Well I guess it's time to go back to rubbing sticks together because we're running out of options.

 

More to the point, GE & TEPCO's stupidity in the lack of common sense for this design and location. Pretty close to the same level of Chernobyl's not having a containment dome.

 

Wondered about that too, a bit. It does seem that the reactor proper is pretty well sealed up and contained, but that perhaps the surrounding building itself should have been sturdier. When I first saw pics of the blown up buildings, I figure they were just sheet-steel-on-frame, but some more detailed pics seem to show a sturdier, if not sturdy enough, reinforced concrete wall design. Obviously those H2 gas explosions were quite strong.

I think the real problem was less the reactors themselves but rather, the vulnerability of the ancillary but still critical backup systems to the ensuing tsunami. It appears the plant weathered the initial quake quite well and shut down as it should have. It was only after the tsunami swept in and incapacitated the backup cooling and other systems that things really started unraveling but fast.

I think, to return to my original thought, is that "worst cases scenarios" all to often aren't, the actual worst case realities having an annoying quality of being much worse than the scenarios and involving scenarios never quite clearly conceived. This clearly happened here where they were very well prepared for a huge 8.0-scale quake, as well indicated by historical records and geological understanding at the time. They were obviously not well prepared for the immense 9.0-scale quake that actually happened, one that was a full order of magnitude -- 10x -- stronger than their worst case scenario planning and design.

Were this some more conventional power plant, it would have been a mess, but fairly limited in scope. However, being a nuclear plant, the potential impact can be horrendous, widespread, and very long lasting. They seem, slowly, to be getting things a bit more under control, but easily could have gone, and easily still could go, the other way.

All power generating methods have their negative points, some more severe and deleterious than others, including the two main ones of fossil fuel or nuclear. And for better or worse, in at least the short term interim, we're stuck with both though the true scale of the negative consequences of each will likely only be realized by our children. As for nuclear power plants, likely the newer designs are safer than the ones giving such headaches in Japan. But too, a bit of humility, both of our own capabilities and knack for technical fallibility and for the power and capriciousness of mother nature, would warrant proceeding with all due caution and diligence.