Entire Pacific Basin put on alert after Japan earthquake.

What is it with boobquaking to support earthqakes?

And here I'd thought that the punishment for Pearl Harbor was having a bomb dropped on them that was so horrible no one's used them against other people since! Thank you internet for telling me the truth!

"Did we quit when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?"

Off-topic, I know, but I couldn't resist the opportunity to quote that famous line from "Animal House".

Sunatic wrote:

The spewing of hate towards the victims is so wide-spread that two websites have started to collect them. Warning for more blood-boilingness.

I really didn't know that Pearl Harbor bothered people so much even today.

Mr.Doobie wrote:

I really didn't know that Pearl Harbor bothered people so much even today.

Well, it seems to be pretty much the only thing many Americans know of the history between USA and Japan, so of course they would use that and only that as a justification for this "karma". Also, it was a very media-sexy happening. Got a movie and all...

Raine wrote:

And thanks Sunatic for that link. I don't think I've ever raged harder over the ignorance of people. They're spouting Pearl Harbour like it's some sort of buzzword.

Perhaps someone should throw the words "Hiroshima" and "Nagasaki" in there. Even better, compare them with Pearl Harbour.

Anon wrote:

Raine wrote:

And thanks Sunatic for that link. I don't think I've ever raged harder over the ignorance of people. They're spouting Pearl Harbour like it's some sort of buzzword.

Perhaps someone should throw the words "Hiroshima" and "Nagasaki" in there. Even better, compare them with Pearl Harbour.

I'm seeing a lot of people also say things like "what did Japan ever do for us during Hurricane Katrina?". Uh, it would take like one second to see on Wikipedia:

Quote :

The Japanese Foreign Ministry said that it would provide $200,000 to the American Red Cross to assist victims of Hurricane Katrina. Japan also identified needs in affected regions via the U.S. government and provided up to $1,000,000 in emergency supplies such as tents, blankets and power generators if they receive requests from the U.S. for such assistance. Private and corporate donations totaled over $13,000,000.[33] One Japanese individual, Takashi Endo, donated USD $1,000,000 from his personal funds to Katrina relief efforts.[15]

Someone should say "Domo arigato" to Mr. Endo and ask if there's anything we can do for him.

Chris91 wrote:

Someone should say "Domo arigato" to Mr. Endo and ask if there's anything we can do for him.

[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]

Quote :

Posted by Praveen on 2011-03-12 at 13:42 JST Report spam
Takashi Endo of Mazda is safe and fine..

Well there's a small relief.

Also, Maru is okay. Everyone can relax now.

And now there's a bloody volcano.
What the fucking fuck.

Earthquake, Tsunami, Volcano, well that's a complete three, can nothing else go wrong for Japan now please?

Somath Cegem wrote:

Earthquake, Tsunami, Volcano, well that's a complete three, can nothing else go wrong for Japan now please?

A freak hurricane, that is all that's missing.

Roxanne wrote:

And now there's a bloody volcano.
What the fucking fuck.

Not entirely surprising

But still, holy shit, Japan is fucked, abandon island

I know it doesn't undo the horror, but ever so often, there are small rays of hope:

Miracles In Japan

Quote :

Amid the silent corpses a baby cried out - and Japan met its tiniest miracle.

On March 14 soldiers from the Japanese Defense Force were going door-to-door, pulling bodies from homes flattened by the earthquake and tsunami in Ishinomaki City, a coastal town northeast of Senda. More accustomed to the crunching of rubble and the sloshing of mud than to the sound of life, they dismissed the baby's cry as a mistake. Until they heard it again.

They made their way to the pile of debris, and carefully removed fragments of wood and slate, shattered glass and rock. And then they saw her: a four-month old baby girl in a pink woolen bear suit.

The tidal wave literally swept the unnamed girl away from her parents' arms when it hit their home on March 11. Since then her parents - both of whom survived the disaster - have taken refuge in their wrecked house, and worried that their little girl was dead. Soldiers managed to reunite the baby with her overjoyed father shortly after the rescue.

"Her discovery has put a new energy into the search," a civil defense official told a local news crew. "We will listen, look and dig with even more diligence after this." Ahead of the baby's rescue, officials reported finding at least 2,000 bodies washed up on the shoreline of Miyagi prefecture. How the child survived drowning - or being crushed by fallen trees and houses - remains a mystery.

You can call it what you want-I call it a miracle that she survived three days with no food or water. And doubly so that her parents apparently never gave up hope of finding her.

Quote :

In a nation short on good news, other rescues have buoyed morale, too. In Iwate prefecture, northeastern Japan, the devastating tidal wave swept away an elderly woman along with her entire house - but it couldn't extinguish her will to live.

Rescuers found the 70-year-old alive inside her home on March 15, four days after the black tidal wave wiped out much of the region. Osaka fire department spokesman Yuko Kotani told the Associated Press the woman is now receiving treatment in a local hospital. She is conscious but suffering from hypothermia

But she's alive. Which speaks of one helluva will to survive.

Quote :

Elsewhere, 60-year old Hiromitsu Shinkawa survived two days at sea by clinging on to his floating rooftop. He was discovered 10 miles off the Japanese coastline. "Several helicopters and ships passed but none of them noticed me," he said after his March 13 rescue. "I thought that was going to be the last day of my life."

I really think the Military and Rescue crews in Japan deserve special recognition. These people have worked tirelessly, round the cloud, for going on four fucking days, and in most cases, all they've found is dead bodies. I imagine instances like this help make the lack of sleep and tiredness and despair they doubtless feel maybe a little less keen. They can't save everyone, but they can save some.

Here's to hoping for more good news.

Rabid Badger wrote:

I know it doesn't undo the horror, but ever so often, there are small rays of hope:

Miracles In Japan

Quote :

Amid the silent corpses a baby cried out - and Japan met its tiniest miracle.

On March 14 soldiers from the Japanese Defense Force were going door-to-door, pulling bodies from homes flattened by the earthquake and tsunami in Ishinomaki City, a coastal town northeast of Senda. More accustomed to the crunching of rubble and the sloshing of mud than to the sound of life, they dismissed the baby's cry as a mistake. Until they heard it again.

They made their way to the pile of debris, and carefully removed fragments of wood and slate, shattered glass and rock. And then they saw her: a four-month old baby girl in a pink woolen bear suit.

The tidal wave literally swept the unnamed girl away from her parents' arms when it hit their home on March 11. Since then her parents - both of whom survived the disaster - have taken refuge in their wrecked house, and worried that their little girl was dead. Soldiers managed to reunite the baby with her overjoyed father shortly after the rescue.

"Her discovery has put a new energy into the search," a civil defense official told a local news crew. "We will listen, look and dig with even more diligence after this." Ahead of the baby's rescue, officials reported finding at least 2,000 bodies washed up on the shoreline of Miyagi prefecture. How the child survived drowning - or being crushed by fallen trees and houses - remains a mystery.

You can call it what you want-I call it a miracle that she survived three days with no food or water. And doubly so that her parents apparently never gave up hope of finding her.

Quote :

In a nation short on good news, other rescues have buoyed morale, too. In Iwate prefecture, northeastern Japan, the devastating tidal wave swept away an elderly woman along with her entire house - but it couldn't extinguish her will to live.

Rescuers found the 70-year-old alive inside her home on March 15, four days after the black tidal wave wiped out much of the region. Osaka fire department spokesman Yuko Kotani told the Associated Press the woman is now receiving treatment in a local hospital. She is conscious but suffering from hypothermia

But she's alive. Which speaks of one helluva will to survive.

Quote :

Elsewhere, 60-year old Hiromitsu Shinkawa survived two days at sea by clinging on to his floating rooftop. He was discovered 10 miles off the Japanese coastline. "Several helicopters and ships passed but none of them noticed me," he said after his March 13 rescue. "I thought that was going to be the last day of my life."

I really think the Military and Rescue crews in Japan deserve special recognition. These people have worked tirelessly, round the cloud, for going on four fucking days, and in most cases, all they've found is dead bodies. I imagine instances like this help make the lack of sleep and tiredness and despair they doubtless feel maybe a little less keen. They can't save everyone, but they can save some.

Here's to hoping for more good news.

You and me both, and I have to say that after all these disasters stop, and japan can forces on rebuilding for a good long period of time. The Military and Rescue crews should get rewarded for what they are doing other there.

Somath Cegem wrote:

Earthquake, Tsunami, Volcano, well that's a complete three, can nothing else go wrong for Japan now please?

Either Godzilla or hostile aliens with giant robots.
Poor souls.

Salamas wrote:

Somath Cegem wrote:

Earthquake, Tsunami, Volcano, well that's a complete three, can nothing else go wrong for Japan now please?

A freak hurricane, that is all that's missing.

The way Japan's luck has been running lately, that's probably just around the corner.

Typhoon.

You're right, I should've said typhoon.

In any case, things are not looking good for the Land of the Rising Sun.

Somath Cegem wrote:

Earthquake, Tsunami, Volcano, well that's a complete three, can nothing else go wrong for Japan now please?

Well, you can add snow to that list because it's been falling over a lot of the disaster area now hampering rescue efforts.

Don't mean to double post, but here's another awesome thing going on that aims to lift kid's spirits during the disaster. A lot of the actors from different superhero shows are posting up messages on their Twitter accounts. Here's some of them translated by /m/:

"Children, please endure these tough times just a little bit longer. Please, keep it up. Just remember that us heroes will always be by your side. - Kotaro Minami"

"Hey everyone, it's GoRed/Matoi Tatsumi! People's lives are the future of the earth! Let's work hard with our burning rescue spirit!! Firstly in this time of disaster and confusion you should what you can. If you do what you are able, what you can do calmly, anyone can be a hero! It's all about the fighting spirit! Fighting Spirit! - GoRed"

"You've all done well up until now! Things may be difficult even from now but only you can help the people who are around you. You have a power that even we cannot match! That is the finishing attack known as a smile! Even if it's hard now, someday you will be able to save people too! - Ultraman Agul/Hiroya Fujimiya"

"Never ever give up! Grab hold and protect the people who you love with your own two hands! Let me tell you this to start! You are all quite con~sid~era~tely strong! - Kamen Rider Zeronos/Yuuto Sakurai"

"The sun will always rise. The night will not last forever. Daybreak will come and the sun will once again rise! Knowing that we must hold our hopes high no matter the circumstances and press forward! I've got your back! Taiyou Sentai SunVulcan ﾟ+.(ﾉ｡･ω･)ﾉ*｡hyohyo~☆ﾟ･:*☆ VulPanther Asao Kobayashi"

"It's fine even if you don't listen to our words. I just want you to believe in yourselves, believe in the people around you, believe that there will always be a new morning. That is what I will believe in. - NinjaRed Sasuke"

It gets worse. Apparently, Unit 1 of Fukushima Reactor had 20 years of spend fuel rods, which are still deadly radioactive, stored outside of the main reactor. That means that when the unit exploded, those spend fuel rods were blown out of the building.

Quote :

Although Tokyo Electric said it also continued to deal with cooling system failures and high pressures at half a dozen of its 10 reactors in the two Fukushima complexes, fears mounted about the threat posed by the pools of water where years of spent fuel rods are stored.

At the 40-year-old Fukushima Daiichi unit 1, where an explosion Saturday destroyed a building housing the reactor, the spent fuel pool, in accordance with General Electric’s design, is placed above the reactor. Tokyo Electric said it was trying to figure out how to maintain water levels in the pools, indicating that the normal safety systems there had failed, too. Failure to keep adequate water levels in a pool would lead to a catastrophic fire, said nuclear experts, some of whom think that unit 1’s pool may now be outside.

“That would be like Chernobyl on steroids,” said Arnie Gundersen, a nuclear engineer at Fairewinds Associates and a member of the public oversight panel for the Vermont Yankee nuclear plant, which is identical to the Fukushima Daiichi unit 1.

People familiar with the plant said there are seven spent fuel pools at Fukushima Daiichi, many of them densely packed.

Gundersen said the unit 1 pool could have as much as 20 years of spent fuel rods, which are still radioactive.

Add to that the supply of Potassium Iodide running out and you have a recipe for panic.

Quote :

Meanwhile scores of terrified residents began to flee Tokyo as the power plant threatened to send a cloud of radioactive dust across Japan.
Even in Yamagata city itself, some 60 miles from the plant, residents were fearful of contamination.

Raine wrote:

Don't mean to double post, but here's another awesome thing going on that aims to lift kid's spirits during the disaster. A lot of the actors from different superhero shows are posting up messages on their Twitter accounts. Here's some of them translated by /m/:

"Children, please endure these tough times just a little bit longer. Please, keep it up. Just remember that us heroes will always be by your side. - Kotaro Minami"

"Hey everyone, it's GoRed/Matoi Tatsumi! People's lives are the future of the earth! Let's work hard with our burning rescue spirit!! Firstly in this time of disaster and confusion you should what you can. If you do what you are able, what you can do calmly, anyone can be a hero! It's all about the fighting spirit! Fighting Spirit! - GoRed"

"You've all done well up until now! Things may be difficult even from now but only you can help the people who are around you. You have a power that even we cannot match! That is the finishing attack known as a smile! Even if it's hard now, someday you will be able to save people too! - Ultraman Agul/Hiroya Fujimiya"

"Never ever give up! Grab hold and protect the people who you love with your own two hands! Let me tell you this to start! You are all quite con~sid~era~tely strong! - Kamen Rider Zeronos/Yuuto Sakurai"

"The sun will always rise. The night will not last forever. Daybreak will come and the sun will once again rise! Knowing that we must hold our hopes high no matter the circumstances and press forward! I've got your back! Taiyou Sentai SunVulcan ﾟ+.(ﾉ｡･ω･)ﾉ*｡hyohyo~☆ﾟ･:*☆ VulPanther Asao Kobayashi"

"It's fine even if you don't listen to our words. I just want you to believe in yourselves, believe in the people around you, believe that there will always be a new morning. That is what I will believe in. - NinjaRed Sasuke"

God dammit, now I'm going to cry.

Some good news I found while checking my e-mail today. It's from two hours ago.

Brai: No offense, but that FDL site doesn't seem very reliable, especially since it only links back to its own articles... and the other link is to the Daily Fail.

Panic and distrust ARE starting to set in, but if a metric ton of spent fuel rods had been blown hither and thither, Japan would already be fucked to kingdom come and anyone with a Geiger counter would be able to plainly see it, to not even speak of the fact that the explosions at the reactor sites holding these rods would have likely been one hell of a lot more cataclysmic. Just because the plant has the CAPACITY to hold that many spent rods doesn't mean they did at the time. Furthermore, just because the person they talked to works in a plant of the same type thousands of miles away doesn't mean he knows what's going on there.

Don't get me wrong, the situation is quite dangerous alright, but "Chernobyl on steroids" is very likely bullshit.

This SomethingAwful thread, believe it or not, is really informative about the situation with the nuclear reactors, and helped put my mind at ease somewhat.