NV and recently found out that our air conditioning unit has a direct feed of minimally filtered air from outside which pretty much eliminates any efficacy of keeping our windows closed since the crisis began with Japan's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear plant!
My husband has illustrated to me that exposure to nuclear materials and the chance of disease really is a crap shoot. Here's one of his examples: in 1956 his family decided to take a driving trip from California, through Nevada and on to Texas to visit relatives. His father is a WWII Vet and served together with a demolition team set to destroy 'heavy water pipes' so he knew certain important things about exposure and decontamination procedures. Well, somewhere driving about 60 miles from the Nevada test site in Mercury, NV they all noticed the hills glowed (his father said it was because of the nuclear tests) and at one point they stopped by the side of the road so my husband and his siblings could pee. Needless to say, at age 6 my husband kicked some of the dirt and noticed it glowed, continued kicking it up since it fascinated him and got it all over himself. Alarmed, his father grabbed him by the scruff of his shirt and had him undress immediately, discarded the clothes and poured a container of some of their water supply provisioned for the trip all over him and said "Son, you might end up not being able to have children, get very sick or (being the joker he is) it might fall off!" They later drove to one of the hospitals in NV since within a few hours he itched all over and had really small blisters mostly over the lower half of his body including his genitals which was a pretty difficult thing to deal with for a 6 year old kid. The Dr. at that hospital actually had 2 different types of geiger counters and said that the type of exposure was 'low' and allayed the family's fears. The itching from the exposure to the glowing dirt persisted for a few weeks before subsiding.
Years later, husband found out that he had very low sperm count and was only able to have one child, a girl from a previous marriage. When he worked in a lab an old timer scientist who had a chart from Los Alamos was able to show that since he messed with the glowing dirt 60 miles away from the test site that it was still considered in the low range of exposure but even the symptoms were enough to show that more than likely the low sperm count could be correlated with the exposure since his health and the rest of the family were otherwise good to excellent.
Husband was exposed to radioactive materials through work and military too. At one point he allowed some students majoring in engineering to geiger his house to help them with some report/study and one of them noted that readings in the sink and other parts of the house seemed to show enough elevation to think there was a presence of Plutonium, Uranium and other isotopes. This was over 20 years ago and, since he sees a Dr. a couple of times per year so far so good, nothing bad, no cancer ever! We both hope he never gets cancer because of all the exposure and, alot of his scientist friends have said that since everybody's different he might be one of the rare ones that has a higher tolerance to exposure and hopefully the same will be true for me too.
Meantime, we'll just do what I've mentioned before as far as 'self checking' and minimizing consumption of dairy products and other higher concentrators of nuclear material, what will you be doing?
~Off my menu: All Seafoods because the oceans really are a military and industrial sewer! Yes, I will miss Anchovies on my pizza, fishsticks, red snapper, tuna (even 'chicken of the sea' is no longer 'worthy,'crab, fake crab (made with Pollock, an ocean fish), clam chowder, Nori Seaweed,Caviar etc... See: http://pstuph.wordpress.com/2011/04/01/can-ocean-currents-transport-radi...
Submitted by David (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 23:49.
12-15 years for the cancers to start showing up. Based on Chernobyl rates worldwide. They will be the lucky ones. The increased morbidity rates of multiple debilitating illnesses, the suffering of slow deaths. The genomic anomalies in the ensuing generations creating not only increased cancers but 'sickly' generations with each generation increasing mortality/morbidity rates. http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/accidents/chernob_report2011webippnw.pdf http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf
And now they seek to blind side us through a MEDIA BLACK OUT so we won't even know when the best time to stay inside is, other than the obvious 'stay out of the rain!' 150 pCi of Iodine-131 here in Jacksonville Florida in rainwater (3pCi=FDA 'acceptable limit' in drinking water) It's still raining radioactive fallout and the industry has managed a world wide media black out stopping all the private prediction services too!
Submitted by David (not verified) on Mon, 2011-05-16 19:07.
Thank you for sharing your personal experience regarding radiation exposure. I'm saddened for the reproductive loss and to hear of the radiation level you found in your home. The effect of long term low dose exposure is just now beginning to be understood. With your permission I'd like to post your experience on a social network if it's ok with you. Hopefully the 10-14% who are less effected by radiation will include you and your family.
The safeguarding steps we are taking are primarily storing known clean food, installing a water purification system, avoiding the rain and showering and cleaning the clothes if we are caught in the rain. We believe our government will knowingly allow contaminated food and water to be fed to the public while de-emphasising and under-reporting the danger and risks . (Which is exactly what they did during the Chernobyl catastrophe according to documents obtained through the freedom of information act). Chernobyl's radiation circled the globe for 2 years. I expect Fukushima's to be shorter because it did not blow as high. However, Chernobyl was entombed within 6 weeks and though fissioning appears to have declined the Japanese have announced it will not be entombed for 9 months. We don't have the ability to store 2 years of food but are storing what we can. Eventually food packaged in the first few months since 3-11 will be all that is available and we hope to have enough stored to live off our stores for 6 or more months at that time.
Specific precautions we are currently taking include:
Purchase of a large freezer for storage of vegetables (especially leafy), cheese (personal favorite) and a few other favorites. All purchases were packaged before the March 11 to assure lack of radiation contamination.
Large purchases of dry goods ie. rice, grits, oats, flour and beans (packaged before 3-11).
Still purchasing canned goods and sweeteners (honey) (before 3-11). ( Just found 3 gallons of some delicious wildflower honey from last year's harvest from a local beekeeper, Yes!)
We installed a reverse osmosis water purification system for drinking water that filters down to 0.0001 microns. (many radioactive nuclei from a meltdown have a slightly larger radii). We're also installing a 'whole house' system for external use. Not as pure but hopefully will catch some.
A very helpful post here at the UC forum is 'My Safe Food List' which explains how to read the packaging dates for some items was a great starting point for us. Calling the companies for brands not listed for information on how to read the codes is helpful. The companies don't seem to be very interested in responding via email. http://www.nuc.berkeley.edu/node/3361
We've purchased a large stock of Laver seaweed grown in China, but are holding it back until we can confirm the packaging date.
The eggs we stocked up are unfortunately about gone.
We have mixed feelings on harvesting the 'lambs quarters' (similar to spinach) we have growing. Some which we harvested were blanched and frozen probably before the first plume arrived here. We'll keep them for at least 90 days in hopes that any Iodine-131 that may have been absorbed will become non-radioactive due it's short half life. Cesium was found in rainwater since the last harvest (30 year half-life) so we'll probably let the rest go to seed for next year.
Fish off the menu.
Fresh fruits and vegetables mostly off the menu. Some exceptions: Fresh fruits from below the equator; Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Chile, etc. maybe, still considering due to fallout being found in Australia. Probably should just go with canned.
We don't eat meat, therefore we won't have to deal directly with bio-magnification of radioactivity in animals. Eggs from non-free ranging chickens kept inside under shelter in those horrible conditions may be safer at least until they are fed feed harvested after 3-11. Grain fed animals may be the same.
We've been checking food with a geiger counter but results are questionable due to the tiny amount required to cause damage if ingested. Without a scintillator it's hard to know. We've been running background rates and have found a slight elevation during rains. We haven't found any food we've checked yet to have elevated readings, but are not sure how much will be equipment variation or statistically significant.
Our HVAC was recently purchased and installed and it has no outside connection. Adding insulation and sealing up everything. But of course the air inside eventually comes from outside, but might get lucky with passing plumes. We wear masks and long sleeves when working in the yard, especially in dusty conditions. The kitties just became inside cats.
We won't be able to avoid it all due to factors like only being able to check to production date on flour but not when the wheat was grown. We should be able to reduce our exposure through prudent behavioral changes which is important because of exposure's cumulative nature.
Any other ideas you have would of course be greatly appreciated.
I hope this has given you some ideas on how to avoid the damaging effects of Japan's leaking radiation.
Submitted by HotCaviar (not verified) on Tue, 2011-05-17 00:53.
Hi David,
My husband just listened to me read your reply. He said what you wrote is excellent:100% correct in terms of response to the situation (certainly the ignorant would just laugh) since he worked at an industrial waste facility as a lab operator that would occasionally receive radioactive 'Slop Water' from good old Lawrence Livermore Lab and refuse based on demonstrable unacceptable levels of radioactivity from top and bottom of a 120 barrel capacity tanker, he knows what you are doing makes complete sense withing the boundaries of your resources.
Anyway, feel free to share my posts although I'm not sure if once anyone posts here if they do not simply become the property of UC Berkeley so go ahead and ask them too.
We certainly wish we had as much resources as you to do what you have done including the topper-a reverse osmosis filtration system for your water, that's really first class! We are in Reno, NV (at just over 5,000' altitude-more solar radiation and possibly more jet stream bringing more nuclear material our way than those in the Bay Area where we originally hail from) and filter all our water using the PUR brand filters and hopefully this minimizes things somewhat but we're stuck having to shower straight from the tap/shower head:( and our air conditioning/heater sends in only partially filtered air:(
In closing, so far we've survived all we have and by the way, the house with the radiation was way before I'd ever met my husband and by that time he was no longer working around hazardous waste!
~Off my menu: All Seafoods because the oceans really are a military and industrial sewer! Yes, I will miss Anchovies on my pizza, fishsticks, red snapper, tuna (even 'chicken of the sea' is no longer 'worthy,'crab, fake crab (made with Pollock, an ocean fish), clam chowder, Nori Seaweed,Caviar etc... See: http://pstuph.wordpress.com/2011/04/01/can-ocean-currents-transport-radi... http://www.nuc.berkeley.edu/node/3486
BRAWM Info., Common Sense, Medical Awareness and Staying Informed...
Submitted by ALCOY (not verified) on Sun, 2011-05-15 00:12.
Canopy to cover damaged reactors.BY HIDENORI TSUBOYA STAFF WRITER
2011/05/15
Tokyo Electric Power Co. is planning the construction of giant canopies that will cover the severely damaged reactor buildings at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, TEPCO officials said.
The canopies are meant to prevent the spread of radioactive materials from the reactor buildings that suffered damage from hydrogen explosions soon after the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake, the officials said May 13.
Each canopy will made of steel-beam scaffolding onto which polyester sheeting will be spread. The structures will stand about 55 meters tall, and the top will measure 47 meters by 42 meters.
The canopies will be set into place with a crane. Initial work to clear debris and create a path for the crane to operate on was done May 13. TEPCO said it hopes to begin actual construction in June and have the canopies completed by August.
This situation is getting
This situation is getting tents!
Gees, I just got it!
Gees, I just got it!
This had to happen.
The "tent solution" is probably the best that TEPCO can do at the moment, given the following facts and modestly informed conjecture:
> Although there is already significant construction going on at Fukushima Daiichi, particularly with regard to the construction of the new, steel "seawall" to mitigate the continued flow of radioactive materials and highly contaminated water into the open sea, there must be prioritization of initiatives... And next on the list is the construction of water tanks and a brand-new water waste treatment facility. With local radiation levels remaining significant, there will necessarily be limits on how many personnel can be on-site at any one time, to maximize efficiency and ensure that all participant private companies, subcontractors and other personnel do not receive maximum yearly dosages too soon, or else they will literally "burn through" all their human capital and there won't be anyone left to clear debris, make repairs, build new systems, or maintain the plant (such as it is).
> There is probably concern about the stability of the ground near and underneath all the affected reactor buildings, 1 through 4, and its ability to sustain new, substantial construction / weight / pressure given the extraordinary forces, in particular seismic ground waves, water and radiation, that have been acting upon it over the course of the past two months. There is also a high probability that said soil, itself, is extremely radioactive, limiting (for the moment, anyway) the ability of construction personnel to significantly enter and move around said soil. Given these limitations, it's highly likely that TEPCO has concluded that, at present, the reactor buildings proper and their immediate surrounds cannot sustain heavy earth-moving, substantial digging and pronounced construction activity, and so they have opted to pursue a course of action with the least probability of making the situation worse. Hence, a relatively low-impact "tent" or canopy solution, that may mitigate the continued release of airborne particulate matter from Reactor 1 while presenting minimum danger and complications to the site, and which also, btw, will require substantially less time to build, placing a far lower burden on the plant's personnel.
> Typhoon season is rising, and they have got to do something to: protect the reactors proper; prevent a potentially calamitous interaction of (nominally) interior electrical systems and additional water; and prevent high winds and whiplash precipitation from blowing what's inside these shattered buildings, outside.
I'm sure that, if they had their druthers, the TEPCO personnel on-site would vastly prefer to surround these buildings with new, far more substantial constructs, but they're out of time, and they must do something, fast, before additional external factors begin to exert their unpredictable, but certainly not helpful, influence on a situation that is only barely being maintained as it is. While the "tent solution" is easy to mock and, against the multitude of far more preferable options, may seem ridiculous, it is also by far the most achievable, for the moment, and in terms of both time and, far more importantly, risk to personnel, it is also far and away the most "cost-effective". And, ultimately, it really is their only option at the moment. Time will tell if this stopgap measure is able to be superceded by a far more permanent, and desirable, course of action down the road. For the moment, we really, really need reliable soil properties, a calm 2011 storm season, and for nothing else to go wrong.
I'm prepared to have these statements challenged, naturally, but I think I'm talking sense, here. BRAWM / UCBNE, do you have an opinion on this?
Rick Cromack.
Allen, Texas
I agree with your
I agree with your perspective but I don't think the tent would be ready before the typhoon season. We already had the first one coming from the Philipines (it was downgraded to tropical storm before hitting Japan, though) and usually they hit hard around August-September.
[Nodding] True, true...
...But, and not to quibble, that only serves to underscore my point: They're manifestly out of time, and they must do something, fast. No one, I suspect, would call this their "ideal" solution. But, in a circumstance where many doors have already -- perhaps, permanently -- closed, and more are apparently swinging shut all the time, it may well be the MOST achievable, LEAST risky, BEST option left to them. Just as aspiring, from this point forward, merely to keep the uranium slag pile sitting at or near the bottom of the Reactor 1 RV, formerly known as the Reactor 1 core, nominally covered with water, appears to now be the only option left to them, the fantastical, mythological "cold shutdown" of Reactor 1 now having been taken completely off the table, it seems, since [A] the RV, and also potentially the CV, not to mention the building that previously enclosed both, has been substantially and irreparably breached; [B] actual "filling" of the Reactor 1 RV can no longer be attained; [C] in order to avoid total structural failure of the critical Reactor 1 architecture, the priority must now be keeping the slag pile as cool as possible while presenting the least possible danger to what remains of the Reactor 1 structures; and [D] it's anyone's guess, at this point, as to what fraction of the former Reactor 1 core is still nominally reaction-capable, what level of public health danger it poses, and how much of it is at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, anyway.
Good times.
Rick Cromack.
Allen, Texas
If this accident happened in
If this accident happened in the US I don't think our response would be much better. Once you let the nuclear genie out of its bottle it is incredibly hard to get it back in.
What this really demonstrates is that we humans are not able to deal with the consequences of nuclear power when it escapes our control.
All nuke plants should have
All nuke plants should have wells bored under each reactor into the mantle of the planet. If a meltdown occurs, you jettison the whole containment back to where it came from.
And, as an extra advantage
And, as an extra advantage of a giant tent covering the damaged Fukushima nuclear reactors, we now no longer will be able to see the leaning tower... I mean the leaning building of Tempco's #4 nuclear reactor.
I guess now you can
I guess now you can officially call this operation a cover-up.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rls=com.microsoft%3Aen-us&biw=1227&bi...
Now that was funny!
Now that was funny!
Funny how every time there
Funny how every time there is an insurmountable problem the solution tends to always be to TARP it.
Without a really detailed
Without a really detailed and scientific-based explanation of the who, what, why and how on this...seems ridiculous. An aside: great band called "wovengreen" has a song "Rim of the Wheel" - here's a a bit of it:
Watch the stream choke, come watch the river bleed,
Watch the shadow rise to meet you in the circus ring.
Listen to the thunder, thunder without rain
Bird wings paralyzed, and the world cries out in pain.
It's about nuclear apocalypse and human greed, written several years ago. Sounds about right.
If it was a film... the film
If it was a film...
the film would be "No return river" of John Wayne...
With music... Let´s song:
No retuuurn noooo retuuuurn... hahahahahaha
Who's the ringmaster of this
Who's the ringmaster of this big top circus?
Someone with intelligence
Someone with intelligence needs to get on this ASAP. This is some REALLY stupid shite. What's going to happen the the tents fill up with noxious radioactive gasses and fumes? How would it be ventilated? Where does this stuff go?
Makes ZERO sense.
Are you kidding? These
Are you kidding? These covers will no doubt be opaque so we can't see anymore what's going on. So this is becoming a shinto shrine of death. I am not surprised. Cover it up. What you can't see can't hurt you.
ROFL. And: "The work is
ROFL. And: "The work is expected to be completed by the end of the year."
Too funny!
Why not use a big band-aid?
Why not use a big band-aid? Or huge spools of Saran Wrap?
This would be funny if it weren't so deadly serious. We've been playing with fire since the beginning of the nuclear energy program and we have now been burned - seriously burned.
There are times when I believe that mankind has a death-wish. That we witness otherwise so-called intelligent people doing things such as engaging in an industry that they know is impossible to control indefinitely, and in which they have no idea in how to dispose of the waste, and in which we would build on known fault lines next to the sea, pretty much qualifies this sentiment.
There's no putting this Genie back in the bottle. And our governments won't tell us just how bad this is. But in the next few years we'll start to see sky-rocketing cancer deaths and of course they'll make no connection to this event.
Morbidity and Mortality rates
12-15 years for the cancers to start showing up. Based on Chernobyl rates worldwide. They will be the lucky ones. The increased morbidity rates of multiple debilitating illnesses, the suffering of slow deaths. The genomic anomalies in the ensuing generations creating not only increased cancers but 'sickly' generations with each generation increasing mortality/morbidity rates. http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/accidents/chernob_report2011webippnw.pdf
http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf
And now they seek to blind side us through a MEDIA BLACK OUT so we won't even know when the best time to stay inside is, other than the obvious 'stay out of the rain!' 150 pCi of Iodine-131 here in Jacksonville Florida in rainwater (3pCi=FDA 'acceptable limit' in drinking water) It's still raining radioactive fallout and the industry has managed a world wide media black out stopping all the private prediction services too!
Who's Next? Morbidity and Mortality rates
To David who wrote the below:
We're all living in it and have as a species been living in the aftermath of the release of nuclear material since 1945. How much of a 'BLACKOUT' in terms of making the memory of nuclear history almost non-existent in the consciousness of the public has been going on? Does anyone reading here remember back in the 1950's when Spenger's fish market and others in the Bay Area advertised 'Rad Free Fish' complete with a geiger counter wielding fishmonger and maps showing where in the ocean the fish came from?
What can we do in the meantime? Me and my husband live in a small apartment in Reno, NV and recently found out that our air conditioning unit has a direct feed of minimally filtered air from outside which pretty much eliminates any efficacy of keeping our windows closed since the crisis began with Japan's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear plant!
My husband has illustrated to me that exposure to nuclear materials and the chance of disease really is a crap shoot. Here's one of his examples: in 1956 his family decided to take a driving trip from California, through Nevada and on to Texas to visit relatives. His father is a WWII Vet and served together with a demolition team set to destroy 'heavy water pipes' so he knew certain important things about exposure and decontamination procedures. Well, somewhere driving about 60 miles from the Nevada test site in Mercury, NV they all noticed the hills glowed (his father said it was because of the nuclear tests) and at one point they stopped by the side of the road so my husband and his siblings could pee. Needless to say, at age 6 my husband kicked some of the dirt and noticed it glowed, continued kicking it up since it fascinated him and got it all over himself. Alarmed, his father grabbed him by the scruff of his shirt and had him undress immediately, discarded the clothes and poured a container of some of their water supply provisioned for the trip all over him and said "Son, you might end up not being able to have children, get very sick or (being the joker he is) it might fall off!" They later drove to one of the hospitals in NV since within a few hours he itched all over and had really small blisters mostly over the lower half of his body including his genitals which was a pretty difficult thing to deal with for a 6 year old kid. The Dr. at that hospital actually had 2 different types of geiger counters and said that the type of exposure was 'low' and allayed the family's fears. The itching from the exposure to the glowing dirt persisted for a few weeks before subsiding.
Years later, husband found out that he had very low sperm count and was only able to have one child, a girl from a previous marriage. When he worked in a lab an old timer scientist who had a chart from Los Alamos was able to show that since he messed with the glowing dirt 60 miles away from the test site that it was still considered in the low range of exposure but even the symptoms were enough to show that more than likely the low sperm count could be correlated with the exposure since his health and the rest of the family were otherwise good to excellent.
Husband was exposed to radioactive materials through work and military too. At one point he allowed some students majoring in engineering to geiger his house to help them with some report/study and one of them noted that readings in the sink and other parts of the house seemed to show enough elevation to think there was a presence of Plutonium, Uranium and other isotopes. This was over 20 years ago and, since he sees a Dr. a couple of times per year so far so good, nothing bad, no cancer ever! We both hope he never gets cancer because of all the exposure and, alot of his scientist friends have said that since everybody's different he might be one of the rare ones that has a higher tolerance to exposure and hopefully the same will be true for me too.
Meantime, we'll just do what I've mentioned before as far as 'self checking' and minimizing consumption of dairy products and other higher concentrators of nuclear material, what will you be doing?
~Off my menu: All Seafoods because the oceans really are a military and industrial sewer! Yes, I will miss Anchovies on my pizza, fishsticks, red snapper, tuna (even 'chicken of the sea' is no longer 'worthy,'crab, fake crab (made with Pollock, an ocean fish), clam chowder, Nori Seaweed,Caviar etc... See: http://pstuph.wordpress.com/2011/04/01/can-ocean-currents-transport-radi...
http://www.nuc.berkeley.edu/node/3486
BRAWM Info., Common Sense, Medical Awareness and Staying Informed...
-------David Wrote:
Morbidity and Mortality rates
Submitted by David (not verified) on Fri, 2011-05-13 23:49.
12-15 years for the cancers to start showing up. Based on Chernobyl rates worldwide. They will be the lucky ones. The increased morbidity rates of multiple debilitating illnesses, the suffering of slow deaths. The genomic anomalies in the ensuing generations creating not only increased cancers but 'sickly' generations with each generation increasing mortality/morbidity rates. http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/accidents/chernob_report2011webippnw.pdf
http://www.strahlentelex.de/Yablokov%20Chernobyl%20book.pdf
And now they seek to blind side us through a MEDIA BLACK OUT so we won't even know when the best time to stay inside is, other than the obvious 'stay out of the rain!' 150 pCi of Iodine-131 here in Jacksonville Florida in rainwater (3pCi=FDA 'acceptable limit' in drinking water) It's still raining radioactive fallout and the industry has managed a world wide media black out stopping all the private prediction services too!
To Hot Caviar- precautions taken
Thank you for sharing your personal experience regarding radiation exposure. I'm saddened for the reproductive loss and to hear of the radiation level you found in your home. The effect of long term low dose exposure is just now beginning to be understood. With your permission I'd like to post your experience on a social network if it's ok with you. Hopefully the 10-14% who are less effected by radiation will include you and your family.
The safeguarding steps we are taking are primarily storing known clean food, installing a water purification system, avoiding the rain and showering and cleaning the clothes if we are caught in the rain. We believe our government will knowingly allow contaminated food and water to be fed to the public while de-emphasising and under-reporting the danger and risks . (Which is exactly what they did during the Chernobyl catastrophe according to documents obtained through the freedom of information act). Chernobyl's radiation circled the globe for 2 years. I expect Fukushima's to be shorter because it did not blow as high. However, Chernobyl was entombed within 6 weeks and though fissioning appears to have declined the Japanese have announced it will not be entombed for 9 months. We don't have the ability to store 2 years of food but are storing what we can. Eventually food packaged in the first few months since 3-11 will be all that is available and we hope to have enough stored to live off our stores for 6 or more months at that time.
Specific precautions we are currently taking include:
Purchase of a large freezer for storage of vegetables (especially leafy), cheese (personal favorite) and a few other favorites. All purchases were packaged before the March 11 to assure lack of radiation contamination.
Large purchases of dry goods ie. rice, grits, oats, flour and beans (packaged before 3-11).
Still purchasing canned goods and sweeteners (honey) (before 3-11). ( Just found 3 gallons of some delicious wildflower honey from last year's harvest from a local beekeeper, Yes!)
We installed a reverse osmosis water purification system for drinking water that filters down to 0.0001 microns. (many radioactive nuclei from a meltdown have a slightly larger radii). We're also installing a 'whole house' system for external use. Not as pure but hopefully will catch some.
A very helpful post here at the UC forum is 'My Safe Food List' which explains how to read the packaging dates for some items was a great starting point for us. Calling the companies for brands not listed for information on how to read the codes is helpful. The companies don't seem to be very interested in responding via email.
http://www.nuc.berkeley.edu/node/3361
We've purchased a large stock of Laver seaweed grown in China, but are holding it back until we can confirm the packaging date.
The eggs we stocked up are unfortunately about gone.
We have mixed feelings on harvesting the 'lambs quarters' (similar to spinach) we have growing. Some which we harvested were blanched and frozen probably before the first plume arrived here. We'll keep them for at least 90 days in hopes that any Iodine-131 that may have been absorbed will become non-radioactive due it's short half life. Cesium was found in rainwater since the last harvest (30 year half-life) so we'll probably let the rest go to seed for next year.
Fish off the menu.
Fresh fruits and vegetables mostly off the menu. Some exceptions: Fresh fruits from below the equator; Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Chile, etc. maybe, still considering due to fallout being found in Australia. Probably should just go with canned.
We don't eat meat, therefore we won't have to deal directly with bio-magnification of radioactivity in animals. Eggs from non-free ranging chickens kept inside under shelter in those horrible conditions may be safer at least until they are fed feed harvested after 3-11. Grain fed animals may be the same.
We've been checking food with a geiger counter but results are questionable due to the tiny amount required to cause damage if ingested. Without a scintillator it's hard to know. We've been running background rates and have found a slight elevation during rains. We haven't found any food we've checked yet to have elevated readings, but are not sure how much will be equipment variation or statistically significant.
Our HVAC was recently purchased and installed and it has no outside connection. Adding insulation and sealing up everything. But of course the air inside eventually comes from outside, but might get lucky with passing plumes. We wear masks and long sleeves when working in the yard, especially in dusty conditions. The kitties just became inside cats.
We won't be able to avoid it all due to factors like only being able to check to production date on flour but not when the wheat was grown. We should be able to reduce our exposure through prudent behavioral changes which is important because of exposure's cumulative nature.
Any other ideas you have would of course be greatly appreciated.
I hope this has given you some ideas on how to avoid the damaging effects of Japan's leaking radiation.
Reply to David: Wow, great informed action you're taking!
Hi David,
My husband just listened to me read your reply. He said what you wrote is excellent:100% correct in terms of response to the situation (certainly the ignorant would just laugh) since he worked at an industrial waste facility as a lab operator that would occasionally receive radioactive 'Slop Water' from good old Lawrence Livermore Lab and refuse based on demonstrable unacceptable levels of radioactivity from top and bottom of a 120 barrel capacity tanker, he knows what you are doing makes complete sense withing the boundaries of your resources.
Anyway, feel free to share my posts although I'm not sure if once anyone posts here if they do not simply become the property of UC Berkeley so go ahead and ask them too.
We certainly wish we had as much resources as you to do what you have done including the topper-a reverse osmosis filtration system for your water, that's really first class! We are in Reno, NV (at just over 5,000' altitude-more solar radiation and possibly more jet stream bringing more nuclear material our way than those in the Bay Area where we originally hail from) and filter all our water using the PUR brand filters and hopefully this minimizes things somewhat but we're stuck having to shower straight from the tap/shower head:( and our air conditioning/heater sends in only partially filtered air:(
In closing, so far we've survived all we have and by the way, the house with the radiation was way before I'd ever met my husband and by that time he was no longer working around hazardous waste!
~Off my menu: All Seafoods because the oceans really are a military and industrial sewer! Yes, I will miss Anchovies on my pizza, fishsticks, red snapper, tuna (even 'chicken of the sea' is no longer 'worthy,'crab, fake crab (made with Pollock, an ocean fish), clam chowder, Nori Seaweed,Caviar etc... See: http://pstuph.wordpress.com/2011/04/01/can-ocean-currents-transport-radi...
http://www.nuc.berkeley.edu/node/3486
BRAWM Info., Common Sense, Medical Awareness and Staying Informed...
I hope the giant tents were
I hope the giant tents were made of Polyester Stallone... hahahahaha
Canopy to cover damaged
Canopy to cover damaged reactors.BY HIDENORI TSUBOYA STAFF WRITER
2011/05/15
Tokyo Electric Power Co. is planning the construction of giant canopies that will cover the severely damaged reactor buildings at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, TEPCO officials said.
The canopies are meant to prevent the spread of radioactive materials from the reactor buildings that suffered damage from hydrogen explosions soon after the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake, the officials said May 13.
Each canopy will made of steel-beam scaffolding onto which polyester sheeting will be spread. The structures will stand about 55 meters tall, and the top will measure 47 meters by 42 meters.
The canopies will be set into place with a crane. Initial work to clear debris and create a path for the crane to operate on was done May 13. TEPCO said it hopes to begin actual construction in June and have the canopies completed by August.
source: Asahi