Disaster in Japan: even Hollywood could not come up with something worse than this

Earlier today there was a massive explosion at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant (officially known as Fukushima I), which completely destroyed the already heavily damaged hall of reactor No.1. One of the unusual things about this was that it was the first time that such an event has been captured on camera (by a Japanese tv news team). The footage was probably taken from 5 kilometers away (about 3 miles), which at the time was the extent of the exclusion zone around the plant. Due to the distance it’s not easy to judge the scale of things. It should be noted that the white buildings shown in this news footage are the other reactor halls, and each are about ten storeys high…

This plant has 6 working reactors. Seven miles south of Fukushima Dai-ichi is the Fukushima Daini nuclear power plant (officially known as Fukushima II) which has 4 working reactors. In the confusion of events, things are still not entirely clear, yet Japanese officials have stated that other reactors in the Fukushima complex are in a state of emergency. One hour after today’s explosion at the Fukushima plant the exclusion zone was extended to 10 kilometers (about 6 miles), and later in the day to 20 kilometers (about 13 miles). Five hours after the explosion, Japanese authorities were distributing iodine to residents in the area (iodine helps counteract some types of radiation) and were advising people to stay indoors and not drink tap water. At the same time, another large earthquake/aftershock hit the Fukushima region and the Japanese Government were saying that everything was under control at the Fukushima nuclear plants.

At the time of writing about 140,000 people have been evacuated from the immediate vicinity of the Fukushima nuclear plants (there are two hospitals within 5 miles of Fukushima I). The nearest big population centre is Minamisoma, about 20 miles to the north, with a population of 75,000. It’s still not known how many of that 75,000 population died in the earthquake and ensuing tsunami. Minamisoma is almost right on the coast, so the death toll is likely to be high. As if this natural horror is not enough, they may now have to face an equal or greater man-made horror.

The Japanese authorities are notorious for being secretive about nuclear accidents. The earthquake that struck on Friday is probably the worst in history, with regard to its power and close vicinity to millions of people. Amidst all the terror/panic, perhaps the Japanese government can not be blamed for trying to cover up not one, but possibly multiple Chernobyls.

If I wrote a script about all this, and took it to Hollywood, the producers would say: nah, too outlandish; it could never happen.

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One Response to Disaster in Japan: even Hollywood could not come up with something worse than this

  1. Janet Kenny says:

    It’s a bit out of date but its premise stands.

    Beyond Chernobyl-women respond:

    http://www.biblioz.com/search.php?a=79&i=52950954

    http://www.huri.harvard.edu/lib/bibliography/cont1.html

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