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Chernobyl plant was testing a new safety device. Shit went wrong and the reaction rate, the nuclear reaction rate spiked causing the control rods that would normally shut down the reactor to get stuck only a third of the way in. Without the control rods the nuclear reaction went out of control becoming so hot that it caused material to catch fire. The reactor kept increasing and jumped to around 30 GW thermal, ten times the normal operational output. The continuing nuclear reaction caused an explosion ejecting all cooling water and remaining control rods. This increased the nuclear reaction even more causing a nuclear excursion or criticality accident. In Japan the reactors shut down as soon as or before the quake hit.

I didn't say it was a nuclear explosion I said out of control nuclear reaction combined with the fact Soviet reactors weren't enclosed in steel containment units hence the need for the cement Sarcophagus. Japans reactors shut down right away. Also, the Japanese reactors which are contained in steel containment units preventing further damage.

Dirty bomb isn't what happened in Chernobyl. For a dirty bomb you need a huge explosive device to scatter the radioactive material over a large area. Unless the firefighters are fighting the fire with explosive shells, I'm safe. Fire fighters were only evacuated temporarily.

Nuclear material material doesn't explode unless there is a nuclear reaction. Uranium isn't like gunpowder where if you light it on fire it will start a nuclear bomb. Chernobyl was the result of an out of control nuclear reaction. In Japan the nuclear reaction was shut off at or before the earthquake struck.

It's so cliche to knock the french but come on: French Embassy Fuels Panic With False Message About Approaching Radiation Also people are using the crisis to spread malware. The BBC is reporting that the radiation message is fake and that the "The US Computer Emergency Readiness Team (US-CERT) has told computer users to be wary of potential e-mail scams, as well as fake anti-virus and phishing attacks regarding the Japan earthquake and the tsunami disasters."

How could it be Chernobyl times 3 when Chernobyl was an out of control nuclear reaction? The Japanese reactors shut down as soon as, if not before, the quake struck. There is no more fission going on, hasn't been since the quake. Sure the core is incredibly hot but each day it is cooled down more.

The Japanese are some of the most responsible in world when it comes to insurance. I'm sure the rates of people covered in the affected region is something like 99%. While Japanese domestic companies will take a hit most of the Japanese insurance companies are covered by reinsurance companies (Companies who insure the insurers) that are mainly Swiss, and German. I'm far from an expert at finical stuff but these companies have already taken a hit with the US mortgage crisis and economic recession. I hope they provide the money they promised and it doesn't turn into another Fannie Fae type situation.

This happened this morning when radiation levels near the plant reached slightly dangerous levels but the levels quickly peaked and are now back to minor radiation levels. In other news 9700 people who were missing and presumed dead have been found safe and sound at the designated evacuation point.

Chernobyl was an out of control reaction which created huge amounts of radiation. The Japanese plant shut down before or as soon as the earthquake hit. Also, the core in Japanese plants are surrounded by a containment container, something the Soviet plant didn't have. The worse it could get would be something like three mile island. During that incident "estimates of radiological exposure for the 2 million people in the area amounted to about one-sixth of what they might have received from a chest X-ray."

Talking about the Three Mile Island accident, "that estimates of radiological exposure for the 2 million people in the area amounted to about one-sixth of what they might have received from a chest X-ray." The Japanese plants are no way as bad as the Three Mile Island accident, which didn't even release large amounts of radiation from the plant.

There was another explosion at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power complex, the same plant of the explosion before. The Japanese news on TV is saying that it was another hydrogen explosion. The last explosion didn't damage the nuclear containment shield, looks like the same thing here. Interesting thing they also said was that when you fly to New York from Japan you're exposed to 100-200 rads which is much higher than any of rads from steam that the power companies are purposely venting from the nuclear plants.

I can agree with that. Although with the upgrade I believe it is now tied as fourth biggest earthquake, in recorded history.

As the before and after pictures clearly show your statement that "much of the complex was washed away by the Tsunami" is not true. A few buildings close to the water were damaged. But the complex was left standing and undamaged and as shown by reports that it continued operating until the battery power died. But I did make it personal by calling you a liar, my bad. You aren't are a liar or have ill intentions you're just misinformed.

The 10,000 number was an offhand comment by a police spokesman, I'm pretty sure hours after the tsunami, that was giving a worst case scenario. It wasn't based on any sort of facts but it was a large round number so the media chose it. Then other media stations cited other media reporting of 10,000 and boom all of a sudden its a fact. Think back to 911 when the media was reporting 50,000 dead in the twin towers. The official death tolls that are being shown on TV, in Japan, in the worst hit prefecture (what they call a province in Japan) is 500+ dead and 1500 missing. True that is one prefecture but the missing number will go down once people get in contact with each other in a place where there is no power, roads are disabled, etc. The other two hard hit states show around 200 dead each. Of course that number will go up.

This is a lie. The nuclear plant where the non-nuclear explosion occurred as shown by the images on TV is structurally fine. It is unclear if water reached the generators but something knocked out the diesel generators that provide power to the cooling system. The actual cooling system is fine as shown that it ran on battery power for 8hrs until the batteries died. The quake was pretty big. They updated it to 9.0 which is 8000+ more powerful than the New Zealand quake, in the top five biggest quakes EVER in history. Yet the death tool is surprisingly low.

As I'm living in Japan right now, I'm paying pretty close attention. The media loves to latch onto crazy figures that are off the cuff like the 10,000 number. The coast is devastated but these are small rural towns that train for this type of shit ALL THE TIME. It's the elderly that will be hit everyone else would have had at least 10min to get to higher ground. The Sichuan earthquake got high numbers because corrupt Chinese officials built shitty schools. The 2004 quake saw 250,000 killed because it was an area that tsunamis don't usually happen. Neither of these apply to Japan as most buildings survived, accept for those affected by the tsunami, for the later the Japanese are prepared for this and were warned which means, hopefully, they got out of the way. Judging by the video footage they're showing on TV there appear to be large crowds on higher ground watching the damage. There is no nuclear meltdown.

Japan is one of the most active areas, seismically, in the world. Before this event earthquakes happened everyday. Small quakes are going on because that is normal in Japan.

Millions of people are "without drinking water, electricity and proper food" because the powers out. That quote makes it sound like millions of Japanese are without homes. Except those small towns along the coast that were wiped out the Japanese people are fine, they just can't play PS3. If half of Canada can survive without power, in the middle of one of the worst ice storms ever, the Japanese people will get along fine. The death toll will stay around 1000 people. There are so many missing right now because there is no power, no phones, no way to get in touch with family and friends.

Why are you trying to narrow the scope to just Muslim extremists? Do you think Jewish extremists are shedding tears when Jewish settlers killed a three month old baby? When Jewish settlers attacked a funeral killing a 14-year-old girl?, When Jewish settlers stabbed a Palestinian child to death? No. Jewish extremists try and escalate the situation whenever they can to their ends. These types of violent acts BY BOTH SIDES are intended to spark a general war. For the Jewish settlers they want a final cleansing with the IDF pushing all Palestinians out of Israel. The Muslim extremists want to spark a general war where surrounding Arab countries push the Jews into the sea.

You're missing the point, Chernobyl was an out of control nuclear reaction that resulted in a nuclear explosion. The Japanese reactors have shut down and aren't reacting anymore. The worst that could happen would be an explosion that caused nuclear material to be scattered over the surrounding area. The reports, so far, show that the explosion shown on TV didn't damage the reactor core so no nuclear material was released in the explosion. As we speak they're using sea water to cool the remaining reactors. Yeah but in 2004 they didn't have any warning. People were just at home without any training on tsunamis. Japan is one of the most prepared countries in the world. People would have evacuated those small villages along the coast A) after the quake B ) when they heard the evacuation notice/sirens.

Not really as talked about above Chernobyl was the result of a nuclear reaction out of control. In Japan as soon as the earthquake struck the reactors shut down. The problem was the cores even though they weren't reacting or "on" were still incredibly hot. The cooling systems failed and while trying to improvise a system to cool them down highly pressurized, non-nuclear, gasses exploded. As for the body count. Thousands is a little high, maybe around one thousand is a little closer. Sure it looks horrible on TV but if you watch closely they keep showing the same few towns that were totally wiped out close to the epicentre. These towns had a good 20min warning before the tsunami struck and looks like they were evacuated. The dead are going to be elderly people who couldn't move, of which there will be a lot, and those who ignored the warning sirens.

Here is another one! 5 Muslim men stalk a 14-year-old girl to her house break in, kill everyone in the house and then gang rape her in front of the corpses of her murdered family. How sick can these Muslims get? Oh wait ... did I say Muslims? I meant 5 American soldiers raped and killed muslims, my bad. But I guess by your logic the actions of these bad apples means that all Americans are like this! How many have to die at the hands of Muslim terrorists American soldiers before we get it?

Didn't all the prisoners break out weeks ago, hence the big surge of Hamas personal in Gaza?

So you admit that when you said multiple "people" were being decapitated in the streets you were full of sh#t. BTW it was the douchebag assassin's intention to cut off the head he didn't actually do it to Theo van Gogh .

Also keep in mind that most of the population live in the big cities, all of which are fine with minor damage. The small towns and villages that you see being wiped out by the tsunami are just relics of Japan's past. Most of Japan's rural population moved to the cities in the last 50 years. These coastal towns are filled with old people and people who serve and support the old people. The only reason these towns can exist are generous government subsidies. The farm land you saw being destroyed provides a fraction of Japan's actual food and are totally inefficient family plots that again only exist because the Japanese government gives them huge amounts of money. Basically the only viable industry in these welfare cities are construction and guess just what the earthquake? did created huge opportunities for construction employment.