are they letting this out if it s not good? they have to. otherwise, boom. it s up to eight oatmosphere of pressure. they vent it slowly, some radiation comes out. put more water in, some radiation comes out. this might take three months to cool this down. this isn t just going to go away on tuesday. this is going to take a very long time for these rods that haven t melted to cool down for real. all right. that was a great explanation. it really helped make a lot of sense. it looks like a cartoon. very helpful. chad myers, thanks. this disaster in japan is beyond comprehension. husbands continue to search for wives, mothers search for their children. we hear from the japanese people themselves right after this break.
as we get past this immediate crisis where we continue to provide support to the japanese, we ll gather information about the specifics of the event, but i don t want to speculate too much about what exactly were the relevant factors in japan at this point. you said that there s a very low likelihood, i believe were your words, of radiation making it to hawaii or the west coast. is that based on the condition of those plants right now, or is that based on a partial meltdown or heaven forbid a total meltdown? the information on the lack of any harmful impacts to the u.s. is simply based on the nature of these reactors and the large distances obviously between those and any u.s. territory. so you just aren t going to have any radiological material that by the time it travelled those large distances could present any risk to the american public. you have been listening to a
at some point in time this all could get so hot, if just like on your car you take all the radiator fluid out of your car, go on the highway and drive and see how long it will take before your engine in your car melts down. not so good. same idea. so those are the rods that stan was just talking about. and if they get too hot, they will melt and there will be a reaction that you cannot overcome, even if you pump more water, you ll just make more steam. the steam they ve been venting. you saw what happened when they made the hydrogen. water, h2o, the h went boom, small explosions but they were there. they need to get i don t know what they re doing now. but they re taking water from the ocean and dumping in there. because this isn t even working anymore. not even worrying about this. just dumping water from the ocean and letting it vent out. the steam is where this radiation is coming from. for everyone wondering, why
pumping sea water in. then that water boils, it causes steam, they go to release the steam, and in releasing the steam, hydrogen builds up in the building and then later explodes. that doesn t compromise the containment vessel and we can talk about that, randy, it is another consequence of what s happening here. they have to keep it cool, they have to put the water in, when they put the water in, they have to let some out and when they let the water out, they get a buildup and an explosion. we keep hearing radiation, people are being exposed to radiation. can you put that in context, can you compare it to anything in our daily lives, like a medical cat scan or something like that. that s a great question. because everyone lumps the notion of radiation in one big pot. radiation is many things and not all radiation is harmful. there s gamma radiation, x ray
near the plant have been ordered to leave. they are seeking shelter anywhere they can. our sanjay gupta takes us inside a school. reporter: a lot of people have been told to evacuate as a result of these concerns about radiation. add that on top of obviously so many people s homes being destroyed as a result of the earthquake and subsequent tsunami, this is one of the largest sort of makeshift refugee camps, just sort of came together over the last few days. this is something that people here in japan know. schools are typically built at higher elevations than many other buildings and the building codes for schools are often stricter. they re more earthquake-resistant and also become an immediate place for refugees in the aftermath of something like this. so hundreds of people have been coming into this particular part of the school, this gymnasium. they say anywhere around 700 people in this particular area. now more people in other parts of the school, and this is quickly becoming