America needs to pay more attention to what is happening in Japan. This is our opportunity to learn and prepare our nuclear power plants in case of such a crisis. We currently have 100 commercial nuclear reactors licensed to operate in the United States. These operate in 31 of the 48 contiguous states. Nuclear reactors provide the United States with about 20% of its electricity. By reviewing the American history of some recent natural disasters, I intend to demonstrate that an accident like Fukushima could occur in the United States. I find it essential that these lessons are taken seriously to strengthen nuclear safety and ultimately lead to a complete phase-out without nuclear power. So let's take a moment and briefly review a brief review of the tragedies of the Tohoku-Oki earthquake is the largest recorded earthquake of magnitude 9.0 and caused a tsunami of almost 50 feet that hit the country already paralyzed by the mega earthquake. Three years have passed since the earthquake and tsunami hit Japan. In the moments after the main power supply to the Fukushima Daiichi reactor was shut down, a safety measure ensured that standby generators would take over and provide much-needed cooling to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. However, World Nuclear Associates (WNA) reports what happened in the two hours that followed a combination of Mother Nature and human hubris coming together in what was a series of unfortunate and disastrous events for the power plant and the villages surrounding it. Fukushima Daiichi suffered unimaginable damage to affected Units 1, 2 and 3 and still affected Unit 4 offline. In the early moments of the calamity the problems were an imminent threat to units 1, 2 and 3 as they began to experience... .... middle of paper ......is capable of withstanding 7.0 and was built in 90s with better technology and materials. Still not convinced this couldn't happen here in the U.S. On January 26, 1700, the coast of British Columbia, Canada, Washington, Oregon and northern parts of California were hit by a dynamic pair of a magnitude earthquake 9.0 and a tsunami that left their geological mark for today's scientists. Lawmakers have warned the US Department of Energy that US nuclear power plants are more susceptible to earthquakes than previously thought. California itself has two coastal nuclear power plants built less than a half-mile from a fault line. The U.S. Department of Energy has yet to formulate a plan to address not only the age of our nuclear power plants, whose life expectancy is only 100 years, but also the significance of such a catastrophic accident occurring on our coasts.