Synopsis: On March 11, 2011, fifty minutes after a magnitude 9.0 earthquake hit eastern Japan, a tsunami 45-feet high engulfed the nuclear power plant known as Fukushima Daiichi, knocking out electrical power and all the reactors' safety systems. Three reactor cores experienced meltdowns in the first three days, leading to an unimaginable nuclear disaster.
The person the Tokyo Electric Power Company called for help was Dr. Charles 'Chuck' Casto. In "Station Blackout: Inside the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster and Recovery", Dr. Casto, (who is arguably the foremost authority on responding to nuclear disasters), shares his first-hand account of how he led the collaborative team of Japanese and American experts that faced the challenges of Fukushima.
Critique: A lifetime of working in the nuclear industry prepared Dr. Casto to manage an extreme crisis, lessons that apply to any crisis situation, making "Station Blackout" not only a riveting read about one particular disaster by a kind of 'how to' manual for nuclear industry related crises or other natural disasters requiring a multinational collaborative response. While unreservedly recommended for governmental, community, and academic library collections, it should be noted for personal reading lists of emergency responders and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the subject that "Station Blackout" is also available in a digital book format (Kindle, $8.99).
MARIETTA, Ga., Dec. 4, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- On March 11, 2011, the Great East Japan Earthquake (a magnitude 9.0 earthquake just off the coast of Japan) spawned a 45-foot-high tsunami propelling the Pacific Ocean to inundate the region of Fukushima, where three reactors of a nuclear power plant sat virtually unprotected. The tsunami flooded the reactors, knocking out the plant's power, causing a chain reaction that led to the meltdown of three nuclear reactor cores. The result was an unimaginable nuclear disaster. A new book by Dr. Chuck Casto, Station Blackout: Inside the Fukushima Nuclear Disaster and Recovery detailing the world's response releases today.
Dr. Charles (Chuck) Casto has 45 years of experience in the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission, the commercial nuclear industry, and the US Air Force. He was honored as a Distinguished Executive in 2012 by President Obama, and in 2008 by President George W. Bush with the Meritorious Rank Award.
Station Blackout is the only account by an on-the-ground expert involved with the official response to the unprecedented catastrophe in Japan. Casto shares what happened in real time as the person in charge of the US team at the request of the Japanese government to provide technical expertise and help develop a response to the disaster.
"I saw the heroism of the individuals inside that plant firsthand. Their courage, knowledge, and readiness to remain in place under harrowing conditions saved much more than just the plant itself," Casto said. "If certain players had not acted as they did at just the right moments, the devastation would have been many times worse."
In Station Blackout, Casto dissects complex problems and translates technical jargon into language the average person can understand. The book is a play-by-play account of the Fukushima disaster, but it also serves emergency managers with crisis leadership advice which applies to disasters of all sorts.
Station Blackout is available at Amazon, as well as from booksellers across the country in hardcover, Kindle and EPub. The audiobook is scheduled for release later in 2019.
Media: Review copies in both print and ebook formats are available upon request. To schedule Dr. Casto for a phone interview or live appearance, contact 206057@email4pr.com.
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