5 ms·

The Banqiao Dam failure [0] came to my mind the moment I read the title. The amount of deaths that single failure caused may have something to do with that. [0

by mszcz 4y ago

The Banqiao Dam failure [0] came to my mind the moment I read the title. The amount of deaths that single failure caused may have something to do with that. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Banqiao_Dam_failure https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1975_Banqiao_Dam_failure

wolfram74 4y ago
yeah, dam failures are pretty spectacular. Maybe we're collectively cooler with them because 1) they've been part of our accepted collateral damages list longer (hundreds of years) and 2) because we know better where the fall out will be we put more marginalized people there? I would be really interested in looking at property values or something like that for regions in suspected dam burst zones and neighborhoods that are just outside them. on topic onion sketch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjfrJzdx7DA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjfrJzdx7DA
arcticbull 4y ago
Truthfully nobody's really heard of the Bangqiao Dam failure. I doubt this contributes to the discourse.
- kortex 4y ago
  Anyone who's spent any amount of time looking into industrial and engineering disasters knows about Bangqiao. It's up there among the greatest single event losses of human life from human-created (non-war, non-disease) catastrophies, along with Bhopal, Chernobyl, Wanggongchang explosion, Halifax explosion, and a few other big ones.
  - arcticbull 4y ago
    I knew about it, but I don't think if you asked an average individual on the street, they'd have any clue - unlike asking any American or Canadian about Chernobyl, or any Canadian about Bhopal or Halifax. I think Chernobyl has a much bigger influence on nuclear policy than Bangqiao on hydro despite the latter causing two orders of magnitude more deaths.
    - nicoburns 4y ago
      > I think Chernobyl has a much bigger influence on nuclear policy than Bangqiao on hydro despite the latter causing two orders of magnitude more deaths. IMO thats entirely rational. Dying is not what I'm scared of when it comes to a Chernobyl-like accident. Dying slowly and painfully of radiation poisoning is. It's hard to imagine a worse fate. Drowning in a huge flood, while unfortunate, is something I'd be much more willing to risk. It'd at least likely be quick.
      - arcticbull 4y ago
        > IMO thats entirely rational. Dying is not what I'm scared of when it comes to a Chernobyl-like accident. Dying slowly and painfully of radiation poisoning is. It's hard to imagine a worse fate. The good news is that really didn't happen. About 40 or 50 people died of acute radiation poisoning (that's a bad way to go). Many were displaced. The most common form of cancer that occurred as a result of Chernobyl was thyroid cancer which is 'almost 100%' [2] curable generally speaking. You take the thyroid out, and folks are put on thyroxine. Broadly preventable with iodine pills and also principally attributable to acute exposure immediately following. Worth skimming the summary of the UNSCEAR report. [1] > Apart from this increase [6000 cases of thyroid cancer], there is no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation exposure two decades after the accident. There is no scientific evidence of increases in overall cancer incidence or mortality rates or in rates of non-malignant disorders that could be related to radiation exposure. The incidence of leukaemia in the general population, one of the main concerns owing to the shorter time expected between exposure and its occurrence compared with solid cancers, does not appear to be elevated. [1] 1 person died in Fukushima, 0 in Three Mile Island, the next two worst incidents of all time. On the other hand, 200,000+ people died and a village was wiped off the face of the earth in Bangqiao. [1] https://www.unscear.org/unscear/en/areas-of-work/chernobyl.html https://www.unscear.org/unscear/en/areas-of-work/chernobyl.h... [2] https://www.cancer.org/cancer/thyroid-cancer/detection-diagnosis-staging/survival-rates.html https://www.cancer.org/cancer/thyroid-cancer/detection-diagn...
        nicoburns 4y ago
ClumsyPilot 4y ago
Coal pollution kills more people every year and noone cares. Estimated mortality is between half a million to two million per year. Thats more people dead in one year, that all people ever killed by all alternative fuel sources combined over entirety of human history- hydro, nuclear, geothermal, solar and wind. If something happena daily, its uninteresting. If one person dies in a freak accident, its all over the news.

by mszcz 4y ago

wolfram74 4y ago

yeah, dam failures are pretty spectacular. Maybe we're collectively cooler with them because 1) they've been part of our accepted collateral damages list longer (hundreds of years) and 2) because we know better where the fall out will be we put more marginalized people there? I would be really interested in looking at property values or something like that for regions in suspected dam burst zones and neighborhoods that are just outside them. on topic onion sketch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjfrJzdx7DA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjfrJzdx7DA

arcticbull 4y ago

Truthfully nobody's really heard of the Bangqiao Dam failure. I doubt this contributes to the discourse.

kortex 4y ago
Anyone who's spent any amount of time looking into industrial and engineering disasters knows about Bangqiao. It's up there among the greatest single event losses of human life from human-created (non-war, non-disease) catastrophies, along with Bhopal, Chernobyl, Wanggongchang explosion, Halifax explosion, and a few other big ones.
- arcticbull 4y ago
  I knew about it, but I don't think if you asked an average individual on the street, they'd have any clue - unlike asking any American or Canadian about Chernobyl, or any Canadian about Bhopal or Halifax. I think Chernobyl has a much bigger influence on nuclear policy than Bangqiao on hydro despite the latter causing two orders of magnitude more deaths.
  - nicoburns 4y ago
    > I think Chernobyl has a much bigger influence on nuclear policy than Bangqiao on hydro despite the latter causing two orders of magnitude more deaths. IMO thats entirely rational. Dying is not what I'm scared of when it comes to a Chernobyl-like accident. Dying slowly and painfully of radiation poisoning is. It's hard to imagine a worse fate. Drowning in a huge flood, while unfortunate, is something I'd be much more willing to risk. It'd at least likely be quick.
    - arcticbull 4y ago
      > IMO thats entirely rational. Dying is not what I'm scared of when it comes to a Chernobyl-like accident. Dying slowly and painfully of radiation poisoning is. It's hard to imagine a worse fate. The good news is that really didn't happen. About 40 or 50 people died of acute radiation poisoning (that's a bad way to go). Many were displaced. The most common form of cancer that occurred as a result of Chernobyl was thyroid cancer which is 'almost 100%' [2] curable generally speaking. You take the thyroid out, and folks are put on thyroxine. Broadly preventable with iodine pills and also principally attributable to acute exposure immediately following. Worth skimming the summary of the UNSCEAR report. [1] > Apart from this increase [6000 cases of thyroid cancer], there is no evidence of a major public health impact attributable to radiation exposure two decades after the accident. There is no scientific evidence of increases in overall cancer incidence or mortality rates or in rates of non-malignant disorders that could be related to radiation exposure. The incidence of leukaemia in the general population, one of the main concerns owing to the shorter time expected between exposure and its occurrence compared with solid cancers, does not appear to be elevated. [1] 1 person died in Fukushima, 0 in Three Mile Island, the next two worst incidents of all time. On the other hand, 200,000+ people died and a village was wiped off the face of the earth in Bangqiao. [1] https://www.unscear.org/unscear/en/areas-of-work/chernobyl.html https://www.unscear.org/unscear/en/areas-of-work/chernobyl.h... [2] https://www.cancer.org/cancer/thyroid-cancer/detection-diagnosis-staging/survival-rates.html https://www.cancer.org/cancer/thyroid-cancer/detection-diagn...
      - nicoburns 4y ago

ClumsyPilot 4y ago

Coal pollution kills more people every year and noone cares. Estimated mortality is between half a million to two million per year. Thats more people dead in one year, that all people ever killed by all alternative fuel sources combined over entirety of human history- hydro, nuclear, geothermal, solar and wind. If something happena daily, its uninteresting. If one person dies in a freak accident, its all over the news.