Japan QUAKE [March 11 2011]

[donbuggy]

pano pag na-expose ang japanese ocean sa radiation? will that mean radioactive japanese fishes? so pano na ang sushi from Japan, will you eat it?

http://www.asiaone.com/News/AsiaOne+...14-268028.html

Singapore, Taiwan to test Japanese food for radiation
AFP
Mon, Mar 14, 2011

SINGAPORE, March 14, 2011 (AFP) - Singapore on Monday said it was testing food imported from Japan for radiation, with Taiwan planning to follow suit after another explosion rocked an earthquake-hit atomic plant.

"As a precautionary measure, AVA (the Agri-Food and Veterinary Authority of Singapore) will monitor Japanese produce based on source and potential risk of contamination," Singapore's food regulator said in a statement.

"Samples will be taken for testing for radiation. Fresh produce will have priority. AVA will continue to closely monitor the situation and its developments."

The AVA said the bulk of Japanese imports arrive by sea, but high-end Japanese restaurants in Singapore routinely use air freight to fly in produce such as raw fish - integral to sushi and sashimi - to ensure its freshness and quality.

The city-state has a large concentration of restaurants serving Japanese cuisine, which is very popular among Singaporeans.

[kinyo]

^ we need the dyson sphere.

if OB is right, earth itself is a dyson sphere

btt: latest news is ... nuclear plant workers are back to work as radiation levels apparently went down ... astig talaga yung mga workers

[vito corleone]

if OB is right, earth itself is a dyson sphere

btt: latest news is ... nuclear plant workers are back to work as radiation levels apparently went down ... astig talaga yung mga workers

yup, they should be proclaimed as heroes after this. . .in chernobyl, all those workers who were assigned to control the situation were the first casualties

[uls]

6.0 (could be revised) quake hits east Japan

[hein]

Daming TANGA sa Pilipinas

[SIZE="3"]Hoax radiation alert sparks panic in Philippines, AFP[/SIZE]

(AFP)MANILA — Hoax news alerts warning that the Philippines would be hit with radiation from Japan's damaged nuclear power plant have sparked anger and confusion, with panicked schools sending their pupils home.
Authorities were forced to issue advisories discrediting the reports, which circulated via mobile phone messages and social networking sites, while the justice secretary warned those behind the fake alerts could be prosecuted.
"There is no scientific and technical basis that a radioactive plume or nuclear fallout from Fukushima-Daiichi Nuclear Power Plants will hit... the Philippines," the Philippine Nuclear Research Institute said on Tuesday.
The hoax news alerts started spreading via text messages on the Philippines' hyperactive mobile phone networks on Monday, as radiation leaked from Japan's quake and tsunami-damaged Fukushima power plant.
One purportedly issued by a popular global television news network warned people to stay indoors, close doors and windows, and swab their necks with antiseptic to protect their thyroid glands.
"Radiation may hit phil starting at 4pm today. Pls send to ur loved ones," it said.
Some schools in the northern Philippines, about 2,800 kilometres (1,700 miles) away from the stricken power plant, sent their pupils home in the early afternoon on Monday.
The schools were apparently unaware that the news was a hoax, Cielito Aglipay, an upset high school student's mother from the northern town of Batac, told AFP.
"The principal sent them home at 3pm. It was a false alarm," Aglipay said by phone.
Justice Minister Leila de Lima ordered the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) to trace the source of the hoax SMS messages, saying they were liable for crimes against public order.
"There is a standing directive to the NBI to arrest those making prank calls or those making false alarms," de Lima told reporters on Tuesday.

[boybi]

Hindi lang dito, pati sa US:

Health authorities advise iodine pills of limited use as panic buying sets in

Agence France-Presse Mar 15, 2011 – 10:10 AM ET | Last Updated: Mar 15, 2011 10:25 AM ET

HONG KONG — Japan’s nuclear crisis has sparked panic buying of iodine pills, with online bids exceeding $500 for one packet, but health experts hosed down the hysteria and warned the pills are of limited use.

As fresh blasts rocked a stricken atomic plant on Japan’s east coast, and crews worked frantically to cool reactors that emitted dangerous levels of radiation near the facility, jitters spread to Tokyo and beyond

U.S.-based firms selling potassium iodide, a preventative for radiation sickness, completely ran out of stock and pharmacies across the country’s Pacific-facing West Coast had a rush on the over-the-counter pills.
Related

*

Post Primer: How iodine tablets help protect against radiation exposure

“We are quite slammed with orders, but we are working as fast as we can to get orders out,” said NukePills.com, which had sold out of iodine tablets and was fast exhausting oral liquid supplies.

“We are experiencing delays in shipping due to the Japan nuclear crisis. A delay in shipping may be a week or more.”

Potassium iodide is a salt used to saturate the thyroid gland to block the uptake of radioactive iodine, a highly carcinogenic substance that can leak from nuclear reactors in an accident.

Another major supplier, Anbex, said it was also out of stock and did not expect to get new supplies until April 18.

One packet of 14 pills had attracted bids of up to $540 at online auction house eBay and talk about radiation poisoning was so feverish on Twitter and other forums that the World Health Organisation issued a statement urging calm.

“Consult your #doctor before taking #iodine pills. Do not self-medicate!” the WHO said on its Twitter page.

Iodine pills are “not radiation antidotes” and offer no protection against radioactive elements such as caesium, the UN’s health agency said, stressing they also carried health risks for some people, including pregnant women.

The WHO also warned against drinking or applying iodine liquid after a rush on the antiseptic wound cleaner in Asian countries, where iodine pills are typically only available in hospitals or by prescription.

“It is crazy, people have been reading about the situation in Japan and they are demanding iodine tablets, but most pharmacies don’t stock the tablets,” said Kuala Lumpur pharmacist Paul Ho.

“There have also been text messages and emails going round that you can use the iodine antiseptic solution, which you place around your neck, to help cut down on radiation absorption,” he added.

Such a treatment would be utterly ineffective, but Mr. Ho said “we have run out of all our iodine antiseptic solution at the moment”.

One SMS text message, also circulating in China, Hong Kong and the Philippines, is billed as a BBC “newsflash” and urges Asians to “take precautions” including sheltering indoors and swabbing the thyroid region of the neck with iodine.

“The BBC has issued no such flash but it has caused particular panic in the Philippines,” a BBC News website story said.

Philippine Health Secretary Enrique Ona dismissed any need for a rush order of iodine.

“Let me be very clear, we don’t see the necessity for that,” he said. “We know where we can get it if necessary. But we are not going to order it yet.”

The Hong Kong Observatory, an official government body, stressed that radiation levels in the Chinese territory were “normal”.

“The rumour that the radiation will affect Hong Kong is unfounded,” it said.

Malaysia’s health minister Liow Tiong Lai dismissed the purported warning as “nonsense”, saying there was “no need to apply such solutions to the neck and private parts”.

“People must not panic. The health ministry is keeping very close tabs on the situation,” he told AFP.

The assurances were echoed in Taiwan, but nevertheless officials were preparing to hand out 100,000 boxes of iodine tablets to residents near two nuclear plants in New Taipei city.

Stephen Tsui, a biomedical expert from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, described the risk of contamination outside of Japan as “low” but said “all countries could be affected” in the region if the Fukushima plant had a total meltdown.

Tens of thousands have already been evacuated from a zone within a radius of 20 kilometres of the 40-year-old plant, where authorities said radiation levels reached dangerous levels Tuesday.—Amy Coopes

http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/03...uying-sets-in/

[uls]

TEPCO says unable to continue work on reactors coz of radiation risk

[ghosthunter]

yup, they should be proclaimed as heroes after this. . .in chernobyl, all those workers who were assigned to control the situation were the first casualties

In chernobyl, the radiation was so strong you can taste the radiation in your mouth (metalic taste). The maximum "safe" dose was only measured in under 30 seconds.

[safeorigin]

updates: http://www.jaif.or.jp/english/news_i...300252224P.pdf

refer here for future updates: http://www.jaif.or.jp/english/

[jave]

Watching TV Patrol, I was disgusted by the overreactions of some Filipinos in Japan.

One lady at the embassy in Tokyo was frantically crying and trying to get home, despite the fact that she's in Tokyo and still relatively safe. Bah.

This is, in contrast, to the Japanese who remain stoic and do what they have to do to survive and not just going about, crying and whining.

Also, typical DFA, typically unprepared and last minute.

[Monseratto]

Basta may drama kuno, kinakagat ng mga local media.

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquire...e-nuclear-zone

Scene from hell’: Panic hits Tokyo; 70,000 flee nuclear zone
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 03:25:00 03/16/2011

TOKYO—Canned goods, batteries, bread and bottled water vanished from store shelves and some residents began to leave, as panic swept Tokyo on Tuesday and the government ordered thousands living near an earthquake-crippled nuclear power plant to stay indoors and avoid radiation sickness.

Some 70,000 people residing within a 20-kilometer radius from the disabled Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Station northeast of the capital have already evacuated and 140,000 remain in the danger zone.

The widening cloud of radiation has added to the misery of millions of people in the devastated northeast.

The humanitarian crisis facing Japan following Friday’s ferocious earthquake and tsunami was unfolding on multiple fronts—from a sudden rise in orphaned children to shortages of water, food, medicine and electricity to overflowing toilets in packed shelters and erratic care of traumatized survivors.

In one sign of the panic, Don Quixote, a multistory, 24-hour general store in Tokyo’s Roppongi district, was sold out of radios, flashlights, candles, fuel cans and sleeping bags.

Some international journalists covering the disaster from the worst-hit region around the northeastern city of Sendai were pulling out.

The Tokyo office of Michael Page International, a British recruitment agency, was closing for the week.

“I am leaving for Singapore tomorrow and will work from our Singapore office,” one employee said.

Retailers said they hadn’t seen such panic in years, perhaps since the oil crisis in the 1970s.

Stores were running out of necessities, raising government fears that hoarding may hurt the delivery of emergency food aid to those who really need it.

“The situation is hysterical,” said Tomonao Matsuo, the spokesperson for instant noodle maker Nissin Foods, which donated a million items including its “Cup Noodles” for disaster relief.

“People feel safer just by buying Cup Noodles,” Matsuo said.

The frenzied buying is compounding supply problems from damaged and congested roads, stalled factories, reduced train service and other disruptions caused by Friday’s 9.0-magnitude earthquake off Japan’s northeast coast and the major tsunami it generated.

Chocolate bars gone

Renho, the minister in charge of consumer affairs, who goes by one name, asked people to refrain from buying items they don’t really need.

Michiaki Tada, a 40-year-old Tokyo Web programmer, was stunned to find the shelves bare at several convenience stores. He gave up and has just been eating out.

“It’s like a joke. Cup Noodles, rice balls, snacks—just about everything, except for super-hot chips, is gone,” he said. “I can’t even find chocolate bars.”

Family Mart convenience store owner Kazuhiro Minami was expecting a small delivery later Tuesday, but said he would have to shut anyway if the electric utility decided to go ahead with proposed three-hour rolling blackouts.

“I’m really, really worried,” he said, blaming hoarding, distribution problems and worries that there might be another quake.

[aijie28]

Grabe talaga ang lindol. hanggang ngayon na fefeel ko parin nalindol. nakakatakot parin ang araw araw na lindol dito. ok lang if lindol wag lang tsunami.

[Monseratto]

Hmm...I wonder why people have not resorted to hoarding this item yet?

http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakin...n-bound-flyers

Thailand to give iodine pills to Japan-bound flyers
Agence France-Presse
First Posted 18:18:00 03/16/2011

BANGKOK—Thailand's public health ministry said Wednesday that it would hand out free iodine tablets to passengers at airports where jets are departing for disaster-stricken Japan.

Fears about harmful nuclear contamination are growing after a series of explosions, fires and radiation leaks at a nuclear facility on Japan's northeastern coast, following Friday's massive earthquake and tsunami.

"I have already ordered the government pharmaceutical organization to produce back-up iodine tablets for special purposes," said a ministry statement.

"Initially, we will produce 15,000 tablets to distribute for free at the airports which have flights from Thailand to Japan, such as Suvarnabhumi airport (in Bangkok) and Phuket airport, starting tomorrow," it said.

"But we will screen and give only to passengers who are traveling to the risk area in northern Japan."

The ministry warned against all but necessary travel to the area, also saying it would offer advice and screenings to those returning to Thailand from Japan.

[hein]

Watching TV Patrol, I was disgusted by the overreactions of some Filipinos in Japan.

One lady at the embassy in Tokyo was frantically crying and trying to get home, despite the fact that she's in Tokyo and still relatively safe. Bah.

This is, in contrast, to the Japanese who remain stoic and do what they have to do to survive and not just going about, crying and whining.

Ganon talaga ang Masang Pinoy. Maarte

[safeorigin]

Hmm...I wonder why people have not resorted to hoarding this item yet?

it's not needed

less than 1 microseivert per hour virtually does nothing to the body

[jansky]

kahit ganyan nangyari sa japan, dito ako bilib sa kanila


http://caffertyfile.blogs.cnn.com/20...ting-in-japan/


But one heart-wrenching byproduct of disasters like this one has been missing in Japan, and that’s looting and lawlessness.
Looting is something we see after almost every tragedy; for example: last year's earthquakes in Haiti and Chile, the floods in England in 2007, and of course Hurricane Katrina back in 2005. It happens when some people who've seen life as they know it get tossed out the window feel that all morality has been tossed out too. It's survival of the fittest and whatever you can get your hands on is yours, no matter who it belongs to.
But that's not happening in Japan.

[jave]

*hein:

I blame the stupid telenovelas. Putting it in their heads that everything needs drama and they are the main character of their lives.

[Monseratto]

People are getting really pissed at what exactly in happening in no. 4. Spent rods are kept in a cooling pool, which some say in now completely dry...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12762608

Over the days of the Fukushima crisis, attention has switched from reactor building 1 to 3, to 2, back to 3 - and now, to 4.

This is a surprise.

Reactors 4, 5 and 6 were shut down at the time of Friday's earthquake, with some or all of their fuel rods extracted and left in the cooling ponds that each reactor building has under its roof.

Once a reactor is turned off, radioactivity and heat generation in the rods die away quickly; down to 7% of the original power within a second of switch-off, 5% within a minute, 0.5% within a day.

Transferred to the cooling pond, allowing technicians to do routine maintenance on the reactor, the rods are supposed to sit quietly until the time comes for their re-insertion or their journey towards disposal.

Hot fuel rods in dry pools may be the source of increased radiation levels The tops of the rods are supposed to be about 5m (16ft) below the water surface.

The water keeps them cool and also blocks radiation.

Over the last few days there have been reports suggesting water levels were low and the water "boiling"; and now the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), which has a team of 11 experts advising in Japan, says the pool is completely dry.

The government ordered Tepco to put water back in the pool.

But either because of high radiation levels or broken pumps or some other reason, they could not.

Wednesday's plan to drop water in from a helicopter - a technique that is used to fight forest fires - had to be scrapped because of concerns about radiation affecting the pilots. Without the water, gamma-rays travel straight up into the air.

There are reports that the authorities have asked US military personnel to bring in water cannon, which would presumably be fired from the ground, aiming to shoot the water in through the broken roof.

The NRC says that in the current dry state, radiation levels from the pond are probably "extremely high", creating a danger to workers at the plant.

[LadyRider]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011...nd-shops-empty


i posted in other threads re the energy & food supply infrastructure which we city dwellers take for granted

we think gas stations will always have fuel, stores will always have food

people aren't aware of the fragile supply infrastructure that supports cities

things can easily disrupt the supply infrastructure -- natural or artificial

just a reminder

*uls

Reminds you of Zimbabwe right how the shelves are empty yun nga lang ito because of disaster sa Zimbabwe because of hyper inflation...

Dito rin pumapasok yung point na kahit may pera kang pambili, wala nang mabili at wala ng halaga ang pera mo.

Ang importante ay yung lagi kang handa sa pwedeng mangyari.

No amount of money will save you if you are not prepared.

Dapat laging may extra food and water; the basic necessities ng tao para at least ready ka for the days to come.

[miked]

Now my sisters are requesting me to get my 1yr old niece and 4 yr old nephew from japan asap. ang prinoproblema nila is wala pang travel documents yung niece ko. pati ako wala pa passport. on the move nako ngayon on processing my papers just to get them on time. nagkakaproblema pa koneksyon ng yahoo e via email pa naman ang appointment. yung main webpage ng dfa unavailable pa. nakakabwiset talaga gobyerno natin my fellow tsikoteers!

my sisters' family in japan is coordinating with a group (not the Phil govt) on how to evacuate themselves kasi as of this writing hindi pa rin tumitigil aftershocks.

ang isa pang kinaiisan ko ay yung balita kagabi. Nagmamayabang na naman Philippine governtment thru their rescue team. Pinagmamayabang ba naman mga hi-tech daw na gamit e kung tutuusin baka pagtatawanan lang ng mga Japanese yung mga gamit nila. Baka surplus gears pa ang mga ito. Bakit di na lang pumunta ngayon din mismo yang rescue team na iyan at saka na lang magmayabang......Philippine governtment is purely THEATRICS!.