ISU Where Will Worlds BE (formerly) JAPAN QUAKE FOR WORLDS | Page 2 | Golden Skate

ISU Where Will Worlds BE (formerly) JAPAN QUAKE FOR WORLDS

dorispulaski

Wicked Yankee Girl
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Country
United-States
And as to energy disasters that weren't covered in US news, due to the quake & tsunami:

http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/8997947/dam-breaks-in-japan-washes-away-homes/

A dam broke, washing away homes in Fukushima prefecture and a massive fire broke out in an oil refinery at Iichihara near Tokyo

Hours after the quake struck with devastating force, TV images showed huge orange balls of flame rolling up into the night sky as fires raged around a petrochemical complex in Sendai.

A massive fire also engulfed an oil refinery in Iichihara near Tokyo.

To put this disaster in the scale of things, the earthquake that devastated Haiti was only 7.3 on the Richter scale. This earthquake was 8.9. The aftershocks are worse than most earthquakes-one that just struck Nagao was 6.2 and before that there was another of 6.1 at Morioka.

Because major earthquakes have major aftershocks, continued damage may occur.
 
Last edited:

Violet Bliss

Record Breaker
Joined
Nov 19, 2010
I can't recall when there was an earthquake of 8.9 on the Richter scale which is logarithmic. Each additional point means ten times the energy or amplitude. That was why Doris called Haiti's quake as only 7.3, which unfornately was pretty much cnetred at a city of shabby dwellings. The Japan quake is off land but the major damage is actually caused by the resulting tsunamis. As well, Japan is one of the most densely populated nations on earth. The damages and losses are just tremendous and record breaking.
 

herios

Medalist
Joined
Jan 25, 2004
I can't recall when there was an earthquake of 8.9 on the Richter scale which is logarithmic. Each additional point means ten times the energy or amplitude. That was why Doris called Haiti's quake as only 7.3, which unfornately was pretty much cnetred at a city of shabby dwellings. The Japan quake is off land but the major damage is actually caused by the resulting tsunamis. As well, Japan is one of the most densely populated nations on earth. The damages and losses are just tremendous and record breaking.


This morning, CP24 in Toronto reported that this was the 5th strongest earthquake ever measured.

And yes, the scale is logarithmic, but the damage sometimes is not exactly in the epicentre, because the shock wave could spread in linear direction of the centre and if it hits on his way a densely populated area, there the damage could be much larger than in the epicentre, if that place is not populated for example. As you just stated, Skatefiguring, the most casualties were caused by the tsunami wave, and not by the quake itself.
 

dorispulaski

Wicked Yankee Girl
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Country
United-States
More iaea updates. I'm staying linked to the alert site and doing a refresh when I walk through the office:

Japan Earthquake Update (2210 CET)
11 March 2011

Announcements, Featured

Japanese authorities have informed the IAEA’s Incident and Emergency Centre (IEC) that officials are working to restore power to the cooling systems of the Unit 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Mobile electricity supplies have arrived at the site.

Japanese officials have also reported that pressure is increasing inside the Unit 1 reactor’s containment, and the officials have decided to vent the containment to lower the pressure. The controlled release will be filtered to retain radiation within the containment.

Three reactors at the plant were operating at the time of the earthquake, and the water level in each of the reactor vessels remains above the fuel elements, according to Japanese authorities.

The IAEA’s IEC continues to liaise with the Japanese authorities, and is in full response mode to monitor the situation closely round the clock.

 

Tonichelle

Idita-Rock-n-Roll
Record Breaker
Joined
Jun 27, 2003
the whole thing is just devastating. I'm on the other side of the water from Japan in the "Ring of Fire" so I know they've had all the same precautions and preparations we have and then some, but still nothing can prepare you for "the big one". Alaska's watching this very closely. We're pretty much next in line for a big one! :eek: praying for all of those out there who are going through this scare and their families.
 

dorispulaski

Wicked Yankee Girl
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Country
United-States
Ski was stationed in Kodiak just after the last big Alaska earthquake. The town was flattened, nearly everyone was living in trailers, and the phone book was 2 pages long.

I hope that any other Alaska earthquakes have their epicenters far from Anchorage and the Kenai Peninsula...and Kodiak.
 

Tonichelle

Idita-Rock-n-Roll
Record Breaker
Joined
Jun 27, 2003
Ski was stationed in Kodiak just after the last big Alaska earthquake. The town was flattened, nearly everyone was living in trailers, and the phone book was 2 pages long.

I hope that any other Alaska earthquakes have their epicenters far from Anchorage and the Kenai Peninsula...and Kodiak.

we had a pretty large one a few years back that broke up the AL-CAN but thankfully the Epicenter was in the middle of no where so there were no human casualties. But yeah. Not looking forward to another '64 quake. (not that I was here for the first one lol but I've seen the pics and there are still scars all over the Peninsula and Anchorage from it)
 

mot

On the Ice
Joined
Feb 17, 2010
I posted this in the other thread about the earthquake in Japan too.

http://www.jiji.com/jc/c?g=spo_30&k=2011031200700

translation:

Ottavio Cinquanta held a press conference (in Inzell, Germany) and confirmed that the ISU will discuss with the JSF and make a decision next week, regarding whether to hold the WC in Tokyo or not, siting the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake and the explosion in Fukushima-Dai'ichi Nuclear Power Station as reasons for such consideration.
He stated that the situation had changed since yesterday as they had received the information about the possible risk related to nuclear radioactivity.
 

dorispulaski

Wicked Yankee Girl
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Country
United-States
The ISU is pretty funny--the vapor in question is a long way from Tokyo.


Here's a rollup of current updates from the power companies (within the last hour). This should, of course, be taken with a grain of salt, (perhaps not alarmist enough) from the way I would take US media, but they are the ones most in touch with the situation also.

UPDATE AS OF 9:30 A.M. EST, SATURDAY, MARCH 12:

The Tokyo Electric Power Company says it has successfully vented the containment of unit 1 at the Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant in northern Japan, according to several industry sources.

Japan’s chief cabinet secretary Yukio Edano, told a news conference that there was an explosion at Fukushima-Daiichi at 15:36 local time, but he said it has not affected the reactor’s primary system or its containment, the news service NucNet reported this morning.

Edano said there was hydrogen explosion in the space between the concrete containment and the reactor’s primary system, but the explosion did not damage the containment function or the reactor system, the report said. A portion of the fuel in the reactor was uncovered and TEPCO is using borated seawater to cover the fuel. Radiation measurements at the site boundary of Fukushima Daiichi were measured at 11 millrem per hour, but were reduced to 7 millirem per hour a few hours after the explosion.

TEPCO also is preparing to vent the containment structures at Fukushima Daiichi 2 and 3, as of Saturday morning.

Edano said, "We've confirmed that the reactor container was not damaged. The explosion didn't occur inside the reactor container. As such there was no large amount of radiation leakage outside.,"

The Japanese government expanded the evacuation zone around the facility to 20 kilometers, or about 12 miles.

Backup diesel generators and backup batteries have arrived at the Fukushima Daiichi reactors.

U.S. support to Japan for the nuclear plant events and earthquake includes assistance from the industry and Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

TEPCO also is working to maintain safe condition of Fukushima Daini units 1, 2 and 3, which have lost reactor pressure suppression function.

The nuclear facilities were damaged in a magnitude 8.9 earthquake on March 11, centered offshore of the Sendai region, which contains the capital Tokyo. Serious secondary effects followed including a significant tsunami, significant aftershocks and a major fire at a fossil fuel installation.

UPDATE AS OF 8 A.M. EST, SATURDAY, MARCH 12:

NEI is coordinating with the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations (INPO) and the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI) this morning and will provide a further update to the situation in Japan as soon as possible.

UPDATE AS OF 5 P.M. EST, FRIDAY, MARCH 11:

Pressure inside the containment of Unit 1 at Fukushima Daiichi reportedly has been increasing over the time that emergency core cooling systems have not been active. TEPCO reported at 2 a.m. local time that pressure had increased beyond plant reference levels, but was within engineered limits. The company said it will reduce the pressure within containment "for those units that cannot confirm certain level of water injection" by the safety systems. "We will endeavor to restore the units and continue monitoring the environment of the site periphery," TEPCO's press release states.

The Federation of Electric Power Companies in Japan released a statement indicating that “slightly radioactive vapor will be passed through a filtering system and emitted outside via a ventilation stack.” TEPCO “is confident that this controlled release will help maintain the integrity of the reactor containment vessel while having no impact on health or the environment.”
 
Last edited:
Joined
Aug 16, 2009
Doris and the rest of you, thanks for the information. I have to hope that a country like Japan, which is so stringent about buildings being constructed to earthquake code, would be at least as demanding in the design of nuclear plants. Even if the threat is exaggerated, it's still unsettling. As several of you pointed out, in a country with that kind of population density, the danger is exponentially greater in almost every location. I've never heard of Sendai, and now I read that it has a population of a million people. Many major cities in the U.S., including San Francisco, Atlanta, Boston, and Baltimore, don't have a million people. One of the saddest pieces of news I've read today is that several commuter trains are simply missing. At least maybe the nuclear outcome will be less catastrophic than we fear.
 

Violet Bliss

Record Breaker
Joined
Nov 19, 2010
In terms of the tsunami and even the earthquake, Tokyo is far from the disaster area, with much credit to its preparedness, e.g. its building codes. In terms of nuclear radioactivity, Tokyo is extremely close to the two nulcear plants in question.

It's not just nuclear explosions such as the atomic bombs or the Chernobyl incident that are immensely dangerous. Any exposure to nuclear radiation will have severe lingering health effect often passed on to the future generations. The disastrous effects of Chernobyl is well known but in the US, the effect of so called depleted uranium deployed in the Middle East by both Presidents Bush's military, are deliberately obscured, even denying the suffering of the returned veterans, when even their wives report being burnt by their semen! Just google "depleted uranium". While cancers and birth defects in far away land may be ignored, the depleted uranium is being wind blown all over the world and it will take billions of years to actually deplete.

There is nothing funny about radioactivity leaks or explosions. I'm not trying to alarm anyone but nuclear safety cannot be overemphasized. In fact, I'm hopeful on new nuclear technology, such as the meltdown proof pebble-bed nuclear technology in China and possible backyard nuclear cells to come. Of course, great strides are being made in other ways of generating or garnering energy. The Japanese plants in question are far from the Chernobyl design but I believe are still relatively old models with much better and added precautions against disasters such as just happened.

I hope and pray it is a good system and all dangers are controlled and contained and such good news will be confirmed soon.
 

jatale

On the Ice
Joined
Feb 24, 2011
Hopefully they will find a way to contain the nuclear reactor problems and finally be able to cool them down. Once the reactors are shut down, however, it will probably be quite some time before they can be started again. As I've been reading in the papers, you can't plan for earthquakes of magnitude 8.9, nothing anywhere in the world is designed to resist that size earthquake according to seismologists on TV. In any event, I suspect the Worlds competition will have to be postponed or moved. In addition to all the problems relating to the disaster, Japan has been rocked with 180 aftershocks in the past two days and this will likely continue for sometime. I don't know how ice skaters can skate with the earth shifting under them.
 

Violet Bliss

Record Breaker
Joined
Nov 19, 2010
Do we want a World Championships event where skaters have perfect excuses for their falls?

(My bit of black humour in time of tragedies and uncertainties.)
 

dorispulaski

Wicked Yankee Girl
Joined
Jul 26, 2003
Country
United-States
The Fukushima facilities are about 240 km (150 miles) north of Tokyo, which is not extremely close.

The prevailing winds, somewhat more to the point, blow west to east, which is also favorable to having minimal effects in Tokyo. I expect that the facilities are where they are because of this fact.
 

blue_idealist

Record Breaker
Joined
Feb 25, 2006
I dont care if Worlds will be held anymore.

I'm starting to not want them to be in Japan, out of concern for the skaters, even though I was being a diehard fan and hoping they would continue as planned yesterday. In my naivete I thought maybe everything would clear up in a couple of days, but I guess not.
 

Violet Bliss

Record Breaker
Joined
Nov 19, 2010
There wouldn't a real World Championships unless all, especially the athletes' parents, can be assured of the safety when and where it is held. The young skaters are precious children to their parents who would definitely put their foot down against sending them to any risk even if the youngsters are foolhearted themselves.
 

MagicFairy

On the Ice
Joined
Dec 31, 2008
I think the championships should be delayed for a month. It doesnt make sense to hold the championships as scheduled, when many federations will not send their competitors. That would be not a real world championship!
 
Last edited:

colleen o'neill

Medalist
Joined
Nov 3, 2006
Would they have a whole month to delay? Many of these skaters will be under contract to skate in shows..

Now a second reactor at the Fukushima plant could be going south..and no-one can blame skaters & their parents for having concerns. Never mind the possibility of continuing aftershocks ( even those that might not threaten life and limb )disrupting the competition.

I particularly feel for the Japanese athletes..
 
Top