Japan beginning to rebuild

05-06-2011

After the natural devastation caused in Japan, a major clear up is needed certainly around the radioactive Nuclear Plants. This has led to the largest concrete pump in the world, the 190,000 pound concrete Putzmeister pump to make the long journey by cargo plane which needed to be refuelled every 5 hours due to the vast size of the load. Now the pump has arrived in Japan, it can play a huge part by helping to stream water around the reactors to keep them cool. The state of the severely damaged Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Plant is still in the balance and the pumps can be also used to pump concrete if and when they are needed.

The trouble at the Fukushima plant started when the earthquake damaged the heating system used to turn the water into steam. From a knock on effect, the suppression chamber which is used to help condense steam, was breached and began to leak radioactive steam out into the Pacific Ocean. The leak has been stopped, however due to the Sodium Silicate material used it may be susceptible to dislodge if there are any future tremors. The introduction of the Putzmeister pump to keep the reactor cool may ease some of the burden on the suppression chamber whose leak some Japanese Officials fear, may already have contaminated the surrounding waters.

Japanese Officials are aiming to use the pumps to focus streams of cool water around the damaged reactors and later use them as a means of rebuilding some of the damage caused by the earthquake, which measured 8.9 on the Richter Scale. The damage to the infrastructure of the economy will take time, patience and dedication, as the deadly tremors will have caused cracks which may take either many months or years to fully repair. Our thoughts are with those beginning to rebuild and we offer our best wishes that they recover even stronger from this terrible tragedy.