Something that I have recommended a number of times to Roger with some humor intended is that with his next reincarnation he should make certain not to try to return as a disaster mitigation worker. I will propose as someone who actually is a disaster mitigation professional that you might want to give that recommendation some consideration as well.

In the disaster mitigation field there cannot be any such word as “forgot,” regardless of how stressful a situation might be.

When dealing with entities such as nuclear power plants it is imperative that there be automatic and mandatory routines for dealing with emergencies like that. There cannot be any room for human error. When there is a major problem there need to be well established routines in place to deal with any and all possibilities. And if someone “forgot” to add fuel to a generator then it means that those routines were never developed in the first place. There have to be backups for the backups, and then more backups.

Something that I was not aware of is the fact that reportedly, there are about 54 nuclear power stations in Japan. And different numbers of plants are owned and operated by different groups. For some reason I had been assuming that the government or some single group ran them all.

When there are multiple groups like that in some field there is usually a competition for profits etc. That then can and often does mean that safety precautions will take a back seat. And that is where the regulatory agencies have to prepare highly detailed lists of regulations and very aggressively enforce them. Reports that I have seen indicate to me that this has often not been the case. In the past, hundreds of safety violations were reportedly ignored and even hidden etc. by one or more nuclear power companies in Japan. That is an open doorway for disaster. And this time, disaster walked right through that open doorway with no hesitation.

These are personal opinions.