AP Tokyo News Editor Eric Talmadge and photographer Wally Santana spent 21 days covering the aftermath of the Japan quake, covering stories in the shadow of the damaged reactors in Fukushima.
Talmadge kept updating his Facebook profile (private), posting short updates to his friends and family. The AP bundled them up into a Facebook notes page, organized by day. Here’s day four:
Just outside nuclear evacuation zone. The invisible threat is on all of our minds. God, I hope this doesn’t go south. (12:45 pm)
Has been ordered to get far away from the nuke reactors ASAP. (12:28 pm)
En route to be tested for radiation exposure. (4:10 pm)
I am smelly, hungry and tired, but not radioactive. (7:27 pm)
Very compelling, and I can certainly understand why Talmadge wanted these updates to go to his worried friends and family — especially with the uncertainty surrounding the reactors. But I can’t help but imagine how his short updates would’ve have been received on a public Facebook page, where others could interact and share his updates with the world.
