That this sort of events still goes on 16 months after the start of the worst nuclear accident in the country is surprising. Or not surprising. I don't know any more. Do you?
It is a leaflet for an event called "Let's Get Cheer (or Energy, Vitality, 'Genki" in Japanese) from Children!". The event is sponsored by an NPO called "Fukushima Stakeholders Coordinating Council" (I don't know if there's an official English name, so it is my translation of the name) set up in May this year. This is the same entity that will be holding a seminar in August on how to "decontaminate" your "soul" (heart, thinking).
It is supported by the Fukushima prefectural government (decontamination countermeasures department), the Board of Education in Date City, and JA Date Mirai (ag producers co-op), and co-sponsored by the Liberal Democratic Party-Kizuna Faction of the Ibaraki City Assembly in Osaka Prefecture.
They are looking for twenty 5th and 6th graders from Ibaraki City to go on a two-day trip (August 16, 17) to Date City in Fukushima Prefecture at a cost of 4,000 yen each. 4,000 yen will cover the lodging and insurance. Transportation costs will be paid by the organizers.
What they are going to do in Fukushima?
August 16:
Soon after arriving at Fukushima after spending 5 hours on the train, go visit Decontamination Information Plaza in Fukushima City set up by the Ministry of the Environment. Then, move to Date City, and enjoy all the peaches they can eat. They stay in Date City overnight.
August 17:
Socialize with school children in Fukushima, take a group photograph at the Decon Information Plaza, and go home to Osaka.
The place they will spend the night in Date City is a public hostel located in Tsukidate-machi, where 1,050 becquerels/kg of radioactive cesium was detected from the rice harvested last year. Date City is famous for its peaches, but they were found with high levels of radioactive cesium last year. Fruit tree "decontamination" of stripping the tree barks must have worked this year.
The organizers are nice enough to hold a informational session on August 11 to explain to the potential participants (and parents I assume) the current condition in Fukushima and the effect of radioactivity.
What is the point of this? How would this make people in Fukushima or in Date City feel uplifted? If I were the receiving end of this "goodwill", I would be nauseated. It is bad enough that the city and the prefecture have been badly contaminated from the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant accident. And here come well-meaning (I hope) organizations and politicians with the support of their city and the prefecture, sending children from far-away Osaka so that people in Date City feel better.
The country is sick.
By the way, the decontamination adviser for Date City, Shunichi Tanaka, is set to become the first chairman of the soon-to-be-created Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Japan. He was also the former acting chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan.
30-Day free trial by following the link.
Tokyo Time
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16 comments:
I feel sick, too.
In Germany this is called "abusing children for political reasons".
This accusation here is mainly used by pro-nuclearists when anti-nuclear demonstrators let their children join the demonstrations, accusing the anti-nuclearists of using their children as living shields against the police battering.
"Then, move to Date City, and enjoy all the peaches they can eat".
Well at least they figured out what to do with all those radioactive peaches from last year. Wasn't Momotaro a nuclear mutant that sprang out of a giant radioactive peach to fight ogres? Are you sure it doesn't say, "Let's wring all the cheer (vitality) out of the children"?
Mr. Shunichi Tanaka is repulsive. The mention of his name makes me physically sick.
Re: "By the way, the decontamination adviser for Date City, Shunichi Tanaka, is set to become the first chairman of the soon-to-be-created Nuclear Regulatory Commission in Japan. "
Two possibilities:
A. Date City decontamination is finished.
B. Tanaka quits a job before it's finished.
Tanaka should stay in Date. Better yet 福島刑務所 (Fukushima Prison).
Re: "He was also the former acting chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission of Japan."
Now that's a qualification that should get him appointed dog catcher. As fouled up as Japan's nuclear industry is, it is insulting that the government would even consider a nuclear industry lap-dog like Tanaka to be a part of any nuclear regulatory body.
Well, probably Tanaka is one of the better ones. He has actually been in Fukushima, and working on "decontamination" at various high-radiation locations.
Remember this is a nation whose government had no qualms at all about sending Okinawa's 14 year boys and high school girls to face U.S. Marines in 1945. Japan's politicians and bureaucrats will sacrifice every last child if it will profit them.
Sorry to use profanity but these people are ignorant and full of shit. As someone in an area right now in Fukushima where the average radiation level is around 2 uSv/hr at best I can tell they are full of shit. Propaganda! The area I am "decontaminated" one park and it sits in a big mound covered by vinyl. Not a park anymore but a disposal site. The next major part has been left alone as the citizens gave up doing it themselves. I gave pictures but cannot post them on this site. Lies and more lies. If you want to see what real nuclear fallout does, come to where I am. Half the the people are gone and parks off limits. Lowest reading outside anywhere is above 2.0 uSv/hr. It goes over 10 in several locations. Fukushima is dead.
What type of parents would allow their children to be exposed to such levels of radiation as Chibaguy describes in his post.
God have pity on us all!
OT: Peruvian nuclear finger choppers, LOL
http://www.world-nuclear-news.org/RS_Minor_amputation_after_radiography_incident_2707122.html
So this radiographer continued working as he was vomiting? Where was this? In Peru or in France?
oh ... japanese speaking, peach-colored, mini hulks.
don't make them angry.
Could it be that these Fukushima stakeholders & Co. are not ignorant nor full of shit but rather trying to sell their peaches whatever it takes? It appears that people like university professors are involved with Fukushima stakeholders so ignorance is not an excuse here. Also, the same association appears to work with ICRP, WHO etc. and has worked on a project to "qualm radiation fears".
Why aren't these folks measuring the peaches contamination and labeling the peaches with the result before sale? If they can't sell them they should be entitled to compensation.
Beppe
Found the source of the WNN article: http://www-news.iaea.org/ErfView.aspx?mId=c7e52c89-bdff-4fb4-bfed-02392b70b53e
(the activity of the Iridium source differs in both articles)
I interpret the article that the worker, working in Peru, got ARS toward the end of the work.
Continuing of work definitely became impossible soon when the vomiting became constant and it became obvious that it was something serious, with the assistants developing nausea.
He was quickly flown to France (to the French military radiation sicknesses special hospital in Percy) and got intensive emergency treatment.
However, the finger blistered soon and later decomposed (necrosis) so it had to be shortened to avoid spread of gangrene.
The intensive treatment probably lasted several weeks or months until the man could be released back to Peru.
You can roughly translate Gray (Gy) as about the same as Sievert:
"Based in biological dosimetry the radiographer received a whole body doses of 1,86 Gy. The dose to his left hand was 35 Gy as average but the dose to the distal falange (finger) was 70 Gy, both based on electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR). The doses to assistants were 0,45 Gy and 0,75 Gy to whole body, based on biological dosimetry."
I am not amazed that the man is in bad psychological shape, with a hand that is constantly aching while it shrivels slowly, probably to be chopped off too in some years.
Just a few illustrative photos of radiation accident victims:
See page 44 and following:
www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub925_web.pdf
See page 28 and following:
www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1123_scr.pdf
See page 36 and following:
http://www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/Publications/PDF/Pub1010_web.pdf
Finally look Thai rescue people work in a (roughly 10 Sievert) radiation field, see page 19:
www-pub.iaea.org/MTCD/publications/PDF/Pub1124_scr.pdf
Oops, forgot to mention pages 25 and 28 to 38 of the last document for some example photos how blistering and necrosis after cobalt gamma irradiation looks.
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