This still bothers me a lot....
I am still digesting all the stories, data, testing, and comments. My head is trying to sort all the information, but one story is still just so incredibly bothersome.
300 school children picking radioactive tea.
How could this school field trip have happened? It goes against the very simplest form of common sense.
Can anyone give me some insight on this ? Will they be planning beach outings with sandcastle building and ocean bathing next in Fukushima Prefecture ?
This story is so troubling to me.
Probably the trip had been
Probably the trip had been happening every year. The date was already decided months ago, the bus driver had been paid, the parents had signed permissions, etc... To change all that would be very problematic, and if you know the Japanese you would know that improvisation and flexibility aren't exactly the most admired virtues around here.
But anyway, the tea the kids picked wasn't dangerous. To understand the dose they may have received: I think it was five times over the temporary limit (2,500 Bq/Kg? of Cesium), but the temporary limit is not the point in which a product stops being edible and starts glowing in the dark. The temporary limits for Cesium are calculated in order to, after drinking 2 liters of water at 200 Bq/L, after eating a standard amount of vegetables, meat, fish and cereals, each of them at 500 Bq/Kg every day for a whole year, the dose received doesn't go higher than 5 mSv.
The dose the kids may have received even if each one of them had eaten a whole kilogram of the leaves (they didn't) with that level of contamination would have been around 0.0475 mSv according to ICRP dose coefficients and 0.325 mSv according to the ECRR model. Both models account for internal ingestion of radioactive isotopes, the time the particles stay in the bodies of the kids, etc... (but Busby and the ECRR have much more strict limits).
The average dose in the US including medical procedures and natural background is 6 mSv per year.
Who knew?
:(
I doubt that anyone gave the field trip a second thought. The purpose was to study the agricultural economy, with a few 'hands - on' demonstrations. The kids each cut a small amount of tea, on a field trip about local agriculture. The field trip likely was a brief survey in tea planting, harvesting, processing, packaging, brewing. Perhaps there was a ceremonial tea dance.
The plot was in Tokyo, nearly 150 Miles (upwind) from the Fukushima nuclear complex. It was a '1st cutting'. The follow-up cutting by facility staff was close to or within the legal limits.
The 'Take-Home' radiation lesson, is the variation in radionuclide content, from plot-to-plot and plant-to-plant. The kids, schools, staff and parents learned, or relearned a valuable lesson about radioactive fallout.
That being said, these kids and all the kids on Honshu and Hokaido Islands are daily exposed to dangerous levels of radionuclides. Internal radiation exposure is building up in their young, susceptable bodies. One glass of milk is fine, the next is 'HOT'. One spring roll is safe, the next is 'HOT'. They spin the Fukushima Roulette Wheel 1,000 times per day. Many will lose.
:(
Hokkaido has not been
Hokkaido has not been affected as far as we know (no increased radiation levels anywhere). It seems nothing north of Miyagi received significant amounts of fallout (I have my doubts about Iwate since it was hit so hard by the tsunami that I don't know what kind of survey can be performed there, but let's hope god doesn't punish them double)
And spring rolls are Chinese ^_^
Famous Lies
;)
Famous Lies:
Hokkaido Island has not been affected ...
I love you
The check is in the mail
I won't tell anyone
...
;)
Technically, you are
Technically, you are correct, Harumaki (Japanese Spring Roll), did originate in China, along with fireworks, noodles ...
I mean, as far as I know. Do
I mean, as far as I know. Do you have any data showing that Hokkaido was affected?
DATA?
:(
Quite the contrary! The local press, everywhere on earth, including Hokkaido Island, insists 'It is safe here'. It is a very consistent Hemispheric Lie, particularly well delivered, if somewhat frantically, in Northern Japan.
Nonetheless, Hokkaido Island is significantly contaminated by radioactive fallout from Fukushima.
http://www.huisa.net/newforums/archive/index.php/t-82.html?s=ba112a937a7...
3. Radiation poisoning
http://www.hokkaido-np.co.jp/news/donai/image/1308_1.jpg
Fukushima nuclear power plant still experience major technical difficulties and there are in fact significant level or radiation pollution, but Sapporo city located more than 500 kilometers away from the dangerous area. We absolutely off limits of any danger from radiation. Even with the strong wind it's impossible for the significant amount of radioactive material to travel from Fukushima to here.
If you have Japanise proficency please see more detail here: http://www.hokkaido-np.co.jp/news/donai/278268.html
Well, I have enough Japanese
Well, I have enough Japanese Proficiency to read "Page not found"
None, zip, zero, zilch, nada,
Odd,
I can call up the referenced COC-blarney page.
Chamber of Commerce (COC)
But what I cannot locate is ANY data from the CTBT CERTIFIED Station on Hokkaido, Island.
AS054 Kamikawa-asahi, Hokkaido fukushima
None, zip, zero, zilch, nada,
I did try Google, Yahoo and Ask search engines, but they never heard of the place EVER reporting any data.
Isn't that station for
Isn't that station for seismic activity only? The one in Gunma has been releasing data regularly about radionucleids.
Anyway, since I understand
Anyway, since I understand that you wouldn't believe MEXT data (despite them being the first ones releasing info about extremely contaminated areas outside the evacuation zone Back in March 16-19, for example) check this private measured data on rad levels:
http://chemibo.jp/hyouka/geiger_kekka.php
Fukushima Plume Maps
;)
The private map shows 'all-clear' for most recent reading, via the Google Translator function.
http://translate.google.com/translate?js=n&prev=_t&hl=en&ie=UTF-8&layout...
Gee, I guess ALL those swirling, ugly Plume maps were just a waste of time.
You are correct, about one thing though.
I don't believe it and won't willingly, knowingly touch ANYTHING from Hokkaido Island, until some internationally verified data becomes available. Dirty until proven clean, when downwind of a Class-7+ nuclear disaster.
;)
TEPCO and the Japanese govt
TEPCO and the Japanese govt must have good publicity in order to keep the company from bankruptcy and the Yen from collapsing. What's a few school children in the grand scheme of things? Children have been killed, maimed and enslaved for political and financial purposes for thousands of years. Why stop now?
Just look at what the U.S. has been (and is doing) in Afghanistan, Iraq, etc. Depleted Uranium, along with white phosphorus (which literally burns the skin off) has been shot into neighborhoods for years now. Children picking irradiated tea leaves after they have already been exposed to radiation for months doesn't seem to be so horrendous, in comparison.
I'm not defending their actions. I'm just saying that school children picking tea is definitely not the worst thing that is happening in Japan. Not evacuating a minimum of a 50 mile radius from the beginning is much worse.
And, unfortunately, our country is doing much worse things to children around the world.
yes
I agree with you the depleted uranium and white phosphorus crimes committed the US are absolutely horrific.
I was just so puzzled why anyone would really let their kids roam a field of radiated plants tea or otherwise.
:( The present legally
:(
The present legally mandated, and grossly inadequate, evacuation area for the USA is 10 miles for the same nuclear disaster.
The Japanese have been brainwashed, as has the USA population.
There are no radiation drug stockpiles in Japan or the USA.
There are no medical facilities to treat Acute Radiation Syndrome (ARS) in Japan or the USA.
There are no provisions to protect groundwater, farmland, school, park, homes, food supplies in Japan or the USA.
The USA government and news media have been lying by omission and commission, as much as the Japanese.
In this matter, 'Tu quoque' or the appeal to hypocrisy, is more than a type of logical fallacy. 'You too' is a completely accurate description of a really crappy radiation reality in Japan and the USA.