Author: Simon

Some really cheery news from Japan. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano says that if the current situation continues for a long time, with accumulation of more radioactive substances, there will be “a huge impact on the ocean.” Well OK. If it continues for a long time. What are the odds of that? William Brinkman, director…

I have a couple of prognostications on the effect of the Japanese earthquake on semiconductors. Here is the first. There are several bullet points. I’m going to list those plus the final conclusion. 1. GDP will fall 2. Electronic systems will take a hit 3. There will be no change in IC forecast 4. Supply…

The Chlorine paper mentioned in the video. There is a nice explanation of fission chain reactions in the video. My only minor quibble is that neutron production per fission is 2.5 not 2.0. His point about neutrons being hard to detect is true for standard issue body dosimeters. They are not hard to detect with…

The White House Insider thinks that Donald Trump has a good chance of beating Obama. In discussing that he has a deep critique of the Republicans. The dynamics of a Trump campaign – I find it a fascinating prospect. He could defeat Obama – he really could. And he can play tough. All of the…

Via Zero Hedge. The mayor of Minami Soma city, located 25 km away from the Fukushima plant, had decided to bypass the traditional channels in requesting assistance out of disgust and frustration with the government’s handling of the disaster, and instead is appealing to the entire world via this soon to be viral video clip…

Picture Source If you want to read an engineers view of the current status of Fukushima may I suggest An Engineer’s View. If you have been following my work on the subject you know that my conclusions are very similar. And why not? I’m Naval Nuke trained. Cross Posted at Power and Control

A nice review of the events of the last three weeks at Fukushima can be found at the link. It is in Power Point format. If you prefer a pdf you can get that here. You can also get daily status updates from the IAEA here. So now you know about the apocalypse. What can…

There is some bad news for the Japanese people. According to the Mainichi newspaper Japan’s government plans to take control of Tokyo Electric Power Co , the operator of a stricken nuclear power plant, by injecting public funds. However, it appears that Japan has learned a thing or two from Tim Geithner and the concept…

We are most fortunate that the mysterious source of neutrons at Fukushima has just been found. The risk to workers might be greater than previously thought because melted fuel in the No. 1 reactor building may be causing isolated, uncontrolled nuclear chain reactions, Denis Flory, nuclear safety director for the International Atomic Energy Agency, said…

A commenter on one of my articles about the possibility of a recriticality accident said such an accident was not possible. Well actually, a study of the type of reactor now having problems in Japan (BWR) shows that a recriticality accident is possible: ftp://ftp.cordis.europa.eu/pub/fp5-euratom/docs/09-sara.pdf From the summary of the document: Recriticality in a BWR during…

The news from the Japanese reactor incident is not getting better. Why should it? The spew of radiation is still going on. The International Atomic Energy Agency has told Japan that radiation levels recorded at a village near a stricken nuclear reactor are over recommended levels, a senior IAEA official said on Wednesday. The IAEA…

We have news from a newspaper. In this case The Guardian – UK, which has some bad news about the Fukushima reactor accidents. Richard Lahey, who was head of safety research for boiling-water reactors at General Electric when the company installed the units at Fukushima, told the Guardian workers at the site appeared to have…

My friend Frank in a comment at Worst Case Scenario, reminded me of something I had been saying implicitly and not explicitly when it comes to the nuclear accident at Fukushima. …the fact that ever changing events are driving the clean-up effort not allowing any kind of containment plan to emerge as of now, this…

The news has been entirely too bleak lately. Still, controversy gets eyeballs. So I’d like to present a little controversy that does not have earthshaking implications: Breasts and the people who feed on them. ==== Yeah the video was gratuitous. And there are more of them here. I especially liked the cradle hold. A very…

On Sunday (27 March) I said in Tests Have Been Ordered, that if they were detecting Iodine 131 that they were also detecting any plutonium in the area. And if there was Iodine 131 there was plutonium. They knew. What I said was “we are checking” means “we will announce”. Well here is the announcement.…

Yeah. I know. I’m a damned alarmist and hysteric when it comes to the Japanese reactor difficulties. It seems I’m not the only one. Michio Kaku describes how things could go if they go bad wrong. …the worst case scenario is quite different. If radiation levels continue to rise, then at some point the workers…

In keeping with the theme that the Japanese running the reactor rescue are lying, I bring you this bit of news: Making things much worse is that, apparently for the first time, TEPCO has ordered tests for highly toxic and extremely lethal plutonium on the site: If they have been testing for other contamination they…

I know you are not going to believe this but the above is an image of Radical Islam. Pretty radical for Islam isn’t it? Well at least it is very radical for her father. …the daughter of firebrand cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed, Yasmin Fostok might be expected to share his fanatical beliefs. But the radical…

That report is now about two days old. Since then there have been “developments”. That is an euphemism around here for MSHTF. M = more. I’m sure you can take it from there. Here is a good one: Reactor 3 containment feared breached. A suspected breach in the core of a reactor at the stricken…

The accident at Japan’s nuclear reactors officially just got worse. Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, crippled by the Great East Japan Earthquake of March 11, has discharged more radiation than the infamous Three Mile Island nuclear plant in the United States, according to calculations by the central government. It has already reached a level 6…