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Page added on December 10, 2016
Should we be worried about Fukushima radiation?
For the first time, seaborne radiation from Japan’s Fukushima nuclear disaster has been detected on the West Coast of the United States.
The levels are very low and shouldn’t harm people eating fish from the West Coast or swimming in the ocean, according to Ken Buesseler, a senior scientist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
“To put it in context, if you were to swim everyday for six hours a day in those waters for a year, that additional radiation from the addressed cesium from Japan … is 1000 times smaller than one dental x-ray,” Buesseler said in a phone interview.
But while people make a choice to be exposed to x-ray radiation, they don’t choose to be exposed to Japanese radiation, he said.
Cesium-134, the so-called fingerprint of Fukushima, was measured in seawater samples taken from Tillamook Bay and Gold Beach in Oregon, according to researchers from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
Celsium-134 was also detected in a Canadian salmon, according to the Fukushima InFORM project, led by University of Victoria chemical oceanographer Jay Cullen.
Massive amounts of contaminated water were released from the crippled nuclear plant following a 9.0 magnitude earthquake and tsunami in March 2011. More radiation was released to the air, then fell to the sea.
“In Japan, at its peak [celsium-134 levels] it was 10 million times higher than what we are seeing today on the West Coast,” he said.
Buesseler, who runs a crowd-funded, citizen science seawater sampling project that has tracked the radiation plume as it slowly makes its way across the Pacific Ocean, said the samples, were taken in January and February of 2016 and later analyzed. They each measured 0.3 becquerels per cubic meter of cesium-134.
He said scientists have turned to crowdfunding to measure the radiation from the Fukushima nuclear disaster because federal agencies are not funding research on ocean radioactive studies stemming from the 2011 event.
“We don’t expect to see health concerns from swimming or fish consumption, but we would like to continue monitoring until (the radiation level) goes back down again,” he said.
Learn more about Ken Beusseler’s crowd-funded, citizen-science seawater sampling project at http://www.ourradioactiveocean.org/.
15 Comments on "Should we be worried about Fukushima radiation?"
Midnight Oil on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 9:20 am
See the ice wall ain’t doing its job,
Maybe using candy canes will work better!
Hubert on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 9:36 am
They need a controlled Nuke Bomb to fix this problem. The world needs to be outraged at the stupid Japan and their corrupt gov.
diemos on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 11:18 am
And once again the famous graphic of predicted tsunami wave height that has nothing to do with radiation.
Outcast_Searcher on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 2:54 pm
“To put it in context, if you were to swim everyday for six hours a day in those waters for a year, that additional radiation from the addressed cesium from Japan … is 1000 times smaller than one dental x-ray,” Buesseler said in a phone interview.
And when I noticed from a chart on my dentist’s wall that a dental X-ray had a TINY amount of radiation compared to, say, an hour flying in a commercial airliner, I stopped worrying AT ALL about dental X-rays.
And it’s not like all old airline pilots are dropping dead of cancer, either.
But of course, the Fukishima scare mongers (like all the doom mongers) will continue to proclaim doom since, why pay attention to actual facts or data?
Davy on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 3:14 pm
Outcast, why are you here if you are so sure of yourself? You are just another idiot playing like you are not worried but deep down the things we talk about here scaring the shit out of you. Funny like a clown.
penury on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 3:33 pm
Anyone explain bio accumulation to these people? Lies by omission are as damning as lies with untrue information, this article contains both.
onlooker on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 3:42 pm
Or that ingesting radiation ie. Seafood is much worse than ambient radiation exposure
Outcast_Searcher on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 5:08 pm
Gee Davy, nice intelligent post. If only name calling gave you more credibility than, say, a house cat, you might be onto something.
But I know, data and facts are just so hard for your ilk to deal with.
Davy on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 5:30 pm
Geebee Outcast, idiot is little different than doom monger so what is your credibility, hypocrisy? Also, you didn’t answer my question. Why is your ilk on this doom site?
makati1 on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 7:07 pm
Penury, most would have no idea what bio accumulation is, even if it was mentioned in a article. They never learned it in school. To busy learning about gender preference or not even making to the grade that teaches biology. (Do they still teach biology and physics in American high schools?)
They mention swimming for 6 hours for a year. How about swimming for 24 hours for 20 years? Tuna, for example?
diatoms are eaten by krill that are eaten by sardines that are eaten by mackerel, that are eaten by tuna that are eaten by humans. Every step concentrates the radiation each has absorbed. More than a dental X-ray? I would bet so. Much more. More than an hour in a jet at 35,000 feet. Probably.
USA TODAY is NOT a reliable source of truth.
Mr. Microcurrie on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 10:01 pm
Well it looks like its not as bad as everyone expected…. http://naturalsociety.com/twice-much-radiation-along-california-coast-originally-reported/ …. Honestly a few bq per m^3 of sea water is an incredibly small amount! For example the ocean already has urnaium, potassium, and many other naturally radioactive materials dissolved in it. Each liter of ocean water has on average 11 Bq/L. This is incredibly more dpm than from Fukushima. Additionally K-40 decays with much higher energy than Cs-134 so the dose from potassium would be far greater. If your really worried about radioactive stuff than you might want to go check your own home for radioactive items before worrying about a catastrophe that happened across the ocean.. Yall should all take time to learn more about the radioactivity in your own environment! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XTIvoTiTTSU
GregT on Sat, 10th Dec 2016 10:10 pm
“Penury, most would have no idea what bio accumulation is”
You can add Mr. Microcurrie to that incredibly long list makati.
Truth Has A Liberal Bias on Sun, 11th Dec 2016 12:22 am
http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/feature/how-is-fukushimas-fallout-affecting-marine-life
“The radioactivity of the fish we caught and analyzed would not pose problems for human consumption,”
Sure, why don’t all you fucking retards who couldn’t pass a high school equivalency exam tell us all about the hazards of biomagnification. If you’re dumb enough to believe short and his fucking bullshit Etp model without question you’re too fucking stupid to live. You circle jerk doom porn echo chamber goofs are pathetic.
GregT on Sun, 11th Dec 2016 1:15 am
Conference Paper for Society for Environmental Toxciology & Chemistry (SETAC)
Dr. Juan Jose Alava & Dr. Frank Gobas, Simon Fraser Univ., published Dec 1, 2014
A Marine Food Web Bioaccumulation model for Cesium 137 in the Pacific Northwest
“137Cs can be expected to bioaccumulate gradually over time in the food web… Bioaccumulation of 137Cs was characterized by slow uptake and elimination rates in upper trophic level organisms and dominance of dietary consumption in the uptake of 137CS. This modeling work showed… magnification of this radionuclide takes place in the marine food web over time.”
http://enenews.com/conference-fukushima-global-threat-human-health-west-coast-salmon-forecast-exceed-japan-radiation-limit-major-concern-public-health-coastal-communities-poster
Go Speed Racer on Sun, 11th Dec 2016 4:38 am
Why is ‘Liberals Have a Truth Bias’ so upset? Buy an Escalade, play ‘Don’t Worry Be Happy’,.