TedNugget said:
Look over how small the shock wave is from Reactor Building 1. Not like a typical shock wave that projects in a hemisphere. For some reason this little shock wave was channeled by a building with older construction methods that allowed it an escape.
Look over the rebar hanging into SFP#3 and elsewhere. I'm still going with a much larger energy release in #3 versus Bldg #1 and that would be from explosions. A 'jet of flame' couldn't accomplish clean separation of the rebar from concrete.
REGARDING THE INTERNAL BALLISTICS OF EXPLOSIONS IN CONFINED SPACES
I cannot speak with authority about hydrogen gas + oxygen explosions, but I can speak with authority about reloading ammunition with various gunpowders and primers so, for what its worth, consider this:
Reloading is very tricky and the limits of a safe reload are determined by the absolute pressure that develops in the cartridge and subsequently in the barrel of the firearm behind the projectile. Exceed the safe pressure and your firearm becomes a bomb.
The internal pressure developed depends on the weight of the projectile, the length & diameter of the barrel, and the speed that the primer and powder burn, as well as how firmly the bullet is crimped in the neck of the cartridge. It may seem counterintuitive, but high power rifles develop the most extreme pressures, muzzle velocities and bullet energies with
slow burning powders. The tighter the bullet is crimped, and the more powerful the primer, the faster the pressure rises within the cartridge, and the more energy it develops. But the
heavier the bullet used in a given rifle load, the
lighter and slower burning a powder charge must be to safely propel the bullet without exceeding the safe pressure limits, because acceleration of the heavier bullet down the barrel takes longer, and more pressure builds behind the bullet.
As an analogy, again, for what it may be worth, the containment of the upper portion of Bldg 1 seems to have been structurally weaker than that of Bldg 3 or 4. When the ignition of the hydrogen gas occurred, the pressure in the top part of Bldg 1 rose very rapidly, and it blew out relatively quickly, without the internal build up of larger pressures, and perhaps without the efficient and complete ignition and combustion of all of the contained gas mixture.
The explosions in Bldg 3 and 4 were much more tightly contained, or "tightly crimped", so to speak. A much greater internal pressure (and heat) build up might have been possible, with a longer burn time (and here, we are talking only fractions of a second) and more complete combustion of the internal gasses before the external building exploded. If so, then much more energy might ultimately have been released when the external containment did explode, even starting with about the same amount of combustible gas within the building.
Perhaps this was even greater in the case of Bldg 3 than Bldg 4 because Bldg 3 was in service and during operation, as someone pointed out earlier, many of the internal doors of Bldg 3 were closed.
If the kinetic energy from the stored heat in the water of SFP3 released as steam is a correct scenario, then that, added to the hydrogen explosion, gives even more energy to the explosion of Unit 3 (and perhaps Unit 4?).
