Askari Kanzu
JF-Expert Member
- Jan 7, 2011
- 4,598
- 1,233
Kama matetemeko yangetokea Tandale kwa Mtogole ingelikuwa ni hivi!!! LOL!
The Japanese Earthquake and its Aftermath....
- Thread starter Benno
- Start date
22nd
JF-Expert Member
- Aug 1, 2010
- 495
- 137
rangi nyeusi tuna matatizo, najua kuna watu watachonga kwamba ni mawazo ya kitumwa lakini ukweli ndio huo. tuna roho nyembamba sana, tupo selfish,tupo kama wanyama, hatuna ustaarabu hata kidogo. tukiona chakula roho zinapaparika.aibu kwa kweli.
watoa misaada walipata kazi ya ziada kweli kusaidia kule haiti.
sijui lini tutazoea na kustaarabika, puuuuuuu
watoa misaada walipata kazi ya ziada kweli kusaidia kule haiti.
sijui lini tutazoea na kustaarabika, puuuuuuu
Mkasika
JF-Expert Member
- Sep 11, 2010
- 391
- 155
I felt saddened when reading about cyber scams targeting tsunami donations and families receiving false death notices. I also read the people of Japan have experienced no looting and no violence. My heart goes out to everyone in Japan and their families and loved ones
Akwaba
Senior Member
- Sep 26, 2010
- 113
- 22
Hello My Lovely Friends,
First I want to thank you so very much for your concern for me. I am very touched. I also wish to apologize for a generic message to you all. But it seems the best way at the moment to get my message to you.
Things here in Sendai have been rather surreal. But I am very blessed to have wonderful friends who are helping me a lot. Since my shack is even more worthy of that name, I am now staying at a friend's home. We share supplies like water, food and a kerosene heater. We sleep lined up in one room, eat by candlelight, share stories. It is warm, friendly, and beautiful.
During the day we help each other clean up the mess in our homes. People sit in their cars, looking at news on their navigation screens, or line up to get drinking water when a source is open. If someone has water running in their home, they put out sign so people can come to fill up their jugs and buckets.
Utterly amazingly where I am there has been no looting, no pushing in lines. People leave their front door open, as it is safer when an earthquake strikes. People keep saying, "Oh, this is how it used to be in the old days when everyone helped one another."
Quakes keep coming. Last night they struck about every 15 minutes. Sirens are constant and helicopters pass overhead often.
We got water for a few hours in our homes last night, and now it is for half a day. Electricity came on this afternoon. Gas has not yet come on. But all of this is by area. Some people have these things, others do not. No one has washed for several days. We feel grubby, but there are so much more important concerns than that for us now. I love this peeling away of non-essentials. Living fully on the level of instinct, of intuition, of caring, of what is needed for survival, not just of me, but of the entire group.
There are strange parallel universes happening. Houses a mess in some places, yet then a house with futons or laundry out drying in the sun. People lining up for water and food, and yet a few people out walking their dogs. All happening at the same time.
Other unexpected touches of beauty are first, the silence at night. No cars. No one out on the streets. And the heavens at night are scattered with stars. I usually can see about two, but now the whole sky is filled. The mountains are Sendai are solid and with the crisp air we can see them silhouetted against the sky magnificently.
And the Japanese themselves are so wonderful. I come back to my shack to check on it each day, now to send this e-mail since the electricity is on, and I find food and water left in my entranceway. I have no idea from whom, but it is there. Old men in green hats go from door to door checking to see if everyone is OK. People talk to complete strangers asking if they need help. I see no signs of fear. Resignation, yes, but fear or panic, no.
They tell us we can expect aftershocks, and even other major quakes, for another month or more. And we are getting constant tremors, rolls, shaking, rumbling. I am blessed in that I live in a part of Sendai that is a bit elevated, a bit more solid than other parts. So, so far this area is better off than others. Last night my friend's husband came in from the country, bringing food and water. Blessed again.
Somehow at this time I realize from direct experience that there is indeed an enormous Cosmic evolutionary step that is occurring all over the world right at this moment. And somehow as I experience the events happening now in Japan, I can feel my heart opening very wide. My brother asked me if I felt so small because of all that is happening. I don't. Rather, I feel as part of something happening that much larger than myself. This wave of birthing (worldwide) is hard, and yet magnificent.
Thank you again for your care and Love of me,
With Love in return, to you all,
Anne.
First I want to thank you so very much for your concern for me. I am very touched. I also wish to apologize for a generic message to you all. But it seems the best way at the moment to get my message to you.
Things here in Sendai have been rather surreal. But I am very blessed to have wonderful friends who are helping me a lot. Since my shack is even more worthy of that name, I am now staying at a friend's home. We share supplies like water, food and a kerosene heater. We sleep lined up in one room, eat by candlelight, share stories. It is warm, friendly, and beautiful.
During the day we help each other clean up the mess in our homes. People sit in their cars, looking at news on their navigation screens, or line up to get drinking water when a source is open. If someone has water running in their home, they put out sign so people can come to fill up their jugs and buckets.
Utterly amazingly where I am there has been no looting, no pushing in lines. People leave their front door open, as it is safer when an earthquake strikes. People keep saying, "Oh, this is how it used to be in the old days when everyone helped one another."
Quakes keep coming. Last night they struck about every 15 minutes. Sirens are constant and helicopters pass overhead often.
We got water for a few hours in our homes last night, and now it is for half a day. Electricity came on this afternoon. Gas has not yet come on. But all of this is by area. Some people have these things, others do not. No one has washed for several days. We feel grubby, but there are so much more important concerns than that for us now. I love this peeling away of non-essentials. Living fully on the level of instinct, of intuition, of caring, of what is needed for survival, not just of me, but of the entire group.
There are strange parallel universes happening. Houses a mess in some places, yet then a house with futons or laundry out drying in the sun. People lining up for water and food, and yet a few people out walking their dogs. All happening at the same time.
Other unexpected touches of beauty are first, the silence at night. No cars. No one out on the streets. And the heavens at night are scattered with stars. I usually can see about two, but now the whole sky is filled. The mountains are Sendai are solid and with the crisp air we can see them silhouetted against the sky magnificently.
And the Japanese themselves are so wonderful. I come back to my shack to check on it each day, now to send this e-mail since the electricity is on, and I find food and water left in my entranceway. I have no idea from whom, but it is there. Old men in green hats go from door to door checking to see if everyone is OK. People talk to complete strangers asking if they need help. I see no signs of fear. Resignation, yes, but fear or panic, no.
They tell us we can expect aftershocks, and even other major quakes, for another month or more. And we are getting constant tremors, rolls, shaking, rumbling. I am blessed in that I live in a part of Sendai that is a bit elevated, a bit more solid than other parts. So, so far this area is better off than others. Last night my friend's husband came in from the country, bringing food and water. Blessed again.
Somehow at this time I realize from direct experience that there is indeed an enormous Cosmic evolutionary step that is occurring all over the world right at this moment. And somehow as I experience the events happening now in Japan, I can feel my heart opening very wide. My brother asked me if I felt so small because of all that is happening. I don't. Rather, I feel as part of something happening that much larger than myself. This wave of birthing (worldwide) is hard, and yet magnificent.
Thank you again for your care and Love of me,
With Love in return, to you all,
Anne.
Invisible
Robot
- Feb 11, 2006
- 9,075
- 7,878
By the CNN Wire Staff
March 18, 2011
A ship called Asia Symphony is left stranded after being lifted up onto the promenade of the docks by the March 11 tsunami at the port of Kamaishi town in Iwate prefecture, northeastern Japan on March 18, 2011.
Tokyo (CNN) -- The death toll in Japan climbed past 6,500 on Friday as search teams continued to comb through the rubble a week after a monster 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami hit the country.
Residents of towns decimated by the disaster sifted through twisted metal and broken wood beams, looking for pieces of the lives they lost.
Search crews planted red flags where they found dead bodies.
"I have no words to express my feelings. I lost my mind. We will have to start from zero," Hidemitsu Ichikawa said as he took a break from shoveling mud outside his home.
In Miyagi prefecture, officials observed a moment of silence Friday to mark the one-week anniversary of the quake.
Japan's National Police agency said 6,539 people were confirmed dead and 10,354 were reported missing as of 3 p.m. Friday (2 a.m. ET).
Schools had become impromptu morgues, with names of the dead posted on the doors, Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported.
Long lines snaked around supermarkets as survivors stocked up on supplies.
In the hardest-hit parts of the country, thousands of people, many of them frail and elderly, settled into shelters not knowing when they might be able to leave.
Japanese media have reported difficult living conditions, including kerosene shortages that make it hard to heat the shelters.
Some 380,000 people are staying at 2,200 facilities, Kyodo News reported.
"With all possible measures I'm determined, as part of the government, to improve their living conditions as much as possible," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters Friday.
NHK reported that 25 of the nearly 10,000 evacuees from Fukushima prefecture have died in shelters.
Meanwhile, workers resumed efforts to douse a spent fuel pond outside a nuclear reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, with its owner saying that earlier attempts had been "somewhat effective" in addressing radiation concerns.
But conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi plant itself remain dangerous.
Radiation levels Thursday hit 20 millisieverts per hour at an annex building where workers have been trying to re-establish electrical power, "the highest registered (at that building) so far," a Tokyo Electric official told reporters.
By comparison, the typical resident of a developed country is naturally exposed to 3 millisieverts per year.
The top priority for officials is the nuclear facility's No. 3 reactor -- the sole damaged unit that contains plutonium along with the uranium in its fuel rods, Edano said.
On Thursday, helicopters, fire trucks and police water cannons dumped or shot water on that unit, aiming to cool down the reactor's spent fuel pool. Experts believe that vapors rising from that pool, which has at least partially exposed fuel rods, may be releasing radiation into the atmosphere.
Significant amounts of radiation have been released since the earthquake hit on March 11, followed by a tsunami that swept away cars and houses along its path. The disasters spurred several hydrogen explosions at the nuclear plant.
But Japanese government spokesman Noriyuki Shikata tried to allay fears of an imminent meltdown.
"We have not seen a major breach of containment" at any of the plant's troubled nuclear reactors, he said Thursday.
A meltdown occurs when nuclear fuel rods cannot be cooled and the nuclear core melts. In the worst-case scenario, the fuel can spill out of the containment unit and spread radioactivity through the air and water. That, public health officials say, can cause both immediate and long-term health problems, including radiation poisoning and cancer.
The government has ordered the evacuation of about 200,000 people living in a 20-kilometer (12.4-mile) area around the plant, and told people living between 20 kilometers and 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) from the plant to remain indoors.
"Evacuees, and that can be said of myself as well, are feeling anxious since we are not getting the needed information from the government in a timely manner," said Seiji Sato, a spokesman for the government of Tamura City, about 20 kilometers from the nuclear facility.
One group of 21 people evacuated from a town near the plant made it to a shelter in Shinjo-shi, 300 kilometers (186 miles) away.
They told officials there that they drove as far away as possible, until they ran out of gas.
March 18, 2011
A ship called Asia Symphony is left stranded after being lifted up onto the promenade of the docks by the March 11 tsunami at the port of Kamaishi town in Iwate prefecture, northeastern Japan on March 18, 2011.
Tokyo (CNN) -- The death toll in Japan climbed past 6,500 on Friday as search teams continued to comb through the rubble a week after a monster 9.0-magnitude earthquake and tsunami hit the country.
Residents of towns decimated by the disaster sifted through twisted metal and broken wood beams, looking for pieces of the lives they lost.
Search crews planted red flags where they found dead bodies.
"I have no words to express my feelings. I lost my mind. We will have to start from zero," Hidemitsu Ichikawa said as he took a break from shoveling mud outside his home.
In Miyagi prefecture, officials observed a moment of silence Friday to mark the one-week anniversary of the quake.
Japan's National Police agency said 6,539 people were confirmed dead and 10,354 were reported missing as of 3 p.m. Friday (2 a.m. ET).
Schools had become impromptu morgues, with names of the dead posted on the doors, Japanese public broadcaster NHK reported.
Long lines snaked around supermarkets as survivors stocked up on supplies.
In the hardest-hit parts of the country, thousands of people, many of them frail and elderly, settled into shelters not knowing when they might be able to leave.
Japanese media have reported difficult living conditions, including kerosene shortages that make it hard to heat the shelters.
Some 380,000 people are staying at 2,200 facilities, Kyodo News reported.
"With all possible measures I'm determined, as part of the government, to improve their living conditions as much as possible," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told reporters Friday.
NHK reported that 25 of the nearly 10,000 evacuees from Fukushima prefecture have died in shelters.
Meanwhile, workers resumed efforts to douse a spent fuel pond outside a nuclear reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, with its owner saying that earlier attempts had been "somewhat effective" in addressing radiation concerns.
But conditions at the Fukushima Daiichi plant itself remain dangerous.
Radiation levels Thursday hit 20 millisieverts per hour at an annex building where workers have been trying to re-establish electrical power, "the highest registered (at that building) so far," a Tokyo Electric official told reporters.
By comparison, the typical resident of a developed country is naturally exposed to 3 millisieverts per year.
The top priority for officials is the nuclear facility's No. 3 reactor -- the sole damaged unit that contains plutonium along with the uranium in its fuel rods, Edano said.
On Thursday, helicopters, fire trucks and police water cannons dumped or shot water on that unit, aiming to cool down the reactor's spent fuel pool. Experts believe that vapors rising from that pool, which has at least partially exposed fuel rods, may be releasing radiation into the atmosphere.
Significant amounts of radiation have been released since the earthquake hit on March 11, followed by a tsunami that swept away cars and houses along its path. The disasters spurred several hydrogen explosions at the nuclear plant.
But Japanese government spokesman Noriyuki Shikata tried to allay fears of an imminent meltdown.
"We have not seen a major breach of containment" at any of the plant's troubled nuclear reactors, he said Thursday.
A meltdown occurs when nuclear fuel rods cannot be cooled and the nuclear core melts. In the worst-case scenario, the fuel can spill out of the containment unit and spread radioactivity through the air and water. That, public health officials say, can cause both immediate and long-term health problems, including radiation poisoning and cancer.
The government has ordered the evacuation of about 200,000 people living in a 20-kilometer (12.4-mile) area around the plant, and told people living between 20 kilometers and 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) from the plant to remain indoors.
"Evacuees, and that can be said of myself as well, are feeling anxious since we are not getting the needed information from the government in a timely manner," said Seiji Sato, a spokesman for the government of Tamura City, about 20 kilometers from the nuclear facility.
One group of 21 people evacuated from a town near the plant made it to a shelter in Shinjo-shi, 300 kilometers (186 miles) away.
They told officials there that they drove as far away as possible, until they ran out of gas.
Mathias Byabato
JF-Expert Member
- Nov 24, 2010
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- 691
bora sisi hatuna vinu hivyo,vizuri vina cost zake katika kutunza
ingekuwa bongo mambo yangekuwa mabaya sana
ingekuwa bongo mambo yangekuwa mabaya sana
Kang
JF-Expert Member
- Jun 24, 2008
- 5,495
- 2,252
![00dc054BfOp[1].jpg](https://www.jamiiforums.com/data/attachments/3124/3124634-e31d2a0d8ca1ce99ece924153f857e25.jpg "00dc054BfOp[1].jpg")
Chimunguru
JF-Expert Member
- May 3, 2009
- 10,678
- 4,350
Hii dunia mungu akiamua kuifunika kwa maji dk mbili tumekwisha
engmtolera
JF-Expert Member
- Oct 21, 2010
- 5,150
- 1,437
RADIOACTIVE fallout from Japan's crippled nuclear plant has reached Southern California, but the first readings are far below levels that could pose a health hazard, a diplomat says.
The diplomat, who has access to radiation tracking by the UN's Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO), cited readings from a California-based measuring station of the group.
Initial readings are "about a billion times beneath levels that would be health-threatening", the diplomat told AP, speaking on condition of anonymity because the CTBTO does not make its findings public.
The organisation forecast earlier this week that some radioactivity would reach Southern California by yesterday.
A CTBTO graphic obtained on Thursday by AP showed a moving plume reaching the US mainland after racing across the Pacific and swiping the Aleutian Islands.
The diplomat's comments backed up expectations by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) officials and independent experts that radiation levels - which are relatively low outside of the immediate vicinity of the Japanese plant - would dissipate so strongly by the time it reached the US coastline that it would pose no health risk whatsoever to residents.
While set up to monitor atmospheric nuclear testing, the CTBTO's worldwide network of stations can detect earthquakes, tsunamis and fallout from nuclear accidents such as the disaster on Japan's north-eastern coast that was set off by a massive earthquake and a devastating tsunami a week ago.
Since then, emergency crews have been trying to restore the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant's cooling system and prevent overheated fuel rods from releasing massive doses of radioactivity.
Japanese officials yesterday reclassified the rating of the accident at the plant from Level 4 to Level 5 on a seven-level international scale, putting it on par with the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in the US.
The International Nuclear Event Scale defines a Level 4 incident as having local consequences and a Level 5 as having wider consequences.
Nuclear experts have been saying for days Japan was underplaying the severity of the nuclear crisis.
Yukiya Amano, the head of the Vienna-based IAEA, left for Tokyo on Thursday to assess the situation. He plans to return at the weekend and to brief the IAEA's 35-nation board in an emergency session on Monday.
In Geneva, the World Health Organisation said Tokyo's radiation levels are increasing but are still not a health risk, and the group sees no reason to ban travel to Japan because of its nuclear crisis.
WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said on Friday the organisation "is not advising travel restrictions to Japan" outside the 30-km exclusion zone around the nuclear complex.
Hartl said that includes Tokyo, where "radiation levels have increased very slightly, but are still well below the absolute levels of radiation where it would be considered a public health risk".
He also said: "In general travellers returning from Japan do not represent a health hazard."
The diplomat, who has access to radiation tracking by the UN's Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organisation (CTBTO), cited readings from a California-based measuring station of the group.
Initial readings are "about a billion times beneath levels that would be health-threatening", the diplomat told AP, speaking on condition of anonymity because the CTBTO does not make its findings public.
The organisation forecast earlier this week that some radioactivity would reach Southern California by yesterday.
A CTBTO graphic obtained on Thursday by AP showed a moving plume reaching the US mainland after racing across the Pacific and swiping the Aleutian Islands.
The diplomat's comments backed up expectations by International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) officials and independent experts that radiation levels - which are relatively low outside of the immediate vicinity of the Japanese plant - would dissipate so strongly by the time it reached the US coastline that it would pose no health risk whatsoever to residents.
While set up to monitor atmospheric nuclear testing, the CTBTO's worldwide network of stations can detect earthquakes, tsunamis and fallout from nuclear accidents such as the disaster on Japan's north-eastern coast that was set off by a massive earthquake and a devastating tsunami a week ago.
Since then, emergency crews have been trying to restore the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant's cooling system and prevent overheated fuel rods from releasing massive doses of radioactivity.
Japanese officials yesterday reclassified the rating of the accident at the plant from Level 4 to Level 5 on a seven-level international scale, putting it on par with the 1979 Three Mile Island accident in the US.
The International Nuclear Event Scale defines a Level 4 incident as having local consequences and a Level 5 as having wider consequences.
Nuclear experts have been saying for days Japan was underplaying the severity of the nuclear crisis.
Yukiya Amano, the head of the Vienna-based IAEA, left for Tokyo on Thursday to assess the situation. He plans to return at the weekend and to brief the IAEA's 35-nation board in an emergency session on Monday.
In Geneva, the World Health Organisation said Tokyo's radiation levels are increasing but are still not a health risk, and the group sees no reason to ban travel to Japan because of its nuclear crisis.
WHO spokesman Gregory Hartl said on Friday the organisation "is not advising travel restrictions to Japan" outside the 30-km exclusion zone around the nuclear complex.
Hartl said that includes Tokyo, where "radiation levels have increased very slightly, but are still well below the absolute levels of radiation where it would be considered a public health risk".
He also said: "In general travellers returning from Japan do not represent a health hazard."
engmtolera
JF-Expert Member
- Oct 21, 2010
- 5,150
- 1,437
ALL the latest updates on the nuclear and humanitarian crises in Japan will be posted here as they come to hand.
Live updates: Disaster-stuck Japan in nuclear crisis | News.com.au
Live updates: Disaster-stuck Japan in nuclear crisis | News.com.au
engmtolera
JF-Expert Member
- Oct 21, 2010
- 5,150
- 1,437
The disaster in Japan is causing major problems for automakers around the world. General Motors has closed down a U.S. plant, Toyota is still shut down in Japan and Nissan is having to test vehicles
Japan's disaster hitting automakers
Japan's disaster hitting automakers
engmtolera
JF-Expert Member
- Oct 21, 2010
- 5,150
- 1,437
MILITARY search teams have pulled a young man from a crushed house eight days after an earthquake and tsunami wrecked northeast Japan.
A military official said the young man was rescued Saturday from the rubble in Kesennuma, a city in one of the most devastated areas. The official says the man was transferred to a nearby hospital, but he is too weak to talk.
Kyodo, the Japanese news agency, says the man was in his 20s.
The rescue is the latest and one of the few after the disaster, as the power of the tsunami, triggered by the magnitude-9 earthquake, likely pulled many people out to sea.
A military official said the young man was rescued Saturday from the rubble in Kesennuma, a city in one of the most devastated areas. The official says the man was transferred to a nearby hospital, but he is too weak to talk.
Kyodo, the Japanese news agency, says the man was in his 20s.
The rescue is the latest and one of the few after the disaster, as the power of the tsunami, triggered by the magnitude-9 earthquake, likely pulled many people out to sea.
Ms Judith
JF-Expert Member
- Dec 24, 2010
- 2,563
- 918
Japan cites radiation in milk, spinach near plant
AP In this image taken from footage released by the Japan Defense Ministry, a fire engine from the Japan
By SHINO YUASA and ERIC TALMADGE, Associated Press Shino Yuasa And Eric Talmadge, Associated Press Sat Mar 19, 4:52 pm ET
FUKUSHIMA, Japan In the first sign that contamination from Japan's stricken nuclear complex had seeped into the food chain, officials said Saturday that radiation levels in spinach and milk from farms near the tsunami-crippled facility exceeded government safety limits.
Minuscule amounts of radioactive iodine also were found in tap water Friday in Tokyo and elsewhere in Japan although experts said none of those tests showed any health risks. The Health Ministry also said that radioactive iodine slightly above government safety limits was found in drinking water at one point Thursday in a sampling from Fukushima prefecture, the site of the nuclear plant, but later tests showed the level had fallen again.
Six workers trying to bring the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant back under control were exposed to more than 100 millisieverts of radiation Japan's normal limit for those involved in emergency operations, according to Tokyo Electric Power Co., which operates the complex. The government raised that limit to 250 millisieverts on Tuesday as the crisis escalated.
Officials said the crisis at the plant appeared to be stabilizing, with near-constant dousing of dangerously overheated reactors and uranium fuel, but the situation was still far from resolved. Japan's military planned to start dousing one troubled reactor Unit 4 for the first time shortly after daybreak Sunday morning.
"We more or less do not expect to see anything worse than what we are seeing now," said Hidehiko Nishiyama of the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.
Japan has been grappling with a cascade of disasters unleashed by the 9.0-magnitude earthquake on March 11. The quake spawned a tsunami that ravaged Japan's northeastern coast, killing more than 7,600 people and knocking out cooling systems at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant, causing the complex to leak radiation.
More than 11,000 people are still missing, and more than 452,000 are living in shelters.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano, meanwhile, insisted the contaminated foods "pose no immediate health risk."
An expert in the United States also said the risk appeared limited and urged calm.
"The most troubling thing to me is the fear that's out of proportion to the risk," said Dr. Henry Duval Royal, a radiologist at Washington University Medical School.
The tainted milk was found 20 miles (30 kilometers) from the plant, a local official said. The spinach was collected from six farms between 60 miles (100 kilometers) and 75 miles (120 kilometers) to the south of the reactors.
Those areas are rich farm country known for melons, rice and peaches, so the contamination could affect food supplies for large parts of Japan.
More tests was being done on other foods, Edano said, and if they show further contamination, then food shipments from the area would be halted.
Officials said it was too early to know if the nuclear crisis caused the contamination, but Edano said air sampling done near the dairy showed higher-than-normal radiation levels.
Iodine levels in the spinach exceeded safety limits by three to seven times, a food safety official said. Tests on the milk done Wednesday detected small amounts of iodine-131 and cesium-137. High levels of iodine are linked to thyroid cancer, one of the least deadly cancers if treated. Cesium is a longer-lasting element that affects the whole body and raises cancer risk. But only iodine was detected Thursday and Friday, a Health Ministry official said.
After the announcements, Japanese officials immediately tried to calm an already-jittery public, saying the amounts detected were so small that people would have to consume unimaginable amounts to endanger their health.
"Can you imagine eating one kilogram of spinach every day for one year?" said State Secretary of Health Minister Yoko Komiyama. One kilogram is a little over two pounds.
Edano said someone drinking the tainted milk for one year would consume as much radiation as in a CT scan; for the spinach, it would be one-fifth of a CT scan. A CT scan is a compressed series of X-rays used for medical tests.
The Health Ministry said iodine levels slightly above the safety limit were discovered Thursday in drinking water samples from Fukushima prefecture. On Friday, levels were about half that benchmark; by Saturday, they had fallen further.
Drinking one liter of water with the iodine at Thursday's levels is the equivalent of receiving one-eighty-eighth of the radiation from a chest X-ray, said Kazuma Yokota, a spokesman for the prefecture's disaster response headquarters.
The trace amounts of iodine were found in Tokyo's water on Friday, the first day since the government ordered nationwide daily sampling due to the nuclear crisis, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology said. A ministry statement said the amounts found did not exceed government safety limits. But tests on water, which for decades were only done once a year, usually show no iodine.
At the Fukushima plant, emergency workers have been struggling to cool the reactors and the pools used to store used nuclear fuel, as well as to put the facility back on the electricity grid.
A replacement power line reached the complex Friday, but workers needed to methodically work through badly damaged and deeply complex electrical systems to make the final linkups without setting off a spark and potentially an explosion. Company officials hoped to be able to switch on the cooling systems Sunday.
Once the power is reconnected, it is not clear if the cooling systems will still work.
A fire truck with a high-pressure cannon pumped water directly from the ocean into one of the most troubled areas of the complex the cooling pool for used fuel rods at the plant's Unit 3 in a 13-hour operation that ended in the early morning hours Sunday. Because of high radiation levels, firefighters only went to the truck every three hours to refuel it.
Holes were also punched in the roofs of units 5 and 6 to vent buildups of hydrogen gas, and the temperature in Unit 5's fuel storage pool dropped after new water was pumped in, according to officials with Tokyo Electric Power Co., which owns the complex.
More workers were thrown into the effort bringing the total at the complex to 500 and the safety threshold for their radiation exposure was raised 2 1/2 times so they could keep working.
Officials insisted that would cause no health damage.
Edano said conditions at the reactors in Units 1, 2 and 3 all of which have been rocked by explosions in the past eight days had "stabilized."
The reactors and the storage pools both need constant sources of cooling water. Even when they are taken from reactors, uranium rods remain very hot and must be cooled for months, possibly longer, to prevent them from heating up again and emitting radioactivity.
Low levels of radiation have been detected well beyond Tokyo, which is 140 miles (220 kilometers) south of the plant, but hazardous levels have been limited to the plant itself.
People evacuated from around the plant, along with some emergency workers, have tested positive for radiation exposure. Three firefighters needed to be decontaminated with showers, while among the 18 plant workers who tested positive, one absorbed about one-tenth of the amount that could induce radiation poisoning.
Outside the bustling disaster response center in the city of Fukushima, 40 miles (60 kilometers) northwest of the plant, government nuclear specialist Kazuya Konno was able to take only a three-minute break for his first meeting since the quake with his wife, Junko, and their children.
"It's very nerve-racking. We really don't know what is going to become of our city," said Junko Konno, 35. "Like most other people, we have been staying indoors unless we have to go out."
She brought her husband a small backpack with a change of clothes and snacks. The girls aged 4 and 6 and wearing pink surgical masks decorated with Mickey Mouse gave their father hugs.
The government conceded Friday that it was slow to respond to the crisis and welcomed ever-growing help from the U.S. in hopes of preventing a complete meltdown.
Nishiyama, of the nuclear safety agency, also said backup power systems at the plant had been improperly protected, leaving them vulnerable to the tsunami.
The failure of Fukushima's backup power systems, which were supposed to keep cooling systems going in the aftermath of the earthquake, let uranium fuel overheat and were a "main cause" of the crisis, Nishiyama said.
"I cannot say whether it was a human error, but we should examine the case closely," he told reporters.
A spokesman for Tokyo Electric said that while the generators were not directly exposed to the waves, some electrical support equipment was outside. The complex was protected against tsunamis of up to 5 meters (16 feet), he said. Media reports say the tsunami was at least 6 meters (20 feet) high when it struck Fukushima.
Spokesman Motoyasu Tamaki also acknowledged that the complex was old, and might not have been as well-equipped as newer facilities.
The crisis has led to power shortages and factory closures, and triggered a plunge in Japanese stock prices.
On Saturday evening, Japan was rattled by 6.1-magnitude aftershock, with an epicenter just south of the troubled nuclear plants. The temblor, centered 150 kilometers (90 miles) northeast of Tokyo, shook buildings in the capital.
SOURCE: Japan cites radiation in milk, spinach near plant - Yahoo! News
AP/Kyodo News
A farmer checks leeks cultivated in a vinyl house in the earthquake and tsunami-stricken town of Yamamoto in Miyagi Prefecture, northeastern Japanhttp://news.yahoo.com/nphotos/Huge-...fires-landslide/ss/events/wl/031111japanquake
AP In this image taken from footage released by the Japan Defense Ministry, a fire engine from the Japan
By SHINO YUASA and ERIC TALMADGE, Associated Press Shino Yuasa And Eric Talmadge, Associated Press Sat Mar 19, 4:52 pm ET
FUKUSHIMA, Japan In the first sign that contamination from Japan's stricken nuclear complex had seeped into the food chain, officials said Saturday that radiation levels in spinach and milk from farms near the tsunami-crippled facility exceeded government safety limits.
Minuscule amounts of radioactive iodine also were found in tap water Friday in Tokyo and elsewhere in Japan although experts said none of those tests showed any health risks. The Health Ministry also said that radioactive iodine slightly above government safety limits was found in drinking water at one point Thursday in a sampling from Fukushima prefecture, the site of the nuclear plant, but later tests showed the level had fallen again.
Six workers trying to bring the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant back under control were exposed to more than 100 millisieverts of radiation Japan's normal limit for those involved in emergency operations, according to Tokyo Electric Power Co., which operates the complex. The government raised that limit to 250 millisieverts on Tuesday as the crisis escalated.
Officials said the crisis at the plant appeared to be stabilizing, with near-constant dousing of dangerously overheated reactors and uranium fuel, but the situation was still far from resolved. Japan's military planned to start dousing one troubled reactor Unit 4 for the first time shortly after daybreak Sunday morning.
"We more or less do not expect to see anything worse than what we are seeing now," said Hidehiko Nishiyama of the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency.
Japan has been grappling with a cascade of disasters unleashed by the 9.0-magnitude earthquake on March 11. The quake spawned a tsunami that ravaged Japan's northeastern coast, killing more than 7,600 people and knocking out cooling systems at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant, causing the complex to leak radiation.
More than 11,000 people are still missing, and more than 452,000 are living in shelters.
Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano, meanwhile, insisted the contaminated foods "pose no immediate health risk."
An expert in the United States also said the risk appeared limited and urged calm.
"The most troubling thing to me is the fear that's out of proportion to the risk," said Dr. Henry Duval Royal, a radiologist at Washington University Medical School.
The tainted milk was found 20 miles (30 kilometers) from the plant, a local official said. The spinach was collected from six farms between 60 miles (100 kilometers) and 75 miles (120 kilometers) to the south of the reactors.
Those areas are rich farm country known for melons, rice and peaches, so the contamination could affect food supplies for large parts of Japan.
More tests was being done on other foods, Edano said, and if they show further contamination, then food shipments from the area would be halted.
Officials said it was too early to know if the nuclear crisis caused the contamination, but Edano said air sampling done near the dairy showed higher-than-normal radiation levels.
Iodine levels in the spinach exceeded safety limits by three to seven times, a food safety official said. Tests on the milk done Wednesday detected small amounts of iodine-131 and cesium-137. High levels of iodine are linked to thyroid cancer, one of the least deadly cancers if treated. Cesium is a longer-lasting element that affects the whole body and raises cancer risk. But only iodine was detected Thursday and Friday, a Health Ministry official said.
After the announcements, Japanese officials immediately tried to calm an already-jittery public, saying the amounts detected were so small that people would have to consume unimaginable amounts to endanger their health.
"Can you imagine eating one kilogram of spinach every day for one year?" said State Secretary of Health Minister Yoko Komiyama. One kilogram is a little over two pounds.
Edano said someone drinking the tainted milk for one year would consume as much radiation as in a CT scan; for the spinach, it would be one-fifth of a CT scan. A CT scan is a compressed series of X-rays used for medical tests.
The Health Ministry said iodine levels slightly above the safety limit were discovered Thursday in drinking water samples from Fukushima prefecture. On Friday, levels were about half that benchmark; by Saturday, they had fallen further.
Drinking one liter of water with the iodine at Thursday's levels is the equivalent of receiving one-eighty-eighth of the radiation from a chest X-ray, said Kazuma Yokota, a spokesman for the prefecture's disaster response headquarters.
The trace amounts of iodine were found in Tokyo's water on Friday, the first day since the government ordered nationwide daily sampling due to the nuclear crisis, the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology said. A ministry statement said the amounts found did not exceed government safety limits. But tests on water, which for decades were only done once a year, usually show no iodine.
At the Fukushima plant, emergency workers have been struggling to cool the reactors and the pools used to store used nuclear fuel, as well as to put the facility back on the electricity grid.
A replacement power line reached the complex Friday, but workers needed to methodically work through badly damaged and deeply complex electrical systems to make the final linkups without setting off a spark and potentially an explosion. Company officials hoped to be able to switch on the cooling systems Sunday.
Once the power is reconnected, it is not clear if the cooling systems will still work.
A fire truck with a high-pressure cannon pumped water directly from the ocean into one of the most troubled areas of the complex the cooling pool for used fuel rods at the plant's Unit 3 in a 13-hour operation that ended in the early morning hours Sunday. Because of high radiation levels, firefighters only went to the truck every three hours to refuel it.
Holes were also punched in the roofs of units 5 and 6 to vent buildups of hydrogen gas, and the temperature in Unit 5's fuel storage pool dropped after new water was pumped in, according to officials with Tokyo Electric Power Co., which owns the complex.
More workers were thrown into the effort bringing the total at the complex to 500 and the safety threshold for their radiation exposure was raised 2 1/2 times so they could keep working.
Officials insisted that would cause no health damage.
Edano said conditions at the reactors in Units 1, 2 and 3 all of which have been rocked by explosions in the past eight days had "stabilized."
The reactors and the storage pools both need constant sources of cooling water. Even when they are taken from reactors, uranium rods remain very hot and must be cooled for months, possibly longer, to prevent them from heating up again and emitting radioactivity.
Low levels of radiation have been detected well beyond Tokyo, which is 140 miles (220 kilometers) south of the plant, but hazardous levels have been limited to the plant itself.
People evacuated from around the plant, along with some emergency workers, have tested positive for radiation exposure. Three firefighters needed to be decontaminated with showers, while among the 18 plant workers who tested positive, one absorbed about one-tenth of the amount that could induce radiation poisoning.
Outside the bustling disaster response center in the city of Fukushima, 40 miles (60 kilometers) northwest of the plant, government nuclear specialist Kazuya Konno was able to take only a three-minute break for his first meeting since the quake with his wife, Junko, and their children.
"It's very nerve-racking. We really don't know what is going to become of our city," said Junko Konno, 35. "Like most other people, we have been staying indoors unless we have to go out."
She brought her husband a small backpack with a change of clothes and snacks. The girls aged 4 and 6 and wearing pink surgical masks decorated with Mickey Mouse gave their father hugs.
The government conceded Friday that it was slow to respond to the crisis and welcomed ever-growing help from the U.S. in hopes of preventing a complete meltdown.
Nishiyama, of the nuclear safety agency, also said backup power systems at the plant had been improperly protected, leaving them vulnerable to the tsunami.
The failure of Fukushima's backup power systems, which were supposed to keep cooling systems going in the aftermath of the earthquake, let uranium fuel overheat and were a "main cause" of the crisis, Nishiyama said.
"I cannot say whether it was a human error, but we should examine the case closely," he told reporters.
A spokesman for Tokyo Electric said that while the generators were not directly exposed to the waves, some electrical support equipment was outside. The complex was protected against tsunamis of up to 5 meters (16 feet), he said. Media reports say the tsunami was at least 6 meters (20 feet) high when it struck Fukushima.
Spokesman Motoyasu Tamaki also acknowledged that the complex was old, and might not have been as well-equipped as newer facilities.
The crisis has led to power shortages and factory closures, and triggered a plunge in Japanese stock prices.
On Saturday evening, Japan was rattled by 6.1-magnitude aftershock, with an epicenter just south of the troubled nuclear plants. The temblor, centered 150 kilometers (90 miles) northeast of Tokyo, shook buildings in the capital.
SOURCE: Japan cites radiation in milk, spinach near plant - Yahoo! News
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