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Are We In Danger of Radioactive Exposure from the Japanese Nuclear Leaks?
If we could rely on the Japanese and American governments to inform us of any danger, we wouldn't have to be so vigilant.
But given the American government's cover up of the severity of the BP oil disaster, the health risk to New Yorkers after 9/11, and numerous other health issues, we will have to educate and empower ourselves.
As ABC News notes, experts says that Japan has a long history of nuclear cover-ups.
The New York Times points out:
The different radioactive materials being reported at the nuclear accidents in Japan range from relatively benign to extremely worrisome.
The central problem in assessing the degree of danger is that the amounts of various radioactive releases into the environment are now unknown, as are the winds and other atmospheric factors that determine how radioactivity will disperse around the stricken plants.
BBC reports (scroll down on left side):
Japanese engineer Masashi Goto, who helped design the containment vessel for Fukushima's reactor core, says the design was not enough to withstand earthquakes or tsunami ...
Indeed, Goto said:
“It is difficult to say, but that would be a core meltdown. If the rods fall and mix with water, the result would be an explosion of solid material like a volcano spreading radioactive material. Steam or a hydrogen explosion caused by the mix would spread radioactive waste more than 50km. Also, this would be multiplied. There are many reactors in the area so there would be many Chernobyls.
And Goto accused the Japanese government of deliberately withholding vital information that would allow outside experts help solve the problems:
For example, there has not been enough information about the hydrogen being vented. We don’t know how much was vented and how radioactive it was.
What We Know
The jet stream passes right over Japan on its way to the West coast of the United States.
The former editor of the Japan Times - Yoichi Shimatsu - states that after a high-level government meeting, “Japanese agencies are no longer releasing independent reports without prior approval from the top,” and that censorship of what is really occurring at the plant is being overseen under the Article 15 Emergency Law.
As I noted Saturday:
The jet stream passes right over Japan. The jet stream was noticed in the 1920's by a Japanese meteorologist near Mount Fuji, and the Japanese launched balloon bombs into the jetstream to attack America during WWII.
If a meltdown caused radioactivity to be thrown high enough, or if the radioactivity got blown by surface winds up into the jet stream, it could spread widely.
Here's how the jet stream looks today:
Here is an artist's impression of how the jet stream could spread radiation in the future:
And here's a forecast for the next couple of days.
Accuweather notes the following times for radiation - in a worst-case scenario - to reach the West Coast:
Calculated time for radioactive particles to cross the Pacific from the power plants in Japan to big West Coast cities if the particles take a direct path and move at a speed of 20 mph:
Cities Est. Distance (miles) Est. Time to Cross Pacific (days) Anchorage 3,457 7 Honolulu 3,847 8 Seattle 4,792 10 Los Angeles 5,477 11
But Accuweather meterologists argue that the winds will likely shift in different directions on a frequent basis, making it less likely that the radiation would be blown all of the way to the U.S.
As CNN Meterologist Ivan Cabrera says:
If radioactive material gets into the jet stream then... we share that with the world.
However, Cabrera points out that the Jet Stream is at 30,000-50,000 feet in altitude. 30,000 feet is 5.7 miles up. So that's a long way up above the Japanese nuclear reactors, which are essentially at sea level.
Unless the radiation from the Japanese nuclear power plants is carried aloft that high, it will probably not make it into the jet stream.
So far, there is no indication of any kind that radiation has been carried into the jet stream. However, a U.S. aircraft carrier around 100 miles from the nuclear power plants have been exposed to radiation. 100 miles is obviously greater than 5.7 miles, but that is horizontal distance, and does not necessarily mean that radiation has risen high into the air. Obviously, if the wind is blowing off-shore at ground level, then that will move the radiation more or less horizontally. That is very different from blowing the radiation upwards.
As all of the experts agree, if a truly huge meltdown occurs, then the odds of radiation reaching the jet stream increase dramatically.
As national security expert Joe Cirincione told Fox News' Chris Wallace:
The worst case scenario is that the fuel rods fuse together, the temperatures get so hot that they melt together in a radioactive molten mass that bursts through the containment mechanisms and is exposed to the outside. So they spew radioactivity in the ground, into the air, into the water. Some of the radioactivity could carry in the atmosphere to the West Coast of the United States.
But a more difficult question is whether low-level radioactive release spread over many weeks or months could spread into the jet stream and then the Western United States.
As the New York Times notes:
Experts in Japan and the United States say the country is now facing a cascade of accumulating problems that suggest that radioactive releases of steam from the crippled plants could go on for weeks or even months.
Indeed, Japan's nuclear problems may be spreading.
There are currently 3 Japanese nuclear reactors experiencing meltdown, and 3 more in trouble.
The Jet Propulsion Laboratory is forecasting a magnitude 8.0 aftershock, which could completely destroy the damaged reactors at the Fukushima facility:
(Aerial view after Fukushima numbers 1 and 3 exploded; click for larger image.)
And the limited radiation readings which are available are rather worrisome.
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Read the MIT site and did not find anything to contradict GW
In fact, their assertion that nuclear reactors cannot explode like nuclear bombs means they are much dirtier with radioactivity because their fuel is not designed to be consumed all at once
Suprisingly few are considering ecoterrorism
If you are going to toss around conjecture like that, you need to post the statistics to support it, so your homework is to go through a year or so of GW posts and tell us how many of them turned out to be chicken-little. You might want to pick up on the Junks hypothesis from above for extra credit.
About 100% of the Geo Wash posts concerning the Macondo well were entirely BS that he sourced from Before It is News. Everything from dangers of Sigsby Salt to the nutty idea that there was a monsterous cave filled with oil and gas three miles below the ocean and ready to collapse the entire gulf coast to the non-existant oil leak from a source miles away from the wellhead. 100% pure fairy tale. I deon't know who was paying him but it must have been quite generous to have him continue with the nonsense for weeks.
Wow - how about you read through them and tell us how many were prescient? Have you actually been keeping up?
OR
The new rage in Hollywood
Thorium and Cesium wraps
Survivor - Radiation Island
Rusell blows a fart and the gamma sensors go crazy.
I can see it now
Reality show starts next week,
Hollywood deuchebag housewives run for the radiation to save on facelifts!!!
On at 9
So much fear mongering, so much ingnorance. The anti-nuke goons are out in full force. They shut down the nuke industry after radiation leaked from 3 Mile Island. The radiation was about the same radiation that you get from a dental xray. The studies that have been done in the 3 Mile Island area show zero negative health effects.
What is happening in Japan is serious but all of this speculation is bullshit. The focus should be on the people that are suffering now, not some imaginary group somewhere on the west coast of the US.
To be honest I would love to see all nuke plants shut down tomorrow just so that I could hear the screams to turn them back on. What would you asses do without your Iphone or Ipad or your Facebook.
They showed zero negative health effects just like they show no rigged markets.
The last time I got a dental xray, I lost a tooth. Damn painful too.
I'd advise you stay away from dental xrays and anything similar like radioactive cloud formations.
Ask Madame Curie who died of aplastic anemia or Thomas Edison's assistant who worked with X Rays, lost both hands, both arms and died in pain
Sorry, dude, but Chernobyl happened.
Yes, but Chernobyl denial isn't illegal in Europe go figure
Sure...because the authorities did such an awesome job conveying the actual state of affairs during the whole crisis and didn't just get lucky about not evacuating 80% of the people that should have been.
You want people to stop fear-mongering?
Try telling them the truth about the situation on the ground so they don't have to guess!
Fear mongering???...on a GW thread???
Surely you jest...LOL.
THe whole truth!
Like Y2K,
Pig flu pandemic,
bird flu pandemic,
world running out of food first by 1980, then 1990, then 2000, then 2010 now 2020,
world running out of oil first by 1980, then 1990, then 2000, then 2010 now 2020.
the hole in the ozone layer,
man made global warming.
and too many other to count instances.
Not one single casualty from three mile island other than the human race when not one other nuke plant has been built in the US since.
Homer Simpson is the US face of nuclear energy.
Keep up the fear mongering though, it seems to go hand in hand with torture, 9/11 conspiracy and the rest.
But remember can't invade Iraq for WMD the US sold the guy.
Must be hard to be so inconsisent?
+1,000
Really George? +1000? that the government should have EVACUATED the gulf coast?
Honestly - I know you were really replying to the meme that if the gov't just told people the "truth" then none of the fear-mongering would be necessary but I can't resist the question. The Govt should have evacuated millions of people and destroyed an entire region's economy on the basis of completely false hysteria spread by completely clueless individuals who happen to own a computer with an internet connection?
None of that hysteria was correct about the oil spill George - NONE of it. All the screaming about evacuating and the hand-wringing and pontificating about the impending disaster was complete bullshit. The reasons it was bullshit were available to anyone who understood the science and were repeatedly explained here - to complete disdain on the part of your followers. The same will be true here - a disaster is occurring, it appears to be spiralling out of control, but because of the distance and the basic physics involved the risk you appear to be pushing in this post is also miniscule.
And BTW - the "artist rendition" of the potential plume is a freaking joke. In the real world point sources spread. They do not concentrate back to a point.
ZH has been one of my favorite reads for unconventional views on financial issues for quite some time - however it is becoming the home of every crackpot apocalypse prophet on the planet. And is attracting a crowd of commentors who appear to be sitting around in mom's basement convinced that every thing that happens is "the big one" that will finally let them live out their post-apocalypse gamer fantasies. Got news for you boys - when/if the SHTF the common sense you lack will still be a handicap.
What part of 85% of the BP oil is still sitting on the bottom don't you get? How about chatting with some of the locals in Louisianna and ask them if the problem is gone? You honestly think that RIP Cap was the end of it? WOW..There really are alot of Gomers on this planet. Well I hate to tell you gas but the toxic stew that rests at the bottom is killing it. And the oil is still leaking from the cracks created when the well head blew. They are still pumping corexit on the bottom to submerge the shit on a daily basis. You are nieve and GW and Matt Simmons were right in their findings. The loop current is dead and sea life is washing up daily. When the floor on the gulf eventually implodes in on itself and proves GW correct, I hope you have the decency to admit he was right.
2nd on the Thorium.
BTW, I had a bunch of dental x-rays over a 2 year period and it toasted my thyroid.
http://www.radiation.org/press/pressreleaseThyroid100121.html
I'm starting to wonder if this whole thing has been orchestrated by PETA or GreenPeace tree-huggers. Could all these explosions just be firecrackers? I remember something about thousands of birds fear-mongering themselves into the ground when they over-reacted to a firecracker display.
I'm all for thorium or other next-gen, safer reactors. But all of these 1970s dinosaurs should have been shut down a long time ago...
Especially any residing along 'the ring of fire'..
Or around fault lines...Diablo Canyon nuclear plant...I'm thinkin all of southern California better start evacuating...pronto!
What's good for the goose is good for the gander ;-)
PA thyroid cancer epidemic:
http://www.radiation.org/press/pressreleaseThyroid100121.html
Just another anti nuke group that stretches statistics to find whatever they need to find. If you don't want radiation exposure don't get x-rays, don't fly at 30,000ft and ask to be felt up by TSA rather than walk into the xray screening machine.
From what?...dental x-rays, mammograms, frequent flyer TSA screenings, solar bursts?...or screaming at the worthless Eagles franchise about to go on furlough ;-)
It was meant as a joke that only long time readers of GW's posts would understand...as in, "evacuate the entire SE part of the country" because of an oil spill.
Thus, goose/gander...did I just get flagged for a fowl?...LOL.
Well... we seem to have survived a whole bunch of atmospheric N-tests...It was good thing our populace was so radiologically illiterate back then, eh?
Why doesn't someone look at the plumes produced from coal mining and coal plants...
"we seem to have survived a whole bunch of atmospheric N-tests"
Did we? Do you think anybody got cancer later? Do you think we should resume open air testing?
Are you so thick to not even recognize sarcasm...
I guess I just assumed you wouldn't say something intelligent.
And even the Japanese government is now talking about damage to core containment structures. As MSN notes:
There has now been an explosion at reactor number 2. As NHK reports:
BBC, NHK and other large media outlets just reported that Number 3 has now exploded (so 1, 2 and 3 have all now exploded) ...
When they say could explode. It means probably will.
Should we start singing "Waltzing Matilda" yet? (know someone out there will get it:)
...only if you look like Ava Gardner...
I don't think so. But I highly recommend Tommy Emmanuel's rendition.
Good to see you WB7.
I am watching and reading everything. Posting images via twitter. But I have to say, this last series of events is very disconcerting, to say the least.
I know plenty of people who are busy worrying about more than saving their faces.
Something to consider about Japanese culture that may have bearing on whatever information we are (or are not) getting as far as the prognosis of these events -- in Japan if someone gets terminal cancer, they do not tell the patient, they inform their family! There is a lot of face-saving going on, to the point of absurdity. I hope that the leaders in Japan are telling the American government what is really going on, and I assume they are. Whether or not these governments will actually inform the media or the public is another question.
In the past the Japanese would have been lining up to go in there and throw water on it or whatever it takes. Think voluntary sopuku or kamakazi pilots. Now I don't know. I do know that if it were Ameircans we would be saying Fuck you, I aint going in there.
American government? What a joke. Your one of those koolaid drinking, unicorn fart sniffing Obama supporters.
I found an article like this on Drudge and it went to Prison Planet as the source
Is this GW the one writing this stuff for PP?
I know the Internet is confusing. It's a weird and whacky place where news sites post stories written by other authors, attributing authorship so readers can tell where the story was orginally posted.
Here, here, here and here ;-)
SDC KI (Potassium Iodide Fact Sheet): http://www.bt.cdc.gov/radiation/ki.asp
I have a good friend who lives right across from the beach in Southern CA. She is more concerned about other things and given the chain of natural events, I would say with good reason.
Of course, PGE and the US government will be paragons of transparency if the time ever comes.
I lost you at .gov...
lad-the misguided children aboard the local camp have the situation well in hand.
- Ned
{OT-did u see the RULE about the n... thing that may never b said?}
Oh for crying out loud. Have you been reading GW long? It's clear to this reader that he works his hind end off with heavily referenced and original work. Furthermore, and no disrespect at all intended here, but it's not exactly a complex connect-the-dots thesis now, is it..?