Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant • Hacker News Board

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#111

Post by patrickgzill » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 1:29 PM UTC

rmah wrote: post #59

Duff wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd argue that is splitting hairs. What will magically lower the radiation when the workers leave? They can't drop boric acid and water on the half-melted reactors from helicopters for fear of rupturing them further, the control systems are no longer effective, and pumping in seawater hasn't worked too well so far.

What will magically lower the radiation when the workers leave? Time.

I would point out that the dangerous stuff that is there is iodine(-131 IIRC) with a half life of 8 days and since it can give you thyroid cancer it is not "safe" until it virtually is gone at 80 days; and cesium-137 with a half life of 30 years, a gram of which can kill you.

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#112

Post by lallysingh » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 1:33 PM UTC

cookiecaper wrote: post #55

patio11 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Outside of the immediate disaster zones, I think "everything went as planned and life went on without missing more than a few beats" is substantially accurate. The context for my post was originally I got literally in excess of a hundred people who thought I might be dead trying to reach me because of the reporting, despite me being several hundred miles away. I have been talking to news reporters the last few days (…

My impression is simply that people don't know Japanese geography, which isn't all together too surprising. There's no reason a person should know the geography of Japan any better than the geography of Uzbekistan if he or she doesn't have a specific tie to either country. They just hear "earthquake in Japan" and ask the people who live in Japan if they're doing alright. My brother lives in Auckland. We had a lot of…

If you're reporting on Japan about a natural disaster that affects different parts of the country differently, it may be worth the 1-2 seconds to type in 'maps.google.com' in your browser.

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#113

Post by pyre » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 2:01 PM UTC

josephcooney wrote: post #107

jrockway wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no reason a person should know the geography of Japan any better than the geography of Uzbekistan if he or she doesn't have a specific tie to either country. I'm going to agree here. I went to high school in Tokyo and I hadn't heard of Gifu until patio11 mentioned it. This is not really a problem due to the availability of these things called "maps", however.

This is not really a problem due to the availability of these things called "maps", however. And the availability of this thing called 'the periodic table' means everyone knows and understands basic chemistry.

The periodic table explains more complex relationships than: "how far apart things are" or "where they are in relation to one another." Basic concepts such as distance and relative orientation are things that (should) come as a basic understanding to even people with no formal education; therefore once one is introduced to maps, those concepts are (or should be) very easy to grasp. The relationships and orientation of elements on the periodic table are much more complex and cover much less 'intuitive' topics.

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#114

Post by cookiecaper » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 3:23 PM UTC

lallysingh wrote: post #112

cookiecaper wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My impression is simply that people don't know Japanese geography, which isn't all together too surprising. There's no reason a person should know the geography of Japan any better than the geography of Uzbekistan if he or she doesn't have a specific tie to either country. They just hear "earthquake in Japan" and ask the people who live in Japan if they're doing alright. My brother lives in Auckland. We had a lot of…

If you're reporting on Japan about a natural disaster that affects different parts of the country differently, it may be worth the 1-2 seconds to type in 'maps.google.com' in your browser.

I agree with that. The reporters thing seems to be a fresh take on it -- my impression from the beginning of the comment I replied to and the blog post from the other day was that it was just a lot of normal persons enquiring. Interfacing with reporters obviously is bound to be frustrating.

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#115

Post by smackfu » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 3:28 PM UTC

hartror wrote: post #2

False attention grabbing title. They have not abandoned it, they said in the press conference just passed that they had suspended operations due to a radiation peak but they expected to resume again without much delay. Edit: The workers have returned http://roound.com/redalert

CNN actually sent out breaking news alerts for both. Silly.

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#116

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 3:35 PM UTC

guelo wrote: post #98

edambauskas wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Volunteers? In Soviet Russia? You are kidding me. I lived there (not in Russia, but it does not matter). I was a small kid at the time, but I have heard a family story a few times how my father stayed out of work and home not to be included into the list of "volunteers". There were people asking for him at work. The reasons for choosing him? He was an engineer and young enough. He got notified by a coworker and got h…

Yes, I know there are a lot of "Liquidators" that were forced to work at Chernobyl. But the original crew that was going up to the roof and disposing material by hand, those guys were military volunteers. Here I found the story of one guy that volunteered http://www.chernobylee.com/articles/chernobyl/interview-with... Apparently those guys were treated as heroes, got benefits like higher pensions and being able to go…

[deleted]

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#117

Post by webXL » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 3:40 PM UTC

pero wrote: post #16

They earlier raised the legal radiation limit that workers can be exposed to from 100mSv to 250mSv. Readings at the gates were 800uSv 30 or so minutes ago when the suspension was announced.

Don't you mean 800μSv - microsieverts?

Seems to me like they have a long way to go until 100mSv - millisieverts

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#118

Post by pero » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 5:52 PM UTC

webXL wrote: post #117

pero wrote: post #16

They earlier raised the legal radiation limit that workers can be exposed to from 100mSv to 250mSv. Readings at the gates were 800uSv 30 or so minutes ago when the suspension was announced.

Don't you mean 800μSv - micro sieverts? Seems to me like they have a long way to go until 100mSv - milli sieverts

No, I don't think so. Whatever sources I got that from had it as milli. I triple checked.

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#119

Post by iujyhgtfhj » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 9:21 PM UTC

cookiecaper wrote: post #55

patio11 wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Outside of the immediate disaster zones, I think "everything went as planned and life went on without missing more than a few beats" is substantially accurate. The context for my post was originally I got literally in excess of a hundred people who thought I might be dead trying to reach me because of the reporting, despite me being several hundred miles away. I have been talking to news reporters the last few days (…

My impression is simply that people don't know Japanese geography, which isn't all together too surprising. There's no reason a person should know the geography of Japan any better than the geography of Uzbekistan if he or she doesn't have a specific tie to either country. They just hear "earthquake in Japan" and ask the people who live in Japan if they're doing alright. My brother lives in Auckland. We had a lot of…

People have a 1/x scale with distance. When I lived in California my grandmother in the UK would call everytime there was a hurricane in Florida.

You can't really expect professional TV reporters to be any better informed than my 80year old grandmother.

Re: Japan suspends work at stricken nuclear plant

#120

Post by leoc » Wed, Mar 16, 2011, 11:36 PM UTC

iujyhgtfhj wrote: post #119

cookiecaper wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My impression is simply that people don't know Japanese geography, which isn't all together too surprising. There's no reason a person should know the geography of Japan any better than the geography of Uzbekistan if he or she doesn't have a specific tie to either country. They just hear "earthquake in Japan" and ask the people who live in Japan if they're doing alright. My brother lives in Auckland. We had a lot of…

People have a 1/x scale with distance. When I lived in California my grandmother in the UK would call everytime there was a hurricane in Florida. You can't really expect professional TV reporters to be any better informed than my 80year old grandmother.

That famous New Yorker cover http://bigthink.com/ideas/21121 comes to mind again.