NHK (Nippon Housou Kyoukai/Japan Broadcasting Corporation) has run several reports that show local prefectural governments, near the damaged nuclear pant, but outside the 20km (12.4 miles) evacuation zone, are encouraging their residents to evacuate.
Some residents are leaving. Some local governments have even booked hotels for mass evacuations to begin next week. One hotel said they were booked up for two months.
NHK reporting that one of their helicopter news crews took video of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, after Tokyo Electric Power Company announced that they stopped the contaminated water leak from Reactor 2 pit.
Not only does the video show water still pouring into the ocean, but it shows smoke coming from reactors 2, 3 & 4.
An analyst interviewed by NHK said the water still pouring out could be from other leaks not yet discovered.
TEPCo admitted that the smoke might be caused by continued build up of hydrogen gas inside the containment vessels. They are going to try to inject nitrogen into Reactor 1, to prevent an explosion by hydrogen gas. If another explosion happens, this time it will rupture the reactor’s containment vessel.
In a joint report between The Washington Post and Foreign Policy, it’s been revealed that while Rome burned Tokyo Electric Power Company fiddled.
Apparently, instead of trying to figure out what to do after two of their reactors suffered hydrogen gas explosions, and continued to spew radiation, TEPCo officials were trying to figure out how to build two new reactors!
On March 26 they presented the Fukushima Prefectural government with their plan for new reactors. “It was just unbelievable.”-Nozaki Yoichi, Fukushima Prefectural Planning and Coordination Department
After getting the cold shoulder from local authorities, TEPCo submitted the plan to the Japanese central government on 31 March. They got the same reaction.
TEPCo is so hated now, in Fukushima Prefecture they’ve covered up their signs for their offices, because they’ve been getting threatening phone calls, and employees are being harassed.
Fukushima Prefectural officials told TEPCo “…to sort out problems on the ground first and stop thinking about new reactors.”
TEPCo officials now say they made a mistake in asking for the new reactors now, and they claim the plan was made before the 11 March disasters. If that’s so, why did they wait until 26 March to present the plan?
What corporate arrogance, to ask for government backing for two new reactors while the ones you have are blowing up and spewing radiation. Baka!
For several days the Japanese government, and Tokyo Electric Power Company officials, have been talking about using specially coated sheeting to wrap the Fukushima Daiichi nuke plant in. Now they’ve announced when that will happen: September!
Hello, I think that’s too late guys! How much radiation will have spewed in that amount of time? And it doesn’t even address water leakage.
The Japanese government has already commissioned a contractor to do the job. According to Kyodo News, that contractor says they hope to start work by June (June!). The reason, same as always, radiation levels are too high to do any truly productive work.
This is a vicious circle: They have to do work to get radiation levels down, but the radiation levels are so high that the amount of time a worker can be at the job is limited to less than 15 minutes, with full protective gear. This has been stated by many TEPCo employees interviewed by Japanese media. Even Japanese nuke analysts have said as much. In other words this has become a “sit & spin” operation!
Let me ask again: Why don’t they dump concrete on it!?
The U.S. Navy has withdrawn 10 ships from Japan. They say it’s because they are no longer needed for supply efforts, now that more roads have been cleared.
Most roads and rail systems in the north east of Honshu were destroyed in the 11 March disasters.
The U.S. still has plenty of troops in the area, including a special nuke team sent to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
CNN interviewed Bill Nye about the water leaking out of reactor 2, at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. He said he wasn’t worried “yet”, and then pointed out that debris from the three week old tsunami has already reached the Pacific Northwest of North America.
CNN downplayed the water leak by stressing that is is low level contamination. That is not true. When I watch the Japanese media, they continually point out that the water coming from the cracked pit, connected to Reactor 2, is high level contamination, including cesium. In fact cesium-137 levels, off the Pacific Coast of Japan, are now millions of times above safe limits. It is the water that is intentionally dumped from the other reactors, for operational safety, which is the low level stuff.
Bill Nye pointed out that stuff will eventually get to North America. I wrote a little piece, a couple of days ago, about the Black Current, explaining which way the contamination will flow.
Nye went on to say that people need to put pressure on TEPCo to “…pave the thing over.” He doesn’t understand why they’re taking so long with this disaster. Perhaps he hasn’t read some of my posts which explain that, THEY DON’T KNOW WHAT THEY’RE DOING! Even TEPCo contracted employees are saying, in recent interviews on Japanese TV, and with Japanese newspapers, that they have yet to start getting serious with this thing.
NHK has interviewed a worker from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. The worker agreed to the interview if his identity was hidden. He says Tokyo Electric Power Company is just at the beginning of their efforts to control the critical plant.
He says what has been done at the plant so far is just prep work: “We have not yet begun to climb the mountain.” Meaning efforts to secure Fukushima Daiichi haven’t even started.
He says radiation levels at the plant are too high to safely work. Radioactive water has been leaking ever since the first hydrogen gas explosions at least three weeks ago. Radioactive debris, including sections of pipes that carry highly radioactive water, are spread all over the plant’s compound.
”The state will take on the responsibility of providing support for renewal.”-Kan Naoto, Prime Minister
Japan’s Prime Minister Kan Naoto said Japan’s government (meaning taxpayers) will take responsibility in recovery and rebuilding efforts after the nuclear disaster at Fukushima Daiichi.
Many evacuees told Kan, in a written statement, that nothing is being done to help them with health care, education for evacuated children, daily expenses and employment. But, Kan said Japan must first bring the still critical situation at Fukushima Daiichi under control.
Tokyo Electric Power Company is using a chemical they call “liquid glass” to try and stop the leak of highly radioactive water from Reactor 2 pit, at Fukushima Daiichi.
TEPCo thinks the leak is coming from pipes under the reactors. They injected liquid glass (sodium silicate) into the gravel under the pit for Reactor 2. At this point the water flow has actually decreased, but it’s not known for sure if it’s from the liquid glass or that the source is finally running dry.
TEPCo will also use silt barriers in the water, in front of Reactor 2’s water intake. Radiation is also leaking from the intake, and they hope the silt barriers will block the radiation from spreading in the ocean.
People have petitioned the Japanese government to let them go back to their contaminated homes, to take care of things like livestock and pets.
After the 11 March disasters that damaged the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, the government ordered people within a 20 kilometers radius from the plant to evacuate, and those within 20-30km to stay indoors.
One man, who went back in violation of evacuation orders, said livestock and pets are wandering through the streets of towns.
Prime Minister Kan Naoto told the people that the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disaster must be brought under control first. Many of the evacuees say they were led to believe they would be returning home by now.