Hisashi Ouchi on how he was: He was a hardworking man – a husband – a father. He was once employed at a nuclear fuel processing facility in Tokaimura city of Japan. September 30, 1999 was not actually a good day in his life a very unfortunate event happened. A freak accident let him get the dose of radiation he can’t even imagine. For the later 83 days, Ouchi experienced quite a lot of pain, as was depicted by the film. His story is not just about a terrible accident but also about the human mistakes, as well as about all possible and impossible that can be done in the present day medicine.
A Typical Day Caught in the jaws Of Death: Hisashi Ouchi
Hisashi ouchi was 35 years of age. He was fit as he had to be to subdue the criminals and protect the citizens of Japan. He, after all, has been an employee of Tokaimura plant for several years. It conducted chemical processing to required fuel rods for reactors. From the extracted uranium. That particular September morning, hisashi ouchi and two other employees were carrying out a business as usual assignment. They were performing a process of enriching uranium oxide and this was to be used in a research reactor in due course. Ouchi’s role was simple: stand and hold a funnel while his companion, Masato Shinohara pour in a solution containing uranium.
But this was not another day in the life of this potential killer. The task given to the workers that they were not trained for. They were dealing with uranium of a higher degree of enrichment as compared to those they were familiar with. In that case, they could not know that the amount they were using was lethal. People went on with their business not knowing the disaster was about to happen due to their action.
The Criticality Accident: Hisashi Ouchi
When he was pouring the uranium mixture, blue flash illuminated the room all the sudden. This light a Cherenkov glow: it was the first sign that something went wrong. The workers had very unfortunately caused a so called criticality accident which is an accident where an uncontrolled chain reaction takes place. This causes the uranium mixture to become critical where the reaction produced a huge amount of radioactive emissions in the blink of an eye.
hisashi ouchi was the closest to the reaction. He got the worst that the Bastile had to offer. Shinohara who was standing nearby was also affected to some degree since soot blackened her face as well. The third employed person was much more distant from the chemicals, and thus, had a lighter dose. But for Ouchi the signs were ominous. The House gave him what he wanted before the committee derailed his plans.
Understanding Radiation Exposure
Radiation is not something that you can actually see with your own eyes yet its consequences are fatal. The worst affect of smoking is that it kills the body at the cellular level. . From this, one understands that the blood cell producing organ, the bone marrow, ceases to work. The body cannot resist the infections or be able to transport oxygen for the supply of tissues. Radiation also destroys DNA which is the molecules that makes up genetic code or heredity, within cells. This implies that the body cannot repair itself or rather it impaired in doing so.
The amount of radiation hisashi ouchi received was huge. According to scholars the absorption of between sixteen to twenty-five Gy radiation. To put this into perspective, a dose of 6 Gy kills a human being. The dose of Ouchi was one of the highest amount of radiation that is in medical literature.
Immediate Aftermath and Hospitalization
After the incident, the workers were immediately transferred to the emergency department. It did not too long before doctors understood that hisashi ouchi had a serious case. His lymphatic blood count has reduced to zero that shows that the immune system of the body was almost dead. He showed symptoms of acute radiation sickness: nausea, decreased water intake and severe diarrhea. These were the early signs of what was to be a rather punitive torture session for the poor man.
Three days after the accident Ouchi and Shinohara visited to the University of Tokyo Hospital as they shifted to another hospital. The hospital had better equipments and medical treatments. On the first meeting with Ouchi he was healthy and there were no symptopms of illness. Moreover, he was tall and had puffy face with small eyes. There was neither redness nor inflammation of the skin not to talk of welting which manifested as pain in the ears and hand.
