NHK Live - Water Spraying Coverage

[Lucinda]

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/nhk-world-tv

[brooklynite]

1. I'm confused...

I thought they gave up on helicopter spraying because of the angles, and were going to use hoses from trucks.

[Lucinda]

2. They just dropped one load...

Reactor 3

[thewiseguy]

3. Pouring water does not hurt but I am wondering how effective this operation is.

Watching it live.

[Lucinda]

4. I think it's really a last ditch effort?

Looks like a lot of the first drop was off the mark

[Lucinda]

6. Two copters involved in the attempt

[thewiseguy]

7. That is why I made that first remark.

[pokerfan]

28. While it does smack of desperation

it still could serve a mitigative effect until they can get grid power restored which I understand they are also working on.

[Thav]

30. At least they're still trying

rather than running around going "omg omg omg omg omg"

[pokerfan]

32. It's probably an apocryphal story

but supposedly an astronaut was once asked if his engines were broken and he only had an hour of oxygen left to live on, how would he spend that last hour? The astronaut's answer was, "I guess I'd probably work on the engine."

[nadinbrzezinski]

5. Some of that water land outside, indeed

this looks like sheer desperation to me

[PA Democrat]

8. Each load of water is 7.5 tons.

[B2G]

9. Could the force of the drop

knock the rods about? Seems like a bad idea.

[Angry Dragon]

12. That was one of the fears was my understanding

[Turbineguy]

10. That's good for 16 million btu

In theory anyway. Heat release equivalent of 5 MW.

[Lucinda]

11. 3 drops so far

[CJvR]

13. Doesn't look like...

...it is very effective IMPO. They are to high too land much on target and moving too fast.
One pilot seems to know what he is doing, the second seems to be wasting fuel.

[Lucinda]

14. They are trying to get as low as they can...its a high learning curve I think

[Lucinda]

15. 4th drop was much lower altitude than the others

lead sheild on bottom of copters to try and help protect

[Lucinda]

16. 11 water canon trucks heading to site

[godai]

23. followup to spraying. n/t

[CJvR]

19. Probably.

The problem is that each pilot will only make a small number of flights so the learning curve will not get any better. Once they get to know what they are doing they will have been too irradiated to fly anymore.

[Lucinda]

21. Yes.

:(

[originalpckelly]

17. Um, yeah, this isn't working.

It sprays all over the place unfortunately.

[godai]

18. They are spraying over the entire area.

Looks intentional, as a 1st step.

[Lucinda]

20. 40 minutes of air time per copter - more is too much exposure

[Lucinda]

22. Aerial operations stopped?

[nc4bo]

25. Water cannons coming in I think. nt

[bluecoat_fan]

24. They just given up on this idea

[Lucinda]

26. Water cannons to target reactor 3 first

[Lucinda]

27. Covering other news now - will give updates

Water cannons en route

[Maru Kitteh]

29. Weather report. :-(

[Maru Kitteh]

31. Helicopter mission abandoned now.