westerner comments

So, it seems senior management knew about the losses year after year but just covered it up in order not to "upset the applecart". Sounds like Tepco. And a $687 million consultancy fee to a little-known financial adviser based in the Cayman Islands for a $2.2B deal.... where's the corporate governance???

Although TEPCO were pretty much pre-occupied with the nuke disaster, there's no excuse for stuffing up this simple but absolutely essential task of record-keepinIg. If they can't get this right how can they be expected to run a nuke plant?

I havent read all the comments and I'm not totally opposed to nuke power but... all those years ago Tepco proposed to the Jpns gov't to build a nuke plant in an earthquake zone, on a coastal location prone to tsunami damage, with a sole back-up diesel power supply at-or-below sea level within the grounds of the power station. And the Jpns gov't approved it. That diesel generator was "Plan B" but surely Tepco and the gov't would have considered a "Plan C" to have a further diesel generator several kms inland (or the Plan B generator located elsewhere). That would be a tiny % of the overall project cost to avoid a massive stuff-up that has now happened. I am sure all senior officials on both sides were aware of this but didn't want to upset the applecart. Yes, Tepco and the gov't are doiong the best they can - but its too late.

Getting that aluminium ferry off the hostel is the easy bit; one or two mobile cranes would do, but it's several kms inland so my guess is - a) despite pretty much everything between the hostel and the sea being flattened, they just cannot truck it back to the port area (oversize load); b) they will dismantle it (carefully and accurately) and move the sections back to the port area on conventional size trucks and and maybe rebuild it; c) there are other more pressing priorities so they just need to cut it up and get it out of the way.