Explosion at a Japanese nuke plant, with who knows how much radioactive steam spewing into the atmosphere. As I write this, they’re saying there’s a 20 km evacuation zone. This of course will be the gift that keep on giving to generations to come, and is why nukes are a bad idea (especially in a seismically unstable place like Japan). Plus, it got cold overnight, so if things weren’t bad enough for the people over there, they can now freeze their asses off in the dark. Good luck to them, and let’s hope this doesn’t deter Obama from his support of nuclear power.
Control rod problems here, too, though not from the nuke plants which are, frankly all too close to us (fifty mile by car, give or take, but about 36 miles as the crow flies – at least until the crow flies into radioactive steam and drops into one of the Colonel’s buckets). When I got home from work last night, I heard one of our three sump pumps running constantly (I’ve become rather attuned to the sound and duration of their run, even though they’re in the basement). This is a pedestal type pump with a vertical float switch, and the bracket that stabilizes the float shaft at the bottom had rusted through and broken (people bitch about plastic, but, frankly, it has its uses). So the shaft got cocked and jammed and didn’t drop to shut the switch off (which I supposed is better than not having it come on, but who knows how long it had been that way).
So, anyhow, I cobbled something together with a piece of PVC pipe and some strapping. It was hard to get the damn thing to not bind up, but it seems to be working now (worked all night, at least). I’m pretty screwed if this thing craps out, though, as we are getting a rather massive amount of water at this point, with no real end in sight.
And then SU had to go and lose to f*cking UCONN.
This is not shaping up to be a very good weekend.
meltdown ?
here’s the current wind chart. it’s going to be dumped in my lap.
http://www.weatheroffice.gc.ca/data/satellite/goes_gedisk11_1070_100.jpg
Never fear, in a year or so, it should be pretty evenly distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere. A little radiation goes a long way.
I don’t see any reason to believe that Japanese Government officials are any more truthful than ours, but for what it’s worth:
Government spokesman Yukio Edano said the explosion destroyed the exterior walls of the building where the reactor is placed, but not the actual metal housing enveloping the reactor.
snip
Edano said the radiation around the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant had not risen after the blast, but had in fact decreased. He did not say why that was so. The pressure in the reactor was also decreasing after the blast, he said.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/12/japan-nuclear-plant-explosion_n_834867.html
“There was “no immediate health hazardâ€, public broadcaster NHK announced, citing nuclear officials.
But the government ordered the evacuation of 45,000 people.
“The events that occurred at these plants, which is the loss of both offsite power and onsite power, is one of the rarest events to happen in a nuclear power plant, and all indications are that the Japanese do not have the situation under control,†said Edwin Lyman, a nuclear expert at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a US-based organisation.
“It’s a dice roll whether or not the containment will retain its integrity and prevent a large radiological release.â€
Mark Hibbs, a nuclear expert at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, predicted meltdown. “What we’re seeing, barring any information from the Japanese that they have it under control, is that we’re headed in that direction,†he said.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/8377506/Japan-earthquake-nuclear-disaster-feared-after-power-plant-explosion.html
CNN reports that they’ve doubled the size of the evacuation area around the plant.
I know I’m missing something, but why is it that government types appear to think that avoiding panic is more important than avoiding environmental disasters?
Cause all government types know “You can’t handle the truth”
and because they’re the guv’mint, they know better.
The public are probably extra-touchy on the whole “radiation” thing over there in Japan, too.
Oh, they’ll be fine. Just hand out some iodine pills and call me in the morning. Oh………., and be sure to stay indoors for awhile and don’t breath-in too deeply.
This is the most detailed anaylsis I’ve seen of what might be going on (and what might be happening) with the nuclear reactor.
White smoke is “a sign that concrete might be burning”
http://www.stratfor.com/analysis/20110312-red-alert-nuclear-meltdown-quake-damaged-japanese-plant#ixzz1GPNV2KLK
burning concrete is never a good thing
Pretty sure you gotta get concrete pretty darn hot to get it to burn.
Just in from CNN- “a catatrosphic meltdown is underway”….,
having ‘trouble’ controlling a second reactor. Might have to release “radioactive vapors”
I didn’t know there’s a difference between what’s happening and what’s going on.
Other than the catastrophic meltdown, everything’s OK, right?
😳 I think I meant ‘going on’ in the future and ‘happening now’
of course what’s happening now looks pretty bleak as well as what might be going on in the future :paranoid:
but other than that…………………………,
everything’s ok :barf:
Cool. ‘Cuz with all this earthquake and tsunami and nookulur power plant hoo-hah, I haven’t heard anything about Charlie Sheen in, like, days.
A bit of off topic levity from Gail Collins:
The presidential race is barely under way, but already we have had our first Big Thought. I am speaking, of course, of Newt Gingrich’s suggestion that he was driven into serial adultery by hard work and patriotism.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/12/opinion/12collins.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper
Seattle opener maybe:
How’s everyone doing this evening? Yeah. Really, now? It’s like Mare Nubium out there! What the fuck (oh shit, the retarded guy said something in latin)?
The massive 8.9-magnitude earthquake that shook Japan and triggered a powerful tsunami on Friday has had a profound effect on both the surrounding terrain and the planet as a whole.
Dr. Daniel McNamara, a seismologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, told The Huffington Post that the disaster left a gigantic rupture in the sea floor, 217-miles long and 50 miles wide. It also shifted Japan’s coast by eight feet in some parts, though McNamara was quick to explain much of the coast likely didn’t move as far.
McNamara found the way in which the quake actually sunk the elevation of the country’s terrain to be more troublesome than coastal shifting. “You see cities still underwater; the reason is subsidence,” he said. “The land actually dropped, so when the tsunami came in, it’s just staying.”
In the aftermath of the largest earthquake in Japan’s history, scientists have scrambled to gather concrete data to quantify such a powerful tremor’s effect on the Earth. But the numbers don’t always add up. For example, McNamara pointed out that reports claiming the sea floor’s rift measured 93 miles wide are incorrect.
Additionally, conflicting reports over whether and how far the enormous tremor shifted the Earth’s axis have been circulating.
According to CNN, the earthquake moved the planet’s axis approximately 4 inches, though other sources, like The Vancouver Sun and The Montreal Gazette, report the estimate even higher — around 10 inches.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/12/japan-earthquake-axis-shift-climate-change_n_834985.html
Reports that a partila meltdown is probably under way.
Meanwhile in Madison, 200K :cold: and :kub: :kub: :kub: :kub: :kub: :kub: :kub: :kub: :kub: :kub: :fist: :yippee:
I’d play this song before my set. Then I’d say you know what I like about stand up? Don’t guess, I’ll tell you. I can cheat because I’ll be sitting most of the time.
that’s probably been said before
Atomcraft? Nein Danke bumpersticker was on my VW bus for many years.
His name was Arthur, btw. :love: