Meltdown Imminent in Japan?

Almost 60 hours after an earthquake rattled Japan and a tsunami engulfed parts of Northern Japan, the entire region has been riddled with aftershocks while self-defense forces have been rescuing trapped citizens. Japanese officials upgraded the earthquake to 9.0. Over 1,300 deaths have been confirmed by the government, but officials stated that in excess of 10,000 more deaths have yet to be confirmed in Miyagi prefecture.

But now, the country is also battling a potential nuclear meltdown at multiple nuclear facilities in Fukushima. Almost 200,000 residents have been evacuated after one of the buildings housing one of the reactors exploded (but the reactor remained in tact).

And now, there's reports of a cooling system failure at a third nuclear power plant in Tokai. Tokyo is less than 100 KM from Tokai.

It's been difficult to obtain the real story -- the biggest fear is that Japanese officials are downplaying the potential meltdown(s) while scrambling to cool down their reactors -- sort of a semi-bluff to buy more time.

Here's a recent report from RT...


To complicate matters, a volcano in southern Japan resumed its eruptions. Shinmoedake erupted in January, which concerned locals because it was the most activity the volcano has seen in over three centuries. But in the last 24 hours, the volcano unleashed ash and surrounding towns have been evacuated. With heavy rains expected, officials were concerned about mudslides.

For live updates, visit the English feed for NHK's live stream.

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Update:

According to George Washington's Blog... Meltdowns at 2 reactors...and problems with 4 others.

If there's any fallout, the West Coast of the U.S. would likely be hit.

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Here's a recently released video of the tsunami's destruction...


H/T to Zerohedge.