momoese

Lots of legit info here
Berkeley Radiological Air and Water Monitoring Forum | Department of Nuclear Engineering

GreenFin

Yikes, man, that's really inaccurate. I have indeed looked into Chernobyl in some depth, and if folks want to be legitimately horrified, they should do the same.

Not only was Chernobyl pretty horrific, there's the overwhelmingly important point that the aftermath was darn near the best possible scenario because Russia immediately implemented one of the most profound mobilizations of human badassery in history. Tens of thousands of troops were sent there immediately and immediately got to work on containing the problem (so that it wouldn't get out of hand, as Fukushima has). They poured hundreds of thousands of people into a desperate, 24/7 mega-engineering project to encapsulate the problem. Fukushima is being battled primarily by a few dozen Tepco employees with spitwads and garden hoses (that's unfortunately only a very slight exaggeration).

Fukushima utterly dwarfs Chernobyl. Utterly and completely. We are in a drastically worse situation now than we were following the Chernobyl incident. And I don't mean like twice as bad, I mean like a thousand times or a million times as bad.

First, there are already multiple meltdowns (as the people who have followed this closely have known since day one). Those molten blobs are already in the ground on their way toward rendering a large portion of Japan's groundwater hysterically unusable and creating perpetual geysers of hyper-radioactive steam. That alone dwarfs Chernobyl. Chernobyl was contained; Fukushima was out of control, possibly permanently, from day one.

Second, there are 1,300+ fuel rods stored in an upper floor of the crumbling reactor #4. Those are at EXTREME risk of going critical. If you want to picture hell on earth, a sputtering open-air nuclear reaction with all that fuel would be sufficient. [At that point we'd probably see some really amazing/horrifying hail Mary's, such as trying to use nukes to blow that entire section of Japan into the ocean as a 'lesser of two evils' option by keeping as much of the radioactive particles out of the atmosphere as possible.]

Third, there hasn't been jack squat of a containment effort compared to Chernobyl. There is just no comparison between the massive, almost miraculous nationwide effort put forth by Russia to barely contain their vastly smaller problem, and the tiny, pitiful effort put forth by a laughably overwhelmed private company. It's like comparing the building of the Great Wall of China to the building of the electric fence around my garden.

My view is that most if not all of Japan was effectively lost on day one. The ensuing 2 years have just been about desperately trying to cover up that fact and somewhat doing a half-ass job of trying to prevent the much, much, much, much wider destruction that would result from having those fuel rods take off. Tepco is going to start trying to remove the rods in November (it's only a matter of time until the building collapses anyway, so they HAVE to make this desperate play). It's an incredibly delicate and difficult operation even in the best of circumstances with functioning equipment. They're going to have to try to do it manually, since their computer controls just fry in that environment. If things go flawlessly, it will still take them years to finish, just due to the sheer number of rods being stored there and the damaged condition of the holding pool/building/equipment/etc. I think it's overwhelmingly likely that things won't go perfectly and that we're going to witness the most fubared event in human history at that time. If I were to guesstimate odds, I'd say there's only about a 5% chance they pull it off; put another way, 95% chance of hardcore doom for the entire northern hemisphere at a minimum.

I majored in nuclear engineering for a year and got to get up close and personal with a real, functioning reactor, but I did not get a degree in NE. I have not had a nuclear engineering job. My graduate work was in a completely unrelated field. I have not recently stayed at a Holiday Inn. My word is not gospel. But as for me, my life permanently changed on 3/11/2011. As I watched the events unfold in those early hours/days, I was already coming to terms with the likely repercussions and setting my mind and actions toward dealing with what likely lay ahead. It wasn't out of hobby-like interest; it came screaming from my intuition as a primal call to survival.

Best of luck to all of you. These are indeed interesting times. I cannot stress enough the importance of clean indoor food production. Fukushima is one sufficient reason to do it, though there is another: whereas indoor food production may be our only source of clean food in the near future, it may be our only dependable source of food, period, a bit farther out (decade or two, maybe less imo) due to rapid onset climate change. Frozen methane is already destabilizing en masse and roaring to the surface. Methane levels in the arctic are already spiking, and this is just the opening salvo; the pace will pick up considerably in a few years when the ice is gone. We're about to go through one of those 'cycles' that the earth has admittedly experienced before (during massive extinction events), but this time on steroids in comparison to those past cycles. Outdoor agriculture will soon be decimated by uncooperative, unpredictable weather and rapidly changing/meandering hardiness zones. It's too late to reverse, imo, but I expect to see some truly freaky Hail Mary attempts to mitigate, such as mega-engineering projects aimed at burning off gigatons of methane as it belches out of the frozen north and seeks to make its death march southward.

To finish on topic, hopefully Stanford's breakthrough cancer cure, which goes into human trials in 2014, is a massive success.

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Set out runnin', but I'll take my time; a friend of bananas is a friend of mine.

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GreenFin

On the subject of Berkeley, note that, like virtually any collection of humans, they're not all "good guys" there. There was one nuclear engineer who seemed to be serving as an obvious disinformation agent soon after the incident. His schtick was to push the following comparison on the press as being legitimate:

A) experiencing being bombarded by radiation on a cross-country flight;

and

B) ingesting radioactive particles

Those two are NOT equal. B is MASSIVELY worse than A. Utter apples to oranges nonsense. But his stupid, false comparison was picked up and repeated endlessly in the press.

So wrong it's evil.

__________________
Set out runnin', but I'll take my time; a friend of bananas is a friend of mine.

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momoese

Berkely also has a rep for spreading mis info on GMO's thanks to huge grants from Monsanto.

Thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts. I've read several opinion pieces from nuclear experts that are inline with you, some even more dire.

bengtang

“Fukushima: Your Days of Eating Pacific Ocean Fish Are Over At the Very Least”
"Fukushima: Your Days of Eating Pacific Ocean Fish Are Over At the Very Least" | Alternative

Fukushima apocalypse: Years of ‘duct tape fixes’ could result in ‘millions of deaths’
Fukushima apocalypse: Years of ‘duct tape fixes’ could result in ‘millions of deaths’ — RT News

laserlight

I have some interesting articles to share.
First more leaks were found over the weekend.
More leaks feared at Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant - CNN.com

Next an older article. The radioactivity is increasing in a well and the scientists dont know why.
Its still doing that and its now even worse. I will post the link when I find it.
Latest Radioactive Leak at Fukushima: How Is It Different?

Next the groundwater radiation is peaking and it will be reaching the sea soon.
Fukushima Groundwater Shows Record Radiation Levels

At Fukushima, Radioactive Groundwater Nears Sea

K. Now the lighter side. Mutant veggies.
Deformed Vegetables, Fruit Reportedly Pop Up Around Japan Nuclear Plant - ABC News

Btw we have a gieger counter for radioactivity. The count has risen from 14 clicks before the disaster to 30 clicks now. And we dont even live on the west coast.

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caliboy1994

All I know is that it's probably a bad idea to go boogie boarding at Zuma Beach right now.

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laserlight

Lol yeah! Or wind surfing! And watch for 2 headed sharks!

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G.W.

WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE !

No really

Bleh.... Lost my long post.......oh well then some vitriol.......

Idiots, the whole lot of them.
Amateur hour.
Don't we look like a bunch of little kids who got burned playing with matches.

This event is the result of a social phenomenon which I will define thusly....... Has two Masters Degrees but cannot change a car tire.

My prediction, bomb shelters will be back in style late next decade.

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winter winners, jackfruit, carambola, hua moa, d namwah, hak ip lychee with pink leaves 2 days before a cold snap eeeek!

Winter losers, kohala longan, misi luki, 80% jackfruit seedling loss

first bloomers, HUA MOA, DC, D NAMWAH, FHIA 17, KANADARIAN, RAJA PURI, M D NAMWAH

best bunch FHIA 17 , undisclosed

WORST BUNCH hua moa, 2 fingers

Lemmysports

I am intentionally exposing myself so that I become immune (and hopefully my kids will be even stronger.) Survival of the fittest right? I also drink copious amounts of bourbon, eat bacon, and don't wear nearly enough sunblock... maybe that's a bad idea, but than again, maybe stressing yourself out something that you cannot control is not soo healthy either? In the words of Lamb of God: "There's no one left to save!"

laserlight

They found a way to fix Fukushima and stop the ground water from getting into the sea. Its an idea they used in Tennessee only that accident was 150x smaller but they think it can work. They are making nuclear ice cubes!
If you go to Japan then take warm hoodies and bobsleds.
http://www.nbcnews.com/science/japan...ins-8C11067684

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