When Warnings Fail: Chicken Little, the Boy Who Cried Wolf, and the Japan Meteorological Agency

The drama all started with an e-mail I received four days ago on a news thread I subscribe to for updates on post-disaster radiation in Fukushima.  I read it so I'm in the loop.  I'm not worried about radiation in Japan but feel better being informed.  I want to be clear on this.  Japan is not some radioactive, glow-in-the-dark hot bed of nuclear waste.  Certain parts of Fukushima are.  Don't assume all of Japan is.

The e-mail asked about the accuracy of a recent post on some corporations-are-evil website stating Reactor 3 in Fukushima was spewing steam and about to blow.  This explosion would send clouds of radioactive waste into the atmosphere which would reach the west coast of the United States in two or three days (this was four days ago) and thus everyone should be prepared.  The author had suggestions on how to prepare for this impending nuclear fall-out but I'll get back to that later.

I deleted this e-mail because I've seen and heard this all before.  Everything coming from Japan is contaminated.  (It isn't.) Every bit of tsunami debris that washes up on the shores of the western coast of North America oozes the yellow-green slime of death.  (It doesn't.)  When I woke up this morning to a message from a friend asking "what do you know about reactor 3?" I decided perhaps this subject warranted another look.  I wanted to be clear in how I responded.  While clear is good, I most definitely wanted to be accurate.  I make my way back to my e-mail trash bin and sort through junk mail to find the posting from several days ago.  As I marvel at the amount of crap I receive on a daily basis (most of which gets deleted without ever being opened) I finally find the thread and start reading.  The article I mentioned earlier is the one referenced in the thread, and I smile at the reply given to the question of its accuracy.  "Pure bullcrap."

This is a well-informed and dedicated group of people who have, since the beginning of the nuclear disaster almost three years ago, followed and researched the truth.  I trust the author when she writes the article announcing a doomed west coast is bunk.  The sky is not falling, Chicken Little.  Chill.

These warnings, if you can call them that, are in my most humble opinion dramatized pseudo-journalism.  When too many people cry wolf no one takes real warnings seriously.  Postings like these are an egregious public disservice.  Knock it off.  Please.

Now I will switch gears and contradict myself.  My go-to source when there's an earthquake here in Japan is the web site for the Japan Meteorological Agency.  If I feel my apartment shaking, I know in a few minutes I can look up where the earthquake hit, how big it was, and whether there is a tsunami warning.  This service I appreciate because when it comes to earthquakes I know they will get it right.  I trust their numbers.

Tsunami warnings are another matter.  When the M9.0 earthquake hit off the coast of Tohoku in 2011, the tsunami warning issued for Rikuzentakata was for a wave between two to three meters.  The tsunami that actually hit was closer to sixteen meters.  One can presumably ride out a tsunami of two or three meters on the second floor of a building.  Sixteen?  No.  This error is too big to dismiss.  On predicting tsunami warnings, I don't trust their numbers.

Similarly, when a tornado hits outside of Tokyo and the JMA holds a press conference after the fact to tell us a tornado hit I have to ask myself, "Really, guys?"  We saw the tornadoes on television.  They already hit.  How is telling us this helpful?  Why hold a press conference?  Focus on warning us and not on reporting what we already know.  Some days the agency in Japan all-things-weather-related is most helpful.  At other times I cringe at what I can only call their stupidity.

Back to Chicken Little, or more precisely, the author who wrote the article about preparing for impending doom on the west coast of the United States.  Her suggestions on how to survive this act of natural terror were to, among other things buy a TYVEX suit to wear when going outside and, here I quote, "wash obsessively."  I almost spewed tea reading that line.

Allow me to make the following observation:  define obsessively.  Quantify this please.  Am I to wash often, or wash for longer?  Or, is it both?  How often is often enough?  How long is long enough?  How do I know the water is safe to use?  Do I wash just with water or do I use soap?  You didn't say, dear author, and I do believe these are key points requiring useful and specific advice.  Keep Chicken Littling us and we'll believe you less and less if at all.

Language can be beautiful.  The word "warning" contains the point it makes:  to warn.  Let's allow language to do what it's meant to.  Warn me when I need to act.  The rest of the time keep you Chicken Little diva shit to yourself.

Hell and the Evil Called "Spider"

Why a book read to me by my first grade teacher has stayed with me all these years is a true mystery.  Books by Ayn Rand, the  Brontë sisters, and Charles Dickens are all lodged somewhere in my subconscious, but seem to have left significantly less of an impression than this one book.  How is that?  What triggers such a strong reaction to a book read to a group of six year olds?

The Japanese folk tale "Kumo no Ito" or in English, "The Spider's Strand" as in the single strand of silk it ejects when getting from place to place, is a story about a spider (God) lowering one lone strand down to earth to bring up the good people into heaven.  The good people of earth do indeed climb up, sharing the space single-file.  Pleased, God the Spider decides to do this again, at which point a bad man climbs up the strand of spider silk kicking down those who try to make their way to heaven behind him.  Displeased, God the Spider sends this bad man down into hell where the Japanese version of the devil, red, big, mean, surrounded by fire awaits this man.

That was all it took.  Spiders and Hell were forever connected in my mind.  Six year olds can be convinced of pretty much anything, and in my case this meant I began to believe spiders (God) some how have the power to send people to hell. 

Fast-forward to the no longer six year old me, I don't actually believe spiders are that powerful, or that there's some yet to be proven connection between spiders and god.  My point is broader than that.  I walked into a single strand of spider silk last night, connecting the staircase bannister to the wall.  I always find myself fascinated by the fact spiders actually get from point a to point b.  Do they fly?  Do they just float through air waiting to land on something?  Spiders lowering themselves downward, that I can understand.  It's this sideways movement, the strand that can measure many meters at times, how they do this is what confuses and fascinates me.

My fear of spiders and the horrible Japanese version of the devil all came back to me in that one instant as I frantically batted this strand off me.  Knowing I would feel this strand on me the rest of the night in the same way I feel non-existent spiders on my skin all day when I find one crawling on me in the morning, the miracle of horizontal spider-flight, amazing as it is, would be overshadowed by the fact I would toss and turn trying to rid myself of the strand I just walked through.  I really don't like spiders.  I am not proud to say I scream and flail when I feel one me.

This latest spider-thread incident has brought back how much of what I grew up with, all that is buried in my psyche untapped and ignored, is still very much a part of me regardless of whether I give it any time or energy.  Indeed, all it takes is walking into spider silk, and I'm taken back decades to the classroom where I trembled at the power of what is surely the evil called "Spider."