Turns out all the optimistic scenarios beloved by Hacker News were sadly wrong. The containment for reactor 2 is almost surely damaged now. If I understand correctly, the suppression pool is vital to maintain integrity primary containment as it vents extra pressure steam and is also the source for water that is pumped in to the primary containment to keep it cool. After the explosion pressure in the suppression pool dropped to 1/3, implying its seriously damaged. It may be only a matter of time till the primary containment itself is damaged.<p>Its not apocalypse yet, nor will it be apocalypse even if the containment fails. Chernobyl after all resulted only in a few hundred deaths. But there are a few more complicating factors here. Primarily, if reactor 2 does indeed go in to full meltdown and radioactivity escapes freely, how will the other reactors be maintained? They are still critical. Sadly I think several of the workers there will likely be giving their lifes for this.<p>Secondly, Japan is much more dense country than Ukraine/Belarus were. And finally, the country's infrastructure is not yet restored to normalcy. Surely power/water/communications all will further breakdown.<p>Still, Japan itself has recovered from even greater calamities - as the Prime Minister reminded us. I believe in this case, within a few months recovery will be with us.