Meltdown.

[hater]

Your point? Are you saying this isn't to be expected?

are you saying this was expected? link?

[Wild Cobra]

are you saying this was expected? link?

Why should I have to provide a link with someones theory that higher levels of radioactivity are uncommon after a disaster at a nuclear plant?

What matters, is what type of radiation are we reading with these higher numbers, and what is it's half-life. If it's just radioactive steam that condensed, then it will dissipate rather fast. If it's nuclear material, then it can take millions of years or longer. Numbers without context are meaningless. As for the pools outside, there were also the spend fuel ponds that probable spilled over. Again, radioactive water will dissipate quickly, if that's what it is.

Again.... need more facts and context rather than just numbers that may be short lived.

[mouse]

Your point? Are you saying this isn't to be expected?

I think his point was they were way off on their original levels they thought the water contained. So if they are that off on radiation levels it means three things.

1: They need better equipment.

2: If they are off on their original findings or if they are lying now then how can we trust them if the situation gets worst, (Pm Manny?)

3: People like you need to be updated daily since it seems like you live in a Bubble.

[Winehole23]

Fearing the potential impact on crews, cargo and vessels worth tens of millions of dollars, some of the world’s biggest container shipping lines have restricted or barred their ships from calling on ports in Tokyo Bay over concerns about radiation from the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/26/bu...ipping.html?hp

[Agloco]

are you saying this was expected? link?

Link.....

Hater, it was expected.

[Agloco]

I think his point was they were way off on their original levels they thought the water contained. So if they are that off on radiation levels it means three things.

1: They need better equipment.

2: If they are off on their original findings or if they are lying now then how can we trust them if the situation gets worst, (Pm Manny?)

3: People like you need to be updated daily since it seems like you live in a Bubble.

Their equipment couldn't have been damaged? How about the cir stances under which the initial set of assumptions was arrived at?

[mouse]

The point I was making is...... someone is either lying, or they don't have the proper equipment if they can't seem to figure out what the accurate Radiation levels are.

If your cable bill says you owe 100 dollars then two days later they say you owe 20 dollars wouldn't you want to know who is in charge, and if they know what they are doing?

What many people fail to realize is Radiation in itself is faily new as far as what Scientist know about it. They have no idea what Radiation can do after a certain amount of years.

That is why The Atom Bomb dropped in Japan and Chernobyl scenarios keep coming up when people try to figure out what Radiation exposure really does to the human body.

Did we have Nuclear radiation in the 1800s? Who is to say that 10 years from now Babies born by radiation infected mothers back in 1986 will have a short lifespan? It's only been 25 or so years. People who keep saying radiation is your friend you get it from the sun, from cell phones, X-ray machines, those people are dangerous.


The commercials on Cancer research centers and other TV exposure makes people used to the disease to the point they don't question it anymore. Its normal conversation now.

People are so occupied with their 401k and whats on face book they can't even see their world going to .

[Cry Havoc]

The point I was making is...... someone is either lying, or they don't have the proper equipment if they can't seem to figure out what the accurate Radiation levels are.

Mouse, the armchair expert, who somehow knows more living 4000 miles away than people do on the scene but can't explain why.

If your cable bill says you owe 100 dollars then two days later they say you owe 20 dollars wouldn't you want to know who is in charge, and if they know what they are doing?

Ah yes. The old cable bill - nuclear radiation analogy. Classic.

What many people fail to realize is Radiation in itself is faily new as far as what Scientist know about it. They have no idea what Radiation can do after a certain amount of years.

But you're going to educate us with fear-mongering pictures, yes?

That is why The Atom Bomb dropped in Japan and Chernobyl scenarios keep coming up when people try to figure out what Radiation exposure really does to the human body.

Yes, shocking how the two worst nuclear disasters of all-time would be used to determine the effects of radiation.

Did we have Nuclear radiation in the 1800s? Who is to say that 10 years from now Babies born by radiation infected mothers back in 1986 will have a short lifespan? It's only been 25 or so years. People who keep saying radiation is your friend you get it from the sun, from cell phones, X-ray machines, those people are dangerous.

FEAR! TERROR! Mouse is the modern day equivalent of chicken little.

The commercials on Cancer research centers and other TV exposure makes people used to the disease to the point they don't question it anymore. Its normal conversation now.

This is a statement that makes sense.

People are so occupied with their 401k and whats on face book they can't even see their world going to .

Yes, there are definitely no threads on SpursTalk or in other forums expressing concern over the state of the world. It's all Winehouse and Wild Cobra talking about diversifying their portfolio.

[hater]

Link.....

Hater, it was expected.

Fail

noone was expecting water leakage from reactors or high radiation hundreds of miles away.

Feared? yes. Expected? no.

[Winehole23]

The radioactive core in a reactor at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant appears to have melted through the bottom of its containment vessel and on to a concrete floor, experts say, raising fears of a major release of radiation at the site.

The radioactive core in a reactor at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant appears to have melted through the bottom of its containment vessel and on to a concrete floor, experts say, raising fears of a major release of radiation at the site.

The warning follows an analysis by a leading US expert of radiation levels at the plant. Readings from reactor two at the site have been made public by the Japanese authorities and Tepco, the utility that operates it.Richard Lahey, who was head of safety research for boiling-water reactors at General Electric when the company installed the units at Fukushima, told the Guardian workers at the site appeared to have "lost the race" to save the reactor, but said there was no danger of a Chernobyl-style catastrophe.

Workers have been pumping water into three reactors at the stricken plant in a desperate bid to keep the fuel rods from melting down, but the fuel is at least partially exposed in all the reactors.At least part of the molten core, which includes melted fuel rods and zirconium alloy cladding, seemed to have sunk through the steel "lower head" of the pressure vessel around reactor two, Lahey said.

"The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two, and at least some of it is down on the floor of the drywell," Lahey said. "I hope I am wrong, but that is certainly what the evidence is pointing towards."

The major concern when molten fuel breaches a containment vessel is that it reacts with the concrete floor of the drywell underneath, releasing radioactive gases into the surrounding area. At Fukushima, the drywell has been flooded with seawater, which will cool any molten fuel that escapes from the reactor and reduce the amount of radioactive gas released.

• 
  
  Lahey said: "It won't come out as one big glob; it'll come out like lava, and that is good because it's easier to cool."
  
  
  The drywell is surrounded by a secondary steel-and-concrete structure designed to keep radioactive material from escaping into the environment. But an earlier hydrogen explosion at the reactor may have damaged this.
  "The reason we are concerned is that they are detecting water outside the containment area that is highly radioactive and it can only have come from the reactor core," Lahey added. "It's not going to be anything like Chernobyl, where it went up with a big fire and steam explosion, but it's not going to be good news for the environment."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011...uclear-reactor

[Winehole23]

Radioactive caesium and iodine has been deposited in northern Japan far from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, at levels that were considered highly contaminated after Chernobyl.


The readings were taken by the Japanese science ministry, MEXT, and reveal high levels of caesium-137 and iodine-131 outside the 30-kilometre evacuation zone, mostly to the north-north-west.


Iodine-131, with a half-life of eight days, should disappear in a matter of weeks. The bigger worry concerns caesium-137, which has a half-life of 30 years and could pose a health threat for far longer. Just how serious that will be depends on where it lands, and whether remediation measures are possible.


The US Department of Energy has been surveying the area with an airborne gamma radiation detector. It reports that most of the "elevated readings" are within 40 kilometres of the plant, but that "an area of greater radiation extending north-west… may be of interest to public safety officials".
Caesium contamination

An analysis of MEXT's data by New Scientist shows just how elevated the levels are. After the 1986 Chernobyl accident, the most highly contaminated areas were defined as those with over 1490 kilobecquerels (kBq) of caesium per square metre. Produce from soil with 550 kBq/m2 was destroyed.


People living within 30 kilometres of the plant have evacuated or been advised to stay indoors. Since 18 March, MEXT has repeatedly found caesium levels above 550 kBq/m2 in an area some 45 kilometres wide lying 30 to 50 kilometres north-west of the plant. The highest was 6400 kBq/m2, about 35 kilometres away, while caesium reached 1816 kBq/m2 in Nihonmatsu City and 1752 kBq/m2 in the town of Kawamata, where iodine-131 levels of up to 12,560 kBq/m2 have also been measured. "Some of the numbers are really high," says Gerhard Proehl, head of assessment and management of environmental releases of radiation at the International Atomic Energy Agency.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/...chernobyl.html

[The Reckoning]

so was bill nye right all along?

[Winehole23]

What did the Science Guy say?

[The Reckoning]

it was posted before...they had him on the show like the day after it happened

[CosmicCowboy]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011...uclear-reactor

Japan may have lost race to save nuclear reactor
Fukushima meltdown fears rise after radioactive core melts through vessel – but 'no danger of Chernobyl-style catastrophe'


Highly radioactive water is now being detected outside the containment area at Fukushima, experts have warned.
The radioactive core in a reactor at the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant appears to have melted through the bottom of its containment vessel and on to a concrete floor, experts say, raising fears of a major release of radiation at the site.

The warning follows an analysis by a leading US expert of radiation levels at the plant. Readings from reactor two at the site have been made public by the Japanese authorities and Tepco, the utility that operates it.

Richard Lahey, who was head of safety research for boiling-water reactors at General Electric when the company installed the units at Fukushima, told the Guardian workers at the site appeared to have "lost the race" to save the reactor, but said there was no danger of a Chernobyl-style catastrophe.

Workers have been pumping water into three reactors at the stricken plant in a desperate bid to keep the fuel rods from melting down, but the fuel is at least partially exposed in all the reactors.

At least part of the molten core, which includes melted fuel rods and zirconium alloy cladding, seemed to have sunk through the steel "lower head" of the pressure vessel around reactor two, Lahey said.

"The indications we have, from the reactor to radiation readings and the materials they are seeing, suggest that the core has melted through the bottom of the pressure vessel in unit two, and at least some of it is down on the floor of the drywell," Lahey said. "I hope I am wrong, but that is certainly what the evidence is pointing towards."

The major concern when molten fuel breaches a containment vessel is that it reacts with the concrete floor of the drywell underneath, releasing radioactive gases into the surrounding area. At Fukushima, the drywell has been flooded with seawater, which will cool any molten fuel that escapes from the reactor and reduce the amount of radioactive gas released.

Lahey said: "It won't come out as one big glob; it'll come out like lava, and that is good because it's easier to cool."

The drywell is surrounded by a secondary steel-and-concrete structure designed to keep radioactive material from escaping into the environment. But an earlier hydrogen explosion at the reactor may have damaged this.

"The reason we are concerned is that they are detecting water outside the containment area that is highly radioactive and it can only have come from the reactor core," Lahey added. "It's not going to be anything like Chernobyl, where it went up with a big fire and steam explosion, but it's not going to be good news for the environment."

The radiation level at a pool of water in the turbine room of reactor two was measured recently at 1,000 millisieverts per hour. At that level, workers could remain in the area for just 15 minutes, under current exposure guidelines.

A less serious core meltdown happened at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania in 1979. During that incident, engineers managed to cool the molten fuel before it penetrated the steel pressure vessel. The task is a race against time, because as the fuel melts it forms a blob that becomes increasingly difficult to cool.

In the light of the Fukushima crisis, Lahey said all countries with nuclear power stations should have "Swat teams" of nuclear reactor safety experts on standby to give swift advice to the authorities in times of emergency, with international groups co-ordinated by the International Atomic Energy Authority.

The warning came as the Japanese authorities were being urged to give clearer advice to the public about the safety of food and drinking water contaminated with radioactive substances from Fukushima.

Robert Peter Gale, a US medical researcher who was brought in by Soviet authorities after the Chernobyl disaster, in 1986, has met Japanese cabinet ministers to discuss establishing an independent committee charged with taking radiation data from the site and translating it into clear public health advice.

"What is fundamentally disturbing the public is reports of drinking water one day being above some limit, and then a day or two later it's suddenly safe to drink. People don't know if the first instance was alarmist or whether the second one was untrue," said Gale.

"My recommendation is they should consider establishing a small commission to independently convert the data into comprehensible units of risk for the public so people know what they are dealing with and can take sensible decisions," he added.

[Winehole23]

#511:

http://www.spurstalk.com/forums/show...&postcount=511

[cheguevara]

'no danger of Chernobyl-style catastrophe'

that's a relief

[MannyIsGod]

So much for those GE containment vessels.

[RandomGuy]

'no danger of Chernobyl-style catastrophe'

Until of course, there is.

There is no danger that house prices will fall and make our mortgage backed securities worthless.

Until there was.

Pardon me if I put off booking my trip to the hotel in the town next door to the reactor.

Any takers for my hotel room booking?

[LnGrrrR]

But I thought that our corporate overlords said everything would be ok?

[Agloco]

Fail

noone was expecting water leakage from reactors or high radiation hundreds of miles away.

Feared? yes. Expected? no.

Spoken like a true layperson. Keep up the fear mongering though. You're pretty good at it.

Edit: What time point are you referring to? I'm speaking about events after we found out about the seawater being sprayed on the cores.

[Agloco]

The point I was making is...... someone is either lying, or they don't have the proper equipment if they can't seem to figure out what the accurate Radiation levels are.

Based on many years of experience, it's probably due to many indirect measurements being made in order to reduce the amount of exposure the crew is getting. It's not as accurate as it should be, but it gives an idea about the safety of an area before anyone spends a significant amount of time near the measurement point. After the initial reading, direct measurements can then be made (usually) for a more accurate picture.

Also keep in mind: The amount of radiation present (and subsequently detected) can fluctuate quite a bit based on prevailing winds. In addition, it was noted that most of the equipment had either malfunctioned or failed as a result of the quake/tsunami. They rolled with what they had at the time.

If your cable bill says you owe 100 dollars then two days later they say you owe 20 dollars wouldn't you want to know who is in charge, and if they know what they are doing?

Not really. I'd ask the experts (read: the billers) for more info about the nature of the 80 dollar discount. I wouldn't immediately question the competency of those who work with billing on a day to day basis. Perhaps there's some food for thought here mouse.....

What many people fail to realize is Radiation in itself is faily new as far as what Scientist know about it. They have no idea what Radiation can do after a certain amount of years.

Such is the nature of radiation and it's effects on biologic systems. Stochastic processes are a . Don't fall into the same trap that habitual gamblers do here. Reality is, there are shades of gray in the world. It's not all black and white. No one can guarantee that you won't develop some sort of ailment (including cancer) as a result of radiation just as no one can guarantee that you won't develop an ailment.

That is why The Atom Bomb dropped in Japan and Chernobyl scenarios keep coming up when people try to figure out what Radiation exposure really does to the human body.

Which should offer you a perspective on exactly how rare situations like these are. Both of those events were as a result of extraordinary cir stances, the likes of which we are unlikely to ever see again. Ditto for Fukushima, especially with all of the safety data being gathered during this crisis.

Did we have Nuclear radiation in the 1800s? Who is to say that 10 years from now Babies born by radiation infected mothers back in 1986 will have a short lifespan? It's only been 25 or so years. People who keep saying radiation is your friend you get it from the sun, from cell phones, X-ray machines, those people are dangerous.

No. What's really dangerous are people who don't understand the difference between exposure at Chernobyl and exposure from background radiation and electronics. Fear mongering at it's worst tbh.

Also, read my comment above. You can't guarantee that something will happen, just as I can't guarantee that something won't.

The commercials on Cancer research centers and other TV exposure makes people used to the disease to the point they don't question it anymore. Its normal conversation now.

I don't follow your train of thought here. Are you maintaining that it's been sensationalized? In talking to patients I find that the exposure (pardon the pun) helps quite a bit in terms of awareness. Education is number one. Idle speculation in the absence of education leads to what we have here in this thread, and more generally what the government and public's opinion of nuclear power will be after all of this is over. Shameful really.

People are so occupied with their 401k and whats on face book they can't even see their world going to .

My new EVO 4G rocks btw. I can do status updates on FB in between radiation treatments. There's also a neat Wells Fargo app that allows me to look at all of my investments........

[Viva Las Espuelas]

Radiation Traces Found in U.S. Milk

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...googlenews_wsj

[Wild Cobra]

Radiation Traces Found in U.S. Milk

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...googlenews_wsj

So?

Know how small a pico is?

[mouse]

So?

Know how small a pico is?

Twice the size of your brain, or your package?


Drinks on me!