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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Fukushima Daiichi Reactors Update |
| 2011-03-20 |
| Progress restoring power to the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant has apparently stalled after a full day of work Sunday, although the situation has not deteriorated any further. "Stalled"? The situation has been getting worse since shortly after the tsunami. IMHO if the situation has not deteriorated any further, that is real progress. After stringing a new power line to the plant from the electric grid, company officials reported on Saturday that they had reconnected coolant pumps in reactor Nos. 5 and 6 and restored the flow of water to the spent fuel cooling pools in those buildings. In the day since, temperatures in those pools have returned to near normal. But those two pools had not been considered a significant threat. NONE of the Fukushima pools were at first considered a significant threat. Then some of them suddenly BECAME significant threats. Yomiuri Shimbun: TEPCO also drilled holes in the roofs of the buildings housing the Nos. 5 and 6 reactors to prevent hydrogen explosions. Photo at the LA Times site of a tank loaded on a flatbed truck, caption: A military tank that will be used to clear rubble from the Fukushima nuclear complex leaves Camp Asaka on a trailer. (Takehiko Kobayashi / Yomiuri Shimbun / March 20, 2011) Took long enough. I imagine a tank is particularly well-suited for that job since it is most likely designed to protect its crew while working in a radioactive environment. Doesn't the US or the SDF have amphibious vessels that could have delivered the tank to Fukushima several days ago? The impression has been forming of TEPCO moving very slowly and retroactively to deal with or prevent problems that were easy to foresee. Getting huge emergency generators to Fukushima Daiichi seems to have been possible & desirable in the first couple of days after the tsunami before the overheating & explosions started, but this wasn't done. |
| Posted by:Anguper Hupomosing9418 |