That's the bleakest picture I've seen so far about Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant.
UK's Guardian has a series of photographs taken secretly by Kazuma Obara, who "became the first photojournalist to gain unauthorised access to the power plant and produced an exclusive glimpse of life inside the facility".
On the "Never Give Up, Fukushima" screen, Obara says the photo was taken before the 10-plus sieverts/hour location was found just nearby. The workers in the photo never knew about the radiation, and were never told about it even after the announcement by TEPCO, which was on August 1 evening.
For the rest of the photos and Obara's commentary, go to Guardian.
Kazuma Obara became a freelance photojournalist 3 days after the disaster. For more of his work, go to his website.
30-Day free trial by following the link.
Tokyo Time
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18 comments:
It does seem that the subcontractor system used in Japanese industry is being abused at Fukushima. Responsibility and accountability are so diffused as the work flows down through 3 or 4 or even more levels of subcontractors and subcontractees that it seems almost designed to obfuscate.
How is this consistent with the established people management skills that have made Japanese firms world beaters? Does no one have the strength to insist on a clear line of responsibility and documented performance?
As is, it seems certain that there will be some sort of cleanup and entombment of the facility, but no one will be able to really tell what the actual situation is and how effectively the work was done. This does not seem good policy for the country.
nicely made up and a hero of a man!
it seems he was there only one day and took over 100 pictures, but we see ten of them... the rest of his blog is written so beautiful, i'm so curious to read the whole story, when can i buy the book (and scan it and give it to w.leaks)? i understand his fears, it's monstrous. and dangerous. i wish him lots of good health!!!
i would love to be at the site now and to take off the angry phonecalls from Tokyo haaaaa revolution at the plant what a movie
is there a japanese version?
if not, maybe it would be interesting to do one for your japanese blog. in japan, there also isn't much information about the workers' living and working conditions or now even less than in english, it seems.
(i know his blog has some of it bilingual, but it's only very short and the really scary points are sometimes completely missing)
I'm sorry, it seems that i was wrong.
On http://kazumaobara.com/2011/08/flontline-in-fukushima.html, when you scroll down, it seems to be the complete version of the article in Japanese.
But please post it to your Japanese Blog, it's content is just too disgusting, people should become aware.
let's say we are around 80-100 people. we are dead anyway. we have the power not to work. they don't have weapons. everything gets very hot then. no man will come to derail us, army has quit their job already. we don't want money. we want policy back. we want Naoto Kan and his only friend, his wife, take control over TEPCO and all the ministerys with help of the army, then to evacuate the women and children first. then the others, but clever, for not to leave it to criminals. then he should establish a food and water measuring system like speedi is, fix it forever to the constitution and then organize serious democratic elections. ministerys should be parliaments. then step back.
Error in skf article headline. It's 10 Sieverts/Hr, not 10 MilliSieverts/Hr at the base of the exhaust stack.
I know you are not trying to mislead, and make an easy mistake.
As always, thanks for the great blog!
TerraHertz
@terrahertz, LOL thanks. 10 millisieverts is such an understatement. 10,000 millisieverts.
@doitsujin, will do. What's on the site is the abbreviated version, taking here and there from the Guardian.
@netudiant, they (TEPCO, government) willfully do not want to know what or who is below the 3rd level subcontractors. It seems it has always been like this in Japanese nuclear industry, and only now more people become aware of it, thanks to this accident. Good part of the reason why increasing number of people there are disgusted with nuclear power which relies on the system like this.
Please send the following people to work by hand at the Fukushima plant:
- Prime Minister Kan.
- his cabinet.
- all highest level Japanese government people (decision makers.
- Shintaro Ishihara.
- All TEPCO top staff and escpecially CEO.
- IAEA top guy.
- All journalists and scientists who downplayed and lied about the dangers.
Send them ALL to work by hand at the plant until they cannot work anymore. This will show others that this will not be accepted by the people. They are all guilty of mass murders.
Please send the following people to work by hand at the Fukushima plant:
- ..
- Don't forget any scientist and engineer working for nuclear mafia and built the NPP all over the world.
Without these scientific criminals and helping hands neither nuclear power nor nuclear weapons would exist.
Those who profit from NPPs could never obtain or build such devices by their own.
He says "I had been exposed to 60 microsieverts in the space of six hours".
So, 10 μSv/hr. You can do worse than that on a transatlantic flight.
"he established people management skills that have made Japanese firms world beaters? Does no one have the strength to insist on a clear line of responsibility and documented performance?"
Little do you know about how Japanese companies work, my friend… The "Toyota Way" is perhaps nice for management text books, the reality is that 99% of don't know the spelling of 'responsibility'. This is the dark side of management, always there, rarely visible - until now.
To paraphrase "Hope is not a plan":
"Never give up Fukushima" is not a plan. Especially when you paint it on a wall near a reading of 10+ sv/h.
wtf!!!! never give up???? its all done!!! it is melt through ... rubbish!!!!! a common sense,,,, japan is dead!!!!! instead of bullshit... accept that reality...!!!!
Just listened to a speech by Dr. Helen Caldicott, long time adversary and out-spoken opponent of what must be called the NUCLEAR TERRORIST/POWER MAFIA. The less aware refer to this organization as The Nuclear Power Industry. So what have all the people who have been, and are currently occupied and paid to run 'things' nuclear ? Here is a list:# 1) Built and exploded SEVERAL HUNDRED NUCLEAR BOMBS ON AMERICA and used us, the people of America as ,not as 'virtual' laboratory rats, but as real experimental subjects! Will someone ask the profiteers,(anyone deriving an income from this activity), When did they know their diabolically destructive contraptions worked ? After the first TWENTY OR THIRTY were exploded into OUR atmosphere, water, and soil/food ? Oh no, can't stop there, how about we do this SEVERAL HUNDRED TIMES MORE !$!$. This is a description of the most serious CRIME AGAINST ALL HUMANITY and ALL LIFE ON EARTH . If We The Co-passengers here on 'Spaceship' Planet Earth do not rise up and hold these criminals to account for their past and on-going MOST DESTRUCTIVE activity(building reactors and exploding nuclear bombs), then we deserve to be the passive and willing lab rodents the oh so 'smart' nuclear geniuses and profiteers think we are. #2) The Nuclear Mafia has also saddled the 'horse' of humanity with the responsibility and the cost of cleaning up,transporting,containing, and securing an ever increasing and huge amount of deadly radioactive waste. They also do not have an economically and environmentally viable plan to deal with their excrement, still, AFTER MORE THAN ONE- HALF OF A CENTURY !? This inability to properly deal with their waste is clear example of an infantile mentality which dominates applied nuclear science.Why are most of us so asleep on this PRIORITY LIFE AND DEATH SITUATION ! Please act soon to demand a discontinuation of the Nuclear Mafia forcing their radioactive excrement DOWN OUR THROATS, INTO OUR LUNGS, INTO OUR GENES ! Now is the time to stop being complacent and DEMAND NO MORE NUCLEAR EXCREMENT IN OUR AIR WATER AND SOIL/FOOD! Dr. Caldicot ended her speech with a call for REVOLUTION ! TURN-OFF NUCLEAR NOW ! Or We all die slow radioactive induced cancer deaths, and worst, We die as cowards, who would not defend themselves or the future !
If the comments about the broad acceptance of pervasive subcontracting to diffuse responsibility and avoid accountability are true, Japan has bigger problems than just Fukushima. Maybe this disaster will wake people up and force them to face reality as a matter of survival.
I am in fear of a future when we call those workers "heroes".
They are cattle, pawns, humans, men and probably about to die. When dead, they will not be less or more dead than the other dead. They will not be less or more dead than my father who was robbed of his youth and may have robbed others of their youth with the help of a cleanly oiled and maintained machine-gun. No difference in their state of dead.
The difference is in the way you die and in the reason. But once dead, a baker stops being a baker, a killer stops being a killer, a bloody politician stops being a bloody politician and as regards heroes... I see no difference.
A loving mother is living when she does her most heroic dead as does any doctor. Or my neighbour who provides the advice that I need to avoid making a mess of my construction-work.
Do never call them heroes, please. Being murdered by a powerfull clique of madmen does not make anyonw a martyr, nor a hero. They are kettle, sheep, pawns and they were burned.
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