Japan Readies Robot For Work At Crippled Nuclear Reactor 78
angry tapir writes "A Japanese robotics lab has developed a new emergency response prototype that will soon be put to work at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in northern Japan. The robot, called 'Rosemary,' is about the size of a lawn mower and has four extended treaded feet that swivel up and down to help it climb over obstacles."
Re:Cringely: Next Japan Nuke Accident Will Be Wors (Score:3, Interesting)
jesus. on one side we have tepco and the iaea (both of whom have enormous vested interests in maintaining the reputation of nuclear power as being 100% A++++++++ safe would buy again!!), and on the other we have people claiming that the cores are currently melting through the earth into borneo and spawning lizard people.
as of right now, all that matters if that if a major quake hits, the fuel pools could very well collapse, and the sky shine caused by fractured and burning fuel rods will make further work at the site extremely difficult (i.e. deadly). sure, you can pretend that is never going to happen and is impossible, but unfortunately it's not. spent fuel will heat itself to combustion if not continuously cooled (otherwise why would you keep it in a continuously cooled pool.. duh) and the area is extremely prone to earthquakes.
hopefully tepco can build some haphazard crane apparatus and remove the spent fuel before something bad happens, but if not.. well.. sucks to be japanese!