It's not only sad, it's damn criminal.
Let the "updated" rewrites and reedits begin!
"Japan races to avert nuclear meltdowns; Two crippled reactors failing; three more face cooling problems | Monster tsunami claimed whole communities; death toll soars" by Hiroko Tabuchi and Matthew L. Wald, New York Times / March 13, 2011
TOKYO — Japanese officials struggled today to contain a widening nuclear crisis in the aftermath of a devastating earthquake and tsunami, saying they presumed that partial meltdowns had occurred at two crippled reactors and that they were facing serious cooling problems at three more.
Related: Cooling ability lost in 5 reactors
The accident appeared to be the worst involving a nuclear plant since the Chernobyl disaster 25 years ago.
That's not the way my printed Sunday Globe spun it!
The developments at two separate nuclear plants prompted the evacuation of more than 200,000 people. Japanese officials said they had also ordered the largest mobilization of their Self-Defense Forces since World War II to assist in the relief effort.
According to officials, at least 1,000 people were killed in the earthquake and tsunami — including 200 bodies found today along the coast — and hundreds more are missing....
Firefighters had yet to contain a large blaze at the Cosmo Oil refinery in Ichihara....
One US aircraft carrier is already in Japan and a second was on its way.
Severe aftershocks continued to rock a traumatized country. The US Geological Survey recorded 90 earthquakes off the eastern coast yesterday alone, five of them with magnitudes larger than 6.0. Kyodo News reported more than 125 aftershocks since Friday’s earthquake.
Yesterday, Japanese officials took the extraordinary step of flooding the crippled No. 1 reactor at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, 170 miles north of Tokyo, with seawater in a last-ditch effort to avoid a nuclear meltdown.
Cooling failed today at a second reactor — No. 3 — and core melting was presumed at both, said the top government spokesman, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano. Cooling had failed at three reactors at a nuclear complex nearby, Fukushima Daini, although he said conditions there were considered less dire for now.
With high pressure inside the reactors at Fukushima Daiichi hampering efforts to pump in cooling water, plant operators had to release radioactive vapor into the atmosphere. Radiation levels outside the plant, which had retreated overnight, shot up to 1,204 microsieverts per hour, or more than twice Japan’s legal limit, Edano said....
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"As death toll rises, rescuers scramble to reach survivors" by Martin Fackler and Mark McDonald, New York Times / March 13, 2011
NAKAMINATO, Japan — Japan yesterday mobilized a nationwide rescue effort to pluck survivors from collapsed buildings and rush food and water to thousands in an earthquake and tsunami zone under siege, without water, electricity, heat, or telephone service.
Villages in parts of Japan’s northern Pacific Coast have vanished under a wall of water, many communities are cut off, and a nuclear emergency was unfolding near two stricken reactors as Japanese tried to absorb the scale of the destruction after Friday’s powerful earthquake and devastating tsunami.
Most of the hundreds of deaths were from drowning....
The United States, which has several military bases in Japan, is sending in helicopters, destroyers, and an aircraft carrier, the Ronald Reagan, which has the ability to act as a hospital as well as to convert sea water into drinking water, said a spokesman for the Navy’s Seventh Fleet in Japan.
The continual swaying and rolling of the ground from aftershocks deepened the disorientation of a nation accustomed to disaster — earthquakes, tsunamis, and two atomic bombs — but which has not experienced anything on this scale for generations.
Compounding those fears was uncertainty about the scale of the radiation damage from the explosion at the nuclear plant in Fukushima, in the earthquake zone.
Aerial photographs of the ravaged coastal areas showed a string of cities and villages leveled by the power of the tsunami. Plumes of black smoke rose from burning industrial plants. Stranded ships bobbed in the water.
Town after town reported that parts of their population were unaccounted for. Survivors gathered on rooftops, frantically shouting or signaling for help....
While aftershocks from the earthquake continued, the tsunami wreaked the most damage....
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"Cascading disaster in Japan; Blast shakes a second reactor; death toll soars" by Martin Fackler and Mark McDonald, New York Times / March 14, 2011
SENDAI, Japan — Japan reeled from a rapidly unfolding disaster of epic scale yesterday, pummeled by the death toll, destruction, and homelessness caused by the earthquake and tsunami and new hazards from damaged nuclear reactors. The prime minister called it Japan’s worst crisis since World War II.
Japan’s $5 trillion economy, the world’s third largest, was threatened with severe disruptions and partial paralysis as many industries shut down temporarily. The armed forces and volunteers mobilized for the far more urgent crisis of finding survivors, evacuating residents near the stricken power plants and caring for the victims of the record 8.9 magnitude quake that struck on Friday.
I had read it was upgraded to a 9.
The disaster has left more than 10,000 dead, many thousands homeless, and millions without water, power, heat, or transportation.
The most urgent immediate worries concerned the failures at two reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station.
The second hydrogen explosion in three days rocked the Daiichi plant today, sending a massive column of smoke into the air and injuring six workers. It was not immediately clear how much — if any — radiation had been released....
The government ordered 100,000 troops — nearly half the country’s active military force and the largest mobilization in postwar Japan — to take part in the relief effort. A US naval strike group led by the aircraft carrier Ronald Reagan also arrived off Japan yesterday to help with refueling, supply, and rescue duties.
Related: USS Ronald Reagan Runs Into Radiation, Reactor 3 Explodes As Fear Mounts
Nope, nothing about that in my newspaper.
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After the Gulf oil spill cover-up this was their one last chance to begin telling the truth, and they are failing.
"So far, little fear of a new Chernobyl" by Carolyn Y. Johnson, Globe Staff / March 14, 2011
Scientists and radiation specialists monitoring the unfolding nuclear crisis in Japan say it is the worst since Chernobyl and also strikingly different from that disaster because it may not, in the end, pose a major risk to human health or the environment.
I'm sorry, readers; I simply no longer believe a newspaper that covers up depleted uranium poisoning among so many other things while hollering lies about wars and warming.
But the extent of infrastructure failure in Japan and the spreading number of reactors involved are worrisome, they said yesterday, complicating efforts to prevent meltdowns that could release harmful radiation.
That was ALWAYS a BAD WORD to put into a REPORT -- at least, according to my college writing instructor.
With the information coming out of Japan spotty and fast-changing, and with the situation not fully under control, the scientists said there is uncertainty about the outcome and the extent of the threat to the public from a meltdown....
BUT don't worry, it's not another Chernobyl.
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Yup, everything under control:
"Japan struggles to bring reactors under control" by Hiroko Tabuchi and Matthew L. Wald, New York Times / March 14, 2011
TOKYO — A second explosion rocked a troubled nuclear power plant today, blowing the roof off a containment building but not harming the reactor, Japanese nuclear officials announced on public television.
The explosion underscores the difficulties Japanese authorities are having in bringing several stricken reactors under control three days after a massive earthquake and a tsunami hit the country’s northeast coast and shut down the electricity that runs the crucial cooling systems for reactors.
Operators fear that if they cannot establish control, despite increasingly desperate measures to do so, the reactors could experience full meltdowns, which would release catastrophic amounts of radiation....
Twenty-two people who live near the plant are already showing signs of radiation exposure from earlier radiation releases at the plant, but it is not clear if they received dangerous doses....
In what was perhaps the clearest sign of the rising anxiety over the nuclear crisis, both the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Russian authorities issued statements yesterday trying to allay fears, saying they did not expect harmful levels of radiation to reach their territory....
Isn't it AMAZING how GOVERNMENTS and MEDIA play up SOME FEARS (like "Islamic terrorists" and global warming) while MINIMIZING REAL THREATS to PEOPLE?
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Yup, time to focus on rescue and recovery:
"Millions suffer without power and water as temperatures fall near freezing" by Jay Alabaster, Associated Press / March 14, 2011
SENDAI, Japan — Hundreds of thousands of people across a ravaged swath of the country suffered for a third day yesterday without water, electricity, and proper food, as the Japanese grappled with the immensity of the disaster.
Near-freezing temperatures compounded the misery of survivors along hundreds of miles of the northeastern coast battered by the tsunami that smashed inland with breathtaking fury. Rescuers pulled bodies from mud-covered jumbles of wrecked houses, shattered tree trunks, twisted cars, and tangled power lines while survivors examined the ruined remains....
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Back in better times:
"Despite its dwindling population, a Japanese town clings to tradition; Festival draped in a celebratory, foreboding air" by Chico Harlan, Washington Post / February 27, 2011
NIYODOGAWA, Japan — The Akiba Matsuri festival has been going on for so long that much of its logic has been lost. Men don feline costumes and hideous masks; children dance with one another, thrashing real swords; about a dozen men haul a portable shrine up a mountain, nearly collapsing at points along the way from exhaustion; six particularly acrobatic honorees march along the same path while dancing with 25-foot poles.
Occasionally, the men toss these poles back and forth, their failure to maim one another all the more impressive when one considers the numerous sake shots they took well before lunchtime....
Honestly, I'm tired of the back-handed insults to all things not Jewish.
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I think the Japanese will be searching for some sake soon:
Quake, tsunami ravage Japan
Scale of destruction leaves nation reeling
Calif., Ore. sustain damage from Japan-based tsunami
Big quake is latest in cluster that began in ’04
Scientists see Atlantic region largely unprepared
Firms’ Japan operations spared direct blow
In Boston, relatives watch, wait, worry after quake
Some quake survivors able to ease anxious kin’s fears
Stories of loss and ruin are plenty
Area residents with ties to Japan yearn for contact
Also see:
Japanese teen arrested on cheating charge
Japan census shows slow growth
Suicides dip, but remain high in Japan
Japan halts vaccines use after deaths
Related:
Quake hits N. Zealand; deaths reported
From ruin of New Zealand quake, screams, cell calls to say goodbye
New Zealand attends to grim task of accounting for earthquake victims
Hope of finding more New Zealand quake survivors dims
Infant’s funeral first of quake victims
New Zealand ends quake rescue mission
10,000 homes in New Zealand city ruined by quake
Think the two are connected? Wouldn't be much of a stretch if the undersea floor was collapsing. Even if it is just plates moving it could be a cause-and-effect situation.
Sorry I never got around to reading about the Christchurch quake, readers; however, there is going to be a lot I am no longer reading when it comes to the Boston Globe.
Also see: 25 killed in quake in southwest China
Well, time to get back to making money:
"Markets watch to see how Japan’s crisis will affect world’s economy" by Howard Schneider Washington Post / March 14, 2011
WASHINGTON — The first working day since the quake dawned to rolling blackouts and hoarding, despite the central Bank of Japan’s vow to keep the economy on track. The bank announced it was injecting a record $183.8 billion into money markets in an attempt to keep the country’s financial system stable and its trading system functioning.
Analysts warned that extended power disruptions or larger-than-expected damage to manufacturers could undercut a global economic recovery....
Yeah, if it ain't those pesky Arabs with their protests and oil it's the Japs with their earthquake.
Anything but central banks and their printing presses.
And what recovery are they talking about anyway?
Japan was already groaning under government debt equal to twice its yearly economic output, proportionally the world’s largest load, but analysts said the country should have the financial muscle to deal with the reconstruction....
Although the cost of reconstruction may prove challenging, analysts said Japan retains enough room to borrow what it will need to bounce back from the devastation without, for example, using nontraditional methods such as spending down its trillion-dollar stockpile of international currency reserves.
Further enslaving the nation to banks is NOT the way!!
Money is likely to also flow from Japanese investments overseas back to the country, a phenomenon that may have been behind the jump in the value of the yen Friday, following the disaster....
No wonder the DOW is DOWN OVER 100 POINTS right now!
The global impact could be unpredictable in an era when markets, investors, and policy makers have become increasingly concerned about the way shocks in one country can ripple through the world in unexpected ways.
Ain't globalization grand?
And if this is true, why are the architects of this failure still calling the shots?
In its most recent analysis of Japan, the IMF said it was concerned any disruption to Japan’s tentative return to economic growth could send the country into a deflationary spiral, with wages, prices, and investment falling, and households and businesses reluctant to spend. Although Japan’s economy, with its aging population and stagnant incomes, is not a driving source of world demand for goods and services, it does play an important role in world trade....
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Update: Quake selloff wipes $287 billion off Tokyo stock market
Good thing nukes are going to save us from global warming, huh?
"Nuclear industry expects scrutiny after leaks, reactor blast" by Norimitsu Onishi, Henry Fountain and Tom Zeller Jr., New York Times / March 13, 2011
NEW YORK — Critics of nuclear energy have long questioned the viability of nuclear power in earthquake-prone regions like Japan. Reactors have been designed with such concerns in mind, but preliminary assessments of the Fukushima Daiichi accidents suggested that too little attention was paid to the threat of tsunami.....
Nuclear advocates argued that Daiichi’s problems were singular in many ways and stemmed from a natural disaster on a scale never before experienced in Japan. They pointed out that the excavation of fossil fuels has its own history of catastrophic accidents, including coal mine collapses and the recent BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
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"US nuclear energy gets more scrutiny" by Beth Daley and Theo Emery, Globe Staff / March 14, 2011
The Obama administration’s push for construction of nuclear power plants, financed with taxpayer-backed loan guarantees, faces new uncertainty in the wake of the Japanese disaster and new questions about safety of such facilities.
The crisis in Japan could also stir debate about whether to lengthen the lifetimes of two nuclear power plants in New England, politicians and environmentalists say.
Yesterday, some leading politicians took to Sunday talk shows and other venues to say that the Japanese crisis should prompt at least a pause in the US effort to restart the country’s nuclear industry, if not put an end to the attempt....
The day before Japan’s earthquake, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission extended the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant’s license for 20 years beyond 2012, when its original license was set to expire....
Yeah, WHO CARES if it is leaking cancer into the soil and water.
Related: Around New England: No Veracity in Vermont
Around New England: Vermont Votes Yankee Down
The Boston Globe Can Not Say a Lie
But they sure can tell 'em!
Until last week’s earthquake and tsunami in Japan, the nuclear industry had hoped the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl nuclear disasters were distant memories to politicians and the public. The industry, and the Obama administration, had worked to convince the public — and even some prominent environmentalists — that new reactors are a critical component of fighting global warming because they do not release heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere....
Related: Coldest Back-to-Back U.S. Winters in a Quarter Century
Is believing the lie really worth radiation sickness, cancer, and death?
With costs to build a reactor anywhere from $6 billion to $10 billion, the federal government has stepped in to help finance them. The government has offered a loan guarantee for a proposed plant in Georgia, and President Obama has requested an additional $36 billion in loan guarantees in his proposed 2012 budget, in addition to $18.5 billion already allotted....
See: Obama's Mushroom Cloud of a Bailout
And JUST WHO do you think is GUARANTEEING the LOANS, taxpayers?
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Also see: Plymouth residents tracking nuclear plant crisis
