CONTAMINATION FEARS IN JAPAN

JAPAN FEARS NUCLEAR REACTOR IS LEAKING CONTAMINATED WATER

Hiroko Tabuchi and Ken Belson

The New York Times, March 28, 2011

TOKYO — Highly contaminated water is escaping a damaged reactor at a crippled nuclear power plant in Japan and could soon leak into the ocean, the country’s nuclear regulator warned on Monday.

The discovery raises the danger of further radiation leaks at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, and also poses a further setback to efforts to contain the nuclear contamination crisis as workers find themselves in increasingly hazardous conditions.

Radiation measuring 1,000 millisieverts per hour was detected in water in an overflow tunnel outside the plant’s Reactor No. 2, Japan’s nuclear regulator said at a news conference. The tunnel leads from the reactor’s turbine building, where contaminated water was discovered on Saturday, to an opening just 180 feet from the sea, said Hidehiko Nishiyama, deputy director-general for the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.

The contaminated water level is now about three feet from the exit of the vertical, U-shaped tunnel and rising, Mr. Nishiyama said.

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