Film about Fukushima heroes warns against complacency

I bet the movie skipped the part where they sent a team to open the back up cooling system valve but they came back empty-handed cuz the radiation level was too high lol. Russians get it done under the most difficult conditions. Japanese can't/won't

Facts correct please, Kan (the former PM) rejected Tepco's request to pull all workers.

As suspected this looks more like a propaganda piece than the difficult, probing film it needs to be. (See the Chernobyl TV series)

As gogogo said according to the official investigations the PM Kan had forced the staff to remain at the reactor to prevent a full melt down against the wishes of TEPCO.

The situation was caused by the LDP government that has been in power almost continuously since WW2. Not the Kan government which was unlucky enough to catch the bomb the LDP had been cooking up over generations of incompetence.

If complacency is involved it's on the part of TEPCO who were warned specifically about the potential of a tsunami but simply blew off the warnings with a "that'll never happen". As the report stated. Fukushima was a man made disaster. Not a natural one.

I bet the movie skipped the part where they sent a team to open the back up cooling system valve but they came back empty-handed cuz the radiation level was too high lol. Russians get it done under the most difficult conditions. Japanese can't/won't

I think they were Ukrainian, mate.

Russians get it done under the most difficult conditions. Japanese can't/won't

Um, if the radiation level is too high, then humans can't. Has nothing to do with will. Radiation is stronger than will.

Masao Yoshida defied his masters and prevented the nuclear disaster from becoming even worse than what it was and later died from cancer, unrelated to the disaster.

At one point he thought he and the other workers should run away. He sent home the younger workers and all the female workers.

But it must be said that the plant manager was also part of the problem. There had been no safety training for more than 10 years. The emergency manual was nothing more than a few A4 sheets. The documentation was missing or incorrect.

When the Tokyo firefighter thought they were flooding the rectors they were filling the secondary cooling system located on the roof level.

I think the biggest single mistake by all those part of the atomic village was that no believed a nuclear disaster could ever happen.

Oh, come on. There are tons of documentaries available since forever about the truth of what happened in Fukushima, wake up!

Just for reference, this http://www.nuclearstory.com/ is maybe the most trustworthy one.

Well if their actions did prevent a larger radiation leak than I certainly am grateful as I lived in Tokyo at the time with small kids. For Tokyo, life was barely affected except for a few days of no metro, whereas now the coronavirus has brought Tokyo to its knees.

Those 50 brave men should be celebrated as national heroes. One has tragically died of cancer, and I hate to think what health issues will afflict them in the coming years after exposure to extreme radiation.

I will watch this movie - it will probably be very similar to Chernobyl on Netflix.

an American built reactor..

built by the sea even though advised to build on higher ground ( ignored coz of cost and stupidity) due to dangers from a tsunami.

after the nuclear disaster the Japanese didn't accept foreign help even though they struggled with what to do ( and still are!!).

Japan never learns and continues to push for nuclear power( Abe that is).

sigh....

Fukushima will be a UNESCO World Heritage Site some day.

an American built reactor.

That's a simplification of the truth. The reactors for Units 1, 2, and 6 were supplied by General Electric, those for Units 3 and 5 by Toshiba, and Unit 4 by Hitachi. All six reactors were using a boiled-water reactor design from General Electric, Mark-I for units 1-5 and Mark-II for unit 6. The Mark I and II were known to be quit weak in their containment vessel in the event of rapid increase of pressure. This issue was actually known by GE which has warned Japan not to use that design, considered not safe for seismic prone locations. The Japanese ignored those warnings and went ahead because politically the country was so eager to have a major new source of energy particularly after the oil crisis. In fact many officials at GE have called at that time the Japanese "crazy" for doing so....

Now concerning this movie, let me say it straight. This is shameless propaganda and so typical of Japan in its way to expose things with a distorted and almost childish way after the facts. Those men are not heroes. They are as responsible as the politicians and the Tecpco executives whose corruption and greed has brought this disaster. Those so called heroes have for years closed their eyes on practices that systematically covered up issues and neglected safety for profit. They knew what was going on and in fact the movie fails short in explaining that themselves had major flaws in their understanding on how to operate the plant. They did not know how the condenser worked which was a major factor in making the situation worse and they did not know how the water gauges worked which made them think that there was enough water left to cool the reactors.

I could go on with this since I know it very well but suffice to say that Japan is again falling miserably at recognizing where the failure really came from and particularly at pointing out the dramatic responsibilities of the LDP which for years and until today continue to support a corrupted system that protects the power companies and the politicians linked to them.

@Capuchin

Nobuko Kan was never in the LDP and the LDP has been out of power for over a year prior to 3/11

I bet the movie skipped the part where they sent a team to open the back up cooling system valve but they came back empty-handed cuz the radiation level was too high lol. Russians get it done under the most difficult conditions. Japanese can't/won't

Also I put additional bet, this movie will skip part where that company decided to save reactor first instead trying to prevent a bigger disaster. Not until afternoon the following day finally they give up that idea.

All praise to the heroes! Hopefully, the cowardly TEPCO leader at the time will be portrayed as the POS he really was. He ordered everybody to evacuate the plant knowing full well it was going into a multiple meltdown. I remember the PM Kan screaming and the TEPCO boss and telling him to get his ass-ets back in there and start cooling the rods.

How does the film warn against complacency? Someone on twitter (I know... but wait!) said they bet it was going to glorify individual actions when the accident happened and just conveniently ignore the reasons for why it happened in the first place...

So it looks like they're right. Some guy yelling at a dozy manager doesn't explain anything about how the disaster happened, a big shō ga nai basically. It's like the ww2 movie Zero just glossing over why Japan was fighting the Americans

The Mark I and II were known to be quit weak in their containment vessel in the event of rapid increase of pressure. This issue was actually known by GE which has warned Japan not to use that design, considered not safe for seismic prone locations.

then why sell it to them then?!!

ffs

I haven't seen the movie, but after seeing the posters in the theatre I was wondering how they were going to blame Kan and Minshuto for all of this, and the LDP would come out smelling like roses!

"When I made the film 'Letters from Iwo Jima,' I felt that Japan isn't very good at learning lessons from the past,"

Very true.

I see the myth of Kan standing up to TEPCO is still alive.

> Tepco Executive Vice President Sakae Muto, 60, ordered his subordinates at the head office to craft an evacuation plan, while Fukushima No. 1 chief Masao Yoshida started to secure enough buses. Procedures to send employees to Tepco’s Fukushima No. 2 nuclear plant were also being decided.

Shimizu, Tepco’s 66-year-old president, phoned Kaieda, who had been placed in charge of dealing with the unfolding disaster, and Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano, 46, repeatedly to seek approval for the “evacuation” of workers.

But Shimizu did not communicate clearly that Tepco would maintain a minimum core of employees to monitor the situation and continue to oversee water injection into the three reactors that had suffered core meltdowns.

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/09/23/national/tepco-plea-evacuate-enraged-kan/#.XmXD0S-RWfA

There was almost another meltdown at the other nuclear plant, Daini which had lost power and water supply. Quick thinking by the plant manager and ran out water hoses for several kilometers to the nearest water supply otherwise there could have been a double nuclear disaster.

Saw adds for this; looks like more mellow dramatic garbage and propaganda, that'll no doubt play up the heroism of the people on the ground while failing to properly address the ineptitude of TEPCO and the government (no way it would get passed the film board if they painted an accurate picture). Soon to be matched by the ridiculous mellow drama of the upcoming Nagano ski jumping movie.

This looks absolutely awful

Lots of pre-judging here from people who haven't seen the movie. I've seen it. It's not about the bigger issues. It's about how close eastern Japan came to being **ed. It's based on the book On the Brink: The Inside Story of Fukushima Daiichi **and basically shows the problem starting and the problems dealing with the problems. Kan is portrayed as an angry idiot, TEPCO execs are portrayed as useless idiots and the Fukushima 50 are shown probably as it was, virtually helpless. It doesn't sugar-coat it. Worth seeing.

Unfortunately, there won't be any mention of the "Fukushima Forgotten" still living in shelters in the movie.

The poster is beautifully disturbing.

Going to see the movie this week because of the Comments here.

basically shows the problem starting and the problems dealing with the problems. 

Real problem is starting when they refuse to build wall or to build reactor on higher ground, will they show that on that hesitant to build with that requirement in that movie?

Real problem is starting when they refuse to build wall or to build reactor on higher ground, will they show that on that hesitant to build with that requirement in that movie?

The height of the land was reduced because otherwise it would have need bigger stronger cooling pumps which were then located at sea level. Many design faults in the construction of the plant.