Could someone superimpose this to scale over a map of Japan?
feel free to. It wont mean a damned thing. People who lived within a few god-damned kilos did not get more than a hundred or so mSv the weeks after the blast, and after a few months, almost everything in the entire freaking map outside the plant was basically free of radiation. [Reply]
Originally Posted by alnorth:
Those fuel rod pools aside (seriously, get some water-dropping helicopters if you have to, they aren't that hot and this shouldn't be hard), here's the likely worst-case scenario.
This one reactor melts down. The concrete container holds long enough for the nuclear fuel to be safely encased. Beyond a mile or so, the radiation is not much. After a few days, the radiation is next to nothing even when you stand right next to the facility. This company pays for an expensive cleanup operation. A few workers from the nuclear power plant get cancer and die after a few decades. The world moves on, no one is really hurt. Some silly americans continue to panic over something that isn't as dangerous as coal power.
Breaking News: Japan unveils a new high-level advisory.
Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant
By ERIC TALMADGE and SHINO YUASA
Associated Press
Mar 15, 11:18 PM EDT
FUKUSHIMA, Japan (AP) -- Japan suspended operations to prevent a stricken nuclear plant from melting down Wednesday after a surge in radiation made it too dangerous for workers to remain at the facility.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said work on dousing reactors with water was disrupted by the need to withdraw.
The level of radiation at the plant surged to 1,000 millisieverts early Wednesday before coming down to 800-600 millisieverts. Still, that was far more than the average
Originally Posted by mikeyis4dcats.:
And concrete or not, if those reactors melt down, they will LITERALLY melt through anything in the way - steel, concrete, kryptonite. That is the real hazard.
Its been several days. After about a week, they would have been shutdown cold. Chernobyl was bad primarily because it blew up almost instantly after a problem was detected. At this point in time, after many days of being sprayed and dunked in water, its doubtful that they will burn through several feet of concrete. [Reply]
Originally Posted by Dylan: Breaking News: Japan unveils a new high-level advisory.
Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant
By ERIC TALMADGE and SHINO YUASA
Associated Press
Mar 15, 11:18 PM EDT
FUKUSHIMA, Japan (AP) -- Japan suspended operations to prevent a stricken nuclear plant from melting down Wednesday after a surge in radiation made it too dangerous for workers to remain at the facility.
you are 1 or two pages behind, this is old news. and also not indicative of a crisis. There would have been plenty of workers who were willing to risk their lives if it meant people were in harm's way.
They aren't. In a few days this media-hyped panic in Japan will look utterly retarded. [Reply]
Originally Posted by alnorth:
feel free to. It wont mean a damned thing. People who lived within a few god-damned kilos did not get more than a hundred or so mSv the weeks after the blast, and after a few months, almost everything in the entire freaking map outside the plant was basically free of radiation.
you are either sadly mistaken or a fool. Much of the area around Chernobyl is still contaminated and uninhabitable and will be for hundreds of years. [Reply]
Originally Posted by orange:
Those red and pink zones - they're PERMANENTLY EVACUATED.
Does THAT "mean a damned thing?"
yes, it does. Because politicians are stupid, and people are ignorant of radiation, which to our primitive caveman brains looks like voodoo magic.
Stop hyperventalating and look at the cold hard facts on what amount of radiation is, or is not, present in those areas, right now, compared to what the sun blasts you with everyday and what it takes to be harmed.
People are stupid. If the government tells them they can move back into Chernobyl, a lot of them would scream, and if anyone can make up a BS story that they got cancer after being told it was now safe, they'd sue. Russia is big, might as well fence it off. [Reply]
Originally Posted by alnorth:
The incompetent water pollution from the government was done in the 50's. At least according to my quick research, I remembered seeing that it peaked in 1954 or something like that. I presumed that the study focused on people.
Either way, it remains that we've learned a thing or two since the 50's and the 80's, and the fatality scoreboard is still a few thousand for nuclear and a hell of a lot more for coal.
I'm not speaking of water pollution, I'm speaking of a systematic study of the long term health effects of nuclear workers conducted by Thomas Mancuso and Alice Stewart that determined even low-level exposure at weapons plants and reactors increased the risk of cancer in individuals greatly. At Hanford it was 20 times the national average.
FWIW, when talking about safety, you should consult the supralinear hypothesis of Karl Z. Morgan, who was a pioneer in the field of health physics.
It was assumed for many years that you could predict the rate of malignancy per the total amount of radiation that people were exposed to. Basically, for every 1,000 person-rems (old terminology) of exposure, you would get one cancer. It didn't matter how evenly it was spread, whether 500 person-rems to two people or 1 to 1000, you would get an equivalent number of cancers Well, in fact this is incorrect. The supralinear hypothesis suggests that the wider you spread out of the dose the more cancers you will have at those lower levels, even if each individual is getting a smaller total dose.
In essence, there is no safe, sub-clinical dose of radiation, and while your rate of cancer goes up with the amount of exposure, those small exposures are actually more dangerous per unit dose. [Reply]
Originally Posted by alnorth:
you are 1 or two pages behind, this is old news. and also not indicative of a crisis. There would have been plenty of workers who were willing to risk their lives if it meant people were in harm's way.
They aren't. In a few days this media-hyped panic in Japan will look utterly retarded.
Originally Posted by alnorth:
yes, it does. Because politicians are stupid, and people are ignorant of radiation, which to our primitive caveman brains looks like voodoo magic.
Stop hyperventalating and look at the cold hard facts on what amount of radiation is, or is not, present in those areas, right now, compared to what the sun blasts you with everyday and what it takes to be harmed.
People are stupid. If the government tells them they can move back into Chernobyl, a lot of them would scream, and if anyone can make up a BS story that they got cancer after being told it was now safe, they'd sue. Russia is big, might as well fence it off.
That's stupid as hell. .04 microcuries was the dose set by the government as the absolute maximum for workers to receive, and that was 240 times too high. Now, those areas, 10 years after the meltdown, had 40 curies per square km of Cesium 137 alone. That's not counting the residual strontium-90 (almost equivalent half life) or plutonium 239, which has a much, much longer half life.
You ingest a particle of plutonium, you're dead. Do not cross Go, do not collect $200. You will get cancer, and you will die. You ingest strontium 90 and you can expect an awesome case of bone cancer or leukemia.
Those areas are now, due to decay, safe for short term exposures, but only the stupidest of fools would live anywhere near there. [Reply]
