Not sure what to make of that video. I mean they do have access to other media outlets and the internet in Tokyo. It's obvious the Japanese government does not want to create a panic. I mean how are you going to evacuate over 30 million people?
The ultimate placebo effect. If it can't see your teeth, radiation can't hurt you. How stupid do they think we are?
Biggles<font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
Stingray, the only people who have been claiming that the masks are to stop radiation are foreign media outlets. The reason so many people are wearing masks in Japan at the moment is because of hayfever. It's the pollen season, which Japan has particularly badly. People wear masks as one of several counter measures, helping to reduce the pollen they're breathing in (quite effectively, I might add).
That video is a load of crap. Did that guy expect every TV channel to show continuous news? Did he think that people outside the relatively small tsunami zone shouldn't try to get on with their lives? As for his claim that there is no information: that's provably false. He probably can't speak Japanese and so isn't able to understand the press conferences they had many times a day, which gave out plenty of detailed, factual information (they often gave out so much detail, the reporters couldn't understand it). There is no and never was any radiation death cloud heading for Tokyo or anywhere else (independently proven by many different groups), and there never was a mass exodus from Tokyo, unless you count the many foreigners fleeing due to inaccurate information from overseas. I'm not sure what to make of the claim in the title that Youtube was being restricted in Japan, either. I never noticed any problems.
[QUOTE=JackN;192052]You still ok Biggles?[/QUOTE]
I'm doing fine. The radiation level anywhere south of the site never made it above the natural background level in New Zealand, except for one very brief spike.
ShadowDancerWhen I say, "Why aye, gadgie," in my heart I say, "Och aye, laddie."London, UK
[QUOTE=Biggles;192057]I'm doing fine. The radiation level anywhere south of the site never made it above the natural background level in New Zealand, except for one very brief spike.[/QUOTE]
So no growing extra limbs or superpowers from radiation exposure? Damn :p
Biggles<font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
You know they've been doing that for a couple of weeks, right? And that the cores are designed to handle melting (although obviously not with reuse afterwards)?
All that remains for the Japanese people to do now is to dump a bunch of sand and concrete onto said reactors and move on with their lives.
Of course it's not going to be that simple.
Biggles<font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
No. It's going to be simpler. It's not Chernobyl. The reactors have not exploded. The chain reactions have been stopped since seconds after the earthquake. At worst, there are leaks out of the suppression pools of irradiated water, which is easy to clean up. There are no indications that I'm aware of that the fuel itself has breached the containment, which makes it no harder to clean up than Three Mile Island, which is to say about the same as any reactor that's been shut down, with extra boxes.
[url=http://microsievert.net/]Here's a nice visualisation of the reality[/url]. The boxes are:
Average background radiation around the worldDosage limit for a nuclear plant worker
(assuming they receive it continuously for a year)Dosage for a 0.5% increase in the cancer rate
(if received continuously for one year)Evacuate
30km WNW of the plantMito, IbarakiUtsunomiya, TochigiMaebashi, Gunma
Saitama City, SaitamaIchihara, ChibaShinjuku, TokyoChigasaki, Kanagawa
Please try applying a realistic perspective.
ShadowDancerWhen I say, "Why aye, gadgie," in my heart I say, "Och aye, laddie."London, UK
I like the graphic Biggles! I'm always trying to explain to people I come into contact with at work the scale and implications of the x-rays they're about to get. I'm always getting people who're nervous about getting a chest x-ray, yet are about to hop on a plane to Spain or America. They are actually shocked when I explain that I could give them 10 and still be less than they're about to receive on the plane! Pity I can't show them something like that link
Ok, so people within a radius of 30km are getting the yearly dosage of radiation of nuclear plant workers.
Obviously our local governments are not buying the Japanese propaganda and everyone's jumping on the nuclear power ban bandwagon.
Nobody knows, and everyone has an opinion. :D
Geiger counters are sold out everywhere! Where is my tinfoil hat?
Biggles<font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
[QUOTE=Stingray;192134]Ok, so people within a radius of 30km are getting the yearly dosage of radiation of nuclear plant workers.[/quote]
They would, if this latest for a year. Which it won't. Iodine, which is the most common byproduct to have been released, has a half-life of 8 days.
[QUOTE=Stingray;192134]Obviously our local governments are not buying the Japanese propaganda[/QUOTE]
There is no propaganda. There probably will be from Tepco later on, because that company has a rather poor history, but much of the data on radiation levels in the surrounding areas is constantly independently confirmed by researchers who know what they're talking about.
Damn you Refa! I just lost an hour reading up on satw.. :p
Biggles<font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
[QUOTE=Stingray;192139]The Tepco CEO has been out sick since the events occured. He's smarter than that BP guy, at least he won't say anything stupid in public.[/QUOTE]
That must have been his robot speaking to reporters a week ago, then.
ShadowDancerWhen I say, "Why aye, gadgie," in my heart I say, "Och aye, laddie."London, UK
Well, they [I]do[/I] have some pretty convincing robots out there Biggles! You know, ones that [I]aren't[/I] killbots! :p
yes croxis higher then natural radiation is good for you. Put down the Ann Coulter blow up doll!!!!
ShadowDancerWhen I say, "Why aye, gadgie," in my heart I say, "Och aye, laddie."London, UK
Have you flown anywhere recently PSI-KILLER? Or anywhere at altitude or with a high proportion of granite in the surroundings? All will give you a higher "natural" radiation dose
[QUOTE=Biggles;192143]That must have been his robot speaking to reporters a week ago, then.[/QUOTE]
[URL="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110330/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earthquake"]So the reporters are making these things up then?[/URL] Why isn't he resting in a hospital closer to the stricken power plant?
Biggles<font color=#AAFFAA>The Man Without a Face</font>
[QUOTE=PSI-KILLER;192150]yes croxis higher then natural radiation is good for you. Put down the Ann Coulter blow up doll!!!![/QUOTE]
Better stop getting x-rays at the doctor or dentist. Better not go to the tourist destination of Guarapari, Brazil for a holiday.
Radiation is not a two-step scale. At the levels that made it a reasonable distance from the plant, there is no evidence available today of noticeable effects on health unless you experience them over a much longer period of time.
[QUOTE=Stingray;192154][URL="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110330/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earthquake"]So the reporters are making these things up then?[/URL][/quote]
Apparently. He last commented on the situation [url=http://www.asahi.com/special/10005/TKY201103180619.html]on the 19th[/url]. That's 7 days after the earthquake, not two. That's not the only awful information in that article.
[list][*]The high level of iodine in tap water in Tokyo was a spike, and infants would have to drink water with that level for a year to actually hit the limit. The warning for infants not to drink it was withdrawn the next day. Better safe than sorry, but it's not exactly the apocalypse.
[*]"3,335 times the usual amount of radioactive iodine" Oh no! But what's the usual amount? Without that vital piece of information, the figure of "3,335 times" is meaningless. If it's miniscule, which is likely, then it's still safe. Let us also not forget that it's the ocean - it's a pretty big sink, and, more importantly, iodine-131 has a half-life of 8 days. By the time anything from that water gets anywhere near humans, there won't be much left. Curiously, that's what the local scientists are saying: that it's not actually dangerous.
[*]"Highly toxic plutonium also has been found seeping into the soil outside the plant" but the article neglects to mention that the levels found are about the same as the average plutonium content in soil on Earth; all they've found is that this particular plutonium came from the reactors. Worth them checking up on, but it is both easy to clean up and a highly localised problem[/list]
[quote]Why isn't he resting in a hospital closer to the stricken power plant?[/QUOTE]
Why should he?
I find it really, really sad that the media and people like you insist on trying to beat this nuclear thing up into a major disaster to rival Chernobyl, when there are [i]20,000[/i] dead people and tens of thousands more homeless further north, caused by the same tsunami that the reactors amazingly survived, despite being designed for one only about 1/4 of the size, and meanwhile the reactors have not yet killed anyone through radiation or even caused any cases of radiation sickness.
I don't know... to prove it's really safe perhaps?
[QUOTE]I find it really, really sad that the media and people like you insist on trying to beat this nuclear thing up into a major disaster to rival Chernobyl, when there are [i]20,000[/i] dead people and tens of thousands more homeless further north, caused by the same tsunami that the reactors amazingly survived, despite being designed for one only about 1/4 of the size, and meanwhile the reactors have not yet killed anyone through radiation or even caused any cases of radiation sickness.[/QUOTE]
I'm just trying to get a picture of what is going on, I'm not insisting on anything.
/sarcasm "What I find really, really sad is that scientists and people like you insist on putting people's lives in harms way just to prove a point and get a prize for it."
For one thing, a local tsunami does not affect the rest of the world as much as nuclear radiation does. Europe was affected by Chernobyl and that was just one reactor. I'm still taking a prescribed Iodine pill every day to deal with the consequences. A close relative got her thyroid gland removed due to thyroid cancer. The scar the surgery leaves behind is called the [B][I]Chernobyl necklace[/I][/B] in the Ukraine.
So pardon me if I'm a little biased. I hope you are right, Biggles, but you don't run the show over there.
ShadowDancerWhen I say, "Why aye, gadgie," in my heart I say, "Och aye, laddie."London, UK
[QUOTE=Stingray;192156]For one thing, a local tsunami does not affect the rest of the world as much as nuclear radiation does. Europe was affected by Chernobyl and that was just one reactor. I'm still taking a prescribed Iodine pill every day to deal with the consequences. A close relative got her thyroid gland removed due to thyroid cancer. The scar the surgery leaves behind is called the [B][I]Chernobyl necklace[/I][/B] in the Ukraine.[/QUOTE]
One reactor equals bad, 4 equals worse? Seriously? People hear the word "radiation" and totally freak out. Never mind the fact that the reactors are designed so that a Chernobyl style meltdown cannot happen, the radiation levels are minuscule, and can't travel anywhere in sufficient quantities to do any damage. You would have to be exposed to the "massively increased levels" for a whole [B][I]year[/I][/B] to have an increased risk of developing cancer!
So yes, technically speaking there is more than normal radiation present outside the exclusion zone, but let me offer some perspective on the levels involved here. We did an experiment when I was at uni to try and measure the decay of [B]uranium[/B] using a Geiger counter, and we failed utterly! Why? Because the building we were in was granite, which produces enough [B]natural[/B] radiation to completely swamp the signal from uranium.
My point is I get exposed to more radiation in my job than you would standing outside the exclusion zone! Im sorry to hear about your relative, but I've heard that called a hangmans necklace before...doesn't means we go around hanging people here. Incidentally, did she had radiotherapy? Because that level of radiation certainly can cause cancer if it weren't so precisely delivered, yet no one is worried about that.
If anyone should be worried about their radiation exposure levels then it's me, not you!
Random ChaosActually Carefully-selected Order in disguise
Yes, higher than natural radiation is bad for you. That's why a lot of people fly around the world soaking it in every day, because they love it and know it doesn't do them any harm at those higher levels that are still WAY below dangerous, and still higher than what is being found outside the evacuation radius from the plant.
The airburst nuclear testing of the 50's and 60's put off more hard radioactive fallout around the world than this reactor will ever put out.
[QUOTE=Biggles;192155]... when there are [i]20,000[/i] dead people and tens of thousands more homeless further north...[/QUOTE]
This is a horrible tragedy all by itself, no doubt about it. I've seen some footage and calling a tsunami a big wave does not even begin to cover the power of the ocean when it starts to rise and crush everything in its path.
I'm not arguing here to point fingers, I'm just not sure we are really told what is really going on. We can't say for sure that those radiation readings are reflecting the truth or not, unless we have the means to check for ourselves, which most of us don't.
Those Flash animations linked above btw, are very cute, but that's all they are, cute animations. Back then they said Chernobyl was nothing much to worry about either. Yes, you can eat your homegrown salad. The official toll on Fukushima will not be known for years to come.
Comments
[URL="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbj5HpdfGZU"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbj5HpdfGZU[/URL]
[IMG]http://www.safetyfirstaid.co.uk/images/catalogue/product/Q2139-L.jpg[/IMG]
The ultimate placebo effect. If it can't see your teeth, radiation can't hurt you. How stupid do they think we are?
[QUOTE=PSI-KILLER;192037]fucked up shit
[URL="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbj5HpdfGZU"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wbj5HpdfGZU[/URL][/QUOTE]
That video is a load of crap. Did that guy expect every TV channel to show continuous news? Did he think that people outside the relatively small tsunami zone shouldn't try to get on with their lives? As for his claim that there is no information: that's provably false. He probably can't speak Japanese and so isn't able to understand the press conferences they had many times a day, which gave out plenty of detailed, factual information (they often gave out so much detail, the reporters couldn't understand it). There is no and never was any radiation death cloud heading for Tokyo or anywhere else (independently proven by many different groups), and there never was a mass exodus from Tokyo, unless you count the many foreigners fleeing due to inaccurate information from overseas. I'm not sure what to make of the claim in the title that Youtube was being restricted in Japan, either. I never noticed any problems.
[QUOTE=JackN;192052]You still ok Biggles?[/QUOTE]
I'm doing fine. The radiation level anywhere south of the site never made it above the natural background level in New Zealand, except for one very brief spike.
So no growing extra limbs or superpowers from radiation exposure? Damn :p
This comic seems suitable somehow.. :)
Of course it's not going to be that simple.
[url=http://microsievert.net/]Here's a nice visualisation of the reality[/url]. The boxes are:
Average background radiation around the worldDosage limit for a nuclear plant worker
(assuming they receive it continuously for a year)Dosage for a 0.5% increase in the cancer rate
(if received continuously for one year)Evacuate
30km WNW of the plantMito, IbarakiUtsunomiya, TochigiMaebashi, Gunma
Saitama City, SaitamaIchihara, ChibaShinjuku, TokyoChigasaki, Kanagawa
Please try applying a realistic perspective.
Obviously our local governments are not buying the Japanese propaganda and everyone's jumping on the nuclear power ban bandwagon.
Nobody knows, and everyone has an opinion. :D
Geiger counters are sold out everywhere! Where is my tinfoil hat?
They would, if this latest for a year. Which it won't. Iodine, which is the most common byproduct to have been released, has a half-life of 8 days.
[QUOTE=Stingray;192134]Obviously our local governments are not buying the Japanese propaganda[/QUOTE]
There is no propaganda. There probably will be from Tepco later on, because that company has a rather poor history, but much of the data on radiation levels in the surrounding areas is constantly independently confirmed by researchers who know what they're talking about.
That must have been his robot speaking to reporters a week ago, then.
Stop eating bananas!
[URL="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110330/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earthquake"]So the reporters are making these things up then?[/URL] Why isn't he resting in a hospital closer to the stricken power plant?
Better stop getting x-rays at the doctor or dentist. Better not go to the tourist destination of Guarapari, Brazil for a holiday.
Radiation is not a two-step scale. At the levels that made it a reasonable distance from the plant, there is no evidence available today of noticeable effects on health unless you experience them over a much longer period of time.
[QUOTE=Stingray;192154][URL="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110330/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earthquake"]So the reporters are making these things up then?[/URL][/quote]
Apparently. He last commented on the situation [url=http://www.asahi.com/special/10005/TKY201103180619.html]on the 19th[/url]. That's 7 days after the earthquake, not two. That's not the only awful information in that article.
[list][*]The high level of iodine in tap water in Tokyo was a spike, and infants would have to drink water with that level for a year to actually hit the limit. The warning for infants not to drink it was withdrawn the next day. Better safe than sorry, but it's not exactly the apocalypse.
[*]"3,335 times the usual amount of radioactive iodine" Oh no! But what's the usual amount? Without that vital piece of information, the figure of "3,335 times" is meaningless. If it's miniscule, which is likely, then it's still safe. Let us also not forget that it's the ocean - it's a pretty big sink, and, more importantly, iodine-131 has a half-life of 8 days. By the time anything from that water gets anywhere near humans, there won't be much left. Curiously, that's what the local scientists are saying: that it's not actually dangerous.
[*]"Highly toxic plutonium also has been found seeping into the soil outside the plant" but the article neglects to mention that the levels found are about the same as the average plutonium content in soil on Earth; all they've found is that this particular plutonium came from the reactors. Worth them checking up on, but it is both easy to clean up and a highly localised problem[/list]
[quote]Why isn't he resting in a hospital closer to the stricken power plant?[/QUOTE]
Why should he?
I find it really, really sad that the media and people like you insist on trying to beat this nuclear thing up into a major disaster to rival Chernobyl, when there are [i]20,000[/i] dead people and tens of thousands more homeless further north, caused by the same tsunami that the reactors amazingly survived, despite being designed for one only about 1/4 of the size, and meanwhile the reactors have not yet killed anyone through radiation or even caused any cases of radiation sickness.
I don't know... to prove it's really safe perhaps?
[QUOTE]I find it really, really sad that the media and people like you insist on trying to beat this nuclear thing up into a major disaster to rival Chernobyl, when there are [i]20,000[/i] dead people and tens of thousands more homeless further north, caused by the same tsunami that the reactors amazingly survived, despite being designed for one only about 1/4 of the size, and meanwhile the reactors have not yet killed anyone through radiation or even caused any cases of radiation sickness.[/QUOTE]
I'm just trying to get a picture of what is going on, I'm not insisting on anything.
/sarcasm "What I find really, really sad is that scientists and people like you insist on putting people's lives in harms way just to prove a point and get a prize for it."
For one thing, a local tsunami does not affect the rest of the world as much as nuclear radiation does. Europe was affected by Chernobyl and that was just one reactor. I'm still taking a prescribed Iodine pill every day to deal with the consequences. A close relative got her thyroid gland removed due to thyroid cancer. The scar the surgery leaves behind is called the [B][I]Chernobyl necklace[/I][/B] in the Ukraine.
So pardon me if I'm a little biased. I hope you are right, Biggles, but you don't run the show over there.
One reactor equals bad, 4 equals worse? Seriously? People hear the word "radiation" and totally freak out. Never mind the fact that the reactors are designed so that a Chernobyl style meltdown cannot happen, the radiation levels are minuscule, and can't travel anywhere in sufficient quantities to do any damage. You would have to be exposed to the "massively increased levels" for a whole [B][I]year[/I][/B] to have an increased risk of developing cancer!
So yes, technically speaking there is more than normal radiation present outside the exclusion zone, but let me offer some perspective on the levels involved here. We did an experiment when I was at uni to try and measure the decay of [B]uranium[/B] using a Geiger counter, and we failed utterly! Why? Because the building we were in was granite, which produces enough [B]natural[/B] radiation to completely swamp the signal from uranium.
My point is I get exposed to more radiation in my job than you would standing outside the exclusion zone! Im sorry to hear about your relative, but I've heard that called a hangmans necklace before...doesn't means we go around hanging people here. Incidentally, did she had radiotherapy? Because that level of radiation certainly can cause cancer if it weren't so precisely delivered, yet no one is worried about that.
If anyone should be worried about their radiation exposure levels then it's me, not you!
The airburst nuclear testing of the 50's and 60's put off more hard radioactive fallout around the world than this reactor will ever put out.
This is a horrible tragedy all by itself, no doubt about it. I've seen some footage and calling a tsunami a big wave does not even begin to cover the power of the ocean when it starts to rise and crush everything in its path.
I'm not arguing here to point fingers, I'm just not sure we are really told what is really going on. We can't say for sure that those radiation readings are reflecting the truth or not, unless we have the means to check for ourselves, which most of us don't.
Those Flash animations linked above btw, are very cute, but that's all they are, cute animations. Back then they said Chernobyl was nothing much to worry about either. Yes, you can eat your homegrown salad. The official toll on Fukushima will not be known for years to come.