japan eartquake of 8.9/tsunami

[baloo]

Cute, I'm now a whinger for pointing out that you're a chronic whinger.

[sluggo]

It's good to see that it's not just Sepos and their country that Burb hates.

[baloo]

A 6 hit Shizuoka last night, about 130km SW of Tokyo. As a result we've now got our first batch of refugees arriving this week. With 2 kids under 3 they decided to take a break from it all. Thatll just make our place ground zero for a while with 4 under 4

(Un)fortunately, I'm stuck in Melbourne for a few more days.

[skank-la]

A westerner living in Japan orginally posted this 6 minute from dry streets to building floating away video on facebook & now after repeated tries has got it up on facebook. Look how the world can turn upside down in the short space of 6 minutes

Unimaginable things become real

[Fat Bob]

Saw that video, absolutely amazing. Nature can be so destructive. I am in awe of all of these videos, from this one to the one where the water just keeps moving across the fields, roads and canals destroying everything in it's path.

In the last few months it's all been the Pacific rim, and if you consider death tolls as a marker for how serious, then the human race has got off quite lightly. In very recent memory then the numbers of dead from cyclones in Bangladesh/Burma and earthquakes in Indonesia, China and Haiti have all in each single episode killed far more than the total in 2011 between Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

Of course, the human suffering in all cases is tragic, and my sympathies go out to all those affected.

[slinky]

I keep reading the news in hopes they've finally got these reactors under control, but today I see this quote from a CNN story talking about the plant workers at Fukushima:

"Their situation is not great," said David Brenner, director of the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University. "It's pretty clear that they will be getting very high doses of radiation. There's certainly the potential for lethal doses of radiation. They know it, and I think you have to call these people heroes."

How are they going to get this under control and stopped??

[Morrolan]

Actually maybe I'm unusual, but I'm strangely impressed with all the engineering outcomes that when faced with one of the largest earthquakes registered in history. That Tsunami just to hard to engineer against, but those buildings in Tokyo are fantastic, particularly in reference to a 8m shift of their land mass and the spongy design for the airports. And something not mentioned is the large number of reactors in Japan that were shut down in emergency and not in same boat - was just reading this one was designed for a quake of up to 8.4 40yrs ago, and newer ones up to 9. None that counts I guess if this one reactor goes to complete shyte.

i agree, Tas. the Fukushima plant was built early 1970s with 1960s technology and due to be shut down i think next year after a lifetime extension. we're talking about a 40 year old plant that withstood a 9.0 quake and the only reason it is now in trouble is that the tsunami washed away the back up generators. had those been secured underground the plant would not be in the trouble it is now.

[Burbage]

We had an earthquake yesterday! 4.0 on the Richter Scale.

I love the way all the environmental groups are hopping about shouting "I told you so". They live for moment like this.

[slinky]

Actually maybe I'm unusual, but I'm strangely impressed with all the engineering outcomes that when faced with one of the largest earthquakes registered in history. That Tsunami just to hard to engineer against, but those buildings in Tokyo are fantastic, particularly in reference to a 8m shift of their land mass and the spongy design for the airports. And something not mentioned is the large number of reactors in Japan that were shut down in emergency and not in same boat - was just reading this one was designed for a quake of up to 8.4 40yrs ago, and newer ones up to 9. None that counts I guess if this one reactor goes to complete shyte.

i agree, Tas. the Fukushima plant was built early 1970s with 1960s technology and due to be shut down i think next year after a lifetime extension. we're talking about a 40 year old plant that withstood a 9.0 quake and the only reason it is now in trouble is that the tsunami washed away the back up generators. had those been secured underground the plant would not be in the trouble it is now.

These are good points, and I agree that the plant got hit with an unbelievably rare combination of natural forces which is the cause of what's happening. In some ways, it is rather amazing it withstood any of it, really. M, you bring up a really good point that I hadn't thought of - given that the plant is situated on a coastline, I wonder what the reasoning was for not putting the back up generators under ground?

I'm trying not to get on an anti-nuclear power bandwagon mainly because logically this combination of problems is extremely rare. However, I then read about old plants or questionable technology plants in places like Central America (where they also get earthquakes) and I have to wonder could we see something similar in the future?

[baloo]

M, you bring up a really good point that I hadn't thought of - given that the plant is situated on a coastline, I wonder what the reasoning was for not putting the back up generators under ground?

Would having underground generators in an Earthquake zone make sense ? I'd assume not.

[slinky]

M, you bring up a really good point that I hadn't thought of - given that the plant is situated on a coastline, I wonder what the reasoning was for not putting the back up generators under ground?

Would having underground generators in an Earthquake zone make sense ? I'd assume not.

Huh, well, now that you mention it, yeah, I can see the reasons why that could cause problems too.

[T2K]

That video is amazing, 6 minutes and your town is washed away. Those little Japanese cars seem to float pretty well, though you wouldn't want to be in one for the ride.

I'm in awe of the high level of discipline and civility that the affected Japanese people are displaying. I always knew they were highly civilized, but this is really impressive. People in some parts of the US can and do handle disasters like this, others...no way (New Orleans 2005, for example). Japan's consistency is amazing.

Edit - I've not looked into a lot, but wouldn't tsunamis be expected with earthquakes? In that case, wouldn't back-up generators be somehow sealed against flooding? Or did the earthequake disrupt that and expose them to flooding?

[slinky]

I'm in awe of the high level of discipline and civility that the affected Japanese people are displaying. I always knew they were highly civilized, but this is really impressive. People in some parts of the US can and do handle disasters like this, others...no way (New Orleans 2005, for example). Japan's consistency is amazing.

I agree. It is awe inspiring to see people under these circumstances queueing patiently, not looting, helping each other when they can, etc. From a psychological standpoint, I'm very interested in how a whole society is so consistent like that - what are they doing differently than other cultures that makes this happen, you know?

[Aliya]

Well, looks like they are all queueing patiently in long lines to get out of Japan "as they question whether Japan's government is telling them truth about reactors. If they can't fly out, people are heading out of Tokyo.

I don't blame them, the goverment has admitted it doesn't know how bad this will get.

Truly awful

[baloo]

Government is trying to get the news out as quickly as possible. The Bureaucrats at the Electricity Companies are the ones that are stifling the news. The Prime Minister was livid that no one had told him about the explosion in reactor #2 up to 2 hours after he'd seen it on the news.

The government called for the first 2 evacuations out against the Electricity Companies strong protests. In hindsight, the Government is doing all it can.

Japan is a strange place, the bureaucracy in the ministries are well entrenched and are often the real power brokers. These guys are difficult to topple and ministers who have tried have come off second best.

We have a brand new government from a party that hasn't been in power for 40 odd years. They've had a 9 Earthquake which created havoc to infrastructure deep into Tokyo. The Tsunami which ripped apart the country and caused more stretched emergency services and response units to try and tackle. Then slap a multi nuclear plant failure bang smack in the middle of all this devastation.

I doubt there would be many countries inn the world that could handle all this at the same time with Japan's surface calmness.

[Aliya]

I really feel for the PM, he was very angy to have the news of the explosion kept from him for so long, can see the tensions working away just from the news.

[Morrolan]

Edit - I've not looked into a lot, but wouldn't tsunamis be expected with earthquakes? In that case, wouldn't back-up generators be somehow sealed against flooding? Or did the earthequake disrupt that and expose them to flooding?

whether an earthquake generates a tsunami or not is decided by several factors: offshore vs onshore, shallow depth vs deep, type of disruption and strength. IIRC, a quake below 7 will not generate a tsunami, above that it will and the depth and location will then determine the size of the tsunami.

[T2K]

I'm in awe of the high level of discipline and civility that the affected Japanese people are displaying. I always knew they were highly civilized, but this is really impressive. People in some parts of the US can and do handle disasters like this, others...no way (New Orleans 2005, for example). Japan's consistency is amazing.

I agree. It is awe inspiring to see people under these circumstances queueing patiently, not looting, helping each other when they can, etc. From a psychological standpoint, I'm very interested in how a whole society is so consistent like that - what are they doing differently than other cultures that makes this happen, you know?

I've wondered that too. I think some of it is genetic (Japanese have been a mostly isolated and homogenous breeding population for at least 1000 years), some of it is cultural. More cultural than genetic - Japanese I know really have been brought up not to cause problems, not to impose on others, to get along well in whatever situation they are in, etc. But why have they been brought up that way - something genetic I think.

[Mr Oz]

Image if it was the US and they had a disaster like that. Man it would be ugly. I think it's a cultural thing. I remember when the warning that brisbane was going to flood and the city just went crazy. At my work place where we were instructed to evaluate, there were people still working (in complete denial), there were the headless henny pennies running around , there were people crying. Going home there were people fighting over things in the supermarket, petrol stations, it was just crazy! It is a tribute to the japanese they are able to keep such a level head. If it was a western country it would be kaos!

[baloo]

There is some cultural aspect and genetics maybe. Possibly the pasting they got in WWII also had some effect on them.

But I think it's more to do with a well drilled and prepared population. Live in Japan for just a month and you'll feel a tremor or two. You learn very quickly, as a visitor, and very young as a kid, what to do in case of a crisis and how to do it as calmly as possible. Every japanese person I know has a survival kit or two around the house located where they would run too if they thought they would be trapped in their house.

Kids at pre-school calmly down helmets and crouch under desks when they hear the alarms. It's ingrained from a young age to stay calm.

[T2K]

Mr Oz - the US has things like this happen almost every year. Maybe not this large in scale, but bad nonetheless. And people just step up and take care things, help each other, stay orderly and calm, etc. Foreigners only hear about the stuff that gets messy, like New Orleans / Katrina. Hurricane Katrina didn't only affect New Orleans, neighboring areas were affected. But they just quietly dug themselves out and started putting their lives back together, drama free. No news there, so you don't hear about it.

I myself was in a class 4 or 5 hurricane (depending on when and where it was measured) when I was 16. Atlantic Ocean in the first floor of my house, all cars destroyed, roads blocked by fallen trees every few feet, no power for two weeks, etc. Same thing, no drama in my area. We helped our neighbors, used chainsaws to clear the roads, shared what we had, and just generally acted civilized. Just like Japan. The best parts of the US are like Japan. But the worst parts are like Somalia, that's the difference.

[Fat Bob]

These are good points, and I agree that the plant got hit with an unbelievably rare combination of natural forces which is the cause of what's happening. In some ways, it is rather amazing it withstood any of it, really. M, you bring up a really good point that I hadn't thought of - given that the plant is situated on a coastline, I wonder what the reasoning was for not putting the back up generators under ground?

I can 't beleive people think this is a thing that is unlikley to happen. Tsunamis occur after some earthquakes. Coastal areas are effected by tsunamis. Therefore, the only was the plant was unlikley to hit by a tsunami was if it wasn't in an earthquake region.

Oh, and there are reasons why people use a Japanese word to describe a large lump of water coming at you due to an earthquake, and also why the Pacific Rim is known as the "Pacific Rim of Fire".

To me this seems an appalling lack of risk assessment. The possibility of catostrophic (i.e. lots of deaths) outcome of a nuclear plant failure requires a much higher level of safety measures to prevent it. To anyone who has ever completed a risk assesment then surely it's obvious?

[slinky]

Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

Apparently now too hazardous for the workers to be in there. Shit.

Edit: spelling

[Burbage]

Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

Apparently now too hazardous for the workers to be in there. Shit.

Edit: spelling

Run away!

[Tas]

Cr*st on Bike. So has anyone spelt out what will happen assuming the rods succumb and suffer meltdown. What the likely impacts will be in the immediate vicinity and broader area?