Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Extremely Powerful Typhoon No. 15 On Course to Fukushima I Nuke Plant

Or so it looks like, though no MSMs in Japan dare mention that.

Here's the map from Yahoo Japan typhoon information, and the location of Fukushima I Nuke Plant is marked with an arrow (courtesy of Savechild.net). The expected path of the typhoon looks almost directly over the plant.

According to NHK Kabun tweet, rainfall in 24-hour period in Shikoku, Kinki and Tokai region is between 300 to 400 millimeters (11.8 to 15.7 inches). Rainfall in Tohoku is exceeding 150 millimeters (5.9 inches).

NHK Kabun is also warning about storm surge in the coastal areas.

There are other nuke plants to worry about along the way, most notably Hamaoka Nuke Plant in Shizuoka Prefecture whose reactors somehow managed the "cold shutdown". From Fukushima I, we know that all it takes for a serious accident to happen at a nuke plant is for the cooling of the reactors to stop. If the power supply somehow get disrupted along with disruption in transport long enough (landslide anyone?), and the backup generators run out of diesel and backup batteries to simply die and they are not resupplied, well it doesn't need a Great Tokai Earthquake to wreck the plant, does it?

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

I hate to break this news to you, but Fukushima I has already been destroyed.

Anonymous said...

I expect Tepco are desperate for the typhoon to do some damage so they can blame something else, preferably an 'act of god' (no damages to pay). It was like this with the other silly typhoon 'can't get the cover on it in time'.
What they should be worried about is where the hell is the ground water getting in? Ground water doesn't usually flow upwards without a mechanism for it to flow. And where is it going? And where the hell is that corium stuff anyway...

FigNewton said...

If it doesn't lose strength, this typhoon could be brutal for the crippled nuclear plants; Trees are falling all over. I passed through Dogenzaka (Shibuya) 30 minutes before a large tree fell across the street.

An old man waiting in line for a taxi behind me was blown to the ground. After picking him up, I gave him a plastic bag to hold his recently bought books; they were soaked.

A little video from the taxi; all trains have stopped:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLaaVb3yiTs

(Doesn't do it justice; it's the strongest typhoon to hit Tokyo in awhile..)

Atomfritz said...

Personally I really am not sure what to worry about more.

Strong storm:
much tear and wear on the already weakened structures.
This could rip off these dangling and already weakened pipes that serve to cool the SPFs.
Maybe some more of the remaining "wall tiles" of reactor building #4 will fall down.

Heavy rains up to about 40cm (respective 1 1/3 feet):
much water that could come very inconvenient at this moment.
SFPs flowing over, transporting big quantities of radioactivity into the reactor buildings, making cleanup of the situation increasingly difficult.
Heavy ground and surface water pressure increasing water flow thru the cracked basements of the buildings.
(Maybe this is not bad from Tepco's POV, as radionuclides and salinity gets washed out to the groundwater and the sea, easing the "purification" of the remaining radiating soup...)

Anonymous said...

@Atomfritz ..

yes, you're right of course. what could possibly go wrong ?

"Failures always reveal weaknesses and provide incontrovertible evidence of our incomplete understanding of how things work"

http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/petroski1/English

Anonymous said...

(cr here)
Bad from the ocean's point of view,
(and anyone who preferred Pacific Ocean version 2010).

The world's public should be 'lobbying' for energy conservation measures for all, (especially the wealthiest 10%)
and
for shutting down all nuclear power plants simply for the reason that
a large (another 'Carrington event' perhaps) solar flare could take down everyone's grid.

http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=12507&page=79
..."Depending on damage, full recovery could take 4 to 10 years"...

Good luck with this latest storm, people in Japan,
and please stop blindly trusting your government:
officials everywhere seem to believe the public, the children, even workers who do critical tasks, (and even our environment) are
('tragic', but) 'acceptable losses',

and are not interested in your family's Preparedness, nor in long-term Sustainability.

Anonymous said...

^^ - u mean, like this ..

http://www.japantoday.com/category/national/view/tepco-considers-cutting-pensions-to-pay-compensation

Anonymous said...

(cr again)
We all must consider our situations, and take whatever little steps we can by ourselves,
and try and find others who are willing to
face reality and, "worry" and try to mitigate the harm to our families and regions (even though officials and CEOs do not want us to be informed nor proactive).

Thank you for your blog work arevamirpal::laprimavera.

At least the internet is allowing more citizens to have a chance to know what govt/industry usually hides until those culpable are long dead.

Heavy rains: no place has really built for these, and they may become more frequent.

Vermont had so many roads and bridges washed away in one storm this year that they realized evacuation would have been impossible if the nuclear plant they are trying to get decommissioned had had an 'accident'.
(Their evacuation "plans" weren't ever workable anyway.)

As Japan shows (and, as the H1N1 Pandemic showed)
TPTB would rather claim everything is 'ok'; no need to follow previously-planned Preparedness/Mitigation - because, an educated public trying to save lives in their communities would hurt the profits/power of TPTB.

As long as only the powers that be get to say what is "offically" counted, any Big Lie is possible, and that's what fools the public; if they do not want to believe their officials lie and allow harm to their own constituents.

When will the radiation findings from the Woods Hole expedition from June be disclosed to the public?
http://www.whoi.edu/page.do?pid=67816
University of Tokyo and Tokyo University of Technology are involved, too.

Information in real time to protect health is more important than waiting years to publish at conferences.

Anonymous said...

CBS news is reporting that the plant survived the storm but apparently the video feed was knocked out so we'll just have to take TEPCO's word for it.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/09/21/501364/main20109337.shtml

Anonymous said...

This report claims the winds were less than 25 mph at the crippled plant. It seems like such light winds shouldn't have knocked out the video feed.

"Typhoon Roke hit Japan near Hamamatsu at 14:00 JST Wednesday as a Category 1 typhoon with 80 mph winds. Roke brought sustained winds of 62 mph, gusting to 83 mph to the Tokyo airport at 5:25 pm local time, and a wind gust of 89 mph was reported at Shizuhama Airbase. Roke has dumped heavy rains of 155 mm (6.20") at Hamamatsu and 125 mm (4.86") at Tokyo. Damage due to flooding from Roke's heavy rains will likely be the main problem from Roke, as the soils over much of Japan are saturated from the passage of Tropical Storm Talas during the first week of September. Talas was a very slow moving storm, and brought extreme rainfall amounts of over six feet to some portions of Japan. Roke brought winds less than 25 mph to the damaged Fukishima-Dai-Iche nuclear plant northeast of Tokyo, and heavy rains of 189 mm (7.50") to Hirono, located 8 miles south of the plant."

http://greek.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1936

Anonymous said...

This report claims the winds were less than 25 mph at the crippled plant. It seems like such light winds shouldn't have knocked out the video feed.

"Typhoon Roke hit Japan near Hamamatsu at 14:00 JST Wednesday as a Category 1 typhoon with 80 mph winds. Roke brought sustained winds of 62 mph, gusting to 83 mph to the Tokyo airport at 5:25 pm local time, and a wind gust of 89 mph was reported at Shizuhama Airbase. Roke has dumped heavy rains of 155 mm (6.20") at Hamamatsu and 125 mm (4.86") at Tokyo. Damage due to flooding from Roke's heavy rains will likely be the main problem from Roke, as the soils over much of Japan are saturated from the passage of Tropical Storm Talas during the first week of September. Talas was a very slow moving storm, and brought extreme rainfall amounts of over six feet to some portions of Japan. Roke brought winds less than 25 mph to the damaged Fukishima-Dai-Iche nuclear plant northeast of Tokyo, and heavy rains of 189 mm (7.50") to Hirono, located 8 miles south of the plant."

http://greek.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/comment.html?entrynum=1936

Anonymous said...

@ anon 9/21 5:03 AM

"When will the radiation findings from the Woods Hole expedition from June be disclosed to the public?"

Here's what they say in their newest update from July 2011:
"The results of these analyses will take time, with the first results likely to be issued in six months and continue for several years."
Don't expect results coming out soon...

Anonymous said...

(cr here)
Unfortunately, I expect reports before then
by Japanese public of increased miscarriages, stillbirths, and many other problems with their children's health
(and, with that of the unfortunate workers since March)- even though the govt will be trying to deny everything (as they are currently trying to prevent people getting tested for radiation).

(Weren't the doctors under the soviets forbidden to diagnose, "cancer" from Chernobyl?
- And, more recently in Russia, not allowed to write, "cause of death, wildfire smoke" - remember that?)

As long as those in power gatekeep what gets to be "official" numbers/cases, the ordinary people have to do extraordinary work to ever know what's really going on.

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