Antinuclear

A visit to Fukushima’s radioactive “dead zone”

We also spotted many suspicious looking flowers and other forms of vegetation. According to Yoichi, radiation has affected some flowers in the nuclear zone to go haywire and outgrow their natural size (a
topic for future research). Yoichi noted that radiation affects different plants differently, some are hardy and not affected; others, especially flowers may receive small doses but have big results in terms of mutations.

Below:  Yoichi indicates the normal height of this flower compared to this giant version

We already know that the biologist and expert on mutagenetic affects, Tim Mosseau, has shown that in Fukushima prefecture a variety of insects and other species have been affected (1).

My Trip To The Fukushima Nuclear Disaster Zone http://rense.com/general96/trip.html
(Part One) By Richard Wilcox Ph.D. 7-26-13 On July 20, 2013 Yoichi Shimatsu and I departed from Ueno station in Tokyo to visit the Fukushima nuclear disaster region and see what we
could see…..
Undoubtedly Japan’s countryside regions have suffered from brain drain and thus the numbers of passengers do not justify the number of trains. After the Fukushima disaster many people moved out of the immediate area and this has reduced the need for trains.

Beyond that fact, Yoichi speculates that the Japanese government does not want people going up there to snoop around, Fukushima is now a DEAD ZONE and off limits. Indeed it is, even while they are urging
some people to move back in. Families that moved out of the immediate area of the nuclear disaster may now live in safer zones to the south, but they are forced to train their kids back to their original schools during the daytime, if that is where their family property is registered.
When we arrived at Nakaso, a seaside town on the southern border of
Fukushima prefecture, my dosimeter which is a “Terra-P” (made in the
Ukraine), measured low to normal background radiation. However, after
we had dropped off our bags at the seaside hotel and traveled further
north, radiation levels increased.

We stopped at one town along the train route, Hisanohama, which is
about 11 km from the FNPP#1. On a spectacular summer’s day we had a
chance to walk out to a fishing port. Background air readings averaged
0.25 microsieverts per hour (mcs pr hr), about double a tolerable
background level for long term habitation (although no background
radiation level is known to be safe, some radiation is unavoidable).
The highest reading we found at this location was an old fishing net
piled up alongside the road: 0.52 mcs pr hr. We measured fresh seaweed
that was dropped on the road that locals eat in their soup to be 0.28
mcs pr hr. It would not be recommended to eat such food on a daily
basis given that cesium and other radio nuclides accumulate in the
body faster than they are naturally expelled.

At the port the fishing boats were no longer used for fishing but for
other kinds of clean up work subsidized by the government. There was
some rebuilding work at the port, a perfectly good asphalt parking lot
was being torn up by bulldozer. Presumably the radiation could not be
removed so the only other option is to get rid of the entire
surface………
As we walked back to the station in Hisanohama, we walked past a house
with a motorcycle dude with his two little kids and wife playing in
the yard. With the background radiation noticeably higher than the
recommended dose I wondered about the fate of the children.

We also spotted many suspicious looking flowers and other forms of vegetation. According to Yoichi, radiation has affected some flowers in the nuclear zone to go haywire and outgrow their natural size (a
topic for future research). Yoichi noted that radiation affects different plants differently, some are hardy and not affected; others, especially flowers may receive small doses but have big results in
terms of mutations.
We already know that the biologist and expert on mutagenetic affects, Tim Mosseau, has shown that in Fukushima prefecture a variety of insects and other species have been affected (1).

“Tim Mousseau [has] offered irrefutable and conclusive data proving
the effects of the radioactive linear low-dose on wildlife at
Chernobyl. In other words, the greater the dose, the greater the
evidence of harm. His team continues to investigate the effects in
Fukushima on wildlife and have found disturbingly similar results
including birth defects, genetic mutations and tumors. If it can
happen to bugs and birds, it can happen to humans.” And to
vegetation………
We heard beautiful bird songs, but also noticed strangely shaped
flowers by the roadside that seemed too tall and chaotic; one plant
would have flower stems that varied wildly in length. Was this a sign
of genetic mutations?

As we walked down the hill toward the ocean in the direction of
Tomioka, the town closest to FNPP#1 which is the now abandoned, we
suddenly smelled a distinctly metallic odor which Yoichi described as
“radiation.” Considering that my dosimeter was going crazy with alarm
bells ringing and an average 0.5 mcr sv pr hr reading. It may have
been radiation blowing toward us from the north from FNPP#1. It may
have been some other substance being emitted by the nearby thermal
power plant. We would regularly spit instead of swallowing in order to
make sure we did not ingest it. Whatever that alien substance entering
our bodies, it was definitely not healthy to living organisms and had
to be expelled as soon as possible………
Part two of this article will be a photo-essay of the trip to
Fukushima. I will offer more technical analysis of the affect on
plants from radiation.

Richard Wilcox holds a Ph.D. in Environmental Studies from a social
science, holistic perspective. He teaches at a number of universities
in the Tokyo, Japan area. His articles on environmental topics
including the Fukushima nuclear disaster are archived at
http://wilcoxrb99.wordpress.com/ and are regularly published at
Activist Post and Rense.com. His interviews with Jeff Rense are
available at the website http://www.rense.com. Wilcox can be contacted
at wilcoxrb99@mail.com

Reference

1. Conference Highlights Fukushima Consequences
http://rense.com/general95/confhigh.html

July 26, 2013 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Uncategorized