Earthquake in Japan

Via Slashdot: Earlier NHK article, Nikkei article

It's now apparently clear that what commentators suggested a few days into the disaster -- namely that a meltdown had occurred in one or more reactor blocks at the plant shortly after the quake/tsunami hit -- was true, and that TEPCO apparently lied to or didn't tell the public to calm people down.

A remarkable quote from one article:

Masanori Naito of the Institute of Applied Energy says analysis of data on the reactors' conditions is easy, and could have been completed in a day.

He says the analysis should have been done much earlier, as it would have provided important clues to long-term cooling and other measures.
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---------- Post added at 12:50 PM ---------- Previous post was at 12:48 PM ----------

Another quote:

Tepco later took the unusual step of filling the reactors with seawater, avoiding a far worse scenario of an overheating reactor melting through the containment structures and releasing large amounts of radiation to the outside world.
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So, regardless of the cover-up, they apparently did the right thing to avoid a far greater catastrophe.
 
Bad news from Japan (German)

On a pipe between reactor blocks 1 and 2 of Fukushima Daiichi plant, a radiation dosage of 10 Sv/h has been measured, the highest ever since the beginning of the catastrophe.

Also, rice is suspected of being contaminated, and currently being tested.
 
Isnt it amazing that Japan is so small and in the past it didnt had any resources, but now it is one of the best countries of the world? I mean, they had nothing, but they made so much with that nothing. So many countries with way better conditions than Japan cant get where they got. It is a shame that these disasters occour so much in there, i really like Japan. They are amazing
 
More bad news (Google-translated from German)

Reactor block 1 had a complete meltdown, and 2 and 3 aren't very far behind.

They estimate it'll take 10 years (!) just to get all the work started that they're planning to do ... they currently have no means at all to see what's happening inside the reactor chambers, and they don't know how yet to close holes that have formed in them (b/c probably no-one does).

This is much, much worse than Chernobyl ... in Chernobyl, there was only one meltdown, and in Fukushima, there's at least three!
 
People in Tokyo are wondering about radiation :

"I'm an American who is living in Tokyo. Stories have started popping up about 'radiation hot spots' in Tokyo and surrounding prefectures so I have begun to worry. I live on the first floor of my apartment building and right by our washing machine there is a gutter out there that is clogged with rain water and mud, which has me especially worried because my wife and I are planning to have kids soon. Obviously no one from the government is going to come by to check our gutter so I feel the need to take matters into my own hands. I have absolutely no idea so I'm asking you guys. What kind of radiation detector should I get? A Geiger Counter? If it measures Gamma rays is that enough? Are alpha and beta dangerous too? I know no one has all the answers regarding radiation but any advice you guys could give me would be great."
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