| By Al Jazeera Staff in | on March 19th, 2011. |
Follow the latest events around the Pacific Rim after an 9.0-magnitude earthquake off Japan's coast triggered a devastating tsunami.
Blog: Mar11-12 - Mar13 - Mar14 - Mar15 - Mar16 - Mar17 - Mar18 - Mar19
(All times are local in Japan GMT+9)
A sign is placed along a road in Tamura, Fukushima prefecture, March 19, 2011. The sign reads, "Danger in 10 km. Restricted Area. Fukushima Police Department ":
Engineers at Japan's stricken nuclear plant were checking the cooling and other systems at reactor No. 2 late Sunday, aiming to restore the power soon, operator TEPCO said.
An external electricity supply has been restored to the distributor but power at the reactor unit was not yet back, spokesman Naohiro Omura said.
It will take more time. It's not clear when we can try to restore the systems.
Tokyo Fire Brigade has begun spraying water on the No. 4 reactor at 19:30 local time. This is expected to last around 3 hours.
Radiation has been detected on fava beans imported from Japan to Taiwan, Taiwanese officials said, in what could be the first case of contamination in Japanese exports.
The disclosure came a day after Japanese officials said radiation in low amounts had been found in spinach and milk produced near the damaged Fukushima nuclear power complex in northeast Japan that has been leaking radiation.
An official from Taiwan's Department of Health said the radiation detected on the Japanese fava beans was slightly higher than naturally occurring trace levels.
A woman holding a placard marches down the street during an anti-nuclear protest in Taipei.
Thousands of activists rallied on Sunday to urge the Taiwan government to shut down the three nuclear installations on the island and to stop the construction of the fourth one.
NHK reporter, quoting a doctor at the hospital to which the two survivors were taken by helicopter, said the two had been trapped in their kitchen after the massive earthquake and survived by eating yoghurt and other food in the refrigerator.
The grandson eventually made it to the roof and waved down a rescue helicopter
Japan's top government spokesman says the country's tsunami-ravaged nuclear plant must eventually be scrapped.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano's comment Sunday was the first word from the government that the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear complex will have to be closed once its overheating reactors are brought under control.
Closing the plant is inevitable, since the seawater that emergency crews are using to cool the reactors is corrosive, rendering key parts of the complex unusable.
Edano says the plant will be in no condition to be restarted.
NHK domestic now showing live pictures of a rescue chopper carrying two survivors who have just been discovered. The survivors are an 80 year old and 16 year old who are reported to have been rescued in Ishinomaki.
The operator of Japan's tsunami-damaged nuclear plant has backed away from plans for a tricky venting of radioactive gas at one of the troubled reactors, saying that pressure inside has stabilized.
Tokyo Electric Power company officials say the company has decided that there is no immediate need to vent the pressure at the Unit 3 reactor of the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant.
They say the pressure is relatively high, but that it has stabilized.
NHK reports that technicians will not be releasing air from the containment vessel of No. 3 in order to reduce the pressure inside. The pressure in there is now reported to be stable.
AP Report: Japan's government to lend up to $122 billion to companies for quake recovery.
Taiwan says radiation detected on batch of Japanese peas, but levels not harmful. (AP)
The official death toll from Japan's devastating earthquake and tsunami has risen to 8,133 with 12,272 still missing, Kyodo news agency said, citing the police.
Police earlier said they feared more than 15,000 people had died in one prefecture alone, Miyagi, in the March 11 disaster.
Nuclear officials: Pressure rises again at Japanese reactor, requiring new radiation release. (AP)
The number of people dead in Japan's earthquake and tsunami has rised to 7,700. That comes as hundreds of people from a small town near Fukushima's damaged nuclear plant have been evacuated and put into a sports arena.
A group of boys has taken it upon themselves to scavenge for food and supplies among the debris in Taro, where their village once stood. They have been able to provide some relief to hundreds of survivors sheltered at a nearby Buddhist temple.
Al Jazeera's Steve Chao reports on their inspiring deeds from Morioka in northern Japan:
The operator of Japan's quake-hit nuclear plant says it will be difficult to restore power to the cooling system for reactor No. 2 by the end of the day, Jiji Press reported.
Japan has deployed 10 Self Defence Force trucks and one borrowed from the US military to begin spraying tonnes of water over Reactor 4.
NHK is reporting that the water temperature in the spent fuel storage pools in reactors 5 and 6 have dropped since the power generator in reactor 5 was restored.
The Chinese embassy in Tokyo says more than 6,000 of its nationals in Japan's disaster-hit areas have been voluntarily evacuated, with half returning home and the rest holding up in various emergency shelters, including in Niigata.
An estimated 300 engineers are battling inside the danger zone to salvage the six-reactor Fukushima nuclear power plant. The crisis has also set back nuclear power plans around the world.
Work reportedly advanced on restarting water pumps used to cool overheating nuclear fuel. On Saturday, Hidehiko Nishiyama, the deputy-general at Japan's Nuclear Safety Agency, said:
We are making progress ... [but] we shouldn't be too optimistic.
Yukiya Amano, the International Atomic Energy Agency chief, says it is still too early to say whether things are going in the right direction in Japan's actions to stabilise the stricken reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant.
My impression is that the Japanese side is strengthening [its] activities to overcome, to stabilise the reactors. I hope that safety, stability will be recovered as soon as possible...
General Motors Co has suspended all nonessential spending and global travel while the automaker assesses the impact of the crisis in Japan on the company, a GM spokesman says.
In addition, GM will suspend production in Zaragoza, Spain, on Monday and cancel two shifts in Eisenach, Germany, on Monday and Tuesday, spokesman Klaus-Peter Martin told Reuters. Japan is a key supplier to the global auto and technology sectors, making prolonged disruption a threat to both.
General Motors Co has suspended all nonessential spending and global travel while the automaker assesses the impact of the crisis in Japan on the company, a GM spokesman says.
In addition, GM will suspend production in Zaragoza, Spain, on Monday and cancel two shifts in Eisenach, Germany, on Monday and Tuesday, spokesman Klaus-Peter Martin told Reuters. Japan is a key supplier to the global auto and technology sectors, making prolonged disruption a threat to both.
The photo below shows a fire engine dousing reactor No.3 of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power station in Fukushima prefecture on March 18. Japanese crews fighting to cool overheating reactors laid a power line into the plant yesterday. [AFP]
Aside from the nuclear crisis, officials in Japan are now turning their focus towards delivering crucial supplies and aid to the worst affected areas. But with almost half a million people left homeless, the future seems bleak.
Al Jazeera's Harry Fawcett reports from Morioka in Iwate Prefecture:
Russia will hold consultations with the European Union in the near future about increasing gas supplies to Europe to allow larger liquefied natural gas (LNG) deliveries to Japan, Dmitry Peskov, a spokesman of prime minister Putin says.
This is a case when the co-ordination of efforts by the global economic community is required.
The situation at Fukushima nuclear power plant may be stabilising but there are still risks it will deteriorate further, the UN nuclear agency says. Graham Andrew, a senior International Atomic Energy Agency official, told a briefing:
Could we have something unexpected? Most certainly. There are risks, it could get worse
Japan confirms the presence of radioactive iodine contamination in food products from near a crippled nuclear plant and is considering whether to order a halt to the sale of such products from the area, the UN nuclear body says:
Though radioactive iodine has a short half-life of about 8 days and decays naturally within a matter of weeks, there is a short-term risk to human health if radioactive iodine in food is absorbed into the human body.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said that Japan is starting to get control of the situation at its stricken nuclear power station. Putin told a meeting of nuclear specialists and emergency workers in the Far Eastern city of Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk:
Our Japanese colleagues are gradually, not right away and with mistakes... getting the situation under control.
Tepco, the operator of the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant announced that the "cooling function for spent fuel storage pool in reactor No.6 has been restored".
Earlier, the UN nuclear watchdog said it was unclear whether water pumps at the plant would work once power was restored. Graham Andrew, a senior official of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), also told a briefing that the overall situation at the Fukushima Daiichi plant was similar to Friday.
Andrew said it was hoped power would be restored to the plant's unit 2 "today", without giving details. "We do not know if the water pumps are damaged and if they will work when power is restored," he said.
Justin Dargin, a nuclear energy expert from Harvard University based in Middle East talks to Al Jazeera on the perils of nuclear radiation and the best possible way to check radiation from spreading.
On electricity being connected to the plant:
I am encouraged; it appears to be quite optimistic. If authorities are able to connect the auto-grid with internal electrical system then I think they would be able to do a comprehensive diagnostic in order to check if cooling system is working or not.
Authorities earlier were optimistic that they would be able to help system on line in, the electrical system, by tonight in terms of reactors 1, 2 and 4 but reactor number 3 can take a bit longer, may be tomorrow. I think that’s a good first step. But we have to be cautious so there really hasn’t been any change in the overall system.
Will the supply of electricity help in checking whether systems at the reactors are working or not?
More or less, that would be the first step. But after words they will have to see if cooling system is operative. If it is operative, then they will be able to turn it on and that would the first thing to start in order to start cooling down the spent fuel rods and as well the rods that have partially melted in reactors 1 and 2. But not insignificant but nothing has changed as of yet. Still we've to be a bit cautious.
On Chernobyl model
The Chernobyl option, as they call it, is the last ditch effort in order to stop nuclear facility that has experienced meltdown. And that would require dumping massive amount of sand and earth on the nuclear facility then after words you construct some type of sarcophagus over it and this may be made of steel and concrete and it would arrest any spread of radioactivity.
However, the eco-system of the area could be contaminated for some period of time. And that is why authorities don’t want to look at that option.
Another issue is that depending how you put sand and earth and other material on top of the fuel rods, you could have uranium pellets inside. If they [pellets] mash together they can recatalyse, then you could have intense amount of radiation released.
The nuclear crisis in Japan is spreading with signs of radioactive contamination in food and drinking water in Tokyo. At the source of the crisis - one of the damaged reactors at the Fukushima has been stabilised.
Al Jazeera's Anu Nathan reports on the efforts prevent a major radiation leak at the site:
Welcome to our new liveblog, we'll continue to keep you updated right here...
No comments:
Post a Comment