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Nuclear Industrial Accident
Fuel Reprocessing Plant
Modified Unregulated Process
Created Fuel rods for other power plants -
Around 26 liters of solution had been poured into precipitation tank in 4 batches
Day after 10:30am another batch been prepared and poured into tank (40 liters) 16kg of Uranium (Hisashi Ouchi)
(Tank has a mx. limit of 2.4 kg of Uranium) Created a nuclear fission chain reaction
Began to emit intense Gamma and neutron radiation triggering number of alarms Fission products release into building -
A maximum of radiation was 0.85 msv/hr (millisieverts an hour) in an area round the facility
161 people evacuated
39 houses
in a 350 meter radius
20hrs to control after the accident -
Maximum Neutron rates at the site boundaries were measured to be 4 msv/hr
Due to wet process in the solution, the water in the solution acted as a moderator prolong the reaction -
-Ouchi exposed to 17 Sv (17,000 msv) radiation (300x of annual dose for nuclear engineer and 3x lethal dose)
-Masato Shinohara exposed to 10Sv/ 10k msv
-Yutaka Yokokawa (4meters away) 3Sv/3k msv 5 below the lethal dose Annual limit dose 20 msv per year
Lethal dose 5k msv -
Radiation completely destroys his chromosomes, WBC, covered his body in 3rd degree burns
He immediately becomes disorientated, trouble breathing, vomits Only human to live with no DNA in his body -
had peripheral blood stem transplant from his sister
skin grafts
in november of 1999 he was bleeding from his eyes and intestine -
Also receive blood transplant for bone marrow and skin grath
later on to have lung and kidney failure
contracted Pneumonia as result of MRSA infection -
6 men from JCO including Yutaka Yokokawa were charge with Professional Negligence 5 years.
Fines
Exposed to around 400 people -
-2003 the Uranium conversion stopped completely
-A replica now sits in the Atomic Energy Science Museum in Tokaimura. You can visit the museum if you are ever out there in Japan