Wherever the wind carries me

An update on the decaying situation at Fukushima Daiichi (福島第一) nuclear power plant ...

For those of you at home watching or reading, here's what's happened with the evacuation zone in Fukushima: The Japanese government started with a 20 km radius and then then increased that to 30 km. Now the US government is tell its citizens within a 50 mile (80 km) radius of the Fukushima Daiichi (福島第一) nuclear power plant to evacuate. In addition, the Embassy also addresses the constantly changing nature of the problem:

We want to underscore that there are numerous factors in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami, including weather, wind direction and speed, and the nature of the reactor problem that affect the risk of radioactive contamination within this 50 mile (80 km) radius or the possibility of lower-level radioactive materials reaching greater distances.

This truly is a situation changing minute by minute. When you wake up in the morning, you can't help but wonder which way the wind is blowing (and when that might change). Such thoughts, regardless of the data available, these thoughts come to mind uninvited.

The State Department's move to recommend extending the evacuation zone raises some important questions. They are clearly being careful to avoid inciting or fueling panic by rashly advising citizens to evacuate Kanto. Given the relatively large US citizen population in Kanto (just in the Tokyo area alone), you can imagine what such a recommendation would cause. I don't mean to belittle the embassies that have already advised their citizens leave Kanto if possible; the foreign national population of represented by those embassies in Kanto is comparatively small. And to those who have left (or will leave) Tokyo or Kanto, I understand your decision. You have your family and friends to think about. It is not an easy decision to make. To those of you who have decided to stay (for now), I understand your decision. You have your family and friends to think about. It is not an easy decision to make. As I said, no matter how rational or irrational concerns of radiation in Tokyo/Chiba were, are, or will become, you cannot help but wonder about these things and what a "worst case scenario" might look like. Most of the time you're thinking about this while the ground beneath you is shaking yet again as another quake rolls through. There is so much conflicting information in the media. It's been hard to find food in a lot of places. Rice is sold out almost everywhere. I listened to some Japanese reports that said supplies should be back to normal by next week. Hopefully for everyone that's reliable. Obviously a mass exodus from Tokyo would be a crisis in and of itself. Can you imagine?

Even the Japanese are starting to get a little paranoid. For the past month or so, many people have been suffering from hay fever. For some reason, I'm unaffected. Surgical masks are a common sight. The belief is that wearing the masks will help alleviate some of the irritation. Today I noticed a lot of students wearing masks as well, so I asked some of them if their hay fever was worsening...a couple of them told me that they were wearing the masks because to prevent breathing in 被爆 (radiation exposure). Even here in Narashino the calm Japanese nerve is starting to wear a little thin. People go six grocery stores and start to worry, because they can't find rice, milk, or noodles. Too many students at my school still don't have running water. Parents are worrying, but they're still sending their kids to school.

Narashino is about 132 miles (~212.4 km) from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. I`ve made a map to help people get a sense of the distance:

The point you see in the middle is the Tokai nuclear power plant. Things there are now safe. The northernmost blue point at the end of the line (in the shadow of the text box) marks the location of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

The most recent radiation levels for my area posted on Chiba prefecture's site are not alarming. It is reassuring that there are now official readings oF radiation levels made public by the surrounding prefectures.

Exhausted workers are struggling to cool the No. 2 reactor there, and are having trouble with fires in reactors 2 and 4. From what I understand the spent fuel pools are burning and that water is evaporating, exposing more and more of the rods to the atmosphere. The self-defense force along with the US military has been unable to get close enough to do anything about it because of surging radiation levels around the reactors. One attempted operation was to drop water from above the burning reactor building via a helicopter. They had to abort immediately after takeoff. Right now it looks like they're going to try to extinguish the fires from the ground with the water cannons of fire trucks. There have already been official reports of elevated radiation levels in at least one city in Fukushima. From what experts are saying, these levels are not yet harmful. Whether or not this is true one must ask why the radiation levels in drinking water are elevated. If the levels are indeed low, then could they be due to airborne particulates accumulating on intake water's surface? Or is it something more serious? I won't speculate because I don't want to alarm others without reason. The water table itself is indeed elevated, due to the many quakes and the tsunami.

There has also been a great deal of talk in the Japanese media about the containment vessel being breached. This is worrying, but not so shocking when you consider the forces at work: the many large quakes in the area, the hydrogen explosions, high pressures/temperatures, etc. When we talk about a breach in the containment vessel, do we mean the inner container or the outer container? Given the information available (pressure loss, radiation levels, etc), it seems likely that the outer container (a concrete shell) of at least one reactor has almost certainly been breached, but what about the inner container? What is the extent/size of the breach? Unfortunately no one can get close enough to inspect and the structural integrity in detail.

The US Embassy is clearly analyzing all the data they can access and using it to make rational decisions to try to keep US citizen safe. Will the Japanese government soon follow up with a similar order? This is concerning as this is the first time so far in this crisis that the US Embassy in Tokyo has deviated from the Japanese government's recommendations. At this point they're being more cautious than Japanese government, and perhaps relying more heavily on their own intelligence. The US is sending military personnel and experts to help address the problems at the plant, but who knows what's next? The nuclear crisis is indeed escalating.