Merged 8.8 quake in Sendai, Japan

[Travis]

So if the containment dome blows, (like the TMI threatened to do), would you just get bad radiation release or would you get the core meltdown that happened in Chernobyl?

Hypothetically you could get a core meltdown and still have the radiation kept inside the containment structure. Half of Three Mile Island's core did meltdown IIRC.

 

[William Parcher]

The wave rolled in (and tossed cars around like toys, swept wooden houses away), but isn't rolling back out as you would expect.

Much of the bulk of the invading water does not go back into the ocean. There will be a lot of agricultural land in bad shape because of all that seawater. Freshwater rivers, streams, ponds and lakes will be ecologically ruined because the tremendous influx of ocean water.

 

[King of the Americas]

It appears to have vulnerable geography.

So do the towns to the north and south of it.

Sendai City has a vulnerable coastline but a big part of the city center is on a higher elevation.

If you pan out on the Sendai City map you can see the plate boundary and trench.

Minamisoma is gone as well...

 

[Rolfe]

I don't know how many escaped to higher ground. Here's the channel I was watching. There's a bird's eye view of it at 40 seconds into this clip:

http://news.tbs.co.jp/newseye/tbs_newseye4671552.html

Can't get to view the clip I'm afraid. Keeps telling me that a plugin has crashed.

There's no adverse mention of Rikuzentakata on the BBC or indeed on Google at the moment. Seems not to have been picked up by the English-speaking media.

Rolfe.

 

[BenBurch]

Here, Rolfe;

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rown-sleepy-coast-town.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Here's a clip from Puppycow's link that is incredible:

Wave knocking down mass of houses

 

[Myriad]

Glad to hear you got back, Puppycow. Your Friday night to Saturday morning was my Friday day, so all day I've been imagining you camping overnight in your office or some shopping center kept open with food and water available. (And hoped that was the case, rather than the alternate scenario of you walking along streets in the dark through the aftershocks with your map.) Recent news reports here said none of the trains were running yet -- obviously inaccurate. So, a blessed bit of good news to set against the horrific footage that started arriving, at dinnertime here, with the dawn there.

Best wishes,
Myriad

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

American Nuclear Society News feeds on the developing situation at the Fukushima plants in Japan:

http://ansnuclearcafe.org/

 

[Rolfe]

Here, Rolfe;

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...rown-sleepy-coast-town.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

I'm a sick puppy. I just put that in the Wiki article. I should go to bed before I do anything worse.

Rolfe.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Minamisoma is south of Sendai City, has over 70,000 population which looks to all be in coastal housing, and it was wiped out. I take it back, the death toll is going to be in the tens of thousands. 15 minutes is just not enough time for people to have evacuated the coast where the tsunami hit first and was the worst.

 

[King of the Americas]

Minamisoma is south of Sendai City, has over 70,000 population which looks to all be in coastal housing, and it was wiped out. I take it back, the death toll is going to be in the tens of thousands. 15 minutes is just not enough time for people toi have evacuated the coast where the tsunami hit first and was the worst.

The only things left here are houseless foundations...

The whole city is simply gone.

 

[gumboot]

I can't believe the footage of the Tsunamis. It's just incredible. Horrific, terrifying, and incredible. I think one of the most disturbing I saw was a tide of black water, littered with debris, slowly swallowing what looked like farmland. As with the earlier footage I saw of waves coming ashore, what I think is most chilling is how it doesn't actually look that dangerous. It's just some slow-moving water, right? And then it hits something solid, and just keeps going, and carries the solid thing with it, be it a car, a bridge, or an entire building. And it just keeps coming, and coming, and coming. Entire suburbs barely seem to slow it down.

 

[plumjam]

And at least one of them has been swept out to sea.

It's ok. As he was dragged out to sea members of the political press recorded him shouting "Ayll bee beck."

 

[King of the Americas]

I can't believe the footage of the Tsunamis. It's just incredible. Horrific, terrifying, and incredible. I think one of the most disturbing I saw was a tide of black water, littered with debris, slowly swallowing what looked like farmland. As with the earlier footage I saw of waves coming ashore, what I think is most chilling is how it doesn't actually look that dangerous. It's just some slow-moving water, right? And then it hits something solid, and just keeps going, and carries the solid thing with it, be it a car, a bridge, or an entire building. And it just keeps coming, and coming, and coming. Entire suburbs barely seem to slow it down.

Earlier in the thread someone posted the fact that in square meter of water weighs 1 metric ton.

I can't even fathom the weight of the ocean coming inland and how much actual force was being applied...

 

[Belz...]

Great to have you back !

How are things in Tokyo ? We saw lots of destruction in the north but what about the capital ?

Any news, Puppycow ?

 

[Sword_Of_Truth]

Earlier in the thread someone posted the fact that in square meter of water weighs 1 metric ton.

[nitpick]That's a cubic meter.[/nitpick]

 

[gumboot]

Earlier in the thread someone posted the fact that in square meter of water weighs 1 metric ton.

I can't even fathom the weight of the ocean coming inland and how much actual force was being applied...

Yeah, I knew that (weight of water is probably something more commonly learned in countries on the metric system), but I guess you don't apply the practical reality of what that knowledge means.

I've always wanted to know what a Tsunami actually looks like. Now I know. To be honest I kind of wish I didn't.

 

[Rolfe]

A couple of weeks ago I went with a friend to a swimming pool where there was a "rapids" section. I swim a lot, and I swim in rivers and lakes and the sea, but I've never chosen to swim where there is any significant current.

That "rapids" feature was fun, but scary too. The water was clean and warm, and it wasn't deep, and the rapids section was quite short and fairly gentle. But just at the very end there was a jet that was a bit stronger than the others, which swept you out into the main pool again.

It was easy to end up under water, back to front, and unsure which way was up. OK, just hold your breath, go with the flow, and surface giggling in the pool. But it struck me how impossible it must be to do anything if caught in a significant current. I vowed then and there to stay very careful when picking the places I swim.

I dread to think what it was like for the people overtaken by these waves.

Rolfe.

 

[I Ratant]

Watching entire houses get picked off their foundations, and then disintegrating in the flood... There has to many more fatalities than listed so far.

 

[King of the Americas]

[nitpick]That's a cubic meter.[/nitpick]

Thank you.

I sincerely appreciate being corrected, correctly.