Fukushima 3rd reactor meltdown full#

It seems highly unlikely that safety-obsessed Japanese engineers would have run their plant as carelessly as the Soviets ran Chernobyl. Its operation and safety protocols conformed to the most current international standards for nuclear reactors. As far as we know, before the earthquake and tsunami, the power station was in good repair and was operating within normal parameters. While the situation at Fukushima is dire and very serious, in reality it bears little resemblance to Chernobyl. Investigators also found evidence of a brief uncontrolled chain reaction within the core, which probably intensified the fire and resulting core meltdown. With nothing to control it, the overheated core melted. And since the reactor had no shielding, highly radioactive dust, smoke, and debris from the explosion and fire contaminated the surrounding area for hundreds of miles. The explosion exposed the overheated reactor components to outside air, and they immediately erupted in a huge fireball. The overheated water formed steam pockets, which eventually over-pressurized the reactor, causing it to explode. Then the control rods malfunctioned and could not be reinserted fully. This resulted in a burst of neutron energy that overheated the reactor. When the steam lines to the turbines were shut off, the water circulation in the reactor slowed down. The test involved shutting off the steam to the power station’s main turbine generators in order to determine whether the “freewheeling” (spinning under their own inertia, without the force of the steam) turbines could still produce enough power to keep the reactor’s water pumps operating, while the backup power system was brought online. The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said it was “unlikely” that theĪccident would turn into another Chernobyl, but failed to rule it outįor those of you unfamiliar with the Chernobyl accident, it was a man-made catastrophe caused by engineers who ran a dangerous test on a reactor system later discovered to contain numerous design flaws and malfunctioning components, while the reactor was in an unstable condition. Urgently appealed to US and UN nuclear experts for technical help on

Meltdown at Three Mile Island in the US in 1979, and is second only to theġ986 Chernobyl disaster, according to the French nuclear safety authority.Īfter insisting for three days that the situation was under control, Japan The Fukushima crisis now rates as a more serious accident than the partial Meltdown as workers struggled to keep temperatures under control in the

Fukushima 3rd reactor meltdown full#

Safety officials said they could not rule out a full Three separate reactors had started to melt despite repeated efforts to cool Government officials admitted that it was “highly likely” the fuel rods in Plant after it suffered its second explosion in three days. “But we have not recorded any sudden jump in radiation indicators,” EdanoĮarlier a cloud of radioactive dust billowed from the Fukushima Daiichi power This is the bottom part of the container, which holds water used to cool it Number-two nuclear reactor appeared to have been damaged.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters the suppression pool of the