8.8 earthquake hits Japan

Good question, and I don't know the answer. I ran some projects at Lawrence Livermore for the then Laser Isotope Separation program, about 12 years ago and took a tour around the then long since closed magmetic fusion facility. My last visit to the lab was about five years ago.

I know there has been great emphasis on numerical simulation as a way to substitute for other methods for the warhead reliability program, and it is easy to imagine that what you have in mind might well be a related project. If so it would involve Livermore, Sandia and Los Alamos, so what you suggest is very plausible.

****, haven't they had enough problems?

Cycloptichorn

Has that silly bible bashin chick been praying again?

How much crap can these people take? Yikes!

Considering that they still have massive problems with the nuclear plant, a fair amount I hope..

Even if they avoid a full scale nuclear disaster they still have lots of work to do, and this event just threw them into a recession. It will take years to get the power grid back where they need it to be, a lot longer if they swear off nuclear energy. PLUS, the Japanese have a weak government and have a decades long structural economic problem that they have not been able to solve. They are fading fast, and better get used to being the step stool of the Chinese, because they are in charge of the region as of now.

People in Japan are quite used to furniture moving around every so often and ignore it. Miyagi and Iwate prefectures didn't suffer much damage in that latest aftershock; Fukushima suffered none. Plumbing leaks at Daiichi are slowly getting fixed, so focus is now moving to other nuclear plants worldwide:

This is a very good interactive map with other related data from:
http://blogs.nature.com/news/thegreatbeyond/2011/03/the_worlds_nuclear_reactors_as_1.html

Humungous islands of debris will hit Canada and the US west coast in approx. 3 years.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/story/2011/04/08/bc-japan-tsunami-debris-drift.html

how will we know which debris is our own and which is from Japan?

The American Navy has seen it and says it's filled with houses and car parts, and by the time is hits our shores it will also have severed feet and small traces of radiation, our garbage on the other hand is mostly a kazillion tons of plastic.

The existing monstrous plastic garbage gyres in the Pacific originated in China. No ocean circulation model I can locate claims Japanese tsunami dead bodies or housing planks and such are likely to combine with the gyres, let alone move their contents to the West Coast; oceanic currents don't transport different items in the same manner. We're more likely to see glow-in-the-dark sushi than radioactive timbers on our shores - though some planks, boats, similar (non radioactive) items may eventually make their way across the Pacific. Simulation model of oceanic currents from University of Toulouse (France):
http://sirocco.omp.obs-mip.fr/outils/Symphonie/Produits/Japan/SymphoniePreviJapan.htm#Tra1S_field

No question that masses of flotsam are drifting off Japan's coast; this lucky dog was probably the last survivor to be located on it (video courtesy of MsOlga)
http://media.theage.com.au/national/environment-news/tsunamisurviving-dog-reunited-with-owner-2286021.html?from=newsbox

I would think car parts would sink to the ocean floor while some wood products may drift across the sea. However, even those drifting wood doesn't necessarily end up on the west coast of the US, and may even hit Canada, Central and South America. I don't have any model of how the sea drifts, but it may even depend on the time of year in how their drift changes - somewhat like the atmosphere.

That's true. These are the paths taken by rubber ducks and other plastic toys that fell off a container ship caught in a North Pacific storm many years ago:

Did you press on the link? or watch the videos? They have the models of what the ocean currents will do to the garbage islands. These islands of debris are fairly compact and while some of the garbage will indeed sink or rot, a vast majority will make it to the N. American shores. In fact, it is predicted that these islands will join and be as large as Ontario. They could also alter shipping routes as the garbage would be an obstacle and dangerous to ships propellers.
It could take decades before these floating island of debris completely disappear, if at all, as the models predict they will be swept up by the currents and head back towards Asia again. Most likely adding to the floating islands of plastic debris already situated in the mid-pacific.
Years ago, a shipping containers full of Nikes fell off a ship during a storm, these shoes landed from Vancouver Island, all the way to the Queen Charlotte's and Alaska, they even floated as far as the arctic shores and Ireland.

Follow the link Ceili provided - then click on the link that goes to the pdf from IPRC in Hawaii.

ehBeth, Thanks for the head's up on Ceili's link. Although people in Hawaii are saying it'll reach the west coast in 2014, I'm not so sure about that. I'm not sure what percentage of the debris will hit the west coast, and I believe their modeling may not be accurate, because as we've seen from another link, we've seen swings in how water current changes direction. I'm not so sure the people in Hawaii can predict sea flow changes with any accuracy - especially one that looks three years ahead.

Call me a skeptic. We'll have to wait and see.

Prof. Maximenko (U of Hawaii) who designed the simulation model used in that forecast actually agrees with you: he expects only a small part of the floating debris to wash up on the West Coast. The bulk of it is expected to circle around the Pacific carried by oceanic currents. Links to his article and simulation:
http://www.soest.hawaii.edu/iprc/news/press_releases/2011/maximenko_tsunami_debris.pdf
http://iprc.soest.hawaii.edu/users/nikolai/2011/Pacific_Islands/Simulation_of_Debris_from_March_11_2011_Japan_tsunami.gif

HS, Always good to have confirmation on the things I believe to be based on what I believe are the correct understanding of our environment. Thx, c.i.

c.i. - HS linked you to the same professor you discounted in your earlier post. Are you reading things before you comment on them?

First you disagreed, and then said the same professor confirmed your beliefs.