At worst, Trudy, there could be a swath of land that's contaminated with radioactive particles and it would take a lot of work to clean up. The problem is that there are some long-lived isotopes you wouldn't want to live with for years or, in particular, ingest.
That's the part that scares me. It's not flashy enough for the evening news. Ground gets contaminated, groundwater gets contaminated, people move onto the land, margins get blurry, governments change (though less of a fear with Japan, pretty stable gov)... And what about the ocean? Obviously you get some pretty serious dilution, but you still get problems wherever those isotopes enter the food chain. Scary stuff.
My boss doesn't fully seem to understand what going home sick entails, but I'm going to go lie down in my car and then go home.
Get home safely and feel better, ita. May your boss get a clue.
Ginger, I very much appreciate your commentary. You're beating the news media by miles. And I agree that you could probably publish your comments made here as a column, with only minor modifications.
Cash, that's great! Have fun!
We are waiting to sign consents for surgery #3 which stinks.
I'd like to add my thanks, Ginger. "One cross-country flight" is a lot more specific than "minimal."
Ginger, do you think it would have made a difference if they were there 2-3 days ago?
Who knows? But it's easy to get tunnel vision when managing an emergency of that scope. Having more experts in that reactor type on the ground might have meant spotting the trouble in Unit 2 earlier, for example.
Oh my gosh, so much going on!
Sending good thoughts to Maria and family, to Kat, K and kids, and to ita. ita, feel free to call me if there's anything I can do to help out.
Maria, I'm sorry that good thoughts are all I have. It's such a hard situation.
Many thanks to Ginger for your smart analysis of the situation in Japan. You are amazing.
Maria, all kinds of ~ma to your uncle and your dad and all of you.
Get home safely ~ma to your brother, Hayden. That's scary.
I think what's really sobering about Japan is that so much work is still being done in Haiti to get the country back on its feet, and this disaster is magnified hundreds of times. I just keep thinking, where will those people go? How will they live? And then my brain just shuts down.
Adding my thanks for having Ginger here. It's so nice to be able to come in and listen to an expert in the field and who also speaks common sense.
Oh Haiti worries me too. It's in such a terrible state still.
And I'm grateful to you, too, Ginger. S. was railing yesterday about how he could only find conflicting information, and I was able to point him to everything you've shared.
