A group of Japanese pensioners is volunteering to go into the Fukushima nuclear reactor and replace younger men in the ongoing effort to clean up the nuclear disaster there. This is beyond brave, and I've got no words for it. FOCUS: Discuss the story. ALT-FOCUS: What news stories like this have left you absolutely humbled, or restored your faith in the human spirit?
I find this story slightly more morbid than hopeful. I also find it uniquely Japanese. The engineer in me is mad that nobody can find a better solution than sending people in to clean everything up. Even if the alternative is to bury the entire site under concrete and salt the earth.
I know I should probably be posting some heartwarming story about people helping out during Katrina, one of the tsunamis, or even the most recent tornado destruction across the US. However, nothing restored my faith in the human spirit more than this picture taken during the Australian floods. While it's wonderful when a person gives of himself effortlessly to help strangers, I think it's much more striking when people can keep a sense of humor during times of trouble. I can't remember the exact quote or even if it was Nietzsche who said it, but it was something like, "how one deals with adversity shows his true character." Whoever it was that said it made tons of sense to me and that's what I look for when I see terrible tragedies around the world: laughter and hope.
I read somewhere that one of those volunteers was quoted saying the radiation might kill him in like 30 years, but he realistically had only about 15 left. So basically, why the hell not? This also the nation that brought us the kamikaze. Surprised this news is coming out now? Right or wrong, they took the attitude that their nation is more valuable than any individual. Having no understanding of the Japanese culture outside of Jackie Chan, I'm kind of surprised the government didn't mandate this with the elderly. I mean if you're going to die anyway, might as well save a fuckton of people before you do. Huge gain, no real risk. Sign me up.
Except that as far as I can tell, that quote is an attempt to downplay the potential seriousness of the problems at the reactor and the danger faced by the volunteers. According to the ever-reliable wiki (no seriously, this comes from wiki via Merck so is probably legit), radiation can fuck your shit up with a quickness (See attached. Also, one day I need to figure out how to embed images). It's possible that his comments are a reflection of the current levels of radiation, but I have a sneaking suspicion that he didn't want to say 'yeah, this might kill us' because that wouldn't exactly be a morale boost for the workers, and families of the workers, currently working at the plant. And given the number of times the reactor has supposedly been stabilised, only to have something ever more severe go wrong, I wouldn't trust that the levels of radiation are as high as they are going to get. *edit: apologies, I can't figure out how to spoiler for size.
Where's some goddamn FEV when you need it? On focus though, I think it's extremely brave of these retired folk to be willing to help out so much.