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Another day, another escalation. The Extinction Protocol. Excerpts:
Lebanese Shiite Hezbollah and Iran will fight alongside the Syrian regime if it is attacked by foreign forces, a pro-Damascus Palestinian fighter leader said on Tuesday. In the event of “a foreign attack, we discussed with our brothers (in the Syrian regime), with (Hezbollah chief) Hassan Nasrallah and our brothers in Iran, we will be part of this battle,” said Ahmad Jibril of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-General Command. In an interview with Beirut-based Mayadeen television, Jibril said that if a “Turkish-European alliance or NATO escalate… we will take to the streets and fight on behalf of all those with honour and our Syrian brothers.” Jibril also cited Nasrallah as saying Hezbollah would fight on behalf of the Syrian regime, and described the Iran-Syria-Hezbollah alliance as “one axis” that the PFLP-GC is part of. He added that he met recently with Nasrallah, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Syrian President Bashar Al Assad, without specifying when. He also noted that the Hezbollah chief “said he would join this battle, in the event of a foreign attack” on Syria. The Iranian regime, he said, told him it would not allow a strike on Syria. “We have warned the Turks several times not to play with fire,” Jibril said. Echoing the Syrian regime’s discourse, the PFLP-GC chief said the 16-month uprising against Assad was not a genuine local movement, but rather “a change in the foundations of this region in order to create a new Middle East,” referring to a term coined in 2006 by former US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Jibril described the defence of the Syrian regime as “a decisive battle.” Victory would be necessary, he said, in order to “defeat the American and Zionist projects.” –Gulf News
Iran says missiles could destroy US missile bases: .. Amir Ali Haji Zadeh, commander of the Revolutionary Guards aerospace division, was quoted by Fars news agency as saying. Haji Zadeh said 35 U.S. bases were within reach of Iran’s ballistic missiles, the most advanced of which commanders have said could hit targets 2,000 km (1,300 miles) away. ‘We have thought of measures to set up bases and deploy missiles to destroy all these bases in the early minutes after an attack,” he added. It was not clear where Haji Zadeh got his figures on U.S. bases in the region. U.S. military facilities in the Middle East are located in Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait and Turkey, and it has around 10 bases further afield in Afghanistan and Kyrgyzstan. Reuters
U.S. increases military presence: The United States has quietly moved significant military reinforcements into the Persian Gulf to deter the Iranian military from any possible attempt to shut the Strait of Hormuz and to increase the number of fighter jets capable of striking deep into Iran if the standoff over its nuclear program escalates. The deployments are part of a long-planned effort to bolster the American military presence in the gulf region, in part to reassure Israel that in dealing with Iran, as one senior administration official put it last week, “When the president says there are other options on the table beyond negotiations, he means it.” New York Times
Turkey recovers pilots’ bodies: Turkey on Wednesday found the bodies of two pilots shot down by Syria last month during a contested flight that pushed the neighbors’ relations to a new low almost a year after Ankara threw its weight behind the opposition to oust President Bashar al-Assad from power. The military General Staff in Ankara said on Wednesday that it was working to remove the bodies of Captain Gokhan Ertan and Lieutenant Hasan Hüseyin Aksoy from the Mediterranean. Turkey didn’t identify the location of the dead pilots or provide any additional details. The armed forces weren’t immediately able to provide comment. Wall Street Journal
I'm sure everything will be all right. Are we still on for sushi? San Francisco Gate, via The Extinction Protocol. Excerpts:
For the first time, scientists have detected radioactivity in fish that have migrated into California waters from the ocean off Japan, where radiation contaminated the sea after explosions tore through the Fukushima nuclear reactors last year.
Radioactive cesium was detected in samples of highly prized Pacific bluefin tuna, but it is well below levels considered unsafe for humans, the scientists say.
The evidence is "unequivocal" that the tuna - caught off San Diego a year ago - were contaminated with radiation from Japan's nuclear disaster, the researchers said.
Virtually all bluefin tuna on the market in the United States is either farmed or caught far from the Fukushima area, so American consumers should not be affected by radiation contamination in their fish, seafood distributors say. The migratory bluefin studied by the researchers were all caught by sport fishermen and were not headed for the market.
And:
The finding was wholly unexpected, Madigan said. It came about when he was researching the migratory patterns of bluefin tuna as part of a broader study of Pacific fish migration.
Madigan had collected samples of muscle tissue from 15 2-year-old tuna given to him by San Diego fishermen in August, and when tests detected radioactivity in one sample he sent all 15 samples to Fisher in Long Island, he said.
The young tuna, averaging about 13 pounds apiece, were found to be contaminated with two radioactive forms of the element cesium. Isotopes called cesium-134 and cesium-137 do not exist in nature but are produced only in nuclear explosions such as the weapons tests of the Cold War era.
Before the Fukushima earthquake and tsunami, low levels of the radioactive cesium-137 , which decays to harmlessness only over thousands of years, had been measured in Japanese waters, while the shorter-lived cesium-134 was undetectable, the scientists said. That difference, they said, was crucial in concluding that the radioactive contamination was linked to the Fukushima disaster.
Increased concentrations of radioactivity contaminated nearly 60,000 square miles of the ocean off Japan after workers at Fukushima pumped thousands of tons of seawater over reactors last year to prevent a complete meltdown of the reactor cores.
As with previous estimates about everything regarding Fukushima, the 60 thousand square mile contamination zone is most likely a vast under-estimation, and that estimate will be revised upward.
The worst vegetable mutation Fukushima Diary. Check out this bullshit. This is ONE tomato..
This is from June, 2011. 2011. Now that's good eatin'!! No telling what this year's Harvest of Horror will produce.. Seriously, though.. Nothing is wrong: Keep shopping.
Nice.. Uncharted territory. Unchecked Nuclear Power, will you ever stop being so much fun? ENews. Excerpts:
*UPDATED* ORIGINAL PRESENTATION HERE: Professor Shocked: "The core completely liquefied -- There's nothing left -- There's no hook -- There's no remaining collapsed core" (VIDEO)
Really short post.. Read comments for further hilariousness.. Here's my favorite!
..think it means it's no longer in the corium 'blob' state but capable of traveling into the earth's mantle in a stream-like state; which is much worse than any previous worst case scenario. There will be no remediation possible; resulting in radiological contamination of underground water-ways (interacting ocean and fresh-water aquifers) within this entire region, for hundreds-of-thousands of years.
Given the amount of energy needed to maintain a liquefied condition without significant surface cooling is unusual. Classical thermodynamics has left the building…
I guess things will be super exciting by the time MSM starts reporting this again..
Jeremy Herb for The Hill. Excerpts:
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta offered a blunt assessment of the threats facing the United States on Wednesday, saying the potential for another war breaking out remains high in places like North Korea.
“We’re within an inch of war almost every day in that part of the world,” Panetta said in an interview with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, in response to a question about the threats in the Korean Peninsula. “And we just have to be very careful about what we say and what we do.”
Blitzer then asked Panetta, who joined with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for an interview during the secretaries’ NATO meeting in Brussels, whether the North Korean threat kept him up at night.
“Unfortunately, these days there’s a helluva lot that keeps me awake,” Panetta responded, listing Iran, Syria, the Middle East, cyber warfare and weapons of mass destruction as other insomnia-inducing issues.
It's interesting he didn't mention India/Pakistan. And wouldn't it have been quicker to say Fukushima?
Ministry of the Environment: "Tsunami Debris May Have Already Reached North America, Back in February..." EX-SKF. Excerpts:
Oops. Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution just recently released a paper saying the debris may reach North America in 1 to 2 years (see Huffington Post, 4/3/2012). Well, actually..
From Jiji Tsushin (4/6/2012):
Ministry of the Environment's Forecast of disaster debris in the ocean: it may have already reached North America
The Ministry of the Environment announced its forecast of the movement of the disaster debris in the [Pacific] ocean after the March 11, 2011 tsunami. According to the forecast, part of the debris floating on the surface of the ocean that is more easily affected by winds may have traveled across the Pacific Ocean and reached the west coast of Canada in February this year.
The Ministry's forecast of 1.33 million tonnes of debris from houses that got swept away, which consists the majority of the debris, shows about 3% of this type of debris, or about 41,300 tonnes, may reach within 10 kilometers off the west coast of North America by February 2013.
I can't find a press release on the subject at the Ministry's website. If the Ministry is to be believed, the first debris took only 11 months, instead of 1 to 2 years (I remember they were counting on two years).
Yeah, so what? The reactors are all right; Right? That's what counts! Well, actually..
Ambassador Murata writes to UN Secretary General: “It is no exaggeration to say that the fate of Japan and the whole world depends on No. 4 reactor” — Appeals for independent assessment team One word? Dire. Two words: We're fucked. Three words? That's all, folks! Enenews. Excerpts:
It seems to us that the Nuclear Security Summit was focused on the North Korea nuclear issue and on the issue of common security from a terrorist attack. Our appeal on the need for the independent assessment at Reactor 4 was regarded as less urgent. We predicted this outcome in light of the nature of the Summit. I suppose most participants fully understood the potential disaster which will affect their countries. Nevertheless, they decided not to raise the delicate issue, perhaps in order to not ruffle their diplomatic relationship with Japan.
I was moved by Ambassador Murata’s courage in pressing this issue in Japan. I know how difficult it is for a former career diplomat to do this, especially in my country. Current and former government officials might be similarly restricted in the scope of their actions, as Ambassador Murata is, but it is their responsibility to take a stand for the benefit of our descendants for centuries to come—to pass on a world safer than our ancestors passed us.
If Japanese government leaders do not recognize the risk their nation faces, how could the rest of us be persuaded of the looming disaster? And if the rest of us do not acknowledge the catastrophe we collectively face, who will be the one to act?
..
(From Murata's letter..)
I was asked to make a statement at the public hearing of the Budgetary Committee of the House of Councilors on March 23. I raised the crucial problem. of N0.4 reactor of Fukushima containing1535 fuel rods. It could be fatally damaged by continuing aftershocks. Moreover, 50 meters away from it exists a common cooling pool for 6 reactors containing 6375 fuel rods!
It is no exaggeration to say that the fate of Japan and the whole world depends on NO.4 reactor. This is confirmed by most reliable experts like Dr. Arnie Gundersen or Dr. Fumiaki Koide.
Please allow me to inform you of an initiative being taken by a former UN official who is endeavoring to have the Nuclear Security Summit take up the crucial problem. of N0.4 reactor of Fukushima. He is pursuing the establishment of an independent assessment team. I think his efforts are very significant, because it is indispensable to draw the attention of world leaders to this vital issue.
I am cooperating with him, writing to some of my Korean acquaintances that this issue deserves the personal attention of President Lee Myung-bak. I have written today to Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda. I asked him to consider taking the initiative of mobilizing human wisdom on the widest scope to cope with the Fukushima reactor No.4 problem, fully taking into account the above-mentioned “independent assessment team”.
Mitsuhei Murata
Former Japanese Ambassador to Switzerland and Senegal
Executive Director, the Japan Society for Global System and Ethics
What about the ocean? The ocean's not contaminated; Right? Well, actually..
Study: Radioactive water to reach Hawaii in 2 years Will 2 years be code for 11 months? The Asahi Shimbun. Excerpts:
Water contaminated by radioactivity that entered the sea from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant will reach the Hawaiian Islands in March 2014, according to a computer simulation by the Japan Atomic Energy Agency.
The agency said the radioactivity in the water will be diluted to low levels by the time it has traveled 5,300 kilometers from the Fukushima plant. (They are referring to just cesium, I guess, as no other radioactive substance is mentioned..)
..
The researchers said 18,000 trillion becquerels of radioactive iodine and cesium have leaked from the plant into the sea.
The contaminated water will be carried by ocean currents, and the maximum radioactivity level in cesium-137 will be about 0.04 becquerel per liter when it nears the Hawaiian Islands, they said.
Sweet. So what kind of levels do you expect for the plutonium, uranium, tritium, and the rest of this nuclear cavalcade of whimsy? Cesium 137 has a half life of 30 years. MOX has a half life of 24, 000 years.
No matter, though.. Especially if Reactor 4 goes..
Here we are, at what might be the Last Vestiges of Normal Life, and we all continue on, like everything is normal.
May we continue on, like normal, most still in denial, for at least a little while longer, please.
An old fault line reactivates almost right underneath Fukushima? Not awesome. Really Not Awesome, considering Reactors 2 and 4 seem to be much worse than thought. The only ingredient missing for Catastrophe is a 7.0 or greater quake. According to the article, there's a 70 percent chance of that happening this year, and a 98 percent chance of that happening in the next three years.
Not If. Only When.
Reactor 2 seems to be in trouble; again.. E News (via Rense).. Excerpts:
[Masanori Naito, director in charge of nuclear safety analysis at the Institute of Applied Energy] presumes portion of the fuel which had been recorded before the board of the mesh condition which supports the fuel and dissolved fell to the bottom of the reactor, local like the hill, because accumulating, the calorific value (temperature) increased, with.
Bad Babelfish translation, but Big Picture? Problems. Nuclear Problems. Lots of 'em.
Integrity of Reactor No. 4 building a major concern among experts — Collapse of spent fuel pool could be even worse than 3 reactor meltdowns E News. Excerpts:
Again with the Babelfish translation, but you'll get it..
[...] TEPCO spokesman Junichi Matsumoto [...] said officials are investigating the cause of that leak, but that it was unlikely the pipe had been loosened by the many aftershocks that have hit the plant.
The structural integrity of the damaged Unit 4 reactor building has long been a major concern among experts because a collapse of its spent fuel cooling pool could cause a disaster worse than the three reactor meltdowns. [...]
Aside from the multiple meltdowns that have already happened..
Bird numbers plummet around stricken Fukushima plant Harbinger of The Future. The Independent. Excerpts:
Researchers working around Japan's disabled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant say bird populations there have begun to dwindle, in what may be a chilling harbinger of the impact of radioactive fallout on local life.
In the first major study of the impact of the world's worst nuclear crisis in 25 years, the researchers, from Japan, the US and Denmark, said their analysis of 14 species of bird common to Fukushima and Chernobyl, the Ukrainian city which suffered a similar nuclear meltdown, showed the effect on abundance is worse in the Japanese disaster zone.
..
Many species show "dramatically" elevated DNA mutation rates, developmental abnormalities and extinctions, they add, while insect life has been significantly reduced.
Thankfully, no one will notice until they get HUGE and start attacking humans.
"Backup" Tokyo (Capital of Japan) to Be Considered Somewhere in Japan to Preserve Government Functions in Case of Disaster Ex-SKF. Excerpts:
Democratic Party of Japan will hold the first meeting of "the working group for backing up the core functions of the capital" (headed by Sumio Mabuchi. It is to prepare for the case of Tokyo devastated by an epicentral earthquake. The focus will be whether the group designates a location to temporarily move the function of the Prime Minister's Official Residence and the central government ministries. The group will submit the report to the government by the end of March.
The expert committee at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transportation started the discussion on backup functions of the capital last December, in light of the March 11, 2011 earthquake/tsunami. The committee says it won't specify the location [to which the functions will be moved], but heated campaigns to become a "backup" capital have already started among locations including Hokkaido, Osaka, and Fukuoka City.
Well, even after the Fukushima I Nuke Plant accident, they still do not (or cannot) say they should consider a potential nuclear disaster when planning a backup capital. If they do consider, there may be nowhere in Japan that's suitable.
Pardon my pessimism, but isn't this talk a bit late? Really late?
US ex-diplomat pulls no punches on Japan Google. Wait; Google? Excerpts:
..Maher's main thesis is that Japan -- which has had six new prime ministers since 2006 -- has been crippled by a failure of its politicians to accept responsibility and, hence, to make hard decisions.
Maher pointed to the crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, which was devastated by the March 11 tsunami, and dismissed the government's declaration last month that it had stabilized the leaking reactors.
"It's not stable," Maher said recently at the Heritage Foundation in Washington. "Tokyo is safe, but Fukushima Daiichi is in really bad shape."
And:
Maher said that the US government was privately terrified over the unfolding crisis. He accused Japan's then prime minister, Naoto Kan, of evading responsibility and trying to pass the problem over to the plant's operator, the Tokyo Electric Power Co.
"I remember sitting on a task force many a time thinking, 'Who the hell is in control in Japan?' The government's not doing anything. Kan made one trip and flew up and got in the way and came back," Maher said.
Maher said that he watched in horror as he saw television footage of a sole helicopter dropping water on the stricken plant.
"Is that the best Japan can do?" Maher said.
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