Japan

2011-11-14 From Minamata to Fukushima -- The Japanese Nuclear Crisis Isn't Over Yet by Lyric Hughes Hale, huffingtonpost.com
...1. No One Knows the Magnitude of the Disaster
According to an editorial in the Japan Times on November 8th:
In August, the Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan estimated that the Fukushima accidents released a total of 570,000 terabecquerels of radioactive substances, including some 11,000 terabecquerels of radioactive cesium 137. But a preliminary report issued in late October, whose chief writer is Mr. Andreas Stohl of the Norwegian Institute for Air Research, estimates that the accidents released about 36,000 terabecquerels of radioactive cesium 137 from their start through April 20. It is more than three times the estimate by Japan's Nuclear Safety Commission and 42 percent of the estimated release from Chernobyl...
...2. Fukushima Is Still Not Safe
Tepco has recently uncovered high levels of radiation at its No. 3 plant in Fukushima. The latest reading, 610 millisieverts per hour, is higher than the maximum 500 millisieverts recommended for emergency workers. Basically, we still don't know how dangerous things are, and most Japanese assume that TEPCO is either not telling the truth or they are incompetent. There is not a clear explanation of what happened, and people are demanding to know the fate of emergency workers who were exposed to dangerous levels of radiation.
In spite of the fact that the Japanese government has hired a public relations agency to encourage redevelopment in Fukushima, the locals are clearly not buying the safety promises. According to Kyodo News, 1 in 4 Fukushima residents have no intention of ever returning to live in the area--they don't trust what the government is telling them.
The most common reason for not wanting to go back -- cited by 83 percent of the respondents, who were allowed to give multiple reasons -- was the difficulty of decontaminating the area. The second-most common response was lack of trust in the central government's declarations of safety. No. 3, chosen by 63%, was that they can't expect the nuclear crisis to be resolved. Taken together, the three top reasons indicate serious doubts about the government's ability to manage the disaster...
...3. The Threat Is Not Just in Fukushima
Lest you think that the damage is limited to the Tohoku region, you should know that the Japanese government has asked everyone in Japan to sacrifice in light of the national emergency. 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, debris from the disaster area is being incinerated across 16 prefectures in spite of local protests. At the end of August, the Japanese Environment Ministry asked 469 incinerator operators to measure levels of Cesium isotopes in their ash. Very high levels were found in 42 plants in 7 prefectures, and lower but dangerous levels in other prefectures including Tokyo. I am not a nuclear scientist, but I do not believe that putting contaminated radioactive garbage into an incinerator will do anything except propel radioactive ash into the atmosphere.
The ministry is "discussing how to safely bury incinerator ash and dust with cesium levels above 8,000 becquerels/kg. Local governments have been instructed to temporarily store their ash and dust at disposal sites until the panel reaches a conclusion." They have all the time in the world, because the half-life of cesium 137 is about 30 years.
2011-11-14 Are Fukushima Reactors 5 and 6 In Trouble Also?, washingtonsblog.com.
Everyone knows that Fukushima reactors 1-3 have melted down, and the fuel pool at reactor 4 is ruined.
But reactors 5 and 6 have been almost entirely ignored since the earthquake because – we were assured – the reactors were in controlled shutdown prior to the earthquake, and so all was safe.
However, there are rumors of problems...
...Remember that reactors 5 and 6 have spent fuel pools as well as reactors. As I pointed out on March 16th:

Kyodo News notes:
Edano said water temperatures in the pools at the No. 5 and No. 6 reactors at the Fukushima plant have been rising as well.
***
The agency said among the three, the situation is the severest at the No. 4 reactor because all the fuel rods are stored in the pool due to the change of the reactor’s shroud. At the No. 5 and No. 6 reactors, up to one-third of the rods are being kept in the pools. The more fuel rods that are kept in a pool, the more radioactive substances could be emitted.

I noted on May 31st:

While most of the problems have been at reactors 1, 2 and 3 (which were all operating when the earthquake hit) and reactor 4 (where spent fuel rods have been leaking), there have also been problems at reactor number 5 as well. Specifically, as
NHK writes:

The operator of the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant says temperatures in the Number 5 reactor and its spent fuel storage pool have risen due to pump failure. The reactor has been in a state of cold shutdown.
Tokyo Electric Power Company says it found at 9 PM on Saturday that a pump bringing seawater to cooling equipment for the reactor and pool had stopped working.
TEPCO says temperatures have been rising since then.

And as the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations’ Special Report on the Nuclear Accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, demonstrates, the whole story of a cold shutdown of reactors 5 and 6 may be questionable.
As summarized yesterday by EneNews:

* “Four of the five emergency diesel generators on units 5 and 6 were inoperable after the tsunami”
* “One air-cooled emergency diesel generator on Unit 6 continued to function and supplied electrical power to Unit 6, and later to Unit 5, to maintain cooling to the reactor and spent fuel pool.”
* “Unit 5 had been shut down and in an outage since January 3, 2011. Fuel had been loaded into the reactor and the reactor pressure vessel (RPV) reassembled.”
* “Unit 6 had been shut down and in an outage since August 14, 2010. Fuel had been loaded into the reactor and the RPV reassembled.”
* “The Unit 6 air-cooled EDG and portions of the electrical distribution system survived the tsunami and were used to reestablish cold shutdown on units 5 and 6.”
* “After the tsunami impacted the site, operators were able to use the 6B emergency diesel generator (EDG) to provide power to cooling systems for the Unit 6 spent fuel pool. After installing temporary cables, the 6B EDG [generator] provided power to Unit 5 spent fuel pool cooling.”

This post is not affirmatively making claims, but rather asking questions, to which we deserve answers … especially since Tepco has been covering up the scope and severity of the accident since day one.
2011-11-14 Cesium Contamination in Japan's Farmland, majiasblog.blogspot.com
Cesium-137 deposition and contamination of Japanese soils due to the Fukushima nuclear accident by T. Yasunari, A. Stohl, R. Hayano, J. Burkhart, S. Eckhardt, & T. Yasunari. Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences PNAS 2011 : 1112058108v1-5. http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2011/11/11/1112058108
Abstract
The largest concern on the cesium-137 (137Cs) deposition and its soil contamination due to the emission from the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) showed up after a massive quake on March 11, 2011. Cesium-137 (137Cs) with a half-life of 30.1 y causes the largest concerns because of its deleterious effect on agriculture and stock farming, and, thus, human life for decades. Removal of 137Cs contaminated soils or land use limitations in areas where removal is not possible is, therefore, an urgent issue.
A challenge lies in the fact that estimates of 137Cs emissions from the Fukushima NPP are extremely uncertain, therefore, the distribution of 137Cs in the environment is poorly constrained. Here, we estimate total 137Cs deposition by integrating daily observations of 137Cs deposition in each prefecture in Japan with relative deposition distribution patterns from a Lagrangian particle dispersion model, FLEXPART.
We show that 137Cs strongly contaminated the soils in large areas of eastern and northeastern Japan, whereas western Japan was sheltered by mountain ranges. The soils around Fukushima NPP and neighboring prefectures have been extensively contaminated with depositions of more than 100,000 and 10,000 MBq km-2, respectively.
Total 137Cs depositions over two domains: (i) the Japan Islands and the surrounding ocean (130–150?°E and 30–46?°N) and, (ii) the Japan Islands, were estimated to be more than 5.6 and 1.0 PBq, respectively. We hope our 137Cs deposition maps will help to coordinate decontamination efforts and plan regulatory measures in Japan.
END ABSTRACT
Hat Tip: OfficerDave at Enenews provided the link to the BBC report on this research article (his wife found it). Here is the link to the BBC report http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15691571
2011-11-15 Alice in wonderland by Iori Mochizuki, fukushima-diary.com, Nov 15, 2011
...Today I heard the story that they measured beyond 100,000CPM from 5 people in Minami soma shi.
They were actually “unmeasurable”.(Source)
They are too radioactive so people around them are irradiated by themselves.
Minister of nuclear power , Hosono is promoting meaningless decontamination in Fukushima.
He and his funny frieds are trying to make us believe it’s become CLEAN because volunteers decontaminated the land.
However,some of the volunteers have already died after decontamination labor because of cardiac infarct.
This will never be news on main street.
but the spots on Hosono’s face can’t be hidden.
People who entered Horoshima after atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima had the spots like that.
It was called “city entering exposure”.
cf, http://fukushima-diary.com/2011/11/re-one-of-the-worst-hottest-spots-is-in-front-of-japanese-diet/
Again, I still expect someone to be a sponsorship for this blog.
For what ? for your honor. To show you never surrender to the power.
If you have a bit of extra money,it won’t hurt your reputation to be a sponsor of the truth teller.
2011-11-15 How Much Radiation Has Really Been Released in Japan?, majiasblog.blogspot.com
•Former Minister for Internal Affairs Haraguchi Kazuhiro has alleged that radiation monitoring station data was actually three decimal places greater than the numbers released to the public. If this is true, it constitutes a “national crime”, in Nishio’s words. He follows with, “Giving us the truth once is much more important than saying ‘hang in there Japan!’ a million times.”
•Matthew Penney Jul. 01, 2011. Japanese Cancer Expert on the Fukushima Situation http://japanfocus.org/events/view/100
More data:
Japan Times reported on August 27 that Fukushima’s “Cesium Leak Equal to 168 '45 A-Bombs.”[i] As of September 2011, the situation at Fukushima continues to worsen. Dr. Chris Busby reported on the Russian television network RT on August 17 that air filters from Tokyo are showing levels of Cesium-137 that are 1000 times higher than the levels of that radionuclide found in the air at the peak of atmospheric atomic weapons testing in 1963.[ii] Busby also stated that plant emissions were reported to the Japanese Prime Minister by Tepco to be 10 to the 13 becquerels per hour.[iii] Likewise, during an interview with Dr. Helen Caldicott, broadcasted online in September of 2011, Arnie Gunderson stated that he had been told that Fukushima was currently emitting a gigabecquerel per day (gigabecquerel or GBq 109 Bq), in radiation, which he described as over 2 billion decays per second a day.[iv] This radiation is contaminating Japan and the entire northern hemisphere as it is swept away by the Jet Stream. The latest data from Japan as of September 2011 has found 2,000 square kilometers to have radiation contamination levels at or in excess of 1 microsievert per hour at a measured height of .5 o 1.0 meter,[v] leading an annual external exposure rate of 8.76 millisieverts from soil contamination alone.
[i] “Cesium Leak Equal to 168 '45 A-Bombs: NISA Compares Contamination to Hiroshima Blast,” Japan Times (2011, August 27): http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20110827x3.html.
[ii] Dr. Christopher Busby interviewed by Russia Today (RT) and uploaded to YouTube “Christopher Busby: Chernobyl-like radiation found in Tokyo,” [RussiaToday] YouTube (uploaded 2011, August 17): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNzDg4O9dkw.
[iii] Ibid
[iv] Helen Caldicott interviews Arnie Gunderson: “Arnold Gundersen with a Fukushima update,” If You Love This Planet (2011, September): http://ifyoulovethisplanet.org/?p=4952.
[v] “Up to 1/7 of Fukushima May Be Contaminated,” Mainichi (2011, September 15): http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/news/20110915p2g00m0dm114000c.html.
2011-11-16 New Japan contamination map shows Cesium-137 deposited over 900 km from Fukushima… Extends west of Hiroshima; ENENEWS Admin
2011-11-17 Simulation determines much of east, northeast likely contaminated: Cesium fallout widespread by Mizuho Aoki, "Large areas of eastern and northeastern Japan were likely contaminated by the plant, with concentrations of cesium-137 exceeding 1,000 becquerels per kilogram of soil in some places, says the study, which was posted Monday on the website of the National Academy of Sciences."
2011-11-17 70~80% of cesium dropped to Pacific Ocean
2011-11-18 Sample of Soil Absorption of Radiocaesium and Iodine-131, majiasblog.blogspot.com
Depth distribution of 137Cs, 134Cs, and 131I in soil profile after Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant Accident Original Research Article
Journal of Environmental Radioactivity, In Press, Corrected Proof, Available online 26 October 2011
Hiroaki Kato, Yuichi Onda, Mengistu Teramage
[excerpts from conclusion]
In this study, we investigated the depth distribution of deposited radionuclides after the FDNPP accident triggered by a magnitude 9.0 earthquake and the resulting tsunami on 11 March 2011. Sectioned soil samples were taken from a home garden located in the Kawamata Town, in the northern part of Fukushima Prefecture.
The depth distribution of deposited radionuclides in the soil profile indicated that approximately 80% of the deposited radiocaesium and 131I were absorbed by the surface soil within the upper 2.0 cm. The relaxation mass depth (h0) derived from the depth distribution of 137Cs, 134Cs, and 131I in the soil profile at the study site were 9.1 kg m_2, 9.1 kg m_2 and 10.4 kg m_2, respectively.
The penetration depth of 131I was slightly greater than that of radiocaesium. The h0 of 137Cs in the studied soil profile was greater than those for the cultivated soil nearby the Chernobyl NPP.
A positive relationship was found between clay content of topsoil and the h0 of 137Cs. It was suggested that high clay content increased aggregate stability of topsoil, consequently increasing water infiltration and 137Cs transportation into deeper horizon of the soil profile.
2011-11-19 19.0 micro Sv/h in Shinagawa, Tokyo posted by Mochizuki, fukushima-diary.com.[Rense.com] "This unusually high level of radiation is suspected to be related to incineration ash of radioactive debris,which started to coming from Iwate to Tokyo." http://fukushima-diary.com/2011/11/breaking-news-radioactive-debris-arrived-at-tokyo/
2011-11-19 Fukushima Diary: Architect of Reactor 3 warns of massive hydrovolcanic explosion,
http://fukushima-diary.com/2011/11/architect-of-reactor-3-warns-massive-hydrovolcanic-explosion/
"Architect of Fukushima Daiichi Reactor 3, Uehara Haruo, the former president of Saga University had an interview on 11/17/2011.
"In this interview, he admitted Tepco’s explanation does not make sense, and that the China syndrome is inevitable.
"He stated that considering 8 months have passed since 311 without any improvement, it is inevitable that melted fuel went out of the container vessel and sank underground, which is called China syndrome.
"He added, if fuel has reaches a underground water vein, it will cause contamination of underground water, soil contamination and sea contamination. Moreover, if the underground water vein keeps being heated for long time, a massive hydrovolcanic explosion will be caused."

North America

2011-11-13 [GOOD NEWS] 11/13/11 10:30 pm Downpour Only 7X Greater Than Background Radiation, POTRBLOG Team
2011-11-14 From Minamata to Fukushima -- The Japanese Nuclear Crisis Isn't Over Yet by Lyric Hughes Hale, huffingtonpost.com
...4. Hot Particles in Seattle
Fairewinds, a Vermont based non-profit, has highlighted a recent study about hot particles released as a result of the Fukushima accident which have turned up in Seattle and Boston. Marco Kaltofen, PE , Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering, Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts, presented to the American Public Health Association.
The Fukushima nuclear accident dispersed airborne dusts that are contaminated with radioactive particles. When inhaled or ingested, these particles can have negative effects on human health that are different from those caused by exposure to external or uniform radiation fields. A field sampling effort was undertaken to characterize the form and concentration of radionuclides in the air and in environmental media which can accumulate fallout. Samples included settled dusts, surface wipes, used filter masks, used air filters, dusty footwear, and surface soils. Particles were collected from used motor vehicle air filters and standard 0.45 micron membrane air filters. The samples of Japanese children's shoes were found to have relatively high radiocesium contamination levels. Dusts containing radioactive cesium were found at levels orders of magnitude above background more than 100 miles from the accident site, and were detectable on the US west coast.
2011-11-16 Radioactive Los Angeles Air 11-16-11 by Michael Collins, enviroreporter.com. (For the radiation measurement update page, please link here)
Disturbing readings from one of Radiation Station Central’s HEPA filters after just 30 days of use: 308% of normal background higher. Alpha and beta radiation captured by the filter can be attributed to the triple Fukushima Japan meltdowns, melt-throughs and melt-outs and the decision to begin burning 550,000 tons of radioactive debris in Tokyo from October to March, sending a double dose of radioactive fallout on the Jet Stream over the Pacific to land on America, Canada and beyond. Finding this high a level of radiation is considered dangerous by the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Ingested alpha particles can be up to 1,000 times more dangerous than their beta and gamma counterparts.
Three times background was a threshold defined in a November 30, 2007 report for Region 9 of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The report, created by Walnut Creek, California-based Weston Solutions, Inc., was entitled “Preliminary Assessment/Site Inspection Report – Santa Susana Field Laboratory – Simi Valley, California.”
The lab, commonly referred to as SSFL or Rocketdyne, was the site of this country’s worst partial meltdown in 1959 when the Sodium Reactor Experiment (SRE) failed. The accident released up to hundreds of times more radiation than the Three Mile Island partial meltdown did in 1979 due in part to the SRE not being in a reinforced, airtight building.
The 2007 site assessment report was part of an extensive cleanup costing several hundred million dollars that is tentatively scheduled for completion in 2017. Part of it reads:
“A hazardous substance is considered to be present at a concentration significantly above background levels when one of the following two criteria is met: (1) the hazardous substance is detected in the contaminated sample, when not detected in the background samples or (2) the hazardous substance is detected in the contaminated sample at a concentration equal to or greater than three times the maximum background level, when detected in the background samples.” (Emphasis added)
The amount of radiation detected in the Kenmore Plasmawave HEPA air cleaner exceeded three times background after thirty days of use making a “concentration significantly above background.”
The alpha and beta radiation sucked from the air by the HEPA filter, if from Fukushima’s multiple meltdowns, would be much more dangerous than the background radiation that it is measured against in terms of ratios and multiples of background.
Natural background radiation is mostly cosmic radiation from outer space, terrestrial sources including air, water, soil, rocks, and vegetation. Man-made sources include continued fallout from above ground nuclear weapons testing over half a century ago, ‘fly ash’ from coal burning plants, and meltdowns.
Most of the background radiation measured in nearly 1,400 radiation tests conducted by EnviroReporter.com since March 11, 2011, have been the result of gamma radiation which travels great distances and through objects like human beings. Gamma radiation can be stopped by large amounts of mass like lead.
Alpha and beta radiation behave altogether differently. While alpha radiation can be blocked by a piece of paper, and beta by foil, both are far more dangerous if inhaled or ingested.
Alpha isotopes are particularly dangerous because of their ability to inflict biological injury after entering living cells, about 20 times worse than beta or gamma on average. Alpha can be up to a thousand times more damaging than the same amount of beta or gamma.
Since the meltdowns began, we have detected both alpha and beta particle emitting isotopes in HEPA dust. High spikes in beta detection in Los Angeles correspond to our significantly above background test results though the U.S. EPA’s Radnet beta graph is offline presently. Access to government sampling and tests for radiation on available on EnviroReporter.com‘s Resources page.
RAW RADIATION STATION – CENTRAL DATA:
5:15 pm INTERIOR SPOT CHECKS OF THREE HEPA FILTERS’s AGGREGATE DUST after 30 days of use in Radiation Station (VIDEOTAPED):
Waterpik Teledyne HEPA air cleaner/ionizer: ~60 CPM or 138% of previous background higher
Honeywell HEPA air cleaner: ~64 CPM or 147% of previous background higher
Kenmore Plasmawave HEPA air cleaner: ~134 CPM or 308% of previous background higher
4:50 pm INTERIOR SPOT CHECK OF HONEYWELL HEPA FILTER: ~96 CPM or 221% of previous background higher
4:45 pm 10-minute INTERIOR Radiation Station – Central background average: 43.5 CPM^
2011-11-16 Patty Apostolides says: [reader comment at:
http://www.enviroreporter.com/radioactive-los-angeles-rain-11-6-11-evening]
November 16, 2011 at 12:23 pm
We’ve been measuring the inside of our home with an Inspector+ radiation detector. We have the software (by Mineralab) that shows the data realtime on a spreadsheet and as a graph. Our typical reading ranges from 20-43 cpm. The threshold is set at 50 cpm to alert us when it reaches there or beyond. Today, from 12 pm – 1:45 pm eastern time, we had FIVE alerts at 50-52 cpm! It is raining outside. We live in Hagerstown, MD. We are monitoring this closely.
Patty
2011-11-16 Radiation precautions for areas near Seattle, Vancouver, Portland? "Perhaps you need to wash your shoes"... and other things (VIDEO), November 16, 2011
2011-11-16 Farther Down the Rabbit Hole, majiasblog.blogspot.com, enviroreporter.com.
Fukushima Diary blogger is reporting that he has been questioned by authorities. He feels that he is being framed as a criminal. We may need to start a letter writing campaign. I am going to contact our local chapter of Amnesty International.
http://fukushima-diary.com/2011/11/alice-in-wonderland/#comments
Meanwhile, in other news, Arnie Gunderson states that the Cascades in Washington State may be as contaminated as some areas in northern Japan.
Arnie's interview can be found here http://fairewinds.com/content/update-gundersen-robert-knights-five-oclock-shadow-wbai-new-york
Enenews' report on it can be found here http://enenews.com/radiation-precautions-areas-seattle-vancouver-portland-need-wash-shoes-video
I see a not-so-distant future wherein many people are ill and wasted. It is a post-apocalyptic society in which no one ever acknowledged the apocalypse...
We will suffer because of our collective delusion--a delusion rigidly maintained by our corporations and our governments.
Sadly, the delusion is willingly embraced by compliant populations.
Have we lost the collective will to live or is our societal myopia a function of our evolutionary-derived and media-fed, short attention span?
Farther down the rabbit hole is a place of no return... Are we there yet?
Nuclear Abolition and the Whole Nuclear Chain by Andreas Nidecker, enformable.com, 15 Nov 2011
New evidence of low level radiation effects:

* German KiKK (Kinder Krebs Studie) showed doubling of childhood leukemia around NPPs.
* New study by Hagen und Scherb shows influence on sex odds ratio. Normally slightly more boys are being born than girls. Around NPPs this ratio is inversed, which is likely due to a genetic effect. Observation has been published in peer reviewed journals
* Must consider, that it is not just the late occuring solid tumors which are worrysome. Also a number of non-cancerous detrimental health effects, caused by genetic or perigenetic influences. Eg. today Cesium cardiomyopathies and vascular diseases, eye and kidney diseases. and diabetes in children are known.

And now Fukushima: why it is worse than Chernobyl … Ref: G. Edwards, mathematician and nuclear expert in Montreal Canada, recipient Nuclear free future award 2011

* No one has ever before experienced the extensive radioactive contamination of air, water, soil, and food facing the Japanese after the Fukushima disaster.
* Each NPP contains > 1000x as much radioactive material as fallout from a Hiroshimatype atomic bomb.

The atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki caused enor-mous destruction, brought brought by blast and by fireball. This caused massive radiation exposures, mainly neutron and gamma-radiation, delivered at instant of the explosion. But fall-out in the bombed cities was relatively little, because both bombs were deliberately detonated high in the air so that the shock wave would do the most damage on the ground. Thus no crater was created by the blast, and most of the fallout was carried high into the atmosphere by the heat of the fireball. It became global fallout more than local fallout.
And Chernobyl …
Similarly, in Chernobyl, there was an explosion followed by a very hot graphite fire that raged for days, lofting much of the radioactive fallout high into the air, and sending it across vast distances.
A lot of it was deposited in Belarus and other European countries; it contaminated the sheep in Northern England and Wales for two decades. Some of it made its way across the ocean to contaminate the mosses in Northern Canada, which resulted in measurable increases of radioactive cesium in the bodies of the native Inuit people who fed on the caribou that fed on the mosses.
But at Fukushima …

* Meltdown of 3 reactors as well as pool with spent fuel pool that caught fire and spewed radioactive debris directly into the atmosphere.
* Because there was no fireball, no burning cities, and no burning graphite, the radioactive fallout stayed closer to the ground and contaminated everything.
* The local contamination at ground level is more extensive and more insidious than anything that has previously been experienced.
* Radioactive iodine has already done its worst, though the results will not be seen for decades in terms of thyroid cancers and developmental abnormalities caused by damage to embryos, infants and children.
* Cesium, strontium,plutonium, americium and dozens of other radioactive species will be in the soil and the food and the bodies of Japanese living near the affected areas and even those further away for decades, even centuries to come.
* As mentioned, long-term effects of chronic exposure of such a large population to the internal radioactive contamination from Fukushima could be dramatic

2011-11-18 MI SKY HIGH RADS & KID SICK 11.18.2011 (video), youtube.com.
"Bad news. Los Angeles and STL high readings INDOORS. And my kid dx'd with possible radiation burns from rain in SE Michigan 11.14.2011, which I just learned measured 1230 cpm on the day she got wet.
ADDENDUM 11.21.2011 My daughter had to see 2 docs today, have a biopsy on her arm, and get labs and urinalysis for cesium exposure. Results may take up to TWO WEEKS! Most hospitals can send in urinalysis, you would need an order from your physician, but the only lab that can test it in the US is in Utah.
IMPORTANT FOR PEOPLE WITH GEIGERS: PER ARNIE GUNDERSON...please keep paper towel if you are checking rain, and recheck high measurements the following day. If it is still high, please contact FAIREWINDS about where to send the paper towel.
Crowd sourced data analysis may be the only way we can conduct a radiation survey at this time. This is a job that used to fall under the heading of CIVIL DEFENSE, which was disbanded years ago and replaced with FEMA and DHS.
Dutchsinse vid:
http://www.youtube.com/user/dutchsinse#p/u/0/9Eybu7vwkxY|
Los Angeles vid:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z5ZkkLntdU
Enenews forum where people post their rad readings around the country:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_z5ZkkLntdU

2011-11-18 Air Filter Friday: Radioactivity at 300% of normal background in Los Angeles-area dust — 350 CPM in St. Louis-area Ionic Breeze (VIDEOS), enenews.com

Europe

2011-11-13 Poland tries to blame Pakistan for iodine-131 over Europe — Pakistan says no: “Release of Iodine-131 is not possible unless there is a nuclear fuel failure” by ENENEWS Staff
No KANUPP linkage to Radioactivity in Europe, PAEC clarifies, AP of Pakistan, Nov. 12, 2011:

Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) on Sunday refuted a news item appeared in a section of national and international media alleging that higher than normal radioactivity noticed in parts of Europe could have originated from the recent KANUPP incident. [...]
The release of Iodine-131 is not possible unless there is a nuclear fuel failure, while the incident at KANUPP involved leakage of heavy water which contains tritium and not Iodine-131, said the official.
Higher radiation levels were detected in Poland and Ukraine even before October 19 when the KANUPP incident had not even taken place. [...]
The entire news item is based upon the statement attributed to the spokesman of the Polish atomic energy agency who only said: “Unconfirmed reports suggest there may have been an incident at a nuclear power station in Pakistan but this requires further confirmation”.
And he did not cite any evidence or proof. [...]

2011-11-13 POTRBLOG Suggests Radioactive Iodine Detected in Europe Is From Spallation of Fukushima Fallout, majiasblog.blogspot.com.
Potrblog suggests that the recent solar flares may be interacting with the Fukushima fallout in the atmosphere, resulting in the Iodine-131 detected in Eastern Europe.
It is an interesting hypothesis.
http://www.potrblog.com/
2011-11-14 Radioactive Iodine Blankets Much of Europe … Everyone Points Fingers, washingtonsblog.com.
Radioactive Iodine is Blanketing Much of Europe
Reuters notes that elevated levels of radioactive iodine have been detected in Germany, Sweden, Slovakia, Austria, the Czech Republic, and Hungary.
The Stockholm News reports that Denmark and Poland are also experiencing heightened radiation.
NHK notes that Russia has been hit as well.
AP notes that the radioactive releases are ongoing:

An official [from the International Atomic Energy Agency] familiar with the matter, who asked for anonymity because he was not authorized to comment, said the release appeared to be continuing.

Some scientists have made some unlikely claims about the source of the radiation. For example, as Reuters notes:

Professor Malcolm Sperrin, director of medical physics at Britain’s Royal Berkshire Hospital, said any link with Fukushima was extremely unlikely.
“It is far more likely that the iodine may be as a result of excretion by patients undergoing medical treatment. Whilst such patients are carefully controlled, some release of iodine into the environment may be inevitable but would certainly be well below any limits where health detriment would even begin to be an issue for concern,” he said.

(It is unlikely that patients in so many countries would all start excreting more radioactive iodine at the same time.)
The Czechs deny responsibility, but are sending mixed signals. As AP notes:

In Prague, an official at the Czech State Office for Nuclear Safety said he was “100 percent sure” that the radiation had not come from any Czech nuclear power plant — or from any other source on Czech territory.
[However,] speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to talk to the media, the official said tests are under way around the country to try and identify the source.
The Czechs are betting heavily on nuclear power and have plans to dramatically increase production ….

Poland is trying to blame Pakistan for the radiation; but a Pakistan government official denies the allegation.
All of the mainstream commentators dismiss Fukushima as a potential source. However, Fukushima is still far from any stable shutdown – and is still apparently undergoing nuclear reactions (and see this, this and this).
So – while we don’t have any idea where the radiation is coming from at this point – it is too early to rule out Fukushima.
2011-11-14 European Iodine 131 Detections Indicative of Atmospheric Plutonium 239 Concentrations, POTRBLOG Team
2011-11-15 Radiation Spreads to France, washingtonsblog.com.
France Hit with Radiation
I reported yesterday that a blanket of radioactive iodine – indicating a new nuclear release – has hit Germany, Russia, Sweden, Denmark, Austria, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.
Today, Agence France Presse reports that it has hit France as well:

France´s nuclear watchdog on Tuesday said it had detected traces of radioactive iodine in the air last week ….
Concentrations of iodine 131 measuring a few microbecquerels per cubic metre were detected last week at four monitoring stations in northern and eastern France, the Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) said.
“Although the presence of iodine 131 over national territory is quite exceptional… the level of concentrations that have been observed are of no risk for public health,” it said in a press release.
“The source and date of the radioactive emissions which caused this pollution are currently unknown,” the IRSN said.
Iodine is a very short-lived isotope that decays to half of its radioactivity in only eight days.

As I noted yesterday, mainstream authorities are saying – without proof – that it can’t be from Fukushima.
2011-11-15 European Iodine 131 And Cobalt 60 Fallout- A Romanian Reactor CANDU That, POTRBLOG Team
As the POTRBLOG team was researching the current widespread and unattributed European Iodine 131 outbreak and its potential creation via the spallation of atmospheric Fukushima Plutonium 239 by Solar Coronal Mass Ejections, we discovered one small tidbit of information that could be the fingerprint of a a fuel-rod meltdown common to a CANDU-6 reactor.
The CANDU link is small and tenuous. But it is worth mentioning given that Cobalt 60 has been detected in the European fallout, and that Cobalt 60 would be produced from the meltdown of a CANDU fuelrod. The only CANDU reactor in Europe is located in Cernavoda Romania, due east of some of the strongest fallout detections in Slovenia.
However, given that the connection to Romania would be so obvious, it is hard to imagine that the IAEA would not quickly identify the source. The possible connection to Romania is explored at the end of the above video. [Editor's Note: listed on YouTube as European Iodine 131 Detections Indicative of Atmospheric Plutonium 239 Concentrations].
2011-11-16 Major Website: Mystery cloud of dangerous iodine-131 over Europe is absolutely cause for concern — Certainly deserves more than 129 words by IAEA, by ENENEWS Staff
"Radioactive Particles Are Spreading Across Europe and Nobody Knows Why, Gizmodo (#260 in US), Nov. 15, 2011:
[...] So how would [the postulated reasons of pharmaceutical companies or nuclear submarines or transportation of radioactive materials] explain contamination that spans hundreds and hundreds of miles?
The International Atomic Energy Agency says “the current trace levels of iodine-131 that have been measured do not pose a public health risk,” but we’ve heard that so many times before. It’s not a cause for panic, but an unexplained cloud of dangerous radioactivity is absolutely cause for concern. It certainly deserves more than 129 words on the IAEA’s website. [Reuters]..."
2011-11-16 “Quite Exceptional”: France reveals detection of iodine-131 — Says it could be from nuclear reactor, by ENENEWS Staff,
"France detects radioactive iodine traces in air , Agence France Presse, Nov. 15, 2011:
[...] Concentrations of iodine 131 measuring a few microbecquerels per cubic metre were detected last week at four monitoring stations in northern and eastern France, the Institute for Radiological Protection and Nuclear Safety (IRSN) said.
“Although the presence of iodine 131 over national territory is quite exceptional… the level of concentrations that have been observed are of no risk for public health,” it said in a press release. [...]
the source is unlikely to be Japan´s crippled nuclear power plant at Fukushima, where iodine was released in March but later stopped, the agency said.
A possible source could be a reactor used for electricity or research or a plant using iodine 131 to make medical devices, the IRSN speculated. [...]"
2011-11-17 ANALYSIS: European radiation safety agencies detect traces of iodine-131 in air, source of leak unknown by Andrei Ozharovsky, .bellona.org, translated by Maria Kaminskaya, "Radiation safety agencies in the Czech Republic, Austria, Sweden, and other European countries report traces of iodine-131 in the atmosphere – an indication of either a radiation leak or a severe accident at a nuclear facility. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) asserts no risk to population health, but the lack of reliable data on specific concentrations or locations where the radionuclide was detected suggests safety might be a concern."
2011-11-17 ABC calls radiation plume over Europe “massive, but harmless” — IAEA now claims Hungary lab likely source of iodine-131 — “Extremely unlikely” says director, enenews.com.
"Nov. 17 — International Atomic Energy Agency said today they “believe they have traced the source of a massive, but harmless, radiation plume that has spread across the atmosphere in Europe to an institute in Hungary, but the head of the institute disagrees,” according the ABC News.
Jozsef Kornyei, director of the Budapest-based Institute of Isotopes Co. spoke with the AP in a phone interview: “Citing weather factors and the very low radioactivity of the iodine-131 released into the atmosphere, Kornyei said it was “extremely unlikely” that the leak at the Budapest plant was the cause of trace levels of iodine-131 measured in several European countries.”
The Budapest lab `denies being the source of any elevated radiation,” according to AFP. Lab director Mihaly Lakatos said, “Radiation levels in Hungary were only a little higher in Budapest than elsewhere… If the source of heightened radioactivity had been Budapest, the levels measured here should have been much higher.'”
2011-11-17 Hungary lab emitted iodine-131 — But lab director says “It cannot be the same as what was found covering Europe”, by Energy News Staff
"Hungary lab says emitted iodine-131, now halted, Reuters, Nov. 17, 2011 (Emphasis Added):
“A portion of iodine-131 measured in the atmosphere of Budapest was very likely to have originated from the emission of Izotop Intezet,” [Hungary's Izotop Intezet] said. [...]
Mihaly Lakatos, director of the institute, told Reuters that despite the higher than usual emission of the isotope, Hungary could not have been the source of the leakage registered in several European countries over the past weeks. [...] He said the institute had not been approached by the IAEA for information...
2011-11-18 Can the IAEA Blame the Institute of Isotopes Co., Ltd for the OTHER Fission Products Too?, The POTRBLOG Team.
Update 11/18/11:
Further research indicates that there is more going on at the Institute of Isotopes than just meeting medical isotope needs; it appears as if they also do research on prompt fission products of U235. That being the case, if IoI is the sole cause of the European I-131 detections, then the Iodine 131 was possibly less than ONE PERCENT nuclear frappe of radioactive isotopes released from the facility during the time period in question.
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Original post
The IAEA seems to have laid the blame of the expansive European Iodine 131 detections at the door step of the Hungarian company Institute of Isotopes Co., Ltd. The company does admit to releasing about 300 thyroid killing doses; and God help anyone who was caught in a downwind rainstorm during that release, but putting the finger on IoI co. does NOT explain the detection of the other FISSION products.
It makes no economic sense for the company to produce I-131 via fission; they likely were manufacturing I-131 by neutron bombardment of Tellurium, and a leak in a fume-hood or filter could explain some of the I-131 detections. It might also explain the Cobalt-60 detections, if they were also making a production run of that product during the same time period. But, blaming the airborne detections of Cs-134, C-137, Te-132, I-132, Ru-103, and Ce-144 on the Institute of Isotopes Co., Ltd. makes absolutely no cents or dollars because using a process that creates those type of fission contaminants to make Iodine 131 would NOT be cost effective.
The IAEA may have claimed to have fingered the location of the Pink Panther and the case to be closed, but the real evidence dictates otherwise.