Signs of the Impending Apocalypse

[RusVal]

And now we know where the zombies will likely originate from.

[MilitiaJim]

And now we know where the zombies will likely originate from.

Stay the !@#$ out of the damn jungle!  That place ain't fit fer people.

[glimmerrat]

So, Japan have had the snot smacked out of them by an 8.9 magnitude quake. 

The epicenter was in the north, but it collapsed buildings in Tokyo (!) and was felt 1500 miles away in Beijing (!!)

[Mister Andersen]

“The headline you won’t be reading today: “Millions saved in Japan by good engineering and government building codes”. But it’s the truth.”
—    Dave Ewing

[Wolverine]

The footage of the tidal wave washing over Japan is pretty terrifying. We weren't sure of the scale in one shot, until we realised that the small dark boxes moving along in the water were cars!

[Crafty_Alex]

“The headline you won’t be reading today: “Millions saved in Japan by good engineering and government building codes”. But it’s the truth.”
—    Dave Ewing

True dat. The earthquake in Japan was 8,000 times stronger than the one in Christchurch, and while devestating, is certainly not proportionally as bad (granted, the NZ quake was 3x closer to the surface and significantly closer to the city, but still). As I understand it, a 9.0 + on the Richter scale is the point at which the earth itself takes a wave pattern like liquid, like a tsunami of dirt. That...would be bad.

[Mister Andersen]

The quake is meant to have open a 150 mile long by 50 mile deep rent in the planet's crust, from what I've heard.

[Desertpuma]

In addition, there have been over 100+ aftershocks of 5.0+. The quake was so strong it actually temporarily sped up the Earth's rotation.

The strongest one I know of is the one that hit Mexico City about a decade ago. It was like a 9.5 and we felt it in the middle of Arizona.

[Mister Andersen]

Oh great, looks like there could be a Chernobyl level meltdown 

[Desertpuma]

The good news is Japan had actually shutdown the reactors as part of their protocol in a quake or other natural disaster. This is also the main reason 4 million people in Tokyo went without electrical power following the quake.

[Krensky]

Oh great, looks like there could be a Chernobyl level meltdown 

Well, that's not really fair to the engineers and builders of the plant.

It'll probably be worse the TMI, but it doesn't seem likely to be anywhere near as bad as Chernobyl. It's also likely it won't get anywhere near that bad because the Japanese are sane and built the reactors with multiple layered containment buildings and systems and it doesn't use flammable graphite as it's moderator.

Frankly, the RMBK reactors are a scary kludge, doubly so considering Soviet engineering, construction, and material problems. Heck, the design of the control rods actually causes a positive scram and they take about 20 seconds to insert. Under the wrong (and not all that unlikely) conditions the RMBK emergency shut down system will actually make a the reactor runaway faster.

Fukushima I's BWR and ABWR plants are far more resilient. It might be bad, but it won't be Chernobyl bad.

[RusVal]

...the Japanese are sane...

That part's debatable. 

Regardless, as the only nation that has had nuclear weaponry used against it, Japan is understandably cautious about anything that splits the atom, so it isn't surprising that they would over-engineer a reactor.

[Desertpuma]

Yes, but they are loaded in nuclear reactors with serious safguards. This why the crisis is so alarming: the safeguards failed

[glimmerrat]

The Chernobyl reactor was in the middle of an experiment; the japanese reactors were already shut down.

The Chernobyl reactor did not have a failsafe mechnism; the japanese reactors do.

The Chernobyl situation simply cannot occur with modern reactors.

[ThunderMonkey]

The Chernobyl reactor was in the middle of an experiment; the japanese reactors were already shut down.

The Chernobyl reactor did not have a failsafe mechnism; the japanese reactors do.

The Chernobyl situation simply cannot occur with modern reactors.

Well... if certain groups in the US get their way to fully reinstate America's nuclear program complete with deregulation of the safeguards, it could happen here. However, luckily, there are a number of groups fighting that fight along several fronts.