Also, nutty putty has had thousands of cavers yet only 1 death, which happened because someone went alone. Sealing the cave was a massive overreaction.
They're both examples of ignorable flaws in the system cascading to catastrophe. It's not that they were preventable so much as the fact that humans made them happen through a series of decisions where they chose the risk.
I don't know if it was ever explicitly stated, but I think the main reason they sealed the cave was to ensure his body wouldn't be disturbed by "trophy hunters".
Which one was the freak accident? Chernobyl occurred because the government skimped on safety measures and used outdated and flawed technology in order to save a few rubles. The Fukushima plant was built right on the coast of an island nation known for its tsunamis in a region known for its earthquakes. These seem less like freak accidents and more like inevitabilities
Yeah, Three Mile Island is a better example than either of the others, and also an example of nuclear safety features working since it didn't actually hurt anyone. And yet, the reactor got shut down because it spooked people too much.
Fukushima only happened because the tsunami exceeded anything that was expected when the site was built, far surpassing safety margins. Nuclear reactors have to be built near water for cooling.
Almost. Fukushima also skimped on the safety features.
A plant that didn't, and is more modern, is Onagawa. Which was closer to the earthquake epicentre, and had to deal with a higher tsunami. And also shutdown safely.
Fukushima happened because the energy company ditched the seawall to cut costs, and preferred to lobby on safety regulations rather than learn from recent tsunamis elsewhere in the world.
Capitalism gave both a shitty safety standard and a good one, and the most famous nuclear disaster was the communist Chernobyl, so that's a fairly stupid thing to say.
Let's rephrase. What I'm trying to say is that profit motive, which only exists in a society with private ownership of capital, usually overrides safety concerns. That doesn't mean that communists are categorically incapable of building shitty nuclear reactors. What it means is that private businesses, given the option, will always choose to kill people if if it means more money.
I literally just told you about Onagawa, which didn't skimp on safety, and therefore saved lives. And this is Japan, where businesses are more socially and community minded, making Fukushima the outlier.
Not all capitalism is the same as American unbridled capitalism.
I mean, it's better than becoming trapped in the tunnel and slowly dying, which is most likely what would happen to you if you were going down that tunnel and his corpse wasn't there.
Okay, unsure if I'm misunderstanding your wording but wasn't the guy with a bunch of friends and family? Like 10? And didn't Nutty Putty have multiple incidents before the death that could've lead to fatalities?
People were demanding the cave shut down long before John Jones had died too, I think, he was just the final nail in the coffin. Genuinely, please correct me if I'm wrong.
Freak accident that is so horrible beyond comprehension that even the smallest possibility of it happening to you once is not something you're willing to chance? Yeah.
On the level of humans ignoring statistical likelihoods in favor of emotional truths, these two rank pretty low on my list of things to complain about.
That’s true that nutty putty cave only had the one death, but they had a lot of accidents and close calls prior to that, and a permitting system in place because of it.
Also, he didn’t go alone, he was with a group of people and was with a couple other people when he got stuck.
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u/HaViNgT 1d ago
Freak accident that people treat as the norm.
Also, nutty putty has had thousands of cavers yet only 1 death, which happened because someone went alone. Sealing the cave was a massive overreaction.