It my seem rather selfish to think how the Japan crisis might effect us here in the United States, but I can not help to at least wonder about the radiation.

I was researching the North Pacific Current wind speeds and maps. It span across the pacific from Japan to Alaska to US.
According to some maps and data, wind currents from Japan can reach US. coast in aprox 200 hr. (8 days)

See the weather map here. http://www.stormsurfing.com/cgi/display.cgi?a=npac_wind

A radio active particle is too heavy to travel that far on the wind... I would hope. But what about all the particles on the water, or bits of floating debris that travel the ocean current?

Chernobyl radiation slightly increased all the way around the world through radioactive dust, but the amount was considered "harmless".

Sound paranoid?

Let me know what ya know about how that works. o-0

Depends on which survivalist website imformation ia gfabbbedd from... Last I heard jisr western us ad far reachinf as v
Colorado... Prepare for nothing and sell survival crap to people willing to waste money

Doom is http://bravenewclimate.com/2011/03/13/fukushima-simple-explanation/.

"Famous Last Words"... dun dun duuuunnnn...

You'll only need to worry if the actually reactor breaks.

Chernobyl was poorly designed, probably not maintained as well as it should have, and they had to interrupt the testing of some recent changes due to a drop in power from other sources. And after things started to go bad, someone made a bad mistake.

The radioactive material released so far should have negligible effect on anything (the vast bulk of it is no longer even radioactive).

I don't really understand where the worry came from this.

Then again, i am on the east coast.

I'm not overly worried about it :shrug:

At the very worst we all know that radioactive fallout can only give you super powers anyway. The only problem is then your arch-nemesis will also get super powers and you'll have to fight him on a constant basis though never fully succeed at defeating him as he'll always come back sooner or later.

I don't see why you care, a small amount of radiation wont hurt anyone. Chernobyl spewed radiation all over the world and we are still alive. Even if these go off in the most terrible worst case scenario life wont change in NA.

I don't know, can Poland into space?

People are overreacting, it wont hurt you guys, maybe it will in Japan but other than that not much will happen.
Also about radiation Sasha Yuvchenko survived Chernobyl, that was far worse, so yeah dont worry.

Some people tend to exageratte the news

There is nothing to be worried about - radiation levels in the area around the plants may be up 400x but it's not really that much. You'd have to stand there, naked, for about 2 weeks to get a harmful amount of radiation.

Living in Denver is worse for you. Any radiation that may make it to the US isn't even going to be noticeable.

I suggest you all have a quick read of http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3396817. It's a thread on SomethingAwful that prettly clearly and concisely outlines the current situation.

There is nothing to worry about. It's all basically the media being stupid.

Its the media spreading fear like they always do at any opportunity. And once again they have succeeded in getting more people to live in fear. Good job :laugh:

The amount of radiation that would hit other countries is so small it's well within tolerance levels. Worry about Japan, not us. They need the prayers right now.

And good, safe, and efficient plans for nuclear energy will take a very far back seat, because people are going to be too scared to even want to hear the word 'nuclear.'

It's not a graphite reactor.

That said, recent news that I've read indicates the containment vessel in one of the reactors might be broken. The one thing that was supposed to contain the radiation and it went and broke.

I'm really not sure what will happen. It isn't the same kind of reactor as Chernobyl. But, the new tech safety precautions - well, some of them seem to have failed/broken in the quake?

Still puzzled over the statement that the cooling systems had broken prior to the quake. Does that mean that even if no quake had occurred, the cooling system(s) would have been broken? Or was the break actually quake-related in some manner?

Highlights the risks of nuclear reactors in areas of high tectonic activity.

Someone used the words "nuclear" and "explosion" in the same sentence within earshot of a media rep.

Oh, there is so much fearmongering in the news about this thing. It's been blown incredibly out of proportion. How well the plant has done should be seen as a testament to the safety of nuclear energy, not as a pitfall. Countless fires broke out all over Japan due to conventional fuel being stored compared to the minimal radiation being emitted by the nuclear plants, even in their damaged state.


Have some here. Not worried in the least. Any earthquake that can damage our nuclear plants (rated to completely withstand 7.5 IIRC) is going to kill many more people than any meltdown.


A meltdown is exactly as it's name implies: the core melts. It is NOT an explosion, it does NOT release a cloud of radioactive particles high into the atmosphere. The explosions at Fukushima are all due to steam pressure building up. It does mean higher levels of radiation, which if leaked can pose a threat to the immediate area, but that is it, and that is pretty much a worse-case scenario for a nuclear power plant. Chernobyl is out of the question in almost all cases. Sooo many things led to Chernobyl's disaster that not only are incredibly unlikely to happen at any modern plant, but impossible to happen at some.

There are..."significant" factors involved in all of this for the particles to reach the US. Even if they did the parts of particles within the air would be so low imho that it would have the equivalency of a day in the sun or an x-ray. It won't be the same as standing right next to the reactor receiving that MASSIVE dosage of radiation or being within 10 to 50miles of it. Looked up info online about the Fukusima Dai-ichi plant and it's a light water reactor that uses a MOX fuel blend (Mixed Oxide).

Only thing I can say is that MOX stuff is nasty using Plutonium and varying forms of Uranium.

The plant was old, and was due to be decommissioned this year.

Listen to DEFRON everyone, he speaks much wisdom.

It didn't go and break due to the earthquake or the tsunami - though those were contributing factors. Plus, the hydrogen explosions that have been occurring may have damaged the containment vessel. No one is sure, however.

First, if by "new" you mean "40 year old tech" then yeah. The nuclear plant that is having all the major problems is 40+ years old. And none of the safety procedures were broken by the earthquake - the problem was when the big diesel generators that provide power to the cooling systems (to pump water into the containment vessel - again something done away with in current reactor designs) failed due to the tsunami water breaking them. If it had only been an earthquake, there would be no problem.

The reactor was shut down - all the control rods were put into place. The issue was the plant's old cooling system that relied on generators and such to run - the reason that broke was because of the tsunami water overloading the generators, which allowed the nuclear fuel to get hotter.

Not really. The earthquake itself was not the issue. The combination of old technology (the cooling system design) and bad luck (an earthquake and a tsunami at the same time) was the major issue. If the plant had been built in the last 10-20 years, there would be no problem, since a lot more safety systems in modern nuclear plants are passive - i.e. no electricity is needed for them to work.

"Earthquakes don't kill people, buildings kill people." Anyway, a meltdown that leaks out radiation will cause a lot of problems. Maybe not outright immediate lethality, but definitely detrimental effects (some of which are lethal, such as cancer) that last long after the initial incident and affect people that weren't even near the incident.

@Reneer: thanks for the clarification. I don't know much about nuclear power plant technology, I suppose I should brush up on that a bit. But, yes, old infrastructure sounds like it is definitely a huge risk factor (same goes for the recent spate of natural gas pipeline explosions).

:banghead: <-- Not directed at you, just the general misinformation about nuclear power

If they aren't near the incident, they definitely won't be effected by the radiation leak.

The US already had a meltdown: 3 mile island. No damage to the people living nearby, hell, there wasn't even a mandatory evacuation because it wasn't an issue. I think radiation levels reached 10000 times normal, but that still was only enough to count as getting an x-ray or two. No damage to the ecosystem in the long-run, no damage to the population, and the only material damage was that the station that melted down was inoperable from then on. They even continued operating the station right next to it.

To exemplify just how silly the fear of civilian nuclear power plants is: The Navy uses nuclear power in countless ships and submarines. Things that get shot at while carrying countless tons of explosive ordinance and conventional fuel. No worries whatsoever.

Odd how no one seems to notice that amidst all the doom-stories of explosions and leaks and "experts" declaring catastrophe, none of these things are actually coming from Japan.

the media is getting on my nerves with their histrionics...