[ RadSafe ] "mis-information from both TEPCO and the Japanese government immediately after the incident"

[Busby, Chris]

What concerned me was the statements of the IAEA. These were clearly biased. Ill tell you how. For a long time, IAEA were giving out that the maximum surface contamination was about 1MBq/square metre (I remember 0.9). The reason was, I believe, that the surface contamination could be compared to Chernobyl, and at the time they were saying it was nothing like Chernobnyl. But at the same time, there were lots of measurements that they referred to that gave gamma dose rates at 1m of between 10 and 80 microSieverts per hour at distances as far as 60km. Now it is clear to those of us who can do the sums, and who know, that these two values are incompatible by a large factor. And we assume that IAEA are not incompetent when it comes to converting gamma dose rates into surface contamination. So this is not a question of beer drinking reporters demanding too much from harassed TEPCO spokespersons. It is clear cover up of the seriousness of the situation. More recently TEPCO have admitted knowing that the surface contamination was high and have apologised for not telling those who were being contaminated who could have got out. 
Sincerely
Chris


-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at agni.phys.iit.edu on behalf of Stewart Farber
Sent: Tue 11/10/2011 22:03
To: 'The International Radiation Protection (Health Physics) Mailing	List'
Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] "mis-information from both TEPCO and the Japanese government immediately after the incident"
 
Regarding the behavior of the insensitive German reporter described in the
post below by Enrico Sardori, I'm reminded of a quote from a German Lit
class from my youth. Heinrich Heine was a respected German Romantic era poet
who said:

"There are more fools in the world than there are people." 

---Heinrich Heine
   German critic & poet (1797 - 1856)

To listen to the early news coverage of Fukushima it continually blurred the
line between the Fukushima accident and the impacts of the
tsunami/earthquake. Reading and watching many news reports, a member of the
public might easily think the thousands of deaths shown or mentioned that
resulted from the tsunami and earthquake were caused by the nuclear
accident. 

This was lazy, contemptible reporting by many in the media, fed by
anti-nuclear activists who reveled in the opportunity to advance their
agenda. 

A few years from now there may be minor, token mention made in some course
at the Columbia School of Journalism, of how the print and electronic news
media failed to do its job responsibly and accurately about the tsunami,
earthquake, and nuclear accident in Japan. But the astounding, gross failure
of almost all media to provide factual, non-inflamatory coverage to help the
Japanese people access the resources they need will almost certainly never
be properly highlighted.


Stewart Farber
========================

-----Original Message-----
From: radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu
[mailto:radsafe-bounces at health.phys.iit.edu] On Behalf Of radiation
Sent: Tuesday, October 11, 2011 4:26 PM
To: radsafe at health.phys.iit.edu
Subject: Re: [ RadSafe ] "mis-information from both TEPCO and the Japanese
government immediately after the incident"

When it happened I was then listening to the German television channel ZDF.
A reporter from a Tokyo hotel was complaining that he would not receive
regular fresh information from the Japanese on what was going on in
Fukushima and he stated that it is known that the Japanese regularly hide
the truth in these affairs.

No mention of the distress of the population, the tens of thousands of
death, the tens of thousands of blessed, the desperate situation of the
survivors who had lost everything from the tsunami, or were searching for
the lost members of their family and their friends. And of course, the
journalist was expecting that the Japanese would give priority to inform him
at short intervals about the situation in Fukushima while he was drinking
his beer in a Tokyo hotel, and would please provide the information in
German if possible.

What an insult to the people of Japan !

This was a journalist, who are you Sander C. Perle?

Enrico Sartori

------------------------------

> Mon, 10 Oct 2011 14:07:28 -0400, Perle, Sandy<sperle at mirion.com>  wrote:
>
> The problem is that the mis-information from both TEPCO and the Japanese
government immediately after the incident, continuing on during the incident
and even after the incident is what causes the public alarm and gives a
forum to others. Listening to the YouTube there is a lot of truth as to what
is being stated. The public was misled, mis-information, deliberate or
otherwise was the norm, so to question Chris regarding just his comments on
Fukushima, is not as pertinent as one could say about other topics discussed
here on Radsafe. Fukushima was a disaster with serious consequences and I am
not confident that we have all of the facts as to what happened, what the
current state is and how stable the reactors are, even today.
>
> Regards,
>
> Sandy
>
> -----------------------------------
> Sander C. Perle


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