Even the Japanese mafia pitched in to help amidst earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear catastrophe aftermath

The Japanese mafia, or "yakuza," braved radioactive contamination without dosimeters or potassium iodide tablets in order to deliver relief supplies to the stricken downwind communities in Fukushima Prefecture in the first days of the nuclear crisis, reports Jake Adelstein at the Daily Beast.

Video showing Unit 4 explosion at Fukushima Daiichi

Arnie Gundersen of Fairewinds Associates has circulated a YouTube video labelled as showing the Unit 4 explosion at Fukushima Daiichi. The YouTube plays Japanese language audio of two newscasters, while showing television footage labelled as the explosion of Fukushima Daiichi Unit 4. Such footage has rarely been circulated or broadcast. Arnie points out it may be because of the crude quality of the visual footage. Also, the Unit 4 explosion appears less "dramatic" than the Unit 3 explosion. On May 26th, a DOE analyst named Kelly, speaking at a Fukushima subcommittee meeting of NRC's Advisory Committee on Reactor Safeguards, spoke about the theories regarding the cause of the Unit 4 explosion. In the earliest days of the Fukushima catastrophe, NRC chairman Jaczko announced that Unit 4's high-level radioactive waste storage pool had boiled dry for lack of electricity to run cooling water circulation pumps. But Kelly said on May 26th that while a portion of the pool may have boiled dry (apparently there are walled off, isolated sections within the pool), and generated hydrogen gas that then exploded, this theory is contradicted by how quickly the explosion took place, visual images underwater within the pool showing the irradiated nuclear fuel appears intact, and even the radiological tests on the pool water that have been done. A new theory, he explained, is that hydrogen gas from Unit 3 flowed into Unit 4 and exploded. Unit 3 and 4 share a common venting system leading up a single "smoke" stack. Thus, the venting of Unit 3, rather than sending all its hydrogen gas up the smoke stack, may have sent some into Unit 4, which then exploded. If that is true, then the retrofitted "band aid" venting system, designed to prevent a catastrophic breach of the too small, too weak General Electric Boiling Water Reactor of the Mark 1 design's containment structure, not only failed to prevent an explosion at Unit 3, it actually caused the explosion at Unit 4!

Another YouTube video, a Hindi language news broadcast from Tuesday, March 15th, shows what it labels as the Unit 4 explosion, specifically at the 1 minute mark, the 2 minute 30 second mark, and the 3 minute mark, highlighting the Unit 4 explosion with a red circle on the grainy video.

A third YouTube posting, a series of time lapse photographs, is also labelled as showing the Unit 4 explosion.

Did earthquake begin Fukushima Daiichi meltdown even before tsunami struck?

The Atlantic Wire, in an article entitled "Meltdown: What Really Happened at Fukushima?" by Jake Adelstein and David McNeill, reports -- based on interviews with eyewitnesses, as well as a careful review of the catastrophe's timeline and even documented admissions made by Tokyo Electric Power Company itself -- that major damage to piping and other safety significant structures at Fukushima Daiichi Unit 1 -- the oldest reactor at the site -- may very well have begun the first meltdown, even before the tsunami hit. The article reports:

"The reason for official reluctance to admit that the earthquake did direct structural damage to reactor one is obvious. Katsunobu Onda, author of TEPCO: The Dark Empire, who sounded the alarm about the firm in his 2007 book explains it this way: 'If TEPCO and the government of Japan admit an earthquake can do direct damage to the reactor, this raises suspicions about the safety of every reactor they run. They are using a number of antiquated reactors that have the same systematic problems, the same wear and tear on the piping.' "

The article adds:

"On May 15, TEPCO went some way toward admitting at least some of these claims in a report called 'Reactor Core Status of Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station Unit One.' The report said there might have been pre-tsunami damage to key facilities including pipes. 'This means that assurances from the industry in Japan and overseas that the reactors were robust is now blown apart,' said Shaun Burnie, an independent nuclear waste consultant. 'It raises fundamental questions on all reactors in high seismic risk areas.' "

Tsunamis are even more rare than already rare earthquakes. Thus, tsunami risks -- including to U.S. reactors -- can more easily be portrayed by the nuclear establishment in industry and government as exceedingly improbable -- even though a radioactively catastrophic one has just happened in Japan. Not only Tepco and the Japanese federal government were quick to obscure earthquake damage at Fukushima Daiichi, focusing attention on the tsunami's impact instead. Exelon Nuclear's CEO, John Rowe, who "serves" on President Obama's and Energy Secretary Chu's "Blue Ribbon Commission on America's Nuclear Future," was quick to downplay the earthquake's impact at Fukushima, instead highlighting the tsunami. An Exelon statement dated March 14th began:

"Exelon is closely monitoring the situation in Japan as it continues to unfold. While there is still a great deal we don’t know, from all information the company received so far, it appears that the damage to the Japanese plants was primarily related to the tsunami, not the earthquake."

A common "red herring" refrain of the U.S. nuclear industry since March 11th is that tsunamis are impossible at the many inland reactors across the U.S., while largely or entirely ignoring earthquake risks themselves, as well as other pathways (tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, fires, power outages, mechanical failure, human error, intentional attack, etc.) that could plunge reactors into station blackout, followed within hours by core meltdown and days by high-level radioactive waste storage pool fires.

"National crime" and "graveyard governance" in wake of Fukushima catastrophe

Hokkaido Cancer Center director Nishio Masamichi, a radiation treatment specialist, has published a very hard hitting critique of the Japanese government and nuclear power industry's performance regarding the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear catastrophe. The Asia-Pacific Journal's Japan Focus has published a review. Masamichi expresses grave concerns for the health of residents downwind and downstream of the catastrophic radioactivity releases, and offers suggestions of critical changes that need to be made to thus far incompetent and confused emergency response.

The devil's in the details with radioactive hot particle fallout from Fukushima Daiichi nuclear catastrophe

Arnie Gundersen at Fairewinds Associates, in a video dated June 12th posted online at their Fukushima Updates Section, delves into those devils in the details. He reports, based on air filter documentation gathered by independent scientists on the ground in Japan, that residents of Tokyo likely inhaled 10 hot particles from Fukushima daily during the month of April. Residents of Fukushima Prefecture, however, inhaled 300 to 400 hot particles daily. But even residents of Seattle, Washington, likely inhaled 5 hot particles per day during April, which had blown all the way across the Pacific Ocean. Once in the human lung, or other internal tissue, such hot particles cannot be detected by a simple gamma radiation monitor. But they are now in a place where they can do great damage to human health, such as initiate cancer. This information belies false assurances by top U.S. federal officials, whether at the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission or even President Obama himself, who told the American media and public that no harmful levels of radioactivity would reach U.S. territory. The National Academy of Science has reaffirmed time and again for decades that any exposure to radiation, no matter how small, carries a health risk; the higher the dose, the higher the risk, in a linear relationship; and that those risks accumulate over a lifetime. The title of NRC's March 13th media release, two days into the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe, "NRC SEES NO RADIATION AT HARMFUL LEVELS REACHING U.S. FROM DAMAGED JAPANESE NUCLEAR POWER PLANTS," begs the question -- is NRC simply "looking the other way"?!