Cc Version;fukushima Three Years On; a Synopsis of Events from 311 - Pt1 of 6

On March 11, 2011 a magnitude 9 earthquake struck off the east coast of Japan It was the tsunami that followed that no one had predicted In an instant an estimated 19,000 people lost their lives As a journalist I had never seen so much devastation in a country so vast The two million people living in Fukushima thought they were protected from the destruction of the coast They were wrong The wave hit the nuclear power plant in Fukushima The damage it caused sparked a reaction that would dwarf the tsunami and potentially threaten their lives Pumps for cooling reactors stopped and backup systems failed. Although the Japanese government would take months to admit it The Fukushima plant went into meltdown. Ivor can you bring us the latest development with the nuclear power plant They are not sure what the white smoke is that is rising from the plant The worry is that two of the five reactors at Fukushima about160 miles north of Tokyo are going into meltdown The earthquake yesterday has knocked out the cooling system Official report is one of the reactors has atomic materials seeping out. Five other reactors are under a state of emergency. What are the consequences what has been the reaction how are they gauging what has been unfolding The consequences are nuclear fallout Radioactive levels have reached 1000 times normal at Fukushima plant. People in Tokyo are not in the streets They have either fled the city or are staying indoors. On twitter the people in the north of Japan don't know what's going on. People in Tokyo are worried but they don't know what the situation is. The force of the quake could have damaged some of the piping that might have caused air to leak out disabling the vent as a result I find it extremely important to investigate that possibility Tepco's investigators said in their report few facilities were damaged by the quake. That includes those built to lower standards of quake resistance. Was there no impact on the pipes that were so critical for venting the reactor I doubt if they've checked everything on that level. No one can tell why venting failed or if the piping was damaged by the quake We must investigate further if we are to continue operating nuclear power plants While responders were struggling to vent the reactor the pressure inside the dry well rose far above permitted levels by the night of March 14 News of the situation reached the Prime Minister's office in Tokyo. We will overcome this crisis at all costs Then Prime Minister Naoto Kan went to Tepco headquarters to speak to management. Re-enactment at unit 2 At the main control room of reactor # 2 all the workers could do was repeat their fruitless efforts to relieve the pressure Still can't vent reactor 2 We have to somehow It's still high 740-750 kilopascals Alarming dry well pressure readings rang out in the on sight headquarters But there was no good news Reactor 2 crisis response chief I was in total despair even though I knew everyone was working hard as they could Then at six a.m. on March 15th Check dry well and suppression chamber pressures Yes sir What are they? Suppression chamber pressure ? Zero The pressure was zero Front line workers thought part of the primary containment vessel had been destroyed Releasing a massive amount of radioactive material Re-enactment This is reactor 2 We heard a loud *** The suppression chamber pressure is now zero If the containment vessel had really been destroyed rather than experiencing a leak that would have meant evacuating everyone It could have been fatal for those on the front lines That's what crossed my mind What had happened to the containment vessel More than a year later no one seems to know An enormous amount of radioactive fallout was released after six a.m. on March 15 This photo offers evidence Of all the radioactive releases following the Fukushima crisis this one caused the greatest damage to residents We bring you the update on the Fukushima nuclear power plant explosion An explosion was heard at 6:14 a.m. Japan time on Tuesday at the number 2 reactor As of 6:14 at reactor number 2 there was an explosive sound heard The pressure in the suppression pool went down and damage could have been caused We continue to inject water into the reactor however some employees have been evacuated Tokyo Electric Power Company says radiation levels hit 8,217 microsieverts after the explosion Tepco cannot deny the possibility that fuel rods are melting There are suggestions that a partial nuclear meltdown is now under way What does that mean? The nuclear fuel has become brittle because of hydrogen explosions that have occurred That process makes nuclear fuel brittle The pieces of nuclear fuel inside are about as big as that joint on my pinky and they have fallen to the bottom of the reactor There are thousands and thousands of those pieces and in the center of those pieces is molten uranium This is not a nuclear chain reaction this is not nuclear bomb This is the radiation left over after the chain reaction has started This will go on for several months The heat has got to be removed You say this is not a nuclear bomb but wouldn't the effects be the same if it does reach meltdown The chemicals released are similar The radioactive chemicals released from a nuclear bomb disappear quicker than the radiation that is released from a nuclear power plant The fission spectrum in a nuclear power plant has longer lived radiation than the fission spectrum in a nuclear bomb Are we looking at an apocalypse is that an exaggeration or is that true My term is that this is Chernobyl on steroids This will be worse than Chernobyl Exactly how much worse I don't know but it's clear to me it will be worse than Chernobyl Can a crisis be averted I don't think crisis can be averted The radiation exposures are so high on site that I don't think that human beings can get into areas that need to be accessed in order to put the fires out and to get water into where heat is the highest