There has clearly been miscommunication from the rest of the world to the ears of some MotoGP riders in the last few months. The statement: ‘There has been a explosion at a nuclear power station in Japan’ has been received as ‘there has been a nuclear explosion in Japan’. Or, in two cases, ‘Japan has turned into a radioactive version of Plum Island and it will kill you if you even look at it on a map.’

Now, I’m not going to pretend to understand all the scientific stuff surrounding the Fukushima incident. There are better men than I in this humble profession who can advise you far more betterer [sic] (try @motogpjules with his chemistry degree or motomatters.com with his attention to detail). Until the other day, I thought a microsievert was a small cooking implement.

I don’t really know how serious Fukushima was/is. It wasn’t as bad as Chernobyl but it was worse than Three Mile Island. In fact, here’s a comparison provided by David Emmett at Motomatters.com for he is a far larger Tefal than I ever hope not to be:

"Chernobyl basically exploded and released a lot of radiation into the air, Three Mile Island saw coolant water escape (highly radioactive, though), and Fukushima saw cores meltdown and coolant water escape.

It is still unclear whether one of the reactors has actually breached containment, there are signs of damage to the containment but it’s still largely there.

Chernobyl basically blew its top and exposed the core, hence the sarcophagus they had to build. Big problem at Fukushima now is cooling; the cooling systems no longer work and they are having to use a lot of water to pump through the reactor to cool it.

This is then radioactive and has to be stored somewhere, plus there are signs that there are cracks in the cooling system which is leaking radioactive water away.

Fatalities for the three accidents are different. The additional deaths from Chernobyl fall-out are probably in the low thousands (for a population affected in the tens of millions), additional fatal cancer rates run at about three to four per cent over what would be expected. Three Mile Island had no discernible effect on surrounding populations.

The problem at Fukushima is that the reactors are only barely under control. Another sizeable quake could destabilize the situation, and make things worse. How big that quake would need to be, and how much worse the situation would get, is a matter for speculation."

So there*.

As far as the hard-of-thinking in this office can tell the above looks like The China Syndrome but worse. However, the preliminary report released by the FIM yesterday basically says there is less radiation at Motegi than there is on a normal day in Rome or Madrid. Neither of which have a bust nuclear reactor in them. Or in the same country. Or continent.

Eurosport’s Julian Ryder has been badgering riders in press conferences to give factual reasons why they won’t go to Motegi. And they can’t. They’re just a bit windy about it. I would be too if there wasn’t some hard evidence that a week in Motegi would expose you to approximately the same amount of radiation as a week sitting in a bath of baked beans in Kendal.

Japan was having a hard time before all this crap started. Their economy was in a poor way. They didn’t need an earthquake, subsequent tsunami and then the continued threat of a reactor going spaz. What they did need is some support from the people to whom they have paid millions of Yen to ride motorbikes round in circles for a couple of years.

In fact. If I was Mr Nakamoto and whoever has replaced Mr Furusawa, I would be pressing the cancel button on whatever the Japanese version of a direct debit is to one bank account in Majorca and another one in Switzerland. For no reason other than being so fucking ungrateful.

*The only question about this that comes from this pen is why would you build a nuclear reactor on the coast of a country that regularly suffers seismic events in the first place. That’s like giving Amy Winehouse a job in Threshers…