Meltdown Caused Nuke Plant Explosion: Safety Body (Nekkei.com)

[jpak]

http://e.nikkei.com/e/fr/tnks/Nni20110312D12JFF03.htm

TOKYO (Nikkei)--The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) said Saturday afternoon the explosion at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant could only have been caused by a meltdown of the reactor core.

The same day, Tokyo Electric Power Co. (9501), which runs the plant, began to flood the damaged reactor with seawater to cool it down, resorting to measures that could rust the reactor and force the utility to scrap it.

Cesium and iodine, by-products of nuclear fission, were detected around the plant, which would make the explosion the worst accident in the roughly 50-year history of Japanese nuclear power generation.

An explosion was heard near the plant's No. 1 reactor about 3:30 p.m. and plumes of white smoke went up 10 minutes later. The ceiling of the building housing the reactor collapsed, according to information obtained by Fukushima prefectural authorities.

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[Poll_Blind]

1. I went to bed last night about an hour after the planet blew, woke up this morning and there is...

...apparently STILL debate as to what happened there. My question: Why? Is the only thing within a square mile of the Fukushima No. 1 right now God and curious seagulls? If there is anything more substantial on the scene, why is the definitive answer so unclear?

PB

[tinrobot]

2. Good question

I suspect they either:

a) Don't fully know the extent of the damage.

-or-

b) Don't want to publicly admit the extent of the damage.

[Mnemosyne]

3. I'll take b) for $2000, Alex. I hope that is the wrong answer. n/t

[tavalon]

5. I'll take B) as well, partly political and partly they are probably trying to avoid more panic

[jpak]

7. Yes and that's why I posted the news source in the OP

There's a lot of contradictory info out there....

[tavalon]

4. Curiosity will kill those seagulls

[Fledermaus]

6. Ha ha ha..."resorting to measures that could rust the reactor and force the utility to scrap it"

WTF!?!?!

[femrap]

8. Now the gov't has increased

the evacuation from 3 t0 12 miles and they are handing out iodine tablets which supposedly fights radiation.

This does not sound good, imho.

I read this on Yahoo News and watched the video there of the explosion.

I'm guessing here....but do you think the water lines that carry the water to the reactor were ripped up when the earth moved? I know the diesel generators were flooded and therefore didn't work. But if a new generator were brought in....that wouldn't help if the water lines were dismantled.

edit for typo