Japan hit by powerful earthquake

[MaachaQ]

NHK and NHK World is showing an accounting/overview of the events at Fukushima No.1, with comparitive photos and stuff now.

Edit: TBS is as well.

Someone did a great job on those models in the time they must have had to prepare them...

[Plow]

I really just wanna know what happens if that shit sits in the ground lol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernob...nt_sarcophagus

[Kaslo]

By the way, I practice environmental law (so probably overly precautious) but I had received this from my boss about precautions to take in the US based upon his knowledge and his experience during three mile island:

Our problem will be the “fallout” - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_fallout



The big problem for us will be Iodine 131 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iodine-...ne_and_biology ) and Cesium 137 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caesium-137 ). Both of those are released in massive quantities when a nuclear plant “melts down” and they replace calcium in milk and our bodies. When “fallout” happens, the C131/I121 gets on the grass, and cows “bioaccumulate” it by eating the grass, making the consumption of fresh dairy products here in the USA risky, probably till the end of the year, or next year.



So, for your health, and the health of your family, I would suggest that today or tomorrow you:



1) Go to Walmart, Reasors, etc, and stockpile as much UHT milk (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-h...ure_processing )as you can find, and buy as much fresh milk as you can use before the expiration date. If the situation is as bad as Japan reports, next week the fallout will be here, and the fresh milk will be polluted. This is especially important for young children and mothers who are breastfeeding. Young children are susceptible because 1) they are adding calcium to their bones and will get a lot of the C131, and 2) their immune systems are not as strong as adults, making the injury the would receive from the radiation even worse that it is for adults. Breastfeeding children are further at risk, because the process of making mother’s milk can further concentrate the pollutants. Breastfeeding mothers must avoid all dairy, unless they know it pre-dates that Japan accidents.

2) When you are at Walmart/Reasors, buy as much butter as you plan to use this year. You can freeze butter.

3) And, buy as much cheese of the kinds you like as you plan to use for the rest of the year. Cheese freezes, too.

4) If you need to, buy a freezer.



If your friends have livestock, figure a way to keep them in a barn, esp. when it’s raining, and figure a way to feed them with hay and grains that have already been harvested, which would also need to be stored indoors.



Finally, don’t spend time out of doors in the rain. When the rain is falling, the fallout will be increased, and the action of the raindrops falling can create aerosols where you may breath in the radioactive cesium and iodine. If you must be out of doors in the rain, make sure you wear a jacket and hat that keeps you from getting wet, preferably goretex that doesn’t bleed the rain to your skin or clothes, and consider wearing a mask to prevent breathing the aerosoled radioactive particulates. Wash your hands and face if they become wet with rain (or anywhere else on you that gets wet from the rain).



So, when will it end? Quite a while after the disaster in Japan is contained. It will be weeks or months until they are able to contain the emissions. Then, after that the fallout will need to do just that – fallout of the atmosphere, and then the pollutants will need to be carried away by rain into the rivers and into our lakes and seas. Maybe we can have fresh milk safely by the end of the year. Maybe next year. The good news on this is that we have a lot of experience with it. In the 1950s we blew up atomic bombs in the atmosphere – so we know exactly what’s coming.

Do with it what you will.

[Yuri-G]

I honestly mean no offense here, but that is absolute reactionary fearmongering bullshit, and it's kinda sad that anyone would take it seriously.

[Chun Liroy]

That guy sounds crazy.

Edit: I have a question, in comparison to the size of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima/nagasaki, how much larger or smaller would a worst case scenario explosion be from these reactors?

[Lhyet]

Wow, that is an amazing level of fearmongering. Buy enough butter for a year? You children are more susceptible? That can fuck right off.

[Olo401]

I honestly mean no offense here, but that is absolute reactionary fearmongering bullshit, and it's kinda sad that anyone would take it seriously.

Wow, that is an amazing level of fearmongering. Buy enough butter for a year? You children are more susceptible? That can fuck right off.

I'm glad someone else called this shit out for the total fearmongering that it is. The US isn't gonna see any radiation unless we get a full core exposure.

[Olo401]

Some pretty solid info : http://www.jaif.or.jp/english/news_i...300273535P.pdf

Reactors 3 & 4 are an absolute mess.

[Trigun]

I missed it this past Monday and Tuesday, Diane Sawyer, supposedly she was the first American news reporter there.

They talk about everything, some of the stuff you've probly seen, read, or heard already. You can see the Red Cross in one of the episodes.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/223713/abc...011#s-p1-so-i0

http://www.hulu.com/watch/224006/abc...011#s-p1-so-i0

note: watch the promo before the videos, that way you can scroll back and forth no commercials.

[Takedown3]

i think you guys are getting fear mongering mixed up with preparedness

[Kurokikaze]

Yeah, don't take that post for anything other than fear-mongering. If you told me Glenn Beck or someone else on FOX said that... I'd believe you. Thats how bad it is.

[Lhyet]

i think you guys are getting fear mongering mixed up with preparedness

No, no I'm pretty sure I'm not. Come on, do you really think that America will be hit with enough radiation to require you to buy enough butter for a year and not go outside in the rain?

[Mrbeansman]

http://www.cnbc.com/id/42076147

Spoiler: show

The fact that Charlie Sheen has decided donate a portion of the money from his live stage shows to help people affected by earthquake in Japan should be all you need to know that donating money to Japan is a bad idea.

Earthquakes, hurricanes, floods, tsunamis, volcanoes and even chemical or nuclear disasters can provoke a strong urge on the part of people to want to provide disaster relief in the form of charitable donations directed at those afflicted by the most recent disaster. This is almost always a mistake.

Almost all international disaster relief is ineffective. Part of the reason for this is that relief groups rarely know who is suffering most, or how aid can be most effectively directed.

What’s more, these floods of ‘earmarked’ charity dollars only make the relief process less effective. It results in a gush of funds into a region and organizations that cannot possibly know how to spend it—as a result, much of it often is unspent or ill-spent.

Felix Salmon, who agrees that we shouldn’t be donating to Japanese disaster relief, points out another factor that should come into play—Japan is one of the wealthiest countries in the world. It can pay for its own relief.

In the specific case of Japan, there’s all the more reason not to donate money. Japan is a wealthy country which is responding to the disaster, among other things, by printing hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of new money. Money is not the bottleneck here: if money is needed, Japan can raise it.

We’d do far better to use these occasions to reflect on the unpredictability and fragility of our lives. If we’re charitably minded, we can turn to local charities and churches. If it’s international charity that interests you, donate to Charity Water, the Red Cross or Doctors without Borders—with dollars unrestricted to any particular disaster.

Here's Salmon again:

That said, it’s entirely possible that organizations like the Red Cross or Save the Children will find themselves with important and useful roles to play in Japan. It’s also certain that they have important and useful roles to play elsewhere. So do give money to them — and give generously! And give money to other NGOs, too, like Doctors Without Borders (MSF), which don’t jump on natural disasters and use them as opportunistic marketing devices. Just make sure it’s unrestricted.

Stay classy CNBC.

[Silenka]

That's a troll article right? Right? Please tell me it is, my faith in humanity has pretty much dissolved at this point...

[Kurokikaze]

No, no I'm pretty sure I'm not. Come on, do you really think that America will be hit with enough radiation to require you to buy enough butter for a year and not go outside in the rain?

Possible whoosh. I could be wrong.

[richardd]

That's a troll article right? Right? Please tell me it is, my faith in humanity has pretty much dissolved at this point...

lol, i lost it when i saw 14 year olds claiming payback for Pearl Harbor

and forgive me if my history lessons aren't up to par with the current expecations of the curriculum in general. but can this really be compared to chernobyl in anyway shape or form? or are people in the media comparing it to chernobyl because of what we learned from it? chernobyl v2 seems a bit assanine

[Asai]

Think I found it, scary as hell:

Thank you, and fuck that is crazy... It does look like they're scrambling to get someone on a gurney up the hill or something.. I wonder if they were conscious/aware of what was happening.

[Hyan]

lor are people in the media comparing it to chernobyl because of what we learned from it? chernobyl v2 seems a bit assanine

Chernobyl = nuclear accident

Fukushima = nuclear accident

Probably that's why...

[Kaslo]

Well his rational comes from how the jet stream affected the three mile island incident. The effects were felt across the pond in Wales where a lot of sheep's milk was contaminated. I'm not following it, just posting it. I did buy some extra cheese and butter , but not a ton (like 2 months worth, which isn't much), and mainly because if nothing happens I will still end up using it, and also if something does happen that causes people to panic to grocery stores I don't have to deal with it.

[richardd]

Chernobyl = nuclear accident

Fukushima = nuclear accident

Probably that's why...

hi. you are correct. good job.

but i think i worded it wrong.

basically, im reading more up on it now while im at work, and it seems that the majority of scientists think that chernobyl was far above the lvl of danger than it is in Japan right now.

What i meant to ask was, was it worth comparing to, if those scientists seem to think that chernobyl far outweighs the current crisis in japan? i would think that it has potential to surpass it, but like i said, my knowledge in stuff like this is at an absolute minimal.