Japan Earthquake/Tsunami

[los angeles]

I've been trying not to bring the mood down by posting about this but like everyone else I've of course been watching the news coverage and video footage in dismay :-( Seems like every hour the body-count is higher and higher

Anyone here have friends or relatives over there? RIP to all those victims!

[AmiJeTomar]

There are barely words for how awful it is...homes, lives, people just swept away and destroyed.
It is very upsetting watching the footage on the news...the destruction that was once towns and villages.
My heart really goes out to all those in Japan.

[etu]

Our relatives are in Southern Japan, so we're not worried about them specifically. But it's truly terrible. I just got another news alert about more nuclear problems and I saw on CNN this morning that geologists say the plates in the ocean shifted 59 feet and Japan's islands shifted 8 feet in the earthquakes.

George Takei is tweeting about news and how to help a lot:
http://twitter.com/georgetakei

He's best known as Sulu on Star Trek, but I know of him more from him being a speaker at one or two of the reunions/conferences on Japanese-Americans who were sent to internment camps during World War II.

[James]

The tidal wave was bad enough, the situation with the nuclear reactor is terrifying.  I really hope they manage to get that under control. 

[corbie]

My oldest friend since Jr. High just called finally. (1964!) Her son has been living in Tokyo for several years and just moved to Hong Kong 15 days ago. She lives in San Francisco and said the quakes are moving in a circle since Haiti and she thinks they are next. I will have to look at a map.

One site I am on the owner is half Japanese and she was at the fair with me this weekend. She has relatives and was at her wit's end, but all are accounted for now.

I need to find a relief to send some money to. All want texts and I have not got texting on my phone. This is just awful. I lived in Southern California for 12 years and just ended up with a horror of earthquakes and was very happy to leave.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/events/japan-quake-2011/beforeafter.htm

[etu]

I need to find a relief to send some money to. All want texts and I have not got texting on my phone.

Corbie, CNN has a list of ways to help:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/03/14/iyw.howtohelp.japan/index.html

I gave to the Red Cross as it seems like they're already making use of funds to help:
http://american.redcross.org/site/PageServer?pagename=ntld_main&s_src=RSG000000000&s_subsrc=RCO_FrontPagePanel

My usual charity is UNICEF, as I trust that they will spend the money largely on what I give it to them for. They sent an e-mail Saturday saying Japan has not asked for their help yet.

Similarly, Doctors without borders (Medecins Sans Frontiers) is not earmarking funds just for Japan yet, but they are present and helping.
http://www.doctorswithoutborders.org/news/article.cfm?id=5097&cat=field-news

[corbie]

I don't do UNICEF as I know someone who used to work for them and they spend a lot on themselves. She was disgusted. I ended up with Save the Children and cleaned out my paypal balance.

[etu]

I don't do UNICEF as I know someone who used to work for them and they spend a lot on themselves. She was disgusted. I ended up with Save the Children and cleaned out my paypal balance.

That's good to know. Thanks. And I'm glad you are helping, too.

[Kiyami]

I have a friend over there but on the west coast... After seeing the news Friday I was really worried about her but she is fine. Now there was just an earthquake in Shizuoka near Mount Fuji and I have contacts around there.. hope they are okay.

Do what you can to help.

[etu]

I'm trying to figure out what's happening right now. Are the nuclear reactors melting down? Is the sea water being dumped by helicopters helping? And how are they fixing the electrical and plumbing connections to start cooling the units again? Are there people right next to the leaking reactors? I can't imagine the heroism that would take.

This story from 2 hours ago about the seawater operation talks about how the crews switch off every 40 minutes to prevent overexposure to radiation.

And what about the Jet stream concerns in California? This NYTimes Q&A from earlier today seems informative but hardly comforting. They don't expect there to be much fallout in the U.S. but if there is, don't drink milk or eat cheese.
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/16/q-and-a-on-the-nuclear-crisis-in-japan/?hp

[Anamika]

It's been really difficult to find out what really happened/happens in Fukushima right from the beginning. It almost reminds me of the Soviet non-information policy after Chernobyl, 25 years ago. You have to read all the news very carefully to get the full picture.

It looks as if three of the reactors may have gone into meltdown, as have the fuel rods in the cooling pool of reactor four, which is worse since this doesn't have a secure containment chamber.
As for the people who are still working in the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, trying to pump water into the reactor chambers, they are effectively sacrificing their own lives in there.

The radiation levels that have been reported over the last two days are more than worrying - even in 65 kilometers distance from the reactors, they amount to more than 340 times the usual background level. Just outside the 20-kilometer evacuation zone the radiation is so high, that anyone staying there for three hours will absorb more radiation than the maximum considered safe for one year. And that's outside the evacuation zone.

I wouldn't really worry about radiation levels in Europe or the U.S, the fallout will be minimal compared to e.g. the U.S.A.'s own nuclear tests in the 1950es and 60es.

My thoughts are with the people in Japan, they are facing an unimaginable lot of hardship and danger now.

[etu]

Thanks, Anamika. I really feel sad and grateful for those workers who went in their to try to save other people's lives.

[los angeles]

Death toll is over 18,000 now
Plus the radiation issue, they're working nonstop, trying to get that under control.
The rebuilding cost estimates flying around the net are so high.

[Kajolownsyou]

It's so awful. It's like one thing after another, quake, tsunami, and now the nuclear issues. I can't even watch the news because it's just too depressing. I know it sounds extremely selfish, but I was very glad to be on vacation for the past week and completely cut off from what's going on in the world because it's just too saddening. Back to reality now though. I just hope the situation will get better soon or at least stop getting worse...

[omlick]

It seems like the radiation leakage from this year 2011 is a replay of the BP oil leak last year.  Again, arrogance about how brilliant we are has bitten us in the butt again.  This radiation leak is another threat to the planet and maybe another nail in humanity's coffin on its road to extinction.

This disaster is playing out like the BP one, it will drag on and while more radiation spreads across the planet.  I wonder how much the ultimate damage will be, but again just like the BP disaster, another corporation is in charge and the government agencies are proving themselves usless. 

 It is so deja vu that it is a bore almost to watch, but since radiation spreads over the land, air and sea, I think we will be all affected one way or another.  What a bummer.


http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=23764

[Kajolownsyou]

Right now there is increased radiation in the air (in the US) but it's only slightly above normal background radiation and isn't a threat to public health. Not at the moment anyway.

[saintofgamblers]

What is sad is that so many people died, 12,000 people dead so far and the media has done them a big disservice by talking only about the nuclear emergency, where only one person died because a piece of equipment fell on his head. It got everyone scared and meanwhile all those other people just forgotten. Terrible.

[Kajolownsyou]

I don't think the media has forgotten those people, all the news coverage was about the loss of human life and destruction. It wasn't til pretty recently that the nuclear alerts started taking up media coverage

[Anamika]

IMO, the media are doing the right thing by giving coverage to the situation in Fukushima. It's going to make a big part of the country inhabitable, it will displace hundreds of thousands of people and might still kill thousands by radiation poisoning, just as the disaster in Chernobyl did, 25 years ago.

Plus there are still many news (at least in my country) about the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami, too. I don't think anyone gets forgotten.

[latishya]

There's a great piece on the sensationalist scaremongering nature of the media coverage of Fukushima here:

As the situation at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear powerplant slowly winds down, the salient facts remain the same as they have been throughout: nobody has suffered or will suffer any radiological health consequences. Economic damage and inconvenience resulting from the quake's effects on nuclear power have been significant, but tiny in comparison to all other human activities – the nuclear power plants in the stricken region have suffered less damage and caused less trouble to local residents than anything else that was there. ...

[omlick]

There's a great piece on the sensationalist scaremongering nature of the media coverage of Fukushima here:

As the situation at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear powerplant slowly winds down, the salient facts remain the same as they have been throughout: nobody has suffered or will suffer any radiological health consequences. Economic damage and inconvenience resulting from the quake's effects on nuclear power have been significant, but tiny in comparison to all other human activities – the nuclear power plants in the stricken region have suffered less damage and caused less trouble to local residents than anything else that was there. ...

How is it slowly winding down?  The NY Times today had this in its article:

The isotope, cesium 137, was measured in one village by the International Atomic Energy Agency at a level exceeding the standard that the Soviet Union used as a gauge to recommend abandoning land surrounding the Chernobyl reactor, and at another location not precisely identified by the agency. Using a measure of radioactivity called the becquerel, the tests found as much as 3.7 million becquerels per square meter; the standard used at Chernobyl was 1.48 million.

In contrast to iodine 131, which decays rapidly, cesium 137 persists in the environment for centuries. The reported measurements would not be high enough to cause acute radiation illness but far exceed standards for the general public designed to cut the risks of cancer. The Japanese authorities and the anti-nuclear environmental group Greenpeace have reported similar readings from the area; Greenpeace and some other groups are pressing for the affected area to be evacuated.

Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary, said at a news conference Thursday morning that officials were studying the contamination levels, but that there were currently no plans to expand the evacuation zone.


----------------------------

Cesium 137 is a man made only radioisoptope that did not exist in nature before atomic weapons testing.  I find that interesting.  Who knows what that stuff is going to do as more and more of it is released.  Cancers will probably be skyrocketing in Japan and who knows where else.  I don't think we will be able to determine the number of deaths from cancers that will result from this disaster for years to come.

[Kajolownsyou]

Another large earthquake just hit the northeast coast of Japan. 7.4...another Tsunami warning has been issued. Also, an earthquake just hit Mexico too I heard, but I'm not sure where or how large. :/

[omlick]

http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/11/29/japanese-science-ministry-8-percent-of-country-contaminated-by-radiation/


I think we should be very careful about nuclear reactors that are near seismic faults or close to a body of water that send in tidal waves.  Or maybe we should just do away with them no matter where they are? 

[omlick]

Well it looks like there is some kind of mega trouble with Reactor 4 over there in Fukushima.  I am wondering what it means?  Can someone explain?

I guess this thing is far from over for  better or worse.

http://thewatchers.adorraeli.com/2012/04/12/while-number-of-earthquakes-increase-fukushima-nuclear-reactor-no-4-raises-new-global-worries/
http://www.infowars.com/tepco-not-enough-money-to-handle-fukushima-nuclear-reactor-4-problems/