Disasters

Tornadoes, Climate Change and the Disaster Gap

There are storms and then there is what happened to the town of Sanford, North Carolina on the night of April 16. A boisterous storm system had begun in Oklahoma on April 14, bringing flash floods, tornadoes and thunderstorms from the Midwest through the Southeast, part of a massive weather system that could be felt as far as the New …

Fresh Concerns Emerge as Japan Unveils Timetable for Fukushima Shut Down

Assessing the full impact of Japan’s crisis has been a moving target since the first minutes after the 9.0 earthquake struck on March 11. So it’s with a cautious sense of optimism that Sunday’s news from Tokyo Electric and Power Company (TEPCO) – that the crippled power plant could be in cold shut down before the end of the year …

Japanese Fishermen Bring Back First Tuna Since Quake

Photos of big tuna hanging from their tails usually leave me a little cold, particularly when those tuna have been caught in Japan, the world’s largest consumer of the endangered bluefin.

But this picture released today by the Yomiuri, a Japanese daily, makes me feel… if not exactly warm and fuzzy… at least a little relieved. It’s …

Is the U.S. Ready for a Nuclear Emergency?

On Friday, Japan faced another round of assessing the damage from a massive aftershock — the strongest in over 400 in the last month — that struck off the north coast late last night. At least three people were killed in the quake and more than 140 injured, and as of Friday evening, millions in the disaster-struck region were again …

Beware the Fukushima Sushi

Few American consumers would mourn the loss of the anchovy. If it weren’t for pizza or Caesar salads, there might be no use for the little salty fish at all. But few people want to see the ocean’s anchovy stocks wiped out by radiation either. That’s just the scenario that seemed to be developing, however, when reports coming out of Japan …

Humbled Japan Vows Improvements on Nukes

People signal contrition in a lot of ways, and few countries are better at it than the Japanese — a culture rich in the art of social protocols and interpersonal gesturing. It was not for nothing, then, that when Prime Minister Naoto Kan spoke before parliament this week about the country’s ongoing crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi …

Radiation Reaches the U.S.! And…?

America is a great country, but we do tend to make other people’s dramas our own. You know that uncle who comes over to Thanksgiving dinner, hears about another relative who recently had a heart attack and spends the rest of the meal asking everyone at the table if they think the chest pain he had last week is serious too? Well, to rest …

Can Japan Bury Its Nuclear Disaster?

From the beginning, the Japanese response to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster has been a constant improvisation. After the double blow of a quake and a tsunami knocked out power to the plant, officials have desperately tried to keep nuclear material at active reactors and spent fuel pools cool, to prevent overheating and more …

  1. 1
  2. ...
  3. 10
  4. 11
  5. 12
  6. 13
  7. 14
  8. 15