Question:
Answer:
I'm glad you asked this, a lot of people are confused.
1. The Earthquake hit the north east of Japan and the Fukushima nuclear power plants automatically shut down.
2. The earthquake caused a malfunction in the cooling system, which, although the plant was shut down meant that the reactors (where all the reactions occur and energy is released) was still releasing heat. Like when you turn off the heat on a frying pan after you've cooked something, you've turned the heat off, but its still hot.
3. People living nearby are evacuated, just to be sure. With no power and emergency power failed, the reactors kept getting hotter. So, trying to prevent a 'melt down' they decided to vent a small amount of the air to cool it. This caused the first explosion when the chemicals inside the reactor (at high temperatures) reacted with the air outside to form hydrogen. -Bang.
4. More people are evacuated to give the plant some leeway to solve the problem (without endangering others). They try cool the reactors with the nearby sea water.
5. Sea water does not work as efficiently as expected. Meanwhile several similar problems are found in the other power plants nearby.
6. Officials begin to notice the temperature of the reactors is dropping and more sea water is poured in.
7. Now at a relatively sound temperature, they wait until the reactors have completely cooler, patching up some of the minor problems.
Thats as far as I know has happened, I hope it helps.
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