Tokyo Electric Power Company has received about $24 billion USD in loans from several major banks.
TEPCo officials say they need to money to continue working to deal with the crisis at Fukushima Daiichi. This is proof that corporations are not prepared for disasters.
At least 11 people are dead, and as many as 103 wounded, after an explosion in a Minsk subway, in the country of Belarus. The explosion caused Russian police in Moscow to search their subways.
Witnesses say there is a large crater where the ‘bomb’ went off. Belarus police say it is an act of terrorism, they found the remains of a bomb that ahd been stuffed with scraps of metal. One analyst says this is the first time for such an act of terrorism in Belarus.
Russia suffered a terrorist attack at one of its airports in January. Russia has been asking Western leaders to help them in their fight against terrorism since the 1990s.
“Dad chose to go because of his sense of responsibility toward his job. Now he’s working for everyone.”-worried wife to her daughter
They’re desperate, but determined to support their husbands, working in deadly conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi plant.
“My Dad’s great. He’s a hero.”-proud daughter
Many wives know their husbands might suffer deadly contamination working at the damaged nuke plant, but they say their husbands are driven by a sense of commitment to the country. Their children don’t quite understand the seriousness of the situation; dad is a hero, but how long will he be here after exposure to the deadly radiation?
Some wives say relatives criticize them for not stopping their husbands from working in the deadly plant. Not only do they have to deal with relatives, but their own husbands will not talk about what is going on at Fukushima Daiichi.
“It’s my job as his wife to believe he’s safe and wait for him to come home after work where he’s risking his life.”
A 61-year-old woman, whose husband manages one of the many subcontractors at Fukushima Daiichi, says it is difficult to get info. In a recent email her husband said only “I’m alright”, after she asked about radiation exposure.
She said when he finally came home for a break he looked exhausted.
Another wife tries to deal with it by planing the usual things, like enrolling her daughter in school. She said after a week of working at the damaged nuclear plant, her husband came home looking exhausted, with bloodshot eyes. He told her he had been exposed to high levels of radiation. She said their daughter seems to know, she no longer asks for piggy back rides.
From The Daily Yomiuri
“Output reduction in Japan and overseas will most likely continue until September.”-Kohei Takahasi, JPMorgan Chase & Co. in Tokyo
Toyota expects to lose 35,000 vehicles from the North American shut down, and that’s spread over five days. The problem is that, because of continued nuclear power issues, it looks like parts supply is not going to improve anytime soon.
Almost 70 percent of the Toyota vehicles sold in the U.S., are put together in North America, but, about 85 percent of the parts and materials come from Japan.
The North American car market is important for Toyota, making up about 60% of their profits.
On April 8, Citigroup downgraded Toyota stock to ‘sell’. Citigroup said the downgrade was because Toyota has not addressed the problems created by the lack of electrical power in Japan. It’s clear the lack of power in Japan will go on for longer than expected.
Before the March 11 disasters, JAL had come out of bankruptcy. Now the huge drop in people coming to Japan (some sources say at least 75% drop) is threatening to do JAL in.
Last week JAL announced they will ask employees to take time off without pay. Now JAL says it needs to cut costs by 10 billion yen.
JAL President Masaru Onishi, said international flight passengers is only 25% of what they need to make money.
They will extend the employee time off without pay plan, as well as halt payments for employee ‘expenses’ and ‘allowances’.
Professor Susumu Yasuda of Tokyo Denki University conducted a survey of the effects of liquefaction, caused by the 11 March 2011, 9.0 quake.
He looked at the Tokyo Bay area and found at least 4,200 hectares (10,378 acres) of land had suffered liquefaction. Tokyo is 370km (230 miles) from the quake’s epicenter.
Liquefaction also destroyed residential areas built on reclaimed land in Chiba Prefecture.
Professor Yasuda says more liquefaction will occur in the future unless the underground water is removed and the ground solidified. Left on its own the ground will take more than 100 years to stabilize.
Senior agency official Nishiyama Hidehiko, apologized for his agency’s slow response to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear crisis.
Nishiyama admitted the agency failed to address problems at the plant, as one emergency followed another.
Even the Nuclear Safety Commission, which advises the elected government of Japan, says the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency is unreliable.
The Japanese media has been complaining about uncoordinated press conferences, in which the agency’s info sometimes clashed with info given at Tokyo Electric Power Company’s press conferences.
Sounds like a case of too many arrogant agencies (too many chiefs, not enough Indians), and a total lack of communication between everyone involved.
This is the time of the year for grade school graduations in Japan. Because of the March 11 quake and tsunami, graduation ceremonies are painfully emotional for many.
At one kindergarten, they lost six children (three dead, three missing). Today the mother of two missing girls accepted their kindergarten graduation certificates.
Officials from Argentina and Japan met in Tokyo, to discuss the ongoing nuclear, and now economic, crisis in Japan.
Argentina pledged more help, but only if the Japanese government starts being honest about how bad the nuclear crisis at Fukushima Daiichi really is. Many international observers, by their own radiation readings, believe it is much worse than what the Japanese officials say.
Several cities and towns in the Fukushima Prefecture have shown higher levels of contamination that first thought.
The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology has been taking radiation readings around the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. Since 26 March the radiation readings went up to dangerous levels, and stayed up.
This was part of the government’s decision to expand the evacuation zone.
The International Commission on Radiological Protection recommends 1,000 microsieverts as the long-term yearly limit to radiation exposure. In Namie Town, 30km (18.6 miles) northwest of the plant, the Ministry of Science found 14,480 microsieverts of radiation had accumulated over 17-days! They found many more areas with similar radiation levels.
Hiroshima University Professor Shizuma Kiyoshi, says most of the radiation observed in Fukushima Prefecture is probably radioactive cesium.
Shizuma advises residents to wear masks to avoid inhaling radioactive substances mixed with dust.