URGENT!!! Blackout at Fukushima Daiichi — Cooling at fuel pools stopped

http://enenews.com/kyodo-blackout-at-fukushima-daiichi-cooling-at-fuel-pools-stopped


Blackout at Fukushima Daiichi — Cooling at fuel pools stopped

Published: March 18th, 2013 at 9:36 am ET
By ENENews

March 18, 2013 report from Kyodo News with summary translation by Fukushima Diary:

Power blackout took place in Fukushima plant. The coolant system of the spent fuel pools in reactor1, 3, 4 are stopped.

It has a power failure with the Fukushima 1st nuclear plant. 1, 3 and 4 the spent fuel pool alternative cooling system and the like of the machine stops.

Updates as available here

Published: March 18th, 2013 at 9:36 am ET
By ENENews

Kyodo: “Tepco hasn’t been able to work out steps to ensure bringing system back online” at Fukushima Daiichi — No ‘major’ changes in radioactivity levels

Published: March 18th, 2013 at 3:59 pm ET
By ENENews
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Title: Fukushima nuclear power plant suffers outage, fuel pool cooling stops
Source: Kyodo
Date: March 19, 2013

Tokyo Electric Power Co. said a power failure occurred at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station just before 7 p.m. Monday, leading to the suspension of systems to cool spent fuel pools of the No. 1, 3 and 4 reactor units.

[...] No major changes have been observed in radioactivity levels detected by nearby monitoring posts.

As of 1:45 a.m., TEPCO has not been able to work out steps to ensure bringing the system back online. [...]

See also: NHK: Another fuel pool loses cooling system at Fukushima Daiichi -- CBC: May take days to repair

Published: March 18th, 2013 at 3:59 pm ET
By ENENews

Meanwhile, as the band plays on, radioactive deep water fish are being pulled out of the Ocean on the USA west coast. Seals are sick. Objects floating in from Japan on the tides washed up on USA and Canada's beaches have to be de-contaminated. If those reactors melt down we can all look forward in the future to calling the current days "the good old days".

Some power has been restored,

http://enenews.com/power-still-not-restored-at-unit-3-fuel-pool-and-common-fuel-pool-tepco-we-are-extremely-sorry-it-took-us-so-long-to-announce-blackout

Power still not restored at Fukushima Unit 3 fuel pool and Common Fuel Pool — No fresh cooling water for over a day — Tepco: Extremely sorry it took so long to announce blackout

Published: March 19th, 2013 at 10:38 am ET
By ENENews
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Enformable, March 19, 2013 at 9:56a ET: TEPCO still unable to restore power at all affected facilities [...] After further investigation, TEPCO announced that the switch gear in the process building, common fuel pool, and Unit 3 and Unit 4 switchgear had been found to be not operable. Workers were unable to determine what caused the boards to stop functioning, as no visible damage was found. They later repaired two of the boards, but are currently using an emergency power generator to restore cooling for the Unit 4 spent fuel pool while the Unit 3 spent fuel pool and common fuel pool are still not restored. [...]

AFP: Engineers at Japan’s crippled Fukushima nuclear plant partially succeeded Tuesday in restarting cooling systems after a power cut underlined its still-precarious state two years after a tsunami struck. [...] Power was restored to part of the equipment [...] The system on the pool at reactor 3 will likely return to full operation Tuesday evening [...] A separate cooling system for a common pool is expected to be back online at 8:00 am on Wednesday [...]

AP: Power partially restored at crippled Japanese nuclear plant [...] Power has been restored to two fuel storage pools at Japan’s tsunami-damaged nuclear plant, but two others have been without fresh cooling water for more than a day, raising concerns about the fragility of a facility that still runs on makeshift equipment. [...] The current power outage is a test for TEPCO to show if it has learned anything from the disaster. [...]

The Japan Times: Tokyo Electric Power Co. said repairs to fully recover the cooling functions of the fuel pools at reactors 1, 3 and 4 would be completed by Tuesday evening, while another huge common fuel pool would be fully functional by 8 a.m. Wednesday. [...]

Asahi: Industry minister Toshimitsu Motegi told TEPCO to restore the operations as soon as possible. He also scolded the company for the delay in disclosing the latest problem at the stricken nuclear plant. TEPCO announced the power outage more than three hours after it occurred. “We thought we had better make a report after confirming and summarizing the situation at the facilities,” a TEPCO official said. “We are extremely sorry because it took us so long.” [...]
Watch NHK’s latest broadcast here

Published: March 19th, 2013 at 10:38 am ET
By ENENews