

Following the almost artistic tsunami photograph in the previous post, here's TEPCO releasing 33 additional photographs of the tsunami that hit Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant on March 11, 2011.



There are people (including the Diet Investigation Commission on the accident, who just released the report) think the earthquake may have caused the initial damage to the plant that led to the core melt of Reactor 1. It may have indeed. But that doesn't in any way diminish the destructive effect of the tsunami.



After all, a tsunami is not a one-off high wave on the beach but a manifestation, so to speak, of the massive amount of ocean water behind it moving toward the land.



According to Jiji Tsushin (7/9/2012), TEPCO originally released 11 photographs in May last year. In September, NISA requested TEPCO to release all the photographs it took of the tsunami, but the company didn't. The final report by the Diet Independent Investigation Commission on the Fukushima accident pointed to the existence of these additional photographs, and finally TEPCO released them on July 9. The photographs were taken by a worker at a TEPCO affiliate company from the building located to the south of Reactor 4.



TEPCO's explanation was that the company thought the photographs were redundant.



The worker who took these photos was apparently inside the building when the tsunami was approaching the plant, then moved to the rooftop of the building after it hit the facilities just outside the building where he was.



In the first several photographs, you can see a small oil tanker hurrying out of the breakwater to avoid the on-coming tsunami.



The earthquake hit at 2:46:18 PM on March 11, 2011, Japan Standard Time.



From TEPCO's Photos and Video Library, 7/9/2012:



3:35:16 PM



3:35:50 PM3:36:18 PM3:36:42 PM3:40:16 PM3:40:28 PM3:41:24 PM3:41:36 PM3:41:52 PM3:41:58 PM3:42:20 PM3:42:24 PM3:42:58 PM3:43:12 PM3:44:06 PM3:44:30 PM3:46:06 PM3:47:10 PM3:48:32 PM3:49:58 PMThe entire 33 photographs at the link

The most telling picture (to me) is the very last one, taken at 4:01:04 PM. It shows the terraced hillside, showing the original elevation of the plant location. If the plant had been built on that level, instead of digging down to the near-sea level, there might not have been the Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant accident. The earthquake might have still caused damages, but the cooling of the reactors might have continued as the emergency power generators wouldn't have been swept away in the tsunami and the basement control panels wouldn't have been flooded.



