Japan Nuclear Meltdown: Tests Find Radiation Levels At 100,000 Times Normal In No. 2 Reactor, Reactor May Be Leaking Water

In other news:

Workers flee Japan nuclear plant as false readings say radiation levels are 10 MILLION times higher than normal (Daily Mail)

Japan Nuclear crisis: Nuke plant radiation 10 million times high (NewsX)

Radiation at plant 10 million times above normal (Philippine Star – AP)

Japan says very high radiation reading at reactor was wrong (Stuff.co.nz)

Japan says very high radiation reading at reactor was wrong (Reuters)

How can they be wrong about this?:

Japan Government on Fukushima: ‘We Are Not Able To Measure The Amount Of Radiation Coming From The Power Plant’ (Video):

The Japanese government only ‘estimates’ radiation, not actually measuring.

All of this is totally unprofessional and unbelievable.



Crisis: U.S. freshwater has been rushed to the area surrounding the No. 1, No. 2, No. 3 and No. 4 reactors at the Fukushima plant as fears of further radiation leaks grow

Mar. 27 (Bloomberg) — Efforts to repair the cooling systems at the No. 2 and No. 3 reactors at the Fukushima Dai- Ichi nuclear plant are being delayed by the need to drain radioactive water from the floors, Tokyo Electric Power Co. said.

Tests found radiation levels at 100,000 times the normal level in the No. 2 reactor at the plant, and the reactor may be leaking water, Vice President Sakae Muto said at a briefing broadcast on the Internet.

The company plans to put the radioactive water into condenser tanks. Those tanks are probably already full, so crews must find a way to drain them, company officials said at a briefing today.

“I think it is high,” Muto said of the radiation level in the pool of water at the No. 2 unit.

The cooling pool at the No. 2 reactor, used to store spent nuclear fuel, appears to be full of water, the company said. The pool at the No. 4 reactor is likely full, the company said. The pools need cooling water to keep the rods from melting and releasing radiation into the air.

The radiation level at the No. 2 reactor was measured at 1,000 millisieverts an hour, Japan’s nuclear safety agency said. That’s higher than the dose that would cause vomiting, hair loss and diarrhea, according to the World Nuclear Association.

“They’re finding quite high levels of radiation fields, which is impeding their progress dealing with the situation,” said Richard Wakeford, an expert in radiation epidemiology at the U.K.’s Dalton Nuclear Institute in Manchester. At reactor 2, “you’d have a lot of difficulty putting anyone in there.”
Death Toll Rises

The number of dead and missing from the March 11 earthquake, tsunami and subsequent aftershocks reached 27,110. The government is struggling to help hundreds of thousands of people left homeless or without essential services or food.

Radiation in water was found in one out of three Tokyo water purification plants based on samples taken yesterday, the Tokyo metropolitan government said. Two out of three facilities detected radioactive levels the previous day.

By Mike Lee and Akiko Nishimae
Mar 27, 2011

Source: Bloomberg

Leave a Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.