Japan to Stuxnet: How Long Have You Been Standing There?

New cybervirus found in Japan / Stuxnet designed to attack off-line servers via USB memory sticks  From Daily Yomiuri Online.  Excerpts:

Stuxnet, a computer virus designed to attack servers isolated from the Internet, such as at power plants, has been confirmed on 63 personal computers in Japan since July, according to major security firm Symantec Corp.

The virus does not cause any damage online, but once it enters an industrial system, it can send a certain program out of control.

After Stuxnet finds its way onto an ordinary computer via the Internet, it hides there, waiting for a USB memory stick to be connected to the computer, when it transfers itself to the memory stick. When the USB device is then connected to a computer linked to an isolated server, it can enter the system and take control of it.
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According to the security company, the virus is designed to target a German-made program often used in systems managing water, gas and oil pipelines. The program is used at public utilities around the world, including in Japan.

Was The Japanese Nuclear Crisis Compounded By The Stuxnet Worm?   Room Eight offers the Stuxnet virus as "crazy Pit Bull who didn't mean to attack" Japan, but did.  Horrible, but accidental.

Maybe. This one sounds more curious in a more conspiratorial light.. 10 Germans flee Japan's quake-hit nuclear plant.  Stuxnet targets Siemens equipment, which is German made..

Not to mention this little nugget from Slovenia.  Slovene nuclear plant fails to restart

I'm not sure if any of this can be combined or valid, but with Japan's opaque attitude towards public information, this theory, while thin at the moment, might not be later.  Consider this a bookmark.  If more evidence arises, we'll revisit.

Mayan Ninth Wave First Night, March 27, 2011

March 9, 2011 - Carl Johan Calleman on the 7th Day and 9th Level  Video

The first day of this wave began with an X-Class Flare, followed by Japan Triple Crisis, followed by outside intervention in Libya, combined with further, and serious, destabilization in the Middle East.  Throw into the mix the collapse of the Portuguese government, the imminent financial collapse of the EU, America, Japan and a major portion of the inter-related Asian markets, and the concept of evolving consciousness arising or manifesting from material reality's destruction becomes easier to not only understand as possibility, but to conceptualize the implications of what that possibility might mean..

Japan Quake: Latest Updates, March 25, 2011

Lack of data from Japan distresses nuclear experts.  From The Los Angeles Times/found it on Rense.  Excerpts:

How did Japanese workers at the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant jury-rig fire hoses to cool damaged reactors? Is contaminated water from waste pools overflowing into the Pacific Ocean? Exactly who is the national incident commander?

The answers to these and many other questions are unclear to U.S. nuclear scientists and policy experts, who say the quality and quantity of information coming out of Japan has left gaping holes in their understanding of the disaster nearly two weeks after it began.

At the same time, they say, the depth of the crisis has clearly been growing, judging by releases of radioactivity that by some measures have reached half the level of those released in the Chernobyl accident of 1986, according to new analysis by European and American scientists.
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"Information sharing has not been in the culture of Tepco or the Japanese government," said Najmedin Meshkati, a USC engineering professor who has advised federal agencies on nuclear safety issues. "This issue is larger than one utility and one country. It is an international crisis."
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Masaru Tamamoto, a professor of Asian and Middle Eastern studies at the University of Cambridge in Britain, said the handling of the crisis by Japanese government and corporate authorities is consistent with a culture that carefully guards information from the public and leaves decisions in the hands of anonymous bureaucrats.

Japan, Tamamoto said, lacks a nonprofit sector of government watchdog organizations that work closely with the news media to investigate and publicize government coverups. It leaves the public comfortably reliant on official pronouncements, he said.

"The public lives this way every day, and that's the way things are," Tamamoto said. "Even if you demanded the information, nobody has the information. Even the prime minister blurted out at one point that he didn't have information."

Tamamoto said that even significant nuclear contamination in the country might not be enough to prompt a change in this highly controlled and guarded bureaucracy, adding, "If this doesn't do it, I can't imagine what else would do it."

A crisis of leadership, too:  The many-headed catastrophe points to deeper-seated problems in governing Japan  From The Economist.  Excerpts:

Yet, this month’s disasters underscore how much more the system still needs to change—along with the politicians guiding it. For one, the fiasco at Fukushima Dai-ichi has revealed, again, the cosy ties between the nuclear industry and government. Together, they have stifled debate, covered up bungles and made assumptions about risks that were too optimistic. The crisis management at TEPCO, the plant’s owner, has laid bare an astounding lack of leadership. “What the hell’s going on?” (Prime Minister)Mr Kan demanded at one point.

The same might be asked of the operation to get help to the tsunami victims. For all that Mr Kan has attempted to be seen at the front, in Tokyo the sense of a looming humanitarian crisis in the north has been slow to sink in. That is partly because nuclear worries have absorbed much of the government’s attention. Few politicians in a centralised system have bothered to travel north themselves. The media, taking their cue from the Tokyo establishment, have not thought properly to report the unfolding struggle for food and fuel.

Level of radioactive iodine in Tokyo water supply falls  (For now..)  From Boston.com.  Excerpts:

 Levels of a radioactive isotope found in Tokyo’s water supply fell by more than half yesterday, testing below the country’s stringent maximum for infants, even as three workers at the stricken nuclear plant to the north suffered radiation burns as they struggled to make emergency repairs.   

The lowered readings in Tokyo’s water came hours after Yukio Edano, the chief Cabinet secretary, said the isotope, iodine 131, had been detected in the water supply of Kawaguchi City, just north of Tokyo, as well as those of two of Tokyo’s neighboring prefectures, Chiba and Saitama. On Wednesday, authorities cautioned those in the affected area not to give infants tap water.
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The warning Wednesday over the heightened levels of iodine 131, which can accumulate in the thyroid and cause cancer, set off widespread anxiety and a run on bottled water emptied store shelves in Tokyo. Yesterday morning, the authorities were distributing water for the estimated 80,000 children less than 1 year old in the area and considering importing bottled water. The authorities said frequent rains might have washed radiation into Tokyo’s watershed, which lies mostly north and northeast of the city.

Emissions from the plant have largely blown east; elevated levels of iodine 131 and another dangerous isotope, cesium 137, were found 18 miles off the coast, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Japan nuclear plant to take a month to fix  From SBS.com (With Video)  Excerpt:

The death toll from Japan's worst post-war disaster topped 10,000 as the operator of a radiation-belching nuclear plant warned that work to stabilise it may take another month.

To..  Stabilize.. May take..  Another..  Month.

2 nuclear plant workers hospitalized.  From NHK.  Excerpts:

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency says the workers were standing on a flooded basement floor while working to reconnect power lines in the turbine building adjacent to the reactor. As a result, their feet were exposed to 170 to 180 millisieverts of radiation.
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The maximum level of radiation exposure allowed for nuclear plant workers in Japan is normally 100 millisieverts. But the health and labor ministry has recently raised that limit to 250 millisieverts for emergency crews at the Fukushima plant.

Japan Nuclear Plant Reactor Core May Be Breached, Reactor #3  From The Intel Hub via Godlike Productions.  Excerpts:

Japanese nuclear safety officials said Friday that they suspect that the reactor core at one unit of the troubled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant may have breached, raising the possibility of more severe contamination to the environment.

Tap water crisis spreads to Chiba, Saitama  From The Japan Times via Godlike.  Excerpts:

The scope of radiation-contaminated tap water expanded Thursday, with radioactive iodine detected in tap water in Chiba and Saitama prefectures, while the Tokyo Metropolitan Government, which said the day before its drinking water was contaminated, scurried to distribute 240,000 bottles of water to households with babies.

Chiba authorities urged parents not to give tap water to infants less than 1 year old. Saitama refrained, at least initially, from taking similar measures after the level of iodine fell below the regulated limit later Thursday.

The moves followed the Tokyo government's finding Wednesday that the level of radioactive iodine in tap water from samples taken Tuesday exceeded the central government's recommended limit for infants.

On Thursday, however, the metropolitan government lifted the alert after radioactive iodine in tap water at the purification plant in Katsushika Ward dropped below the alert level for infants, officials said. Depending on the course of events, however, the alert could be reinstated, they said.

Portugal Rejects Budget: Government Collapses, Prime Minister Resigns. Europe Gasps Simultaneously..

Portuguese Premier Resigns After Austerity Is Rejected. 

Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates submitted his resignation Wednesday after parliament rejected his minority Socialist government's latest austerity measures.

The rejection "had taken away from the government all conditions to govern," Socrates said in a televised statement. He said his government would remain in power in a caretaker capacity.

The parliament's rejection of austerity measures—as well as Socrates' resignation—comes just a day before a European summit.

Socrates has said rejection of the austerity plan would force the debt-laden country to follow Greece and Ireland and seek an international bailout, which he opposes.

Brendan Keenan: Kenny will have to pull new plan out of bag as chaos descends  From The Independent.ie..

ENDA Kenny packed his bags for one EU summit in Brussels, but it looks as though he will be attending a very different one.


As the old political saying has it, events have taken over. The plans of EU leaders have been thrown into disarray by even more bad news from Ireland's banks; the imminent collapse of Portugal's government; and stern resistance to bigger bailouts from those flinty Finns.

Mr Kenny's stated purpose at the meeting -- to secure a reduction in the interest rate on the €80bn EU/IMF rescue fund -- now looks irrelevant. Instead, according to reports in Brussels, there may be a special summit as early as next week just to deal with Ireland's difficulties.

The reason seems to be that new estimates for losses at the Irish banks are going to be worse than even the €35bn allowed for in the EU-IMF loan package could cover. These "stress test" figures are not due until next week, but it may be that they will render the original plan unworkable.

EU leaders to delay eurozone rescue deal  From Euractiv.com.  Excerpts:

A government collapse in Portugal and political tensions in other member states means EU leaders are set to postpone until June a decision to reform the euro zone and boost the bloc's bailout facility as they meet for a crucial economic summit in Brussels today and tomorrow (24-25 March).

Today's summit has long been sold as a deadline for leaders to sign off on a swathe of economic reforms including boosting guarantees for its temporary bailout fund, the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), which has already been used for Greece and Ireland.

It was also branded as the summit that will finalise a permanent rescue fund after 2013 - the European Stability Mechanism.

But in light of recent political developments in Portugal, Finland and Germany, both of these goals have been put in jeopardy, EU diplomats say.
And:
Adding to the euro zone's woes, Germany put the brakes on a deal for the ESM on Wednesday as it revealed it could not foot payments it had committed to make in 2013. And Finland said it would resist raising the EFSF's ceiling before elections scheduled on 17 April.

"Those providing the guarantees cannot, and those who may soon need a bailout may not be able to request one," an EU diplomat said yesterday, alluding to Finnish resistance to the EFSF and a political meltdown in Portugal preventing it from requesting a bailout.

There will be many more headlines regarding Europe's economy--soon.

Japan Quake: Latest Updates, March 24, 2011

Pressure rises inside No.1 reactor container  From NHK World.  Excerpts:

Tokyo Electric Power Company is taking measures to reduce pressure inside the No.1 reactor containment vessel at the troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.

The power company began injecting more water into the No.1 reactor on Wednesday, after temperatures on the reactor surface reached about 400 degrees Celsius, exceeding the safety limit of 302 degrees.

First pictures emerge of the Fukushima Fifty as steam starts pouring from all four reactors at the stricken nuclear power plant  From The Daily Mail/found it on Rense.  Excerpts:

The darkness is broken only by the flashing torchlight of the heroes who stayed behind.

These first images of inside the stricken Fukushima Dai-Ichi power plant reveal the terrifying conditions under which the brave men work to save their nation from full nuclear meltdown.

The Fukushima Fifty - an anonymous band of lower and mid-level managers - have battled around the clock to cool overheating reactors and spent fuel rods since the disaster on March 11.

Neutron beam observed 13 times at crippled Fukushima nuke plant  From Japan Today/from Rense.

Tokyo Electric Power Co said Wednesday it has observed a neutron beam, a kind of radioactive ray, 13 times on the premises of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant after it was crippled by the massive March 11 quake-tsunami disaster.

TEPCO, the operator of the nuclear plant, said the neutron beam measured about 1.5 kilometers southwest of the plant’s No. 1 and 2 reactors over three days from March 13 and is equivalent to 0.01 to 0.02 microsieverts per hour and that this is not a dangerous level.

The utility firm said it will measure uranium and plutonium, which could emit a neutron beam, as well.

But the measured neutron beam may be evidence that uranium and plutonium leaked from the plant’s nuclear reactors and spent nuclear fuels have discharged a small amount of neutron beams through nuclear fission.

What price do you put on nuclear power and who is lying? - Part 6  From Eyre International.  Excerpts:

I guess the other issue here, from my perspective, is the fact that we observed a huge explosion that certainly went high into the atmosphere and that explosion carried radioactive particles that contained Alpha rays that could not be detected, not forgetting the spent fuel rods that also went up in the air to a height of around 3000 feet!!! The very fact that such a large amount of spent fuel rods were kept on site and next to the reactors is in itself a crime.

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This catastrophic ongoing disaster continues to emit vast amount of radioactive contamination into our atmosphere and the authorities and the IAEA continue to play along this game of “Can we fix it or not”……the answer is clearly “No they cannot.” It has already gone beyond meltdown and cannot be neutralized to any safe level.

I think this in actual fact is far worse that Chernobyl in that at least after some time they entombed the entire plant. However, at Fukushima they continue to leave the plant exposed to the outside environment to contaminate no only the atmosphere but also the sea that surrounds Japan.
If this is correct, well..  That's it.

Will JPMorgan Now Make and Take 'Delivery' of Its Own Silver Shorts?

From Seeking Alpha.  Excerpts:

There is nothing inherently wrong and certainly nothing "illegal" about J.P. Morgan Chase (JPM) gaining a vault license for storing and taking delivery of gold/silver/platinum/palladium from the futures markets known as NYMEX/COMEX. However, the speed, timing and manner in which the exchanges just granted it troubles us.
The process of being approved as a licensed vault or weigh-master/assayer for the NYMEX/COMEX futures exchange usually involves a careful security inspection of the vaults, a full report of that inspection, and a completely transparent package submitted to the U.S. Commodity Futures Exchange Commission (CFTC) for approval. This process will ordinarily consume considerably more than 45 days. Apparently, such correct and careful practices apply only to banks and independent storage facilities that are not J.P. Morgan Chase.
Some vault operators are more equal than others. JPM appears immune from processes that everyone else must suffer through. On March 15, 2011, the Commodity Exchange (COMEX) and the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) advised the CFTC that they had approved .P. Morgan's application to become a licensed vault facility, using a "self-certification" process. The newly licensed vault, located at 1 Chase Manhattan Plaza, NY, NY, is ready to roll as both “weighmaster” and depository, for delivery of gold, silver, platinum and palladium contracts, as of March 17, 2011, two days later.

Silver's prospects in the near term..

Kitco chart(and where I found the previous article) courtesy Urban Survival.

Silver surged above $37 an ounce to a 31 year high  From FXStreet.com.  Excerpts:

Precious Metals: Gold rose for a sixth consecutive session as prices neared a record high. Spot gold’s record high of $1444.40 an ounce was set on March 7 previously. Unrest in Libya and the Middle East and Europe’s lingering debt crisis spurred demand for the precious metal as an alternative investment. Record low U.S. new home sales also increased speculation of extended central banks' accommodative policies. Silver surged above $37 an ounce to a 31 year high. Year to date, silver has outperformed gold, gaining over 20% compared to gold that is up just 1%.

Bullish momentum favoring gold, silver  From Commodity Online.  Excerpts:

Chart considerations suggest more upside for gold and silver, says BNP Paribas technical analyst Andrew Chaveriat. Spot silver hit a fresh 31-year high Wednesday.

“Bullish momentum favors a rise to $38.62 mega long-term resistance (76.4% retracement of the structural 1980-1993 decline) and perhaps the $40.00 psychological barrier,” Chaveriat says in a research note.

With everything happening all at once, don't forget to keep an eye on commodities.  It's a very important bellwether.

Remember That Oil Slick From Last Year? No? Well..

New Oil Spill in Gulf ... 100-Mile Slick  Comprehensive post from Washington's Blog. 

The well written point?

Indeed, the oil spills in the Gulf and the existence of unsafe nuclear power plants follow the exact same pattern as the financial crisis: As long as big companies know the government will bail them out if there's a "meltdown" and will help them cover up the scale of the accidents, as well as the fraud and corner-cutting which led to the disaster, they'll keep doing dangerous things which put our economy, our environment and our health at risk.

Japan Quake: Latest Updates, March 23, 2011

NEWS ADVISORY: Repair work halted at reactor No. 2 after 500 millisieverts detected — Temp rising at No. 1  From Energy News.  Short, and to the point.


What They're Covering Up at Fukushima  From Counterpunch.  Doom.  Doom.  Excerpts:


Hirose Takashi has written a whole shelf full of books, mostly on the nuclear power industry and the military-industrial complex.  Probably his best known book is  Nuclear Power Plants for Tokyo in which he took the logic of the nuke promoters to its logical conclusion: if you are so sure that they're safe, why not build them in the center of the city, instead of hundreds of miles away where you lose half the electricity in the wires?


..while it made sense to oppose nuclear power back then, now that the disaster has begun he would just as soon remain silent, but the lies they are telling on the radio and TV are so gross that he cannot remain silent.


After reading his account, you will wonder, why do they keep on sprinkling water on the reactors, rather than accept the sarcophagus solution  [ie., entombing the reactors in concrete. Editors.] I think there are a couple of answers.  One, those reactors were expensive, and they just can't bear the idea of that huge a financial loss.  But more importantly, accepting the sarcophagus solution means admitting that they were wrong, and that they couldn't fix the things.


Excerpts from television interview:


Yo:  Today many people saw water being sprayed on the reactors from the air and from the ground, but is this effective?


Hirose:  . . . If you want to cool a reactor down with water, you have to circulate the water inside and carry the heat away, otherwise it has no meaning. So the only solution is to reconnect the electricity.  Otherwise it’s like pouring water on lava.


Yo:  It will take 1300 tons of water to fill the pools that contain the spent fuel rods in reactors 3 and 4.  This morning 30 tons.  Then the Self Defense Forces are to hose in another 30 tons from five trucks.  That’s nowhere near enough, they have to keep it up.  Is this squirting of water from hoses going to change the situation?


Hirose:  In principle, it can’t.  Because even when a reactor is in good shape, it requires constant control to keep the temperature down to where it is barely safe.  Now it’s a complete mess inside, and when I think of the 50 remaining operators, it brings tears to my eyes.  I assume they have been exposed to very large amounts of radiation, and that they have accepted that they face death by staying there.
..
If I were Prime Minister Kan, I would order them to do what the Soviet Union did when the Chernobyl reactor blew up, the sarcophagus solution, bury the whole thing under cement, put every cement company in Japan to work, and dump cement over it from the sky.  Because you have to assume the worst case.  Why?  Because in Fukushima there is the Daiichi Plant with six reactors and the Daini Plant with four for a total of ten reactors.  If even one of them develops the worst case, then the workers there must either evacuate the site or stay on and collapse.  So if, for example, one of the reactors at Daiichi goes down, the other five are only a matter of time.  We can’t know in what order they will go, but certainly all of them will go.  And if that happens, Daini isn’t so far away, so probably the reactors there will also go down.  Because I assume that workers will not be able to stay there.


I’m speaking of the worst case, but the probability is not low..

Tokyo says radiation in tap water above limit  From Chron.com/found it on Godlike Productions..  Excerpts:

Tokyo Water Bureau officials say levels of radioactive iodine in some city tap water is two times the recommended limit for infants.

The officials told reporters Wednesday that a water treatment center in downtown Tokyo that supplies much of the city's tap water found that some water contained 210 becquerels per liter of iodine 131.

They said the limit for consumption of iodine 131 for infants is 100 becquerels per liter. They recommended that babies not be given tap water, although they said the water is not an immediate health risk for adults.

US bars some Japan foods over radiation fears  From Raw Story.  Excerpts:

The United States has announced it was barring some food imports from Japan due to fears of radiation and nuclear contamination in the wake of an earthquake and tsunami disaster.

The US Food and Drug Administration said it had placed an import alert on all milk, milk products, fresh vegetables and fruits from certain regions.

This means that no products of these types from the prefectures of Fukushima, Ibaraki, Tochigi and Gunma can enter the United States without first being shown to be safe.

Asian Stocks Retreat on Iodine in Tokyo Tap Water, Reactor Woes  From Bloomberg/Found it on Rense.com

Asian stocks fell, with the regional benchmark index set for its first loss in four days, after levels of iodine unsafe for infants were reported in Tokyo tap water as worked struggled to reconnect power to a damaged nuclear reactor.
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“Investor focus has moved to the medium-term consequences of the natural disaster to the Japanese and global economies,” said Tim Schroeders, a money manager in Melbourne at Sydney- based Pengana Capital Ltd., which manages about $1 billion.
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“There are still a lot of uncertainties surrounding the nuclear fallout, as well as aftershocks, and we won’t be seeing a stable market for a while,” said Yoshinori Nagano, a senior strategist in Tokyo at Daiwa Asset Management Co., which oversees about $104 billion. “No one thinks the nuclear crisis has ended completely.”

File Under:  Logical, in a World Gone Mad..  Japan's mafia among the first to organise and deliver aid  From Asia News Network/found it on Rense.  Excerpts:

The worst of times sometimes brings out the best in people - even in Japan's mafia, the yakuza.

The Daily Beast news website said that hours after the first shock waves hit, two of the largest crime groups went into action, opening their offices to those stranded in Tokyo and shipping food, water and blankets to the devastated areas.

The website reported that the day after the earthquake, the Inagawa-kai (the third-largest organised crime group in Japan) sent 25 trucks filled with paper diapers, instant ramen, batteries, torches, drinks and other essentials to the Tohoku region.

The Daily Beast said an executive in Sumiyoshi-kai, the second-largest crime group, even offered refuge to members of the foreign community - something unheard-of in a still slightly xenophobic nation, especially among the right-wing yakuza, the website said.

The Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's largest crime group, has also opened its offices across the country to the public and has been sending truckloads of supplies, but very quietly and without any fanfare, the website said.
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But this is not the first time the yakuza have displayed a humanitarian impulse. In 1995, after the Kobe earthquake, the Yamaguchi-gumi was one of the most responsive forces on the ground, quickly getting supplies to the affected areas and distributing them to the local people.

The Daily Beast said that, admittedly, much of those supplies were paid for with money from years of shaking down the people in the area, and that the yakuza are certainly not unaware of the public relations factor.

And yet, they're actually doing something.

Toyota and Honda extend auto shutdowns  From The Detroit Free Press.  Short answer:  Saturday at the very earliest for Toyota, Sunday for Honda, but really, probably much later..

Japan quake: 9,300 dead, 13,786 missing  From Sify news.com  Excerpts:

 The devastating earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan on March 11 have left 9,301 people dead, while at least 13,786 were still unaccounted for till Wednesday morning, Xinhua reported citing the National Police Agency.

Fukushima Nuclear Accident Update Log

Meanwhile In European Financial Crisis News..

Protests continue in Croatia   From World Socialist Web Site.  Excerpts: 

Since late February, continual protests involving thousands of people have been waged in many cities and towns throughout Croatia. Young people, in particular, are demanding the resignation of the right-wing government led by Prime Minister Jadranka Kosor. Workers and farmers are protesting against low wages, horrific working conditions and the precarious situation in the former Yugoslav autonomous republic.

Underlying the protests is the deteriorating social situation. Croatia was hit hard by the financial crisis, which the Kosor government met with a brutal austerity programme involving a drastic reduction in wages and benefits. The economy shrank by 1.4 percent in 2010, and the unemployment rate reached 19.6 percent. The unions say the wages of 70,000 employees are not being paid.

Demonstrations were held in several Croatian cities on Saturday, March 5. About 1,500 participants assembled in the northern Croatian town of Varazdin, according to the Hina news agency. The co-organiser of the protest, Denis Mladenovic, said, “We do not want a state in which the workers work without getting paid, in which they end up on the street after working for their firm for 20 years, and in which young people are left with no perspective.”

Lisbon bail-out talk agitates eurozone debt  From Financial Times.  Excerpts:

A vote on the Portuguese minority government’s austerity package is expected on Wednesday. The main opposition says it won’t back the measures and this could lead to prime minister José Sócrates’s resignation.


Euro zone finance ministers have agreed the terms of a permanent EU rescue fund.

Euro zone finance ministers have agreed the terms of a permanent EU rescue fund which increases the effective lending capacity of the current arrangements.

In the wake of the Greek debt crisis, Europe produced a huge rescue mechanism designed to shore up the single currency and to convince the markets that the euro would be defended.

But almost one year on, the markets have not been reassured and the €750 billion fund has already been tapped by Ireland, with Portugal looking increasingly vulnerable.

Portugal faces deadlock over debt crisis  From Boston.com.  Excerpts:

Just as Portugal appeared to have dodged a bailout like those taken by Greece and Ireland, a domestic political spat yesterday was set to worsen its financial troubles and possibly spoil Europe’s efforts to put the sovereign debt crisis behind it.

Portugal’s main opposition parties told the beleaguered minority government they will not budge from their refusal to endorse a new set of austerity measures designed to ease a huge debt burden that is crippling the economy.

The new steps are likely to be rejected in a parliamentary vote expected tomorrow and the timing could not be worse. A defeat in the vote, Prime Minister José Sócrates warned, would trigger his government’s resignation, plunging Portugal into at least two months of political limbo just as officials were hoping to boost investor confidence in the country’s future.

Japan Quake: Latest Updates, March 22, 2011

Japan quake loaded stress on fault closer to Tokyo  From myway.com/Found it on Rense..

The recent monster quake that hit northeastern Japan altered the earth's surface, geologists say, loading stress onto a different segment of the fault line much closer to Tokyo.

Experts are quick to point out that this doesn't mean a powerful earthquake is necessarily about to strike the Japanese capital. Even if it did, the structure of the tectonic plates and fault lines around the city makes it unlikely that Tokyo would be hit by a quake anywhere near the intensity of the 9.0-magnitude one that struck March 11, said Roger Musson of the British Geological Survey

But, given the vast population - Tokyo and its surroundings are home to 39 million people - any strong temblor could be devastating.

"Even if you've got, let's say, a 7.5, that would be serious," the seismologist said.
 
Contractors Rush in as Kan Pledges to Rebuild After Japan Quake  From Bloomberg, on Rense..

Japanese contractors have rushed workers, generators and equipment to areas devastated by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that damaged or destroyed more than 110,000 buildings and may have killed 20,000 people.

“We’ve had many, many requests” for floodlights, power equipment and construction gear since the temblor, said Takashi Yamada, a spokesman for Osaka-based Nishio Rent All Co. “We’re just sorry we don’t have enough stock for everyone.”

The government has asked companies such as Daiwa House Industry Co. to supply more than 30,000 temporary houses within two months to help shelter the 350,000 people now in evacuation centers. Prime Minister Naoto Kan has also pledged to “rebuild from scratch” following the magnitude-9 quake and tsunami that damaged about 1,500 roads, 48 bridges and 15 railways, according to the National Police Agency.

Smoke spews from 2 reactors at stricken Japanese nuclear plant  From CNN/found on Rense.  Excerpts:

What appeared to be smoke was rising Tuesday from two adjacent reactors in the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, a nuclear safety official said.

Smoke spewed Monday from the same reactors, setbacks that came despite fervent efforts to prevent the further release of radioactive materials at the stricken facility.

Hidehiko Nishiyama, an official with Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, said smoke was rising from the plant's No. 2 and No. 3 reactors. It was not immediately clear why.

Japan Tsunami Delaying Chevy Volt Production   

Japan’s “gusher”: A world crisis?   From the PPJ Gazette/found on Before It's News.  Excerpts:

We are watching what will be a slow death for many Japanese as radiation continues to escape from the nuclear reactors.  The question on everyone’s mind is, “Why aren’t they sealing the reactors like they did in Chernobyl?”  Who in their right mind tries to shower an increasingly unstable nuclear reactor with sea water in an attempt to cool the core when millions of lives are at stake not only in Japan, but also around the world as leaked radiation is carried into the jet stream?  And what if efforts to cool the reactors aren’t successful?  This is a question almost too unbearable to contemplate.

Walkom: Forget meltdowns. The real nuclear problem is waste  From The Star.com.

For Canada, the danger of nuclear power lies not in a Japanese-style meltdown. When industry boosters say such an event is unlikely here, they are right.

But what the boosters don’t talk about is radioactive waste. That’s the main hazard, the part of the nuclear question that has never been properly addressed. No one knows what to do with nuclear fuel rods that remain highly radioactive for thousands of years.

The industry talks of burying them. But this is not a real solution. Sealed containers leak. Ground shifts. Over decades, unforeseen events occur.

Fukushima Status Update Monday PM Edition  Loong, but detailed piece.  Good, but be warned..

Japan fears food contamination as battle to cool nuclear plant continues  From The Guardian UK.  Excerpts:

The operation to cool the reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant has suffered a minor setback after smoke and vapour was seen rising from two reactors, as anxiety grew over the safety of food produced in the area.
Days after authorities reported abnormal levels of radiation in milk, some vegetables and tap water, the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power [Tepco] said high levels of radioactivity had been found in seawater near the facility, raising fears that seafood has also been contaminated.

The power company said seawater samples contained levels of radioactive iodine 126.7 times the allowed limit, and caesium 24.8 times over. The firm said the quantities posed no immediate threat to health.
As with most radiation contamination, quantities usually don't pose An Immediate Threat To Health.  Mostly, Later..
..
The source of the contamination has yet to be established, but officials believe it probably came from the tonnes of seawater that have been sprayed over overheating reactors and fuel rod pools in recent days.

Japan Quake: Latest Updates, March 21, 2011

Japan's catastrophe and the disaster that awaits  From 60 Minutes.  Excerpts:

Scott Pelley and a "60 Minutes" team have been in Japan for over a week, travelling from Tokyo to the port city Sendai to the once-beautiful resort of Matsushima and into the zone surrounding the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant. There, emergency crews are currently struggling to restore cooling and stabilize pressure inside the reactors.

What we have found in Japan is a catastrophe that reveals both the power of nature and the fragility of human technology.
..
The Fukushima Daiichi crisis is not "one" nuclear emergency - it is four potentially catastrophic events standing side-by-side. In all, there are six reactor stations. Numbers one through four are in peril. Last week, crews risked their lives to get water onto melting uranium fuel. Through explosions and blasts of radioactive steam, a few hundred Japanese joined battle with the most powerful force known to man.

Top experts disagree on fundamental questions such as whether melting fuel rods would cause an explosion or just a fire. Answers are critical to planning for a bigger emergency.

"It's just so uncertain. This is unprecedented, you know, uncharted territory that the consequences could be greater than we expect," Nesheiwat said.

And:

The moment that altered the course of Japanese history was when the tsunami inundated about 400 miles of the northern coast.

You can't picture the enormity of it, so "60 Minutes" stopped in one small town called Matsushima. It was said to be among the most beautiful places in Japan, a famous vacation spot. The name has the same ring to a Japanese as Big Sur or Cape Cod does to an American. Matsushima means "Pine Tree Island" - the trees are about all that's left.

Japan Radiation Maximum by Prefecture

Officials Expect 'Ups and Downs' in Reactor Fight  From The Wall Street Journal/Asia, and I found it on Rense.  Excerpts:

Until Tokyo Electric Power Co. fully restores power at the reactors and turns on cooling systems knocked out after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami, it faces continued radiation leakage from spent fuel rods stored at the two reactors. Those fuel rods are stored in pools of water that have been depleted, although Tokyo Electric Power, known as Tepco, says the water hasn't completely disappeared, contrary to some reports.  (So little volume of water could fit that description, right?)

Repeated spraying of water by military and fire-department personnel appears to have raised the water level, but without a permanent solution the rods still could overheat and possibly break apart, spewing more radiation into the air.
..
The operation to connect power to the No. 3 and No. 4 reactors and turn on the standard cooling systems is expected to last at least several days. Until then, some experts believe the rods are at risk of full meltdown, which could damage the containment vessel and cause a radiation release that would dwarf those so far.
..
A separate storage pool for spent fuel rods also is drawing the attention of some Tepco and safety officials. The area, which takes fuel rods from all six reactors, is located near the No. 4 reactor. The pool is nearly full with 6,375 units of fuel, according to Tepco.

Death toll from Japan’s disasters over 8,000; more than 13,000 missing.  From The Washington Post/Found on Rense.  Excerpts:

 The combined toll of those dead and missing after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami surpassed 21,000 Sunday, and new food-contamination reports surfaced as workers continued to try to tame the radiation-spewing Fukushima Daiichi power plant.
And:
With each day there are new recriminations and doubts about the Japanese government’s and Tepco’s response to the March 11 disaster. News reports have raised questions about whether Tepco hesitated to dump seawater on the overheating nuclear reactors because the use of seawater will corrode and ruin these valuable corporate assets. And the government acknowledged that it had been slow in distributing potassium iodide pills to people vulnerable to the invisible atomic clouds emerging from the nuclear plant.

Japan's Refugees Crowd Shelters And Wait  From npr.org.  Excerpt:
As many as 400,000 people in Japan are now displaced due to the earthquake, tsunami and subsequent crisis at the nuclear power plant. Doualy Xaykaothao reports for NPR from Fukushima prefecture, in one of the largest shelters in Koriyama City.

Rich Japan's descent into misery stuns  From The News Herald.  Excerpts:

SHIZUGAWA, Japan (AP) — Bodies are strewn among the knotted skeletons of entire towns. Military helicopters clatter overhead. Survivors who lost everything huddle under blankets in schools-turned-shelters as foreign governments dispatch aid and urge their citizens to flee.


After years spent reporting from desperate and war-torn corners of the world, the scenes I've witnessed here are unsettlingly familiar.

It's the setting that's not.


Here, in one of the richest and most advanced nations on earth, I've found one of most challenging assignments of my career.
..
That first night, it took 14 hours on backroads to cover 180 miles (300 kilometers). When we finally reached the ruined port of Sendai the next morning, we found survivors wearing surgical masks picking through the wrecked junkyard of their annihilated city.

In a tech-savvy society better known for hosting robot marathons, the crisis has produced surreal images, some more apt to appear in a novel about life after a nuclear holocaust: Cut off with no electricity and no phone reception, the hungry and isolated braving long lines outside near-empty grocery stores just to get food; the desperate homeless warming frigid hands in heavy snow above fires fueled by the wooden planks of their own pulverized homes.

In Kesennuma, I saw the hull of a behemoth ship parked inland on a sea of burnt debris beside a wrecked 7-Eleven.

In Shizugawa, a lone Japanese soldier relentlessly swept a small strip of pavement that somehow survived, a futile and slightly bizarre effort considering the entire city surrounding it was reduced to a mashed heap of garbage.  (It the only thing he can control in an uncontrollable nightmare..)
And:
We have survived mostly on snack food — peanuts and potato chips and canned coffee scavenged from mostly empty street-side vending machines. When we found one small food store open, it's dwindling stocks already plundered, we bought everything left that we could fit in our car — raw sausages, dried squid, bread.

Japanese restraint is steeped in a culture of tested resilience  From The Los Angeles Times.  Excerpts:

First a massive earthquake and a devastating tsunami. Now a battle with an out-of-control nuclear reactor facility. How much can one people take?

Though there's obviously a limit to what anyone can bear, cultural features of a society can clearly influence psychological resilience, experts say. As the tragedy drags into a second week, they warn that prolonged stress will lead to heightened trauma for many Japanese people and that levels of sadness and depression will grow.

But right now, as they witness workers risking their lives to bring a crippled nuclear power plant under control or the calm and orderly refugee centers, those who know the culture well says Japan appears to be living up to its reputation for strength and stoicism — a quality they refer to as gaman.
..
The stoicism is deeply rooted in the country's history, says Roland Kelts, a lecturer at the University of Tokyo and author of the 2006 book "Japanamerica." Japan, he notes, has been plagued throughout history by volcanoes, earthquakes, tsunamis and invasions. Disaster and calamities feature commonly in its stories and folk tales. "There is a great deal of pride in the idea that Japan is a long-suffering nation," Kelts says.
And:
"People sometimes make some fun about the rigid societal structures of Japan and how there is so much emphasis on appearance and 'face,' and that you don't show your inner feelings. That is the stereotypical picture," Schaede says. But in times like this, she adds, "that is where they get their strength. This is a helpful feature right now."
..
Though the Japanese have coped remarkably in the early days of the disaster, what happens to their spirit as the weeks and months unfold remains to be seen, Kelts said.

"There is restraint and grace, but there is a certain degree of shellshock," he says. "I think people are still stunned that their world changed in a single afternoon."

Operator of Fukushima nuke plant admitted to faking repair records  From The Herald Sun/found it on Godlike Productions.  Excerpts:

DAYS before Japan plunged into an atomic crisis after a giant earthquake and tsunami knocked out power at the ageing Fukushima nuclear plant, its operator had admitted faking repair records.

The revelation raises fresh questions about both Tokyo, the scandal-tainted past of the Electric Power Co (TEPCO), and the Japanese government's perceived soft regulation of a key industry.

The operator of the Fukushima No 1 plant submitted a report to the country's nuclear watchdog 10 days before the quake hit on March 11, admitting it had failed to inspect 33 pieces of equipment in its six reactors there.

A power board distributing electricity to a reactor's temperature control valves was not examined for 11 years, and inspectors faked records, pretending to make thorough inspections when in fact they were only cursory, TEPCO said.

Look at the results of Limited Government Response.  Little or no Regulations?  Anything goes!  And then.. 

Americans:  You sure you want this shit? 

Japan Quake: Latest Updates, March 20, 2011

Live blog: Japan earthquake  From Al Jazeera, from the beginning.

Officials: Pressure rises again in Japan reactor  From Forbes.  Excerpts:

Japan's nuclear safety agency says pressure is again rising in one of reactors at the country's tsunami-damaged nuclear complex - a setback that means operators will have to vent more radioactive gas into the environment.

Safety agency official Hidehiko Nishiyama said Sunday that efforts to put water in the Unit 3 reactor at the Fukushima Dai-ichi complex might not have been working.

World food supply threatened by Japan nuclear radiation  From Natural News.  Excerpts:

Fallout from the current meltdown occurring at Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, which was hit by the 9.0+ mega earthquake and tsunami last Friday, could contaminate the world's food supply with toxic radiation, say experts. If the plant's radioactive particles get caught in the jet stream and travel the world over, they will end up contaminating crops and grazing fields.

"The explosions could expose the population to longer-term radiation, which can raise the risk of cancer. These are thyroid cancer, bone cancer and leukemia. Children and fetuses are especially vulnerable," said Lam Ching-wan, a chemical pathologist at the University of Hong Kong. "For some individuals even a small amount of radiation can raise the risk of cancer. The higher the radiation, the higher the risk of cancer."

Japan cites radiation in milk, spinach near plant  From MSNBC.  Excerpts:

Japan announced the first signs that contamination from its tsunami-crippled nuclear complex have seeped into the food chain, saying that radiation levels in spinach and milk from farms near the facility exceeded government safety limits.

Japanese officials insisted that the small amounts of radiation — with traces also found in tap water in Tokyo — posed no immediate health threat, and said the situation at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant, while still unpredictable, appeared to be coming under control after near-constant dousing of water to prevent spent fuel rods from burning up.\

Radiation from Japan's Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant reaches California; experts: no health risk  From The New York Daily News.  Excerpts:

 Trace amounts of radiation from Japan's nuclear crisis have reportedly reached California - but they're nowhere near hazardous levels.

"(They're) about a billion times beneath levels that would be health threatening," a diplomat with access to radiation tracking by the U.N.'s Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization told the Associated Press.

Experts agree that any fallout wafting 5,500 miles across the Pacific to California will be too diluted to pose a health risk.

You see? Everything's fine.  Keep shopping.

Taiwan finds radiation on imported Japanese beans  From Mercury News.

Radiation was detected on fava beans imported from Japan to Taiwan, Taiwanese officials said Sunday in what appears to be the first case of contamination in Japanese imports.

Taiwan's Cabinet-level Atomic Energy Council Radiation Monitoring Center said in a statement that a small amount of iodine and cesium had been found on a batch of Japanese fava beans imported to the island on Friday. The center said 11 becquerels of iodine and 1 becquerel of cesium were detected.

The amount of radiation was well below Taiwan's legal limit and not harmful to human health, an official from the center told The Associated Press.

Japan tolls tops 20,000 amid nuclear plant crisis  From Al Arabiya.  Excerpts:

Crews fighting to cool reactors at Japan's stricken nuclear plant struggled Sunday to switch partial power back on after a natural disaster that has left more than 20,000 people dead or missing.
..
In Miyagi prefecture on the devastated northeast coast, the confirmed death toll was 4,882.

But Miyagi police chief Naoto Takeuchi told a task force meeting that his prefecture alone "will need to secure facilities to keep the bodies of more than 15,000 people", Jiji Press reported.

According to the charity Save the Children, around 100,000 children were displaced by the disaster, and signs of trauma are evident among survivors as the nuclear emergency and countless aftershocks heighten their terror.

Scientists lack complete answers on radiation risk.  From The Guardian UK.  Excerpts:

The Associated Press= Thyroid cancer for sure. Leukemia, probably. Too much radiation can raise the risk of developing cancer years down the road, scientists agree, and the young are most vulnerable. But just how much or how long an exposure is risky is not clear.

Those are among the unknowns scientists are contemplating as the crisis unfolds at Japan's stricken nuclear power plant.

In Japan, the Science Ministry said radiation levels about 19 miles northwest of the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant rose at one point Friday to 0.15 millisieverts per hour, about the amount absorbed in a chest X-ray. But levels have been fluctuating, and radiation at most sites that distance from the facility have been far below that.

Threat from Japanese nuclear emergency widens  From World Socialist Web Site.  Excerpts:

Gregory Jaczko, chairman of the NRC, told a Washington news conference on Friday that he expected the struggle to bring down the temperatures at the Fukushima to be a long one. “This is something that will take some time to work through, possibly weeks, as you eventually remove the majority of the heat from the reactors and then the spent fuel pools,” he said. When asked whether the Japanese authorities could avoid a “worst case scenario” he refused to offer an opinion. “I really don't want to speculate on where this could go,” he said.



Gunther Oettinger, the European Union energy head, said, “We are somewhere between a disaster and a major disaster. There could be further catastrophic events, which could pose a threat to the lives of people on the island.”


It was wrong, Oettinger said to “exclude the worst.” He continued “There is talk of an apocalypse, and I think the word is particularly well chosen.”

John Large, who has carried out risk analyses in both military and civil nuclear situations, said that the response to the Fukushima crisis had been “shambolic”. The nuclear industry, he said, did not plan for the one in a million accident. “They are taking a chance, a risk with the helicopters and water,” he added.

“What this means is, accidents like we are seeing now where there are two breaches--one involving the reactors, and one involving fuel ponds outside the reactors--they don’t have any plans for it. They don't have a procedure in a book to turn to—that’s why there is some turmoil. Taking a water cannon and spraying it in may not work. This shows the fundamental omission in nuclear safety culture. What this shows is the basic confidence of nuclear engineers and operators is flawed.”

The concern is that with the situation still unstable at Fukushima, one or more of the steel containment vessels could rupture or the spent-fuel rods may begin to melt down, producing an even more serious nuclear emergency. Some experts have suggested that the fuel rods stored in pool 4 may have already gone critical on Wednesday. That would mean that a nuclear reaction–nuclear fission–is taking place, without any of the usual means to control it.

Still, no encouraging developments.