7.9 and 8.8 Earthquakes in Japan

Minato = Tokyo

10km = very shallow, no tsunami warning.

Ah shit.

Sanpuku, is that the same fault as the Miyagi quakes? What about the Shizuoka quake last night?

This is basically terrifying

Havernt they been having ~5.0 aftershocks all this time anyway tho?

Kyoto news says no tsunami threat; Reuters reports no immediate damage

The big quakes and after/fore-shocks (with the exception of a 6.2 last night) were about 350km away, this one is basically in the metro Tokyo area, and very shallow.

From timeout tokyo

Actor Ken Watanabe addresses the world at large, in English. http://youtu.be/H5T3t9rYcjw

Referring to this site:

http://kizuna311.com/index_eng.html

Ok, AP is confirming that shit is going down:

Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant
By ERIC TALMADGE and SHINO YUASA, Associated Press
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
More...
(03-15) 21:22 PDT FUKUSHIMA, Japan (AP) --

Japan suspended operations to keep its stricken nuclear plant from melting down Wednesday after surging radiation made it too dangerous to stay.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said the workers dousing the reactors in a frantic effort to cool them needed to withdraw.

"The workers cannot carry out even minimal work at the plant now," Edano said. "Because of the radiation risk we are on standby."

The nuclear crisis has triggered international alarm and partly overshadowed the human tragedy caused by Friday's earthquake and tsunami, which pulverized Japan's northeastern coastline, killing an estimated 10,000 people and severely damaging the nuclear plant.

Since then, authorities have tried frantically to avert an environmental catastrophe at the Fukushima Dai-ichi complex in northeastern Japan, 140 miles (220 kilometers) north of Tokyo.

Edano said the government expects to ask the U.S. military for help. He did not elaborate. He said the government is still considering whether and how to take up the various offers of help from other countries.

The surge in radiation was apparently the result of a Tuesday fire in the complex's Unit 4 reactor, according to officials with Japan's nuclear safety agency. That blast is thought to have damaged the reactor's suppression chamber, a water-filled pipe outside the nuclear core that is part of the emergency cooling system.

Officials had originally planned use helicopters and fire trucks to spray water in a desperate effort to prevent further radiation leaks and to cool down the reactors.

"It's not so simple that everything will be resolved by pouring in water. We are trying to avoid creating other problems," Edano said.

"We are actually supplying water from the ground, but supplying water from above involves pumping lots of water and that involves risk. We also have to consider the safety of the helicopters above," he said.

A U.S. nuclear expert said he feared the worst.

"It's more of a surrender," said David Lochbaum, a nuclear engineer who now heads the nuclear safety program for the Union of Concerned Scientists, an activist group. "It's not like you wait 10 days and the radiation goes away. In that 10 days things are going to get worse."

"It's basically a sign that there's nothing left to do but throw in the towel," Lochbaum said.

The government has ordered some 140,000 people in the vicinity to stay indoors. A little radiation was also detected in Tokyo, triggering panic buying of food and water.

There are six reactors at the plant, and the three that were operating at the time have been rocked by explosions. The one still on fire was offline at the time of the magnitude 9.0 quake, Japan's most powerful on record.

Japan's nuclear safety agency estimated that 70 percent of the rods have been damaged at the No. 1 reactor.

Japan's national news agency, Kyodo, said that 33 percent of the fuel rods at the No. 2 reactor were damaged and that the cores of both reactors were believed to have partially melted.

"We don't know the nature of the damage," said Minoru Ohgoda, spokesman for Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, or NISA. "It could be either melting, or there might be some holes in them."

Meanwhile, the outer housing of the containment vessel at the No. 4 unit erupted in flames early Wednesday, said Hajimi Motujuku, a spokesman for the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co.

NISA said fire and smoke could no longer be seen at Unit 4, but that it was unable to confirm that the blaze had been put out.

___

Yuasa reported from Tokyo. Associated Press writers Elaine Kurtenbach in Tokyo and David Stringer in Ofunato contributed to this report.

fuuuuuck

jesus fuck

Oh god no

otoh
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/16/world/asia/16health.html?_r=1&hp
Worsening conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan have raised fears that people will be harmed by radiation. But experts say that in terms of public health, the Japanese have already taken precautions that should prevent the accident from becoming another Chernobyl, even if additional radiation is released.

Someone from an activist group called the Union of Concerned Scientists is concerned! Oh no!

CNN is reporting that those 50 workers have been evacuated.

― taco al pastorius (Steve Shasta), Tuesday, March 15, 2011 8:53 PM (47 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

But NHK is dismissing that as false information.

― taco al pastorius (Steve Shasta), Tuesday, March 15, 2011 8:53 PM (46 minutes ago)

Fuck NHK imo.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/16/world/asia/16health.html?_r=1&hp
Worsening conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan have raised fears that people will be harmed by radiation. But experts say that in terms of public health, the Japanese have already taken precautions that should prevent the accident from becoming another Chernobyl, even if additional radiation is released.

― I just want to give a shout-out to Buzzy Beetles (forksclovetofu), Tuesday, March 15, 2011 11:40 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

thats a pretty low bar forks

like, hardly reassuring

'We have taken precautions": (current pic of reactor 4)

http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/update/images/16_25_v_s.jpg

"You have no reason to be frightened that this nuclear reactor is crumbling shambling skeletal wreckage that's on fire."

"We're just going to pull all our workers from the site and rethink this one for a bit..."

This is pretty convenient:

"BREAKING:
Radioactivity forecast system down

A computer system that forecasts the spread of radioactivity has not been working due to malfunctioning monitoring posts around a troubled nuclear power plant in quake-hit Fukushima Prefecture."

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says it does not know when the system will be back in operation.

The system, called SPEEDI, predicts how radioactive substances will spread in case of radiation leakage from nuclear power plants, based on measurements taken at various locations, prevailing winds and other weather conditions.

SPEEDI data are intended to be used to draw up evacuation plans for residents around power plants in case of accidents.

The system is monitored at government offices, including the industry ministry and the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency in Tokyo.

Friday's earthquake caused power outages around the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The agency says it cannot expect the SPEEDI system to function fully, since many monitoring posts are not operating due to power outages.

"BREAKING:
Japanese Government ups permissible radiation level"

i don't think anything is going to be reassuring right now as regards this disaster
but i recommend clicking the link nonetheless; sounds like the Japanese government is trying to approach this methodically and somewhat realistically.

"　　　　　　　　　The Japanese government has revised upward the permissible level of radiation exposure for workers by 2.5 times at the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.　　　　"

"Inbound flights to Narita are now being routed to aiports in West Japan"

"Putin invites Japanese judo team to train in Russia"

(sorry... but wtf)

thanks for all your posts, steve shasta, you are the most informative person i've read/listened to for days.

Steve Shashta, re. Narita flights, where did you hear that?

"The Times’s Hiroko Tabuchi reports that a small group of workers remains at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, contrary to what an English translation of the chief cabinet secretary’s remarks had implied."

Japan radiation exposure map (roughly real-time): http://www.targetmap.com/viewer.aspx?reportId=4870

Current radiation estimates leaking from reactors 1, 3 & 4 RESPECTIVELY:

600-1000 m*Sv (*MILLI not MICRO sieverts) PER HOUR

Steve Shashta, re. Narita flights, where did you hear that?

― sam500, Tuesday, March 15, 2011 10:06 PM (2 minutes ago)

NHK stream ticker

k thanks. meant to be flying out of there for singapore tomorrow afternoon. not sure what to do now...

Steve Shashta, re. Narita flights, where did you hear that?

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/16/business/global/16fly.html

Citing concerns about potential disruptions to air traffic because of the nuclear crisis in Japan, Lufthansa said Tuesday that it had begun rerouting its Tokyo flights southwest to airports in Nagoya and Osaka.

Some other European airlines, including Air France and Swiss International Air Lines, have added stopovers to direct flights so crew members do not have to stay overnight in Tokyo, the capital.

Spokesmen for the three American airlines with the most traffic across the Pacific — United Continental Holding, Delta Air Lines and American Airlines — told Bloomberg News that they had not changed flight plans.

x-post (sorry Steve, don't want to bogart your excellent posting here)

Also: http://search.twitter.com/search?q=narita

"The Times’s Hiroko Tabuchi reports that a small group of workers remains at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, contrary to what an English translation of the chief cabinet secretary’s remarks had implied."

― max, Tuesday, March 15, 2011 10:07 PM (2 minutes ago)

my take on this is that the radiation rose above the legal limit for the workers to be there, so as posted above, the government upped the "legal dosage" 2.5x so that some workers could remain working at the plant?

Misread that as "Inbound flights to Narnia"

that's what i gather, too

Radiation level rises slightly in Russia's Far East

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia (Reuters) - Radiation levels rose slightly in Russia's Far East on Tuesday but stayed within normal levels, officials said, as Japan struggled to cope with the worst nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Radiation levels in Vladivostok, a city of 600,000 people some 800 km (500 miles) northwest of Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant, were 1 microroentgen per hour higher at 0400 GMT (12 a.m. ET) than six hours previously, the regional emergencies ministry said.

Russia's military said it was on alert to evacuate people if required from Russia's Sakhalin island, whose southernmost tip is visible from northern Japan, and the Southern Kuril island chain which is at the heart of a territorial dispute with Japan, Interfax news agency reported.

Called the Northern Territories by Japan, the Southern Kuril islands are inhabited by Russians and one of the islands, Tanfilyeva, is just 6 km (4 miles) from Japan's coast.

Sakhalin island holds Russia's biggest proven gas reserves in the Far East.

it seems as though workers have been completely evacuated from reactor no. 3? maybe that is where some of the confusion comes from?

http://www.npr.org/2011/03/16/134582068/workers-evacuate-part-of-japanese-nuclear-plant

All workers from a crippled reactor at a nuclear power plant in Fukushima, Japan, have been evacuated, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said Wednesday.

Edano said that white smoke was rising from the No. 3 reactor at the Fukushima Daichi power plant, adding officials were investigating the cause. He said radiation levels had been fluctuating by the hour; they had spiked rapidly Wednesday morning, and that even the minimal workforce was evacuated.

TEPCo says that all workers must remain indoors. In the picture upthread there are no roofs on reactors 3/4 anymore, both structures are basically in shambles, smoldering.

#1 also had it's roof blown off as well what seems like a long time ago.

NEWS ADVISORY: Winds barring SDF copters from dousing Fukushima reactor: minister

But how's this, the #2 reactor (the one that hasn't been mentioned?) is the one that they're currently most concerned with:

Japan's nuclear safety agency says a possible radiation leak from the No.2 reactor may have caused the sharp increase in radiation levels on Wednesday at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, north of Tokyo.

yeah--iirc no. 2 was the reactor that had its steel containment unit damaged