Despite efforts to stop the contaminated water from spilling into the Pacific Ocean, Tokyo Electric Power Company, and the Japanese government, say contamination levels just off the Fukushima coast are at highest point so far.
Iodine-131 has hit 88.5 becquerels per liter, 30km (18.6 miles) away from Fukushima Daiichi. Cesium-137 levels continue to climb as well, but are still under Japanese safe limits.
A Kyodo News investigation revealed that more than 100 evacuation sites were swept away by the March 11 tsunami.
Most of the evacuation sites were selected by local governments. One of the main reasons for selecting the site, even though many were near sea level, is that they were thought to be too far inland for any tsunami. Not only was the tsunami higher than expected, it reached much farther inland.
In Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, most elementary school students lost their lives, along with all but one of their teachers, no thanks to a vague manual about tsunami evacuations.
On March 11, 70% of students at Okawa Primary School were killed. 10 of the 11 teachers were also killed. When the 9.0 earthquake hit, teachers knew they needed to get the kids home, so they called the parents to come pick them up. But time was against them. Suddenly the tsunami warning sounded. The teachers looked in a manual to figure out what to do. The manual simply said “get to higher ground”.
Okawa Primary School is located on the edge of a large river that empties into the ocean. The only high ground is a steep mountainside that the teachers didn’t think the kids could climb, so they headed for a bridge. A 70 year old witness said he was amazed, they were going the wrong way! He ran towards the mountain and survived, only to witness the line of children, and their teachers, get hit by the tsunami.
One problem for the decision making of the teachers was a tsunami survey, which said that any tsunami that reached the school would be less than one meter (3.2 feet) high. The tsunami that hit the school, on March 11, was 10 meters (32.8 feet) high. “No one thought tsunami would even reach this area.”-witness
Toyota is suspending production at all its European factories.
Plants in Britain, France, Turkey and Poland will be closed for several days on April 21, 22, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 and May 2.
Toyota also said they have yet to decide what they’ll do after that. The parts supply problem in Japan does not show signs of lessening. Toyota might be force to continue with sporadic factory shut downs, with all its plants.
President Benigno Aquino ordered all Filipinos living within 50km of Fukushima Daiichi, to leave the area. Any Filipinos living outside the 50 kilometers (31 miles) zone, can voluntarily leave.
The Philippine government said they would pay all the costs of bringing their citizens back to the Philippines. Any Filipinos who want to stay are ordered to move to the southern part of the big island of Honshu.
The order came when it was officially announced that Fukushima Daiichi was a level 7 nuke disaster (the highest level).
Ibaraki Prefecture hit with a 5.8 aftershock, Wednesday morning (Japan time). The day before Ibaraki suffered a 6.3 aftershock.
More info on the strontium contamination found more than 30km from Fukushima Daiichi.
Namie Town and Iitate Village have evidence of strontium 90 contamination, they are 30km (18.6 miles) from the reactors. Strontium 90 was also found in plant samples from Motomiya City, Ono Town and Otama and Nishigo Villages. They are between 40 to 80 kilometers (24.8 to 49.7 miles) from Fukushima Daiichi.
The strontium was detected between 16 & 19 March. One nuclear engineer points out that is immediately after Reactor 3 exploded. Strontium would only come from fuel rods, and it’s a possible indicator that the reactor itself was damaged.
Text: AAron Hutchins
Photo by: Alex Hutchins
Across a cold windswept east Idaho desert, people say you can hear the nuke train haulin’ its contaminated cargo. The short track rails start nowhere, and end nowhere. You might even see the sickly yellow locomotive yourself, if your lucky and don’t miss the turn off (for directions see earlier posting “Ancient Nuclear Powered Jet…”).
Lead-lined train in the Arco desert in Eastern Idaho.
OK, so there’s no ghost train, but, in the middle of nowhere, along side the world’s first nuclear powered jet engine, sits an odd shaped yellow locomotive. It’s not nuclear powered, but it is lead lined, to protect the crew from radiation exposure when hauling the huge HTRE units that make up the nuclear jet engine.
General Electric, who ran the nuke jet project, had rail lines built to haul the huge engine from one test area to the next. In a 2005 document, the Department of Energy explained that “shielding” of various equipment from radiation, like the lead-lined locomotive, were based on 1950s understandings of radiation.
Two sets of tracks were laid for the program. The locomotive rode on the inner rails of the two tracks, pulling, or pushing the HTRE units. The HTRE units rode on both sets of tracks, they were that wide. (More pics in the “Galleries” section, click on the “INL Nuclear Power Site” pic. Click on the pics to make them bigger.).
The nuke train had a top speed of 3.5 miles per hour, but, for safety reasons traveled at 2.5 mph. For a detailed (and boring) explanation you can go to this website: www.inl.gov/technicalpublications/Documents/3028280.pdf Supposedly there are period photos in the document, but they didn’t show up for me.
The Idaho National Laboratory (INL) used to be known as INEEL, before that INEL, before that ERDA and before that NRTS. The names changes coincide with changes in government agencies controlling the “site”, in the early days, and changes in contractors who now run the site.
Yes, people are still protesting in Egypt. This time they want the pro-U.S. military leaders out, replaced by civilian leaders. They’ve also been demanding the prosecution of Hosni Mubarak, which the military leaders seem reluctant to do.
After 5 days of protest, the military moved in, rounding up protesters and tearing down barricades.
The Army claims a deal to clear Tahrir Square was made with protesters, but several protesters interviewed by the press said no such deal was made.
Reince Priebus, chairman of the Republican National Committee, will not get a warm welcome when he speaks in Vermont on Wednesday.
Vermont Unions plan to protest Priebus, because they see him as the architect of Wisconsin’s anti-collective bargaining rights bill. The protest will be in solidarity with Wisconsin’s Unions.
Priebus is speaking at a $100 per plate dinner, to raise money for the Vermont GOP.