Reactor #4 has two 8 meter x 8 meter holes in the side

[wackadoo wabbit]

This is according to Dr. Masashi Goto, a former Toshiba nuclear power plant designer and the man responsible for the design of the Fukushima Daiichi reactors' containment vessels. He said this at the CNIC (Citizens Nuclear Information Center) press conference that ended about a half-hour ago in Tokyo.

The conference was filled with interesting information. I hope that someone who reads Japanese can figure out what the URL is for the archived video at ustream.tv (the live conference was at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/videonews-com-live).

One other interesting tidbit that I gleaned from the presser was that it's possible that the pumps for reactors #4, 5, and 6 were moved to reactors #1, 2, and 3 once problems started there. The implication was that if this didn't cause, it certainly contributed to the explosion at reactor #4. (Even though #4 was offline at the time of the quake and subsequent tsunami, the spent fuel rods still needed to be kept cool; removing the pump from #4 obviously made this more difficult.)

[SidDithers]

1. What part of the reactor has two 8x8 meter holse in it?...nt

Sid

[jannyk]

3. The concrete 'shell' - more info on what happened overnight here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x649408

Thread was updated as info came in.

[SidDithers]

5. Thanks for the link to that thread...

I didn't see it overnight. :hi:

Sid

[Statistical]

2. There is no fuel in the number 4, 5, or 6 reactors.

They were offline for maintenance and inspection. Entering containment is impossible with fuel load in place.

Also the news seems to indicate the fire at #4 was from the spent fuel pond which wouldn't be cooled by main reactor pumps anyways.

Lastly I question the idea that there is a hole in the reactor itself (as opposed to reactor building, or primary containment. The reactor contains an almost unbelievable amount of radiation.

To put it into perspective.
Normal background radiation 0.00027 mSv / hour.
Peak radiation levels reported at plant. 11 mSv / hour (pretty hot).
Radiation at chernobyl exposed core. 300,000 mSv / hour.

A hole in a reactor would produce radiation that was prompt lethal within minutes. There would be nobody alive within a couple miles right now and they would need constant suicide workers to move in do some work, die and then be replaced by the next batch.

[jannyk]

4. From the CNIC press conference a couple hours ago

Update per CNIC Press Conference 4am PST (ongoing)

Firstly, there are SIX reactors at Fukushima Daiiichi. 4,5&6 were offline at the time of the quake. Current status of each:

#1 ok - not good but ok.
#3 ok - same as above
#5 all quiet so far
#6 same as #5
#2 Volatile and dangerous. Not imminent, but could cause damage to 1 & 3
#4 Two holes in concrete casing. Each hole 8m x 8m (64 sq m each - huge) Fire, suspected to be from Hydrogen build up earlier today - now extinguished. Suspect 'Sloshing' from earthquake/aftershocks, and/or all pumps/water/attention being directed to 1,2 & 3 and spent fuel pools being left to fend for themselves as they appeared totally stable. Fire/explosion at this reactor was a big surprise.

More info at thread as appeared/appears
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x649408#649557

[Igel]

6. You have to distinguish between the reactor and the reactor building.

To distinguish between the spent fuel containment pools and the reactor.

People haven't been, so I've been reading about reactors exploding when it was the buildings around the reactors exploding.

Sometimes you have to go by context. When everybody knows what's being talked about they don't have to be explicit in their meaning; the known context helps, real-world and verbal-context information feed the parsing of sentence-level propositional content. But if an outsider listens in, one lacking context, and it's a morass of misunderstanding as they add incorrect extra-sentential, non-verbal discourse information.