“Nothing like this has ever been attempted” — Yale Professor: “All of humanity will be threatened for 1000s of years” if rods in Unit 4 pool touch and have nuclear reaction during removal process — Tepco: “Not clear” if fuel is already damaged

Nothing remotely similar has been attempted before and while everyone – nuclear experts, government officials, environmental groups and the public – agrees that the rods [in the Unit 4 pool] must be moved to more secure storage,
[I]t is feared that any error of judgment could lead to a massive release of radiation into the atmosphere
Unit 4 at the plant contains an alarming 10 times as much caesium-137 as was at Chernobyl, experts say
[A] spokesman for Tepco [...] admitted, however, that it was not clear whether any of the rods were damaged or if debris in the pool would complicate the recovery effort.
Charles Perrow, a professor emeritus at Yale

[He's] made even more strident warnings
“Conditions in the unit 4 pool, 100 feet from the ground, are perilous, and if any two of the rods touch it could cause a nuclear reaction that would be uncontrollable [and] would require the evacuation of surrounding areas including Tokyo”
“[Then] the common storage pool could not be continuously cooled; they would fission and all of humanity will be threatened, for thousands of years”
Unnamed nuclear energy expert who’s monitored Tepco during Fukushima crisis

“I would prefer to have had some US companies that are experts on spent fuel decommissioning brought in to assist”
[S]hould the worst happen at the Fukushima plant [...] Some of the contamination would undoubtedly reach Tokyo
“If so, go up to a very high floor — Radioactive particles are heavy, so keep out of basements”

The Rest…HERE

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