An explosion and feared meltdown at a Japanese nuclear plant yesterday exposed the scale of the disaster facing the country after a massive quake and tsunami left more than 1,000 dead.
Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan said the magnitude 8.9 quake and the terrifying tsunami that followed were an “unprecedented national disaster” and vowed to protect those living near the stricken plant.
Reactor cooling systems failed at two nuclear facilities after Friday’s record earthquake, which unleashed a terrifying 10m tsunami that tore through coastal towns and cities, destroying everything in its path.
Photo: Reuters
Smoke was seen billowing from the Fukushima No. 1 atomic plant about 250km northeast of Tokyo after an explosion at the site.
Kyodo News agency said radioactive caesium had been detected near the aging facility, citing the nuclear safety agency.
However, Kan’s top spokesman, Yukio Edano, said that the Fukushima plant’s operator had reported the reactor container was not damaged and that radiation levels near it had fallen after the blast.
Photo: Reuters
Kyodo and Jiji reported before the explosion that the plant “may be experiencing nuclear meltdown,” while public broadcaster NHK quoted the safety agency as saying metal tubes that contain uranium fuel may have melted.
The cooling system of the plant was damaged in the massive earthquake that struck the region 24 hours earlier, leaving authorities scrambling to fix the problem and evacuate tens of thousands of people within a 20km radius.
Thousands were evacuated near another damaged plant, Fukushima No. 2.
The atomic emergency came as the country struggled to assess the full extent of the devastation wreaked by the massive tsunami, which was unleashed by the strongest quake ever recorded in Japan.
The wall of water pulverized towns and cities along the northeastern coast. Police reportedly said 200 to 300 bodies had been found in the city of Sendai.
About 300 to 400 bodies were recovered in Rikuzentakata, a coastal town of about 23,000 people, NHK quoted the military as saying.
The Fire and Disaster Management Agency said the tsunami had obliterated the town.
It was not immediately clear whether any of the bodies found by the military were included in police tolls showing at least 700 people dead. The government spokesman said at least 1,000 people were believed to have lost their lives.
More than 215,000 people were huddled in emergency shelters, police said.
The full scale of those left homeless was believed to be much higher, with police saying they had not received a tally from Miyagi Prefecture, the hard-hit region that is home to Sendai.
NHK reported that about 10,000 people are unaccounted for in the Japanese port town of Minamisanriku in Miyagi. The figure is more than half of the town’s population of about 17,000, it said.
Local authorities are trying to find their whereabouts with the help of Japan’s Self-Defense Forces, NHK said.
The raging tsunami picked up shipping containers, cars and the debris of shattered homes. It crashed through the streets of Sendai and across open fields, forming a mud slick that covered vast tracts of land.
“There are so many people who lost their lives,” an elderly man told TV reporters before breaking down in tears. “I have no words to say.”
Authorities said more than 3,000 homes were destroyed or swept away.
About 50,000 military and other rescue personnel were spearheading a Herculean rescue and recovery effort with hundreds of ships, aircraft and vehicles headed to the Pacific coast area.
Army helicopters airlifted people off the roof of an elementary school in Watari, Miyagi Prefecture.
In quake-hit areas, 5.6 million households had no power yesterday and more than 1 million households were without water. Telecommunications networks were also hit.
The quake, which hit at 2:46pm and lasted about two minutes, rattled buildings in greater Tokyo, the world’s largest urban area and home to about 30 million people.
More than 24 hours after the first, massive quake struck about 400km northeast of Tokyo, aftershocks were still rattling the region, including a strong magnitude 6.8 tremor yesterday.
The US Geological Survey said more than 100 aftershocks had hit the area.
A signaling system malfunction disrupted high-speed rail (HSR) services beginning at 8am today, with trains temporarily reduced to three northbound and three southbound trains per hour as authorities conduct inspections. The malfunction occurred on a section of track in Miaoli County during pre-operation checks early this morning, forcing northbound and southbound trains to use a single track, the HSR operator said. The regular schedule has been replaced with three hourly trains offering only nonreserved seating in each direction, stopping at every station, it said, adding that business class cars would still have reserved seating. Departures from terminal stations are scheduled at the top
Taiwan is still in the process of assessing the possibility of recruiting workers from Eswatini, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said yesterday, adding that its goal is to help Eswatini upgrade its vocational training centers. If there are plans to recruit workers from Eswatini, safeguarding national security, protecting public health and ensuring the employment rights of Taiwanese would be prerequisites, Department of West Asian and African Affairs Director-General Yen Chia-liang (顏嘉良) told a news conference. Key considerations would also include filling labor shortages in specific industries, and fostering bilateral professional and technical exchanges, he said. Yen was asked about the progress of labor
VERBOSE VESSELS: A CGA cutter and a China Coast Guard exchanged verbal barbs for more than a day in Taiwanese-controlled waters before the Chinese vessel left The Taiwanese and Chinese coast guards had a standoff near the strategically located Pratas Islands (Dongsha Islands, 東沙群島) in the north of the South China Sea, the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) said yesterday. The two sides engaged in intense radio exchanges over sovereignty claims during the 33-hour standoff. China Coast Guard vessel 3501 eventually left the restricted waters, 26.6 nautical miles (49.2km) west of the Pratas Islands, at 5pm yesterday, the CGA said. Lying approximately between southern Taiwan and Hong Kong, the Taiwan-controlled Pratas are seen by some security experts as vulnerable to Chinese attack due to their distance — more than
WARNING: China should stop engaging in actions that undermine regional peace and stability, as it would only build resentment among people across the Strait, the CGA said China has deployed more than 100 navy, coast guard and other vessels in waters from the Yellow Sea to the South China Sea and the western Pacific since US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) met in Beijing, National Security Council Secretary-General Joseph Wu (吳釗燮) said yesterday. “In this part of the world, #China is the one & only PROBLEM wrecking the #StatusQuo & threatening regional peace & stability,” Wu wrote on X. In a separate post, he said Beijing was coercing Taiwan’s maritime domain, calling it illegal and provocative, after the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) expelled a
RSS