Frioball is right if the first picture is true then it does not look good. I'm glad I'm not anywhere near japan right now.

I have heard that anti radiation pills have been flying off the shelf in California. They are 10000 miles away from japan I dont think they have to worry about radiation for a while. Oh well when California has there massive earthquake and our nuclear plants have meltdown then everyone will already have the pills.

On the other hand... with those numbers of used rods as mentioned in the article, it would have been noticed as then the radiation must be much higher than officially stated...

Radiation pills are only good for some types of initial cancer, you still get radiated and mid/long range effects of the rad does not go away with that pill.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...ill-people.html

That's the latest on the situation. They still do not have it under control and admitted that many people working on the situation will die. They plan on cementing it over like they did in chernoble.

I have to say that I don't give a damn about what the media (at least here in Germany) have to say about this. Pretty much all of them are just trying to sell the story and virtually started giving the reactors the count for multiple times. They often also bend the little information that exists to fit their needs like the cementing of the reactors. Of course there are preperations to cement the reactors because ... well if you start with them when thing have gone utterly wrong it's too late (i.e. unnecessary late)...

I just saw on N-TV that they even started to add in a "bang" sound to that video where we first saw an explosion at the power plant (at least I didn't know of a version with any audio)...

My very personal guess:
Nothing bad (i.e. worse than right now) will happen. Maybe we'll see some more caesium / iodine but nothing like in Chernobyl...

Radiation isn´t harmles. There´s no "harmless dose".
Statistically speaking there will be an increased incidence of cancer.

But we can´t predict the consequences of Fukushima,
just like we can´t capture the consequences of Chernobyl.

This is the real problem, imo.
Chernobyl isn´t "dead" or "ready" or something like this.
It´s an ongoing problem.

Also please remember the situation in northern japan and the dense population.

But isn't radiation all around us in the nature as well? As far as I have read they even use radiation to "mark" the gulf stream to measure it's movement. And what about the radiation coming from cole mining?

But maybe you are right and every dose of radiation even the one from the sun kills us over time. I mean, the skin of older people is not as clean as the one from young people. There are growing a lot of dark spots and bumps. Maybe this is life. Maybe it would be better to have fur like animals have.

I dont judge anything here, I just think out loud.

LOL. This is not the reason why skin gets older. This is a Kent Hovind Theory.
(Also, this would imply that moles don't get elder, as they aren't exposed to the sun )

A "harmless dose" is afaik a dose that isn't too much higher than the radiation that surrounds us all the time or a dose that kills less than very a small percentage of people exposed to it.

I haven't heard about marking the gulf stream so far, but I certainly know that they do the same to mark blood in a human's body to see if there are any areas without enough blood and stuff. This is "harmless" meaning that it most propably won't kill you (and not doing it would rather kill you if you are really sick), but doing it too often would of course increase the risk.

As a former member of the "ABC-Abwehrkommando" (NBC defense squad) of our military, there actually IS such a thing as a harmless dose and also quite harmless radiation. Alpha and Beta radiation, for example, are quite harmless, can be blocked by a very thin barrier (Alpha radiation can be blocked by tin foil, Beta by normal glass) and are also used medically, (chemo treatment) they don't pose a real threat as long as you aren't exposed to it 24/7. (duh) Gamma radiation, however, is quite a bitch and needs at least about 1,5 half meters of lead in it's way to prevent it from spreading, if I recall correctly. But there still is a harmless dose of Gamma radiation, which is quite low for humans, which also, of course, depends on your age and overall health. The meanest thing about radiation is, that you won't necessarily feel anything for a few years. (unless you are reeeaaally near a radiation source, of course) However, an overdose of radiation can and will raise the possibility of an outbreak of cancer and cause changes in your blood.

I'm more worried about the future of Japan and those people involved, as they will face a possibly big rise in cancer patients.... I'm not sure, though, the infos we're getting of Japan are still very vague and inconsistent. Let's just hope for the best and donate as much as possible.

"Alpha and Beta radiation, for example, are quite harmless"

...unless the source is ingested or inhaled, in which case they become extremely dangerous.
(I´ve quoted wiki here, because sometimes I can´t express my thoughts in english.)

Guess why they are wearing those suits and a gas mask - it´s not about gamma.



Yes, and we can´t do anything against the natural radiation.
Afaik it´s about 2-2,5 mSv per year here in germany.

The radiation of colemines and old coal-fired power stations is quite large.
In the long way we need a switch to renewable energy.


But we can´t compare natural isotopes with man-made, enriched isotopes that are
coming out of a containment with a propably half melted core when it comes to half-life and impact.





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