Dubbed the ‘suicide corps’ by Goshi Hosono. The group is made up of only retirees over the age of 60. At one time, Goshi Hosono considered using them even if that was a conflict of the Labor Standards Law of Japan. Goshi Hosono showing that he is fully versed in the laws of Japan, NOT. We saw how he handled the Animal Welfare Act, he just ignored the parts that didn’t work for him.
Old Veterans Who Ache for Battle
2011.08.10 Wednesday
By Makiko Segawa
SNA (Tokyo) – A group of retired engineers and professionals calling themselves the “Skilled Veteran Corps for Fukushima Daiichi” handed a letter of proposal to TEPCO and Minister Goshi Hosono on August 3 asking for state sponsorship of their project. What they have in mind is to work in the most dangerous areas of the Fukushima Daiichi plant in the place of younger workers who are more vulnerable to the long-term effects of radiation.
Some observers are describing these men as “Kamikaze”―though this term is meant as praise by some and criticism by others.
The number of old men who want to participate in this project has been steadily growing. On their website it announced on Tuesday that the number of volunteers has reached 505.
The idea for the creation of the Corps comes from Yasuteru Yamada, a retired 72-year-old plant-making engineer of Sumitomo Metal Industries. About four months ago he began thinking that skilled workers over the age of 60 should be sent into radiation-affected areas rather than young men.
“I am simply proposing something very rational and logical,” he told the SNA in an interview this week.
“Just think about it,” he continued, “which is the larger burden on society? That one young man or two elderly men be exposed to radiation?” He then answered his own question: “After radiation exposure, a young man might have to suffer for, let’s say, about sixty years. However, elderly men have much less time anyway in which to develop radiation-related illnesses.”
For their part, TEPCO has indicated their interest in the Corps and Hiroe Makiyama, a DPJ lawmaker, has been recommending their project to Minister Goshi Hosono.
Yamada is resolute, telling the SNA that he “cannot imagine” that the plan will be rejected. “Through the power and voice of the people, I want to push forward and make it happen,” he declares.
However, not everyone has applauded the plan. A 50-year-old worker at the Fukushima Daiichi who is in charge of construction design at Reactor Number 3, told the SNA, “Thinking realistically, it is extremely hard for people who are above the age of 60 to endure the physically demanding work there, wearing heavy and steamy radiation suits.”
He also points out that this project may conflict with the Labor Standards Law of Japan, which prohibits those younger than 18 as well as elderly people to engage in construction work.
The media, on the whole, tends to glorify the self-sacrificing spirit of the project, but as in all large-scale endeavors, people’s motives are often mixed.
One of the old men involved with the project said with a laugh, “After retirement I didn’t have anything to do with my life, so I came to join the Corps. Also, I wanted to escape from the control of my wife!”
Makiko Segawa is a staff writer at the Shingetsu News Agency.
‘The Moral High Ground’: Japanese Seniors Volunteer For Fukushima ‘Suicide Corps’
1st June 2011 ·
Some 250 elderly Japanese men and women have volunteered to help remedy one of the worst nuclear meltdowns in history. Dubbed the ‘suicide corps’ by Goshi Hosono, Prime Minister Naoto Kan’s special adviser on the Fukushima crisis, the group is made up of only retirees over the age of 60.
(Photo: Kawamoto Takuo)
CNN reports that these seniors believe they are in a unique position to be able to contribute to solving the nuclear crisis at the radiation-contaminated Fukushima plant. And they have a valid point– older peoples’ cells don’t divide as rapidly as do those of younger folks, enabling them to do work that could be much more perilous to more youthful workers.
“We have to work instead of them,” 72-year-old Yasuteru Yamada told CNN. “Elders have less sensitivity to radiation. Therefore, we have to work.” Yamada, a cancer survivor, said he wanted to do something to make a difference in his remaining years of life.
Their courageous enthusiasm is remarkable. It’s not as if they are immune to the cancers that radiation can cause. But at their age, it is possible that they will die of other causes before radiation-induced cancer can affect them.
Kazuko Sasaki, a 69-year-old woman who co-founded the ‘suicide corps,’ says that death isn’t as frightening for older people as it is for the young. “When we were younger, we never thought of death,” she told CNN. “But death becomes familiar as we get older. We have a feeling that death is waiting for us. This doesn’t mean I want to die. But we become less afraid of death as we get older.”
Sasaki has a different reason for wanting to help. “My generation, the old generation, promoted the nuclear plants,” she told CNN. “If we don’t take responsibility, who will?”
Right now, it doesn’t seem as if the Japanese government is eager to accept the ‘suicide corps” help. There are currently about 1,000 workers already heroically laboring to contain the damage at the Fukushima plant. The plant’s owner, Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO), told CNN they were thankful for the seniors’ offer but that they had enough workers to manage the crisis.
But CNN reports that some younger workers at the plant will never return there. The cable news network interviewed Hikaru Tagawa, a father of two young children, who temporarily worked at the plant. He lived just a few miles away; now the area is a mandatory evacuation zone.
“Nothing can make me go back to work there,” he said, calling the radiation levels “too dangerous.”
Perhaps that is why Goshi Hosono sounded just a little more open to the idea of accepting the ‘suicide corps” help.
“I met the leader of the group and we’ve started a discussion, looking for any possible, practical next step,” he said at a news conference.
The Japanese government, which has handled the crisis less than admirably, ought to seriously consider their offer. It needs all the help it can get.
(Photo: Kawamoto Takuo)
