Outbreaks of another kind

[UncleEbenezer]

I *think* Stuttley understands that.

Sorry, I don't think I got the memo. Who is Stuttley?

Named after a chap who executed a lot of ambitious and exciting but idiotic projects, whose legacy was always disastrous. His surname and first initial speak for themselves.

[scotia]

So why do we call Fukushima a disaster

TEPCO called it a disaster
https://search-tepco.dga.jp/en/index-e. ... 78957&ref=

Yes - under Japanese Legislation it was subject to "Nuclear Disaster Law". But was it a disaster?
If we are ever hopeful of getting the general public to understand risk - particularly concerning nuclear radiation, and being able to separate myth from fact, we need to reserve words like "disaster" for real disasters.
I wonder how many of the general public are aware (as I am sure you are) that the fly ash from a coal plant carries into the surrounding environment about 100 times more radiation than a nuclear plant generating the same power. Not to mention the Carbon Dioxide emissions, the Acid Rain, and the cost of human life in its mining. Yet changing to coal from nuclear in Germany was apparently a victory for the "Green" party!
Again - apologies for moving from friendly banter. Please don't send me to that other place where dragons lie

[didds]

Could "sunbathing" be a mischievous description of taking a moment to relax while in the park?

some pictures seen online are showing groups of several people sitting aroudn in circles chatting etc. They are not in anyway apparenty having a minute or two's rest whilst running etc.

E.G.
https://metro.co.uk/2020/04/05/thousand ... S49oNIh1AI

Meanwhile another picture on a similar report lambasting the sunbathers then showed a park where everybody in shot was clearly exercising (walking, cycling, running) and maintaining very good social distancing!!

The point being that if parks are closed those that exercise will just do so in the streets. Its not the exercisers that are the problem. (Though I'd hate for parks to be closed down to disrupt sunbathers etc and in some places that may not even be possible to do anyway.)

Genuine question - woiudnt this be as simple as sending a couple of officers down giving out FPNs as they go to those clearly not exercising? Or are they trulty employed fully elsewhere ? (which of course they may be!)

didds

[XFool]

First - I agree that the BBC is not the only organisation that uses the word "disaster" for Fukushima. However I would expect it to broadcast accurate information - unlike many other organisations. So lets look at the definition you supply - and see if the BBC is making a mistake. Your definition requires Great Loss of Life and/or Great Damage.

Great Damage? A Nuclear Power Station has stopped working - with 4 of its 6 reactors being damaged. Not my definition of a disaster, and I think most rational persons would concur.

I cannot say if The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) meets your criteria for "most rational persons".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Nuclear_Event_Scale

But... to sum up, The Fukishima Nuclear Disaster - "the most severe nuclear accident since the 26 April 1986 Chernobyl disaster and the only other disaster to be given the Level 7 event classification of the International Nuclear Event Scale" - caused:

- Three nuclear reactor core meltdowns and damage to a fourth.
- Resulting in hydrogen explosions blowing apart three reactor containment buildings, spreading radioactive debris outside.
- Resulting in an evacuation zone of 20 kM radius and the evacuation of 154,000 residents due to airborne ionizing radiation.

You then add that consequently:

- Japan switched off all its nuclear power plants causing imports 10 million tons of coal and 24% increased in natural gas imports.
- Half of Germany's reactors were closed down.

That strikes me as a curiously innovative way of demonstrating the insignificance of the event! Shades of "What have the Romans ever done for us?"

So what would be your personal benchmark for a "disaster"? Total global thermonuclear war - would that make the grade?

[scotia]

First - I agree that the BBC is not the only organisation that uses the word "disaster" for Fukushima. However I would expect it to broadcast accurate information - unlike many other organisations. So lets look at the definition you supply - and see if the BBC is making a mistake. Your definition requires Great Loss of Life and/or Great Damage.

Great Damage? A Nuclear Power Station has stopped working - with 4 of its 6 reactors being damaged. Not my definition of a disaster, and I think most rational persons would concur.

I cannot say if The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) meets your criteria for "most rational persons".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Nuclear_Event_Scale

But... to sum up, The Fukishima Nuclear Disaster - "the most severe nuclear accident since the 26 April 1986 Chernobyl disaster and the only other disaster to be given the Level 7 event classification of the International Nuclear Event Scale" - caused:

- Three reactor nuclear core meltdowns and damage to a fourth.
- Resulting in hydrogen explosions blowing apart three reactor containment buildings, spreading radioactive debris outside.
- Resulting in an evacuation zone of 20 kM radius and the evacuation of 154,000 residents due to airborne ionizing radiation.

You then add that consequently:

- Japan switched off all its nuclear power plants causing imports 10 million tons of coal and 24% increased in natural gas imports.
- Half of Germany's reactors were closed down.

That strikes me as a curiously innovative way of demonstrating the insignificance of the event! Shades of "What have the Romans ever done for us?"

So what would be your personal benchmark for a "disaster"? Total global thermonuclear war - would that make the grade?

Yes - of course it was the most severe nuclear accident since Chernobyl. All that says is that there are precious few nuclear accidents of any significance. As to the evacuations, you will find reports that suggest these did more harm than good.
My comments on Japan and Germany switching off its Nuclear Plants was simply to describe the irrationality of the response.
What's my benchmark of a disaster - well of the two points in the definition , I think that the most distressing part of a disaster is the loss of life. In that respect Fukushima hardly deserves a mention.
Yet in the supply of power by non-nuclear means, there have been significantly larger losses of life that are hardly mentioned. In a modest sized hydro plant that I once worked in there is a plaque on the wall to the 21 lives lost in the construction of the scheme. In the production of coal, a generation of men (including members of my family) who operated the coal cutters in the thirties and forties suffered horrible deaths twenty to thirty years later from their inhalation of the coal dust. And in the North Sea 167 men were killed on Piper Alpha Oil Rig. But at the time of these incidents we did not, as a result, cease building Hydro, or operating coal mines, or extracting North Sea Oil. The bogy word is nuclear.

[terminal7]

the govt may curtail the exercise allowance because of people sunbathing in parks

Yesterday afternoon walking briskly with my OH through Regents Park and doing my Merve the Swerve routine (one for Welsh rugby supporters of yesteryear). OH duly impressed with my ability to retain a scintilla of sideway movement. We espied a gentleman of Pickwickian proportions sitting in the centre of a park bench with only short shorts. Of course he could have sat at one end of the bench some 3m from the other end affording an old dodderer like yours truly with a berthing point. True the BMI was probably in the region of 35 and maybe he was temporarily beached. Indeed he was jabbering away loudly (I think in Russian) on his earpiece attached to a mobile and may well have been oblivious to the present.

We hastened along to see the ducks in the Inner Ring as a reminder of the days when we would take our grandchildren to see them and the naughty pigeons. What a time of happiness and frivolity were those days. Jeez that was only 4 weeks ago!

Anyway some 45 minutes later we returned the route that we had come. There was Boris glistening with sweat still in exactly the same pose still jabbering away. Now if this was not a Putin plot to destroy our economy - what other explanation can there be? Suddenly I thought that Hancock chap may have a point about sunbathing but clearly he does not want to cause a diplomatic incident. Later in the evening Trump failed to bring up the incident at his press conference. So much for the special relationship.

T7

[XFool]

Yes - of course it was the most severe nuclear accident since Chernobyl. All that says is that there are precious few nuclear accidents of any significance. As to the evacuations, you will find reports that suggest these did more harm than good.
My comments on Japan and Germany switching off its Nuclear Plants was simply to describe the irrationality of the response.
What's my benchmark of a disaster - well of the two points in the definition , I think that the most distressing part of a disaster is the loss of life. In that respect Fukushima hardly deserves a mention.
Yet in the supply of power by non-nuclear means, there have been significantly larger losses of life that are hardly mentioned. In a modest sized hydro plant that I once worked in there is a plaque on the wall to the 21 lives lost in the construction of the scheme. In the production of coal, a generation of men (including members of my family) who operated the coal cutters in the thirties and forties suffered horrible deaths twenty to thirty years later from their inhalation of the coal dust. And in the North Sea 167 men were killed on Piper Alpha Oil Rig. But at the time of these incidents we did not, as a result, cease building Hydro, or operating coal mines, or extracting North Sea Oil. The bogy word is nuclear.

OK. So, as I originally surmised, your criteria for a "disaster" is solely the number of people killed. But, as I pointed out, while that is indeed one criterion it is not the only one, the other being the scale of the event and the damage caused and consequences - even it loss of life is mercifully minimal.