There are very good reasons why we aren’t being told the truth about the Fukushima disaster, but it doesn’t matter what those reasons are. The fact that we aren’t getting updated information in the “normal” media and the scant information that is coming out from them can’t be counted on to be accurate is the problem.
If we were to be told the real truth, civilization as we know it would become utter chaos. It’s hard not to be too fatalistic, or too much of a “conspiracy theorist” over this issue. The reason being that the truth is the disaster that was and is Fukushima will never be over.
There has never been a disaster of this magnitude before and the scientific community and nuclear energy experts don’t have a clue how to fix it
There has been news about Fukushima in the past four years; it’s just hard for the average person to find.
Consider some of the statements made by “experts” in various articles in scientific papers and other world media sites: “Even more ominously, Seiichi Mizuno, a former member of Japan’s House of Councillors (Upper House of Parliament, 1995-2001) in March 2015 said: “The biggest problem is the melt-through of reactor cores… We have groundwater contamination… The idea that the contaminated water is somehow blocked in the harbor is especially absurd. It is leaking directly into the ocean. There’s evidence of more than 40 known hotspot areas where extremely contaminated water is flowing directly into the ocean… We face huge problems with no prospect of solution.” (Source: Nuclear Hotseat #194)”
“According to Arnie Gundersen, an energy advisor with 39 years of nuclear power engineering experience, as reported in The Canadian on August 15, 2011: “The US government has come up with a decision at the highest levels of the State Department, as well as other departments who made a decision to downplay Fukushima. In April, the month after the powerful tsunami and earthquake crippled Japan including its nuclear power plant, Hillary Clinton signed a pact with Japan that she agreed there is no problem with Japanese food supply and we will continue to buy them. So, we are not sampling food coming in from Japan.”
“Dr. Caldicott ended her speech on Sept. 2014 by saying: “In Fukushima, it is not over. Every day, four hundred tons of highly radioactive water pours into the Pacific and heads towards the U.S. Because the radiation accumulates in fish, we get that too. The U.S. government is not testing the water, not testing the fish, and not testing the ambient air. Also, people in Japan are eating radiation every day.”
“Furthermore, according to Dr. Caldicott: “Rainwater washes over the nuclear cores into the Pacific. There is no way they can get to those cores, men die, and robots get fried. Fukushima will never be solved. Meanwhile, people are still living in highly radioactive areas.”
“MSNBC: Largest epidemic ever seen in world’s oceans hits West Coast — Emergency legislation proposed in US Congress — Newsweek: Millions dead, researchers have lost count — Experts: It’s beyond anything I ever imagined… Disintegrating before our eyes… Never been an event so dramatic… Shorelines losing biodiversity, blanketed in barnacles…”
Just recently, stories of fish, birds, and other sea life dying in unprecedented numbers, or being found horribly mutated, have been reported:
“According to the Smithsonian, April 30, 2015: “Birds Are in a Tailspin Four Years After Fukushima: Bird species are in sharp decline, and it is getting worse over time… Where it’s much, much hotter, it’s dead silent. You’ll see one or two birds if you’re lucky.”
“Developmental abnormalities of birds include cataracts, tumors, and asymmetries. Birds are spotted with strange white patches on their feathers.”
“Earlier this week Michael Snyder warned that the bottom of our food chain is going through a catastrophic collapse with sea creatures dying in absolutely massive numbers The cause of the problem is a mystery to scientists who claim that they can’t pinpoint how or why it’s happening.
“What’s worse, the collapse of sea life in the Pacific Ocean isn’t something that will affect us several decades into the future. The implications are being seen right now, as evidenced by an emergency closure of fisheries along the West coast this week.”
“On Wednesday federal regulators announced the early closure of sardine fisheries in California, Oregon and Washington. According to the most recent data, the sardine populations have been wiped out with populations seeing a decline of 91% in just the last eight years.”
“According to two University of Washington scientific research papers that were recently released, a 1,000 mile stretch of the Pacific Ocean has warmed up by several degrees, and nobody seems to know why this is happening. This giant “blob” of warm water was first observed in late 2013, and it is playing havoc with our climate. And since this giant “blob” first showed up, fish and other sea creatures have been dying in absolutely massive numbers.”
No one wants to admit why we are seeing massive die-offs. It doesn’t matter anymore. We are never going to be over Fukushima.
We are still not “over” Chernobyl, which happened in 1986. The land around it will never be habitable again and hundreds of thousands have died, and hundreds of thousands have cancer.
It’s no wonder governments, scientists and industry experts don’t want to talk about it. There’s nothing any of them can do about it. Fukushima is not over, will never be over, and it could get a lot worse. That’s all anyone needs to know.
Karen Warnick is a reporter with The Independent. Reach her at kwarnick@wmicentral.com.
(25) comments
And the republicans in congress want to nuke Iran? Send them your article Karen.[wink]
Hysteria! Nothing more than hysteria. First, note that not one of the above sources has actually published scientific post-mortem studies to determine the factual causes of the observations. In fact, these biological observations are entirely consistent with predictions and modeling for both the burning of fossil fuels and environmental contamination from industrial, transportation, agricultural and other non-nuclear sources.
On 11 November, 2014, 'Science", one of the top two or three most renowned scientific journals in the world, posted an article on this very matter, entitled "Fukushima Radiation Nears California Coast - Judged Harmless". Here are some highlights:
Measurements of radiation in near-coastal Japanese waters, immediately after the disaster, showed about 45,000,000 Bq per cubic meter of water( Bq stands for Becquerel's, a measure of radioactivity) . That is enough to cause some reproductive problems in fish. It must be remembered here, that the Fukushima emissions consist of Cesium-134 which has a very short half-life of 2.5 years. And let us not forget the exponential dissipative properties of radiation with time and distance.
The National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration fournd by June 2011 that radiation 600 miles from Japan had already declined to 325 Bq - a decline of 99.99927%. The World Health Organization and the health departments of California, Washington, Oregon and Alaska all did modeling based on the actual observations and found there would be no threat to the west coast, and none has occurred.
The Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution convinced an eclectic group of organizations to collect water samples up and down the west coast of North America. Participants such as the Umpqua Soil and Water Conservation District, universities, and conservation groups joined in to collect water from more than 50 sites in the Pacific Ocean near U.S. shores.
This effort found less than 2 becquerels per cubic foot of water came from the cesium-134 traced to Fukushima - a trivial amount. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency guidelines for drinking water allow up to 7400 becquerels per cubic meter. One banana has 20Bq; one adult human about 6500Bq; a pound of carrots about 70Bq; a pound of Brazil nuts about 100Bq.
What's Justice Scalia's term? "Jiggery pokery", is it? Nah! Just more nuclear hysteria.
Ron Zimmerman, Former:
USAF Nuclear Weapons Courier;
Nuclear Disaster Planning Officer;
Radiologic Instructor
This is why I only drink bottled water from lake Erie .
Your right Karen. Without going into specifics, thats it in a nutshell. The bad thing with this is that there is not many that are capable of dealing with radioactive anything. It seems that the only one capable of tracking radioactive plumes and so forth, was and is the USA military.
Theres a paper out by Kyle Cleveland in the Asian Pacific Journal on nuclear bias.The information i would like to point out is the freedom of information act transcripts of meeting the USA goverment was having while the accident was in progress. They knew the plants was melting by the readings they were getting. This means they knew by what was being released into the enviorment. This is not a guess or a maybe. This is not a confusing thing to understand like milli severts and reams and Bq and so forth. Tons was being releasaed. They say only grams mess up a large area, and tons was released.
The nuclear issue is confused by there language. Different measurments, and then using words wrong. People dont know the difference between radiation and radioactive contamination, and thereby have no idea of the consequences to having these elements in there enviorment. Radiation is emitted energy. Alot of things that are not radioactive emit energy, electric motors for example. Radiation isnt the issue. Its the radioactive elements that are the issue. More confusion is related to the wave lengths and actual radioactive elements released. They only name a few, but over 1000 different radioactive elements was released.
The experts in this are no names with no verifiable backgrounds, an hold no responsiblity for what they say. They do not match what you read concerning radioactive elements. They bad mouth any crediable people that step out an talk about it. When i say crediable i mean that what they say is more in line with what you read about radioactivity and humans.
After the accident japan has spent some time building themselves a new Nuclear committe in there attempt to restart there plants. If that is not a hodgpodg of yes men, then i dont know what im talking about. Thats how bad the joke has become. They showed a meeting of these people and it almost looked like a 3 stooges movie.
I dont know what to think of the naysayers. Do these people truly believe what they are saying, or are people that poorly mislead? They seem to truthfully believe it, even when faced with the evidence they still have the nerve to tell you nothing to worry about. The state of Man [sad]!
Wes got another moniker.[sad]
Response, Part Two: The contention in this editorial that the Fukushima event is "forever" is incorrect. To be certain, the damage done to four of the six reactors at Fukushima was a catastrophic event, mostly in local terms. A land area the size of Connecticut was initially contaminated; many millions of Bq of Cesium-134 were deposited into the offshore area; fish (especially bottom dwelling species) were contaminated and their consumption in the food chain will accumulate for a time; thousands were displaced and the total estimated cost for this event ranges from $300- $500 billions USD. No small thing.
At this point, however, a comprehensive recovery plan has been published and is on track; soil contamination is sufficiently low that safe vegetables can now be grown; a few displacees have returned to their homes and a regulated flow of returners is scheduled to begin in 2021.
Reactor number four has been nearly dismantled and all 5233 fuel sources have been recovered and secured for future processing. The problem of underground water leakage into the buildings and nuclear tables has been almost completely resolved and on-site quarters are being built for workers.
All of the above and much more stands confirmed by many independent observers and technical organizations. Now, here is the important fact. Current estimates are that full decommissioning of all four reactors will take place within the next 10-40 years. After that, the problem will have been resolved. It is not going on forever.
I will close with a little simile here: There are 1500 volcanos on the planet. These natural phenomena have active lives which sometimes span millions of years. Even modest eruptions have killed tens of thousands of people and destroyed whole communities while releasing particulate matter, laden with constellations of deadly material, into the atmosphere.
In 1991, the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo released, in addition to million of tons of ash, about 25,000,000 tons of sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere. Eight hundred people were killed, over 100,000 became homeless, and ash deposits reached as much as a foot deep. The Fukushima disaster simply adds one more putative volcano to the list. It is far down that list in terms of its destruction. Moreover, it is a one-off event which will not repeatedly recur and which will go away in no more than 40 years, except for some lingering fish contamination.
More fear mongering. I have more chance of dieing in my car than any radiation leak.
By the way, congratulations to Palo Verde staff for it's amazing 30 year record at the number 1 largest plant. 3,937 mega watts and 30,000 megawatt hours, that's a couple thousand windmills, or more, not to mention the thousands of dead birds and the headache I get listening to the woosh, woosh of progress. Thank you Ron for your rational article and thought out response.
Edge: I join you in the kudos to Palo Verde; although, they have no choice in the matter. You see, disasters are forbidden by the Scottsdale city charter.
Al,
I can absolutely guarantee you that this "BADFORYOU" person is not me. I would not make claims like he/she does if my life depended on it. Utterly uninformed.
Wes.
Ron,
As a matter of fact, the radioactive isotope of Cesium is not the worst of our worries. Check on Iodine, and then note that thet all iodine must pass trhough the thyroid gland for processing into thyroxin. Then check the White Mountain
Thyroid cancer rate compared to the average in the rest of the USA and you will see what on big worry is.
This huge diffference is due to the Yucca Flats A Bomb Tests of the fifties and the fact that the upper atomospher winds prevalil from the Northwest, and carried the fallout from the tests right over us and New Mexico.
I wrote an essay on this, which was published and made into a Radio Special named the "Down Winders Syndrome."
Similarly, the human body confuses Strontium with calcium during calcium shortage . . .. and takes up radioactive Strontium (Strontium 90) causing a huge increase in our Arizona rates of bone cancer, lymphoma, and leuckemia. Breast Cancer is more frequent in the White Mountains because lactating females concentrate Strontium 90 in the breasts.
Check me out on these things!
Wes.
Wes Does this mean real estate values will suffer and my 20 acres in Choncho valley are worthless?
Thank you for your opinion.
You also say: "There has never been a disaster of this magnitude before". Fukushima is a huge tragedy. At the same time, “the consequences of the Chernobyl accident clearly exceeded those of the Fukushima accident” (Steinhauser et al. 2014, 800).
I am grateful you mentioned that Chernobyl is not over. Please see more about comparison of government disaster management and public communications after the Chernobyl and Fukushima here: http://fromchernobyltofukushima.com/food-nuclear-plant-accidents/
This article is a result of the reporter getting all her information from hysterical websites. Here's some more info on the much quoted Arnie Gundersen (chief engineer of an anti-nuclear propaganda group):
(you can do a search on these titles)
Arnie Gundersen Caught on Video Lying About Risk of Radiation Released During Fukushima Event
Arnie Gundersen has inflated his resume, yet frequently claims that Entergy cannot be trusted
Arnie Gundersen, Fraudulent Fabricator of Fukushima Radiation Hysteria
Here is my third and final response installment to this editorial. I am calling it CORPORATE MALFEASENCE. For the purposes of this posting, I designate the Japanese government as a quasi-corporation.
1. Japan straddles one of the hottest segments of the "ring of fire' which girdles the Pacific Ocean. It is in one of the most geologically muscular places in the world. The siting of a large nuclear generating plant, in its current location, ranges from imprudent to reckless, in my opinion.
2. Why, given a risk level obvious to any high-schooler was there no seaward protection installed? It would have ameliorated and possibly eliminated anything but the most superficial damage. The Japanese government is now preparing to build the missing seawall at a cost of $8.2 billions. And the dish ran away with the spoon.
3. Where were the inspectors and regulators during the siting and construction of this doomed facility?
4. Why was a permit even issued when the basic safety precautions were not even considered in the submitted plan?
5. During the life of this facility, a minimum of 60%, and up to 80% of all employees consisted of temporary, pick-up, unskilled laborers from day labor camps or contractors. When the event occurred, the proportion of engineers and highly trained technicians to overall staffing was dangerously low, thus diminishing the initial response.
6. Where was the detailed, comprehensive disaster plan and regular plan-exercise calendar by which optimum staff response would have been assured?
The BP disaster, in the Gulf, has resulted in comparable, or perhaps even greater damage to the environment and aquatic flora and fauna in a vast area, not even to mention birdlife. The results will be with us for perhaps 100 years.
Both of these catastrophes resulted from corporate malfeasance which had their origins in the basic principles of free-market capitalism and the refusal to fund even minimum safety precautions because of the pathological pursuit of short-term profits.
POP QUIZ: Maximum possible score is one biscuit per question.
1. How many executives from these companies have been charged with a crime?
2. How many indicted?
3. How many tried?
4. How many convicted.
Multiple choice answers: A 16; B 34; C zero; D 3.
If you answered anything other than "C" for all four questions, you must turn in your driver license, credit card and carry-concealed permit and proceed directly to the nearest 3rd grade classroom.
Wes: Interesting.
Fukishima will be over.
Eventually mother earth will cleanse herself. She'll take care of whatever messes we have made on her. But then in 4.5 billion years, the star we call "the big yellow ball in the sky" will explode, then it will cleanse mother earth completely.
Hopefully by the time the sun goes boom, we will NOT have colonized another planet. As Bill Hicks once said "I'm tired of this back-slappin' "isn't humanity neat" BS. We're a virus with shoes.”
Charos: [thumbup][thumbup]
Arizona Al,
I'm gravely disappointed in the fact that you decided that simply because this "BADFORYOU person used some big words and pseudo technical jargon means that he is me. At least I have accurate facts which came from my knowledge as a physicist and my friends in that community.
Worse, by automatically concluding that anybody with technical knowledge is a pseudonym of "Wes" you demean the entire readership's intelligence.
Wes, Whadda you expect since you have admitted that you have used different monikers? And Wes, it is you that demeans the readership by using those tactics.
Don't you agree with me that the WMI rules of conduct should include that those posting should use only one moniker?
Well, this just rips it. I checked today and discovered that the bacterium Red Deinococcus radiodurans can sustain 1.5 million rads of gamma radiation and never even blink. Japan is rumoured to be recruiting them to work at Fukushima at $90/hour USD (bacterial union scale). Apparently they are going to make enormous batches of chicken-fried radio activity and just eat the stuff.
Yes, Al, I agree. The times when I used monikers was prior to the establishment of the Rules of Conduct. Think way back to the first White Mountain Ruthie days.
However, I have noticed that a couple of those old monimkers have been used again by others - I don't know who, though I have guesses. Apparently there is some humor in their use, which was why I had done it in those old days.
What does surprise me is that now and then, a couple of the former monikers argue with each other, so I assume they must be attempting humor too.
In any event that is ancient history now. These days I am too old and tired to fool around like that.
Al - I suppose we could blame everything on Ron's new bacterium - the Red Deissenoccus Radiodurans. Some of its genes may have crept into the Internet, causing both multiple screen names and outages.
O.K. Ham60
Guys: The cartilage in my ears and nose give of a yellowish-green glow in the dark, as do my fingernails, toenails, and small bones in my hands and feet. Should I worry or just be glad I can read in the dark?
Al, when Dad used those call letters, they were 60J, not just 60.
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