Who ya gonna call? Supertanker!

At this point in the Japanese nuclear emergency it is coming down to the simple proposition of how do you drop enough water on the stricken reactors, and especially the spent fuel ponds, to keep further damage from happening? The Japanese Self-Defense Force is experimenting with helicopter water drops which are, frankly, stupid. The choppers can’t drop enough water to make a difference and they are so slow that they potentially expose their crews to excessive amounts of radiation.  Much better to use the Evergreen 747 Supertanker.

The unique Evergreen Supertanker is the largest piece of firefighting gear on earth, capable of dropping more than 20,000 gallons of water or chemicals at a shot (40,000 gallons per hour!), then streaking back for more at over […]

By |March 16th, 2011|2011|82 Comments
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Hollywood's impending Internet revolution

New York Magazine wrote recently that YouTube was planning to throw large sums of money at celebrities who would then make short form (three minute) videos for the site. The numbers mentioned were staggering (up to $5 million per celebrity channel) but the business model is crazy. It’s the three minute thing that makes no sense. I’m sure if YouTube is planning something like this it is specifically for videos that are not three minutes long.
Youtube already owns the Internet market for three minute videos. While there are probably instances where YouTube might throw some significant money into getting the odd celebrity to do something in this space, it is traditional TV-length videos and movies where Youtube actually needs help.
Looking at total video […]

By |March 15th, 2011|2011|55 Comments
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Is anything nuclear ever really super safe small and simple?

Absent some terrible news from Japan this will be my second and last column about the nuclear accidents unfolding there. It turned out I was right last time about the sodium polyboride or boric acid or whatever neutron absorber the Japanese authorities dumped in first one and now two reactors along with a lot of sea water in an attempt to quench the reaction heat. I think it is pretty clear, too, that most of these reactors will not be coming back online… ever. This column looks at what that can mean for the nuclear industry in Japan and I also want to look at how these accidents are or aren’t like Chernobyl — a comparison I am seeing far too often in news […]

By |March 13th, 2011|2011|161 Comments
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Flea powder may be saving lives in Japan

There’s a 40 year-old nuclear reactor cooling-down right now in Japan following the big earthquake in that country. Actually there are 11 such reactors cooling-down, automatically brought offline by the 8.9 temblor, but one of those reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi generating plant is not going gracefully and 3000 people have been moved from their homes as a precaution.

Good idea.

I worked as an investigator for the Presidential Commission on the Accident at Three Mile Island, 32 years ago, and a few months studying the plumbing TMI’s Unit 2, which is actually younger than the errant Japanese reactor, gives me a very healthy respect for the danger in Japan.

That Japanese reactor shut down […]

By |March 11th, 2011|2011|115 Comments
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Towers of babble: Sprint probably ISN'T buying T-Mobile

Bloomberg reported today that Sprint is in talks to buy T-Mobile, the U.S. wireless division of Deutsche Telekom, according to the usual unnamed sources.  As a result, shares of both companies are moving, tongues are wagging, as are the fingers of technical analysts saying such a tie-up might not be a very good idea given the technical differences between the two networks. After all, look what happened the last time Sprint tried to absorb a foreign network, Nextel, back in 2005. That wasn’t pretty for Sprint or its shareholders. But Wall Street loves news, whether it is true or not, and I am fairly certain this news isn’t true.

Not that Bloomberg would let that get in […]

By |March 8th, 2011|2011|39 Comments
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