8/27/2013 Vanishing Chernobyl: Aerial photos show how devastated town in radiation disaster zone is being reclaimed by nature

Source: Mail Online
Date: 8/27/2013
By: Anthony Bond

Swamped: These astonishing new photographs show how Chernobyl - the site of the world's worst nuclear accident - and surrounding city of Pripyat are being reclaimed by the surrounding forest

Devastated by the worst nuclear disaster in history, Chernobyl is now a barren ghost town slowly being forgotten.

These astonishing aerial photographs of the former power plant and the neighbouring city of Pripyat show how they are becoming hidden from view as the surrounding forest closes in.

Following the disaster - which occurred during a systems test on April 26, 1986 -  the Ukrainian government evacuated 350,000 residents from Chernobyl and Pripyat.
 ...
Read the rest here.

11/10/2012 Major Study: Exposure to Low-Level Radiation Can Cause Leukemia

Source: Washington's Blog
Date: 11/10/2012

Numerous Studies Show that Low-Level Exposure Causes Cancer

Japan Times reports:

Protracted exposure to low-level radiation is associated with a significant increase in the risk of leukemia, according to a long-term study published Thursday in a U.S. research journal.
The study released in the monthly Environmental Health Perspectives was based on a 20-year survey of around 110,000 workers who engaged in cleanup work related to the Chernobyl nuclear plant disaster in 1986.
Scientists from the University of California, San Francisco, the U.S. National Cancer Institute and the National Research Center for Radiation Medicine in Ukraine were among those who participated in the research.
***
Keigo Endo, a radiologist and president of Kyoto College of Medical Science, pointed to previous data showing an increased risk of leukemia with cumulative radiation exposure of as low as 120 millisieverts.
“The latest finding underlines the importance of long-term followup surveys. Further details of the survey should be examined to confirm specific dose levels that could cause leukemia,” Endo said.

Many nuclear scientists agree.
Indeed, the overwhelming consensus among radiation scientists is that repeated exposure to low doses of radiation can cause cancer, genetic mutations and other severe health problems … especially in small children.
Yet many governments pretend that low doses of radiation are harmless. In fact, many governments have been covering up the danger from radiation for 67 years, because they want to push nuclear power as a way to make nuclear weapons.  And see this.

8/4/2012 i must return to chernobyl... call for donations

Source: bionerd23
Date: Aug 4, 2012

Video Description
i heed the call of chernobyl - i must return at all costs.
it's where i belong - basking in atom's glow, blinding YOU with the truth.

my return to chernobyl is planned for september 2012 - but i'm still a few hundred dollars short.
so... if you can help out, i'd be more than grateful -
THANK YOU for making this possible!

DONATE ($USD)

DONATE (€EUR)

6/25/2012 Experts warn of another disaster awaiting at Fukushima

Source: ABC (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) News 7.30
Date: June 25, 2012 21:04:00
by: Leigh Sales, Mark Willacy
Japanese and US nuclear experts warn that another earthquake hitting Fukushima could spark a disaster worse than Chernobyl.

6/5/2012 Fukushima Radiation Hitting the Streets of LA

Source: Activist Post
by: Dr. Mark Sircus

Dees Illustration

Right after Chernobyl blew its top, Edward Teller said on the ABC Evening News in late April 1986, “The chances of a real calamity at a nuclear power station are infinitesimally small. But should it happen, the consequences are impossible to imagine.” The plume from the burning graphite at Chernobyl initially traveled in a northwest direction toward Sweden, Finland and Eastern Europe, exposing the public to levels up to 100 times the normal background radiation.

...
Read the rest here

5/28/2012 Nuclear Denial and the Resignation of Gregory Jaczko: Meltdown at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

Source: Counterpunch
Date: May 28, 2012
by: Karl Grossman

 

Nuclear Denial and the Resignation of Gregory Jaczko

Meltdown at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission

The resignation last week of the chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is another demonstration of the bankrupt basis of the NRC. Gregory Jaczko repeatedly called for the NRC to apply “lessons learned” from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant disaster in Japan. And, for that, the nuclear industry—quite successfully—went after him fiercely.

The New York Times in an editorial over the weekend said that President Obama’s choice to replace Jaczko, Allison McFarlane, “will need to be as independent and aggressive as Dr. Jaczko.”
...
Read the rest here

4/23/2012 Chernobyl 2012: The highly radioactive graphite crane claw

Source: bionerd23
Date: 4/23/2012

Description
This claw was used to pour graphite into the burning reactor of Chernobyl in the initial days after the incident.
to this day, it remains highly contaminated.

4/15/2012 [Video] chernobyl 2012: the kindergarten of копачи (kopachi)

Source: Bionerd23 YouTube channel

Date: 4/15/2012


Description
копачи was a small village near chornobyl. it was entirely torn down as it was heavily contaminated... only the kindergarten - which was too solid to tear down quickly - remained... nowadays, the radiation levels here are minor. the zone provides much stronger stuff...

10/27/2011 Fukushima Station Discharged More Radiation Than Estimated

Source: Bloomberg
Date: October 27, 2011, 4:45 AM EDT
by: Tsuyoshi Inajima

(Updates with NISA comment in fifth paragraph.)

Oct. 27 (Bloomberg) -- The wrecked Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan may have released more than twice the amount of radiation estimated by the Japanese government, a study by European and U.S.-based scientists said.

...
Read full article here

9/17/2011 (Video) Japan's Fukushima 'worst in history'

Source: Al Jazeera
Date: 9/17/2011 Upload date
by: Steve Chao


At least one billion becquerels a day of radiation continue to leak from Japan's Fukushima nuclear plant after the March earthquake and tsunami. Experts say that the total amount of radiation leaked will exceed amounts released from Chernobyl, making Fukushima the worst nuclear disaster in history. Al Jazeera's Steve Chao reports from the Japanese capital of Tokyo.

10 Most Radioactive Places on Earth

Source: brainz

While the 2011 earthquake and worries surrounding Fukushima have brought the threat of radioactivity back into the public consciousness, many people still don't realize that radioactive contamination is a worldwide danger. Radionuclides are in the top six toxic threats as listed in the 2010 report by The Blacksmith Institute, an NGO dedicated to tackling pollution. You might be surprised by the locations of some of the world’s most radioactive places — and thus the number of people living in fear of the effects radiation could have on them and their children.
...
Read full article here

9/20/2011 Column of the Day: What’s happening in Fukushima?

Source: Fukushima Diary
Date: 9/20/2011
by: Mochizuki 9/20,Japanese government declared Fukushima nuclear plants can be settled (kept under 100C) (“cold shutdown”) by the end of this year. 
...
Read full article here

8/17/2011 Christopher Busby: Chernobyl-like radiation found in Tokyo

Source: RT News
Date: 8/17/2011


Workers at Japan's Fukushima plant say the ground under the facility is cracking and radioactive steam is escaping through the fissures. They also say pipes and at least one reactor were seriously damaged before the tsunami hit the area in March. RT talks to Christopher Busby of the European Committee on Radiation Risks.

(Video) Dial M. for "Meltdown"

Source: Fairewinds Associates
Date: 8/12/2011
by: Brian Rich


After seeing the destruction in Japan from the Earthquake and Tsunami. Then Fukushima Nuclear Facility melted down before my very eyes on television. I knew something was not right. My research and investigations were met with dead ends, false readings/answers, and lies. I decided to create this video to make sure the history of Commercial Nuclear power was documented and presented to a younger generation. I found most of the public was turned off by the complex nature of Nuclear Physics, even if what they didn't know was going to kill them and their loved ones.

Meeting Arnold Gundersen and his wife Maggie only opened my eyes to the dangers our country and civilization face because of decisions made decades ago and the lies created to further the nuclear agenda. Their constant truthful testimony against the nuclear industry and their shortcuts and obfuscating, should be a real awakening to the public at large. Creative inspiration came from the GOOD Nuclear Weapons video. Enjoy!

8/11/2011 Clusterfukushima

Source: Washington's Blog
Date: 8/11/2011

There have been a cluster of earthquakes near Fukushima. Just today, there was another 6.0 earthquake.
There have been a cluster of meltdowns at Fukushima. For example, Asahi reports today:

A second meltdown likely occurred in the No. 3 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, a scenario that could hinder the current strategy to end the crisis, a scientist said.
In that meltdown, 10 days after the March 11 Great East Japan Earthquake, the fuel may have leaked to the surrounding containment vessel, according to a report by Fumiya Tanabe, a former senior researcher at what was then the government-affiliated Japan Atomic Energy Research Institute.
***
Under Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s road map to deal with its crippled nuclear plant, reducing temperatures at the bottom of the core pressure vessel is one objective for bringing the accident under control. But if the fuel burned through the pressure vessel surrounding the No. 3 reactor and dropped into the containment vessel, that plan would be affected.
***
Around 11 a.m. on March 14, the reactor building was hit by a large hydrogen explosion that was likely caused by a core meltdown, which led to fuel falling to the bottom of the pressure vessel.
***
Tanabe also estimates that the second meltdown led to the release of large amounts of radioactive materials, and that much of the fuel fell through the pressure vessel to the surrounding containment vessel.
***
Kunihisa Soda, a former commissioner at the Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan who is a specialist on severe accidents at nuclear plants, said the possibility of a second meltdown could not be ruled out.

Nuclear expert Arnie Gundersen notes that there are currently lethal radiation levels at Fukushima, that even higher measurements are to still come, and that the nuclear core has leaked out and is on floor like a pancake working its way down.
NHK notes that scientists have found radiation levels in Japan higher than any found in the contaminated zone in Chernobyl called Red Forest:



And nuclear regulators only thought about worst case scenarios involving a single nuclear plant. They totally ignored the fact that power loss to complexes of nuclear reactors - like the cluster of 6 reactors at Fukushima - could lead to multiple simultaneous meltdowns.
And then there's a cluster of cover ups.
As the New York Times reports:

“From the 12th to the 15th we were in a location with one of the highest levels of radiation,” said Tamotsu Baba, the mayor of Namie, which is about five miles from the nuclear plant. He and thousands from Namie now live in temporary housing in another town, Nihonmatsu. “We are extremely worried about internal exposure to radiation.”
The withholding of information, he said, was akin to “murder.”
In interviews and public statements, some current and former government officials have admitted that Japanese authorities engaged in a pattern of withholding damaging information and denying facts of the nuclear disaster — in order, some of them said, to limit the size of costly and disruptive evacuations in land-scarce Japan and to avoid public questioning of the politically powerful nuclear industry. As the nuclear plant continues to release radiation, some of which has slipped into the nation’s food supply, public anger is growing at what many here see as an official campaign to play down the scope of the accident and the potential health risks.
Seiki Soramoto, a lawmaker and former nuclear engineer to whom Prime Minister Naoto Kan turned for advice during the crisis, blamed the government for withholding forecasts from the computer system, known as the System for Prediction of Environmental Emergency Dose Information, or Speedi.
“In the end, it was the prime minister’s office that hid the Speedi data,” he said. “Because they didn’t have the knowledge to know what the data meant, and thus they did not know what to say to the public, they thought only of their own safety, and decided it was easier just not to announce it.”
***
Meltdowns at three of Fukushima Daiichi’s six reactors went officially unacknowledged for months. In one of the most damning admissions, nuclear regulators said in early June that inspectors had found tellurium 132, which experts call telltale evidence of reactor meltdowns, a day after the tsunami — but did not tell the public for nearly three months. For months after the disaster, the government flip-flopped on the level of radiation permissible on school grounds, causing continuing confusion and anguish about the safety of schoolchildren here in Fukushima.
***
The timing of many admissions ... suggested to critics that Japan’s nuclear establishment was coming clean only because it could no longer hide the scope of the accident.

The mayor of Namie also said the government's justifications for withholding information are nonsensical.
And in related news:

• ABC: Japan’s nuclear agency hides children’s radiation results

• Public anger “exploding” as Japanese discover more about government downplaying spread of Fukushima radiation, health dangers

• TEPCO funds chair/professsorship at MIT — Nuclear researcher: “Nuclear researchers have a stake in reassuring the pubic that nothing bad is happening”

• Panel: Nuke plant operator behind fake email campaign also destroyed documents sought by investigators about public support for MOX fuel

It's a clusterfukushima.

6/17/2011 (Video) Fallout!

Source: 60 Minutes Australia
Date: 6/17/2011

Hint: Click CC button on video for English transcript
When Japan was rocked by a massive earthquake and tsunami back in March, we told ourselves the worst was behind us.
Tens of thousands dead, an economy shattered, whole communities razed.
Surely the Japanese had suffered enough.
But all these weeks later, the crisis is far from over.
The crippled Fukushima nuclear plant is still leaking and, judging from the experience at Chernobyl, Japan's recovery won't be measured in years, but centuries.

7/10/2011 Fukushima Finally Labeled As “New Chernobyl” — Japan Admits Cleanup Will Take Decades

Source: Alexander Higgins Blog
Date: July 10, 2011 at 11:02 am

Japan’s prime minister has finally admitted the to the reality of the Fukushima nuclear disaster, labeling the nuclear meltdowns as the new Chernobyl and admitting it will take decades before the nuclear disaster is cleaned up.

As previously reported, Japan’s new timeline for cleaning up the nuclear meltdown is at least 10 years from now and that is contingent on technology being developed within that time to allow workers to cleanup the molten fuel at the nuclear reactor.
...
Read full article here

7/5/2011 Japan groups alarmed by radioactive soil

Source: AFP
Date: 7/5/2011

TOKYO — Soil radiation in a city 60 kilometres (40 miles) from Japan's stricken nuclear plant is above levels that prompted resettlement after the Chernobyl disaster, citizens' groups said Tuesday.

The survey of four locations in Fukushima city, outside the nuclear evacuation zone, showed that all soil samples contained caesium exceeding Japan's legal limit of 10,000 becquerels per kilogram (4,500 per pound), they said.

The highest level was 46,540 becquerels per kilogram, and the three other readings were between 16,290 and 19,220 becquerels per kilogram, they said.

The citizens' groups -- the Fukushima Network for Saving Children from Radiation and five other non-governmental organisations -- have called for the evacuation of pregnant women and children from the town.

The highest reading in the city of 290,000 people far exceeded the level that triggered compulsory resettlement ordered by Soviet authorities following the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine, they said.

Kobe University radiation expert professor Tomoya Yamauchi conducted the survey on June 26 following a request from the groups.

"Soil contamination is spreading in the city," Yamauchi said in a statement. "Children are playing with the soil, meaning they are playing with high levels of radioactive substances. Evacuation must be conducted as soon as possible."

The coastal Fukushima Daiichi plant has been spewing radiation since the March 11 earthquake and tsunami knocked out its cooling systems.

6/21/2011 | Fukushima Nuclear Plant Remains 'Ticking Time Bomb' After Japan Disaster: Michio Kaku, Theoretical Physicist

Source: CNN (video), comments are by me
Date: 6/21/2011 video date

Theoretical physicist Dr. Michio Kaku makes a return appearance on CNN.
Dr. Kaku makes many important statements about the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear accident:

1. The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant still remains in danger, especially since the estimated (more than) 110 tons of radioactive water on site only has perhaps a week's worth of storage capacity before it is forced to be released (to the sea).
2. The radiation released by Fukushima Daiichi is as much as Chernobyl (many would argue more).
3. This is the worst industrial accident in all history and will take 50-100 years to clean up.
4. 16 miles is not enough of an evacuation area, as radiation hot spots have been found much further out.
5. 34,000 kindergarten students have been given radiation badges (personal dosimeters) to wear to school.
6. TEPCO lied to cover up the severity of the accident and withheld information.
7. Miniscule amounts of radioactive iodine are showing up in milk in New York.

6/10/2011 | Physician and Epidemiologist Say 35% Spike in Infant Mortality in Northwest Cities Since Meltdown Might Be the Result of Fallout from Fukushima

Source: Washington's Blog
Date: 6/10/2011

As I've previously noted, infants are much more vulnerable to radiation than adults. And see this.
However, radiation safety standards are set based on the assumption that everyone exposed is a healthy man in his 20s.
Now, a physician (Janette D. Sherman, M. D.) and epidemiologist (Joseph Mangano) have penned a short but horrifying essay asking whether a spike in infant deaths in the Northwest are due to Fukushima:

The recent CDC Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report indicates that eight cities in the northwest U.S. (Boise ID, Seattle WA, Portland OR, plus the northern California cities of Santa Cruz, Sacramento, San Francisco, San Jose, and Berkeley) reported the following data on deaths among those younger than one year of age:

4 weeks ending March 19, 2011 - 37 deaths (avg. 9.25 per week)
10 weeks ending May 28, 2011 - 125 deaths (avg.12.50 per week)

This amounts to an increase of 35% (the total for the entire U.S. rose about 2.3%), and is statistically significant. Of further significance is that those dates include the four weeks before and the ten weeks after the Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant disaster. In 2001 the infant mortality was 6.834 per 1000 live births, increasing to 6.845 in 2007. All years from 2002 to 2007 were higher than the 2001 rate.

***

Data from Chernobyl, which exploded 25 years ago, clearly shows increased numbers of sick and weak newborns and increased numbers of deaths in the unborn and newborns, especially soon after the meltdown. These occurred in Europe as well as the former Soviet Union. Similar findings are also seen in wildlife living in areas with increased radioactive fallout levels.
(Chernobyl – Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment, Alexeiy V. Yablokov, Vasily B. Nesterenko, and Alexey V. Nesterenko. Consulting Editor: Janette D. Sherman-Nevinger. New York Academy of Sciences, 2009.)

Levels of radioisotopes were measured in children who had died in the Minsk area that had received Chernobyl fallout. The cardiac findings were the same as those seen in test animals that had been administered Cs-137. Bandashevsky, Y. I, Pathology of Incorporated Ionizing Radiation, Belarus Technical University, Minsk. 136 pp., 1999. For his pioneering work, Prof. Bandashevsky was arrested in 2001 and imprisoned for five years of an eight year sentence.

***

Why should we care if there may be is a link between Fukushima and the death of children? Because we need to measure the actual levels of isotopes in the environment and in the bodies of people exposed to determine if the fallout is killing our most vulnerable. The research is not technically difficult – the political and economic barriers may be greater. Bandshevsky and others did it and confirmed the connection. The information is available in the Chernobyl book. (Previously cited.)

The biological findings of Chernobyl cannot be ignored: isotope incorporation will determine the future of all life on earth – animal, fish, bird, plant and human. It is crucial to know this information if we are to avoid further catastrophic damage.