Workers yesterday were a step closer to emptying highly radioactive water from a crippled reactor, which would allow them to start repairing the cooling system crucial to bringing one of the world’s worst nuclear crises under control.
US Nuclear safety regulator Gregory Jaczko described the crisis at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant as “static” rather than stable, because of the continuing struggle to cool the reactors badly damaged by a tsunami on March 11.
New data shows much more radiation leaked from the plant in the early days of the crisis than first thought, prompting officials to rate it on a par with the world’s worst nuclear accident, the 1986 Chernobyl disaster, though experts were quick to point out the two crises were not comparable in terms of radiation contamination.
The toll of the triple disaster is starting to rise, with the government cutting its outlook for the economy, in recession for almost 15 years, for the first time in six months and prices rising due to power disruptions.
It is expected to take months before the damaged reactors at Fukushima are cooled down. Until the coolers are repaired, the plant’s operator has been forced to pump water over them which just creates more radioactive water.
Samples collected on Monday from around 15km off the coast of Minamisoma city, which was devastated by last month’s quake and tsunami, showed radiation in the water rose to 23 times the legal limit from 9.3 times on April 7, said Hidehiko Nishiyama, a deputy director-general of the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.
“At one point, we had detected high levels of radiation on the coast so I think it is drifting somewhat as one chunk of water. While we think it’s not harmful to human health, we will continue to monitor closely,” he said.
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CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not