A friend and colleague sent me this message which is a first hand account of what's going on in Japan. Don't know who originated it, but it's revealing.
From a friend of a friend, etc.
I found the last link about radiation to be especially interesting.
RS
Hunter Brumfield lives in Japan with his wife Eiko. I asked him to
write a report for us of what is happening.
Kitty
Kitty asked me to put together something that describes what we have
gone through here in Tokyo. I will try to keep this brief. Thank you
to all who have been concerned for us, and especially for your
concern for the people in the stricken area. Fortunately, we
Tokyoites escaped the worst of it.
***
Friday, March 11, 2:46 pm
Eiko and I were at home when I noticed a light tinkling sound from
our "earthquake alarm" -- what I jokingly call the Texas cowbell wind
chime made for us by my brother-in-law in San Antonio. We keep it
inside, with a small collection of other glass chimes, since we don't
want our apartment complex chieftains coming down on us for creating
a public nuisance.
I started up my cellphone camera video function, figuring I might
catch something interesting. A few moments later the cowbell was
loudly clanking, and I realized that this shake was far worse than
any I have experienced in my 28 years here, plus nearly 3 years as a
child when my father was stationed in Tokyo in the mid-50s. (Back
then the lights seemed to go out at the slightest tremor, to my big
sister's and my excited delight.)
This time, the movement quickly built until I found myself dodging
wine glasses a cabinet began tossing at me. Here's the video on You
Tube, which also appears in CNN iReports.
< youtube.com <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aewtVlXYZnE>> youtube.com <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aewtVlXYZnE>
The jolting stopped after about 2 minutes. As soon as we could start
moving again, the broken glass at my feet -- our only damage -- was
quickly cleaned up and we began watching reports by white-helmeted TV
newscasters. We also tried to call Eiko's mother but the cell network
was overwhelmed by callers who like us were checking on their loved
ones. (It remained unusable until after midnight, but email, and even
local calls over Skype, never failed.) After it was clear the worst
was over, Eiko went to her mother's apartment on foot and found a
cheerful but very resolute woman, who, despite her 94 years, had
spent the intervening time preparing an earthquake grab bag with
food, batteries, and water -- including for Eiko and me -- and was
ready to leave at a moment's notice.
On TV we were captivated by scenes of vessels of all sizes leaving
port in Tokyo and Yokohama. This was easily within 20 minutes of the
first jolt, and before long we could see them fighting a strong
tsunami surge as they tried to clear the breakwaters. Some could be
seen colliding as it was apparent that they had broken free from
their moorings with no crew on board.
Other scenes from relatively near us were of burning parking lots of
jumbled cars, including on the rooftop of one 11-story building,
followed by exploding fuel storage yards near Yokohama, about 30
miles southwest of our home in eastern Tokyo.
Meanwhile, reports started coming in about the devastation that was
occurring in Sendai, 140 miles northeast of us. The most dramatic
videos came in over the next few days, but sitting there in our
living room within an hour of the quake, we were appalled as we
watched live aerial video from one helicopter as the black tsunami
waves washed over farmland, sweeping everything in their path.
I was quickly contacted by my old newspaper in Jackson, Tn., to
relate what had happened to us. We were on the cover the next day,
Saturday.
Over the following two days the story focused on finding the dead and
helping survivors. These constant reports were interrupted at times
by aftershocks -- more that 300 of a noticeable size in the first
three days, now down to about 10 a day (three so far this morning).
When that happens, a loud chime sounds on TV giving usually a
30-second warning before the shaking can be felt by us. Most come
from the same general area of the original epicenter. Others, in some
ways even more alarmingly, are from a seismically active region about
60 miles on the OTHER side of Tokyo, closer to Mount Fuji. Fuji-san
last erupted in 1707, coating Tokyo with ash.
We stayed home and inside, basically forced to by the disruption of
rail and subway service that caused many employees to walk home from
work (a few people I know more than 10 miles), while others spent the
night on the floor of their offices. Temporary stoppages still occur
whenever there is another aftershock. Traffic was basically frozen
from massive street congestion. Eiko waited several days before
walking to our nearest grocery store, "because I don't want to
[contribute to the sense of] panic," she told me when I suggested we
should go. When we finally did, rice, ramen, milk, and bread were
completely gone, but most other foods were still available, and the
supply has improved since. We still have had no luck getting gas for
our car, though we have not really needed it.
Beginning with the weekend the news of the earthquake and the
struggle to find survivors began to be supplanted by the immense
difficulties bringing the six reactors of the two tsunami-damaged
nuclear power plants in Fukushima under control. Efforts to reduce
heating of spent fuel rods have been hit and miss. But basically they
have made headway, after Tokyo firefighters and Japanese military
brought in water-dumping helicopters, heavy deluge equipment, and
relief crews to spell the heroic and potentially fatal struggles of
plant workers. Highly gratifying assistance has also come from the
U.S.military and dog-assisted international search & rescue teams.
As you have probably been hearing, information on what is happening
with the Fukushima nuclear reactors has been confusing and
incomplete. In my own mind, what we have been getting from CNN and
others has been even worse, as commentators fly in -- and almost as
quickly fly out -- try to figure out what is going on, then fill
their reports with scary half-truths of their own invention. When I
saw my blood pressure hit 214/170 I knew it was time to reduce my
dose of CNN -- I started referring to Anderson Cooper as "Chicken
Little Cooper" after one near-hysterical report* -- and now see that
I have not been alone in my disgust with the foreign press.
< jpquake.wikispaces.com <http://jpquake.wikispaces.com/Journalist+Wall+of+Shame>> jpquake.wikispaces.com <http://jpquake.wikispaces.com/Journalist+Wall+of+Shame>
*It seems Chicken Little Cooper left Japan soon after that display,
in which he blurted to an "expert" he was interviewing back in the
States, "Well, should WE get out of here? What should WE do?!". I
used to like him.
So that brings us now to Wednesday, 12 days later.
Wednesday, March 23, 1:22 pm
Despite what we've been told in the news, a "radioactive cloud" has
not [yet] swept down on Tokyo, much less Seattle, there is no "mass
evacuation by foreigners," and no "nuclear explosion." And while a
few people I know have taken unplanned holidays to Hawaii and
elsewhere, most folks I know have elected to stay put. Several
extremely helpful websites and maillists have sprung up, including by
some foreigners who have their own amateur monitoring stations that
appear to confirm the official (thus less believable) government
radiation reports.
These monitors all show that radioactivity in Tokyo IS slightly up,
but so far well under the amounts considered dangerous, even for
long-term cancer risk. People flying to escape danger will receive
much more radiation exposure from high-altitude cosmic rays, etc.
than if they had remained here. My favorite comparison suggests that
you already receive some exposure from your "hot" spouse sleeping
next to you, and from eating (imported) bananas.
< xkcd.com <http://xkcd.com/radiation/>> xkcd.com <http://xkcd.com/radiation/>
In terms of certain foods, like spinach and milk in which low levels
of radioactivity have been found, the government has banned their
sale from the affected area. Even if you did imbibe some, it is not
enough to cause any ill effects. One friend sent me a link to a blog
post that said quaffing red wine is thought to reduce the effects of
radiation exposure. Any excuse, in my mind!
My favorite part of all this, to the extent that anything at all has
has been comforting, is how well the Japanese people have coped with
a combined disaster of this scale. Any one of these horrendous events
-- the earthquake and its aftershocks, the tsunami that has left as
many as 23,000 dead and missing, the out-of-control nuclear plants --
would have likely caused massive panic in other countries. (In fact,
the only scenes of public panic I have caught were videoed in China
of buyers clamoring for iodized salt thought to reduce the ill
effects of radiation that might blow their way.)
Here, friends and family have told me that where they were forced to
spend the night on bare concrete floors there were no displays of
anger or fear, only acts of kindness.
I love what that says about not just Japanese, but about what we ALL
can potentially rise to under similarly trying circumstances.
Meanwhile, happy to say, our Texas earthquake alarm has on the most
part gone quiet.
Hunter |
