Fukushima radiation levels spike, company says

Today's post was shared by WCBlog and comes from www.cnn.com

There's been a sharp spike in radiation levels measured in the pipes and containers holding water at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant in Japan. But the company in charge of cleaning it up says that only a single drop of the highly contaminated water escaped the holding tanks. Tokyo Electric Power Company said it is confident it can provide safety for workers dealing with the problem. "We will find out the cause of this issue and make proper counter measures immediately, and continue to make every effort to secure safety of workers," the company said in a statement released Sunday. TEPCO found high radiation readings at the contaminated water storage tanks and pipe Saturday. The four locations are the bottom of three tanks and a pipe connecting tanks in separate area. The highest reading as 1800 millisieverts per hour at the bottom fringe of the tank. 220 and 70 mSv were measured at the bottom of other two tanks. And TEPCO said they found a dried stain under the pipe with 230 mSv/h radiation measurement. One drop of liquid fell when a staff member pressed on insulation material around the pipe. But TEPCO said no contaminated water leak is expected as there were no change in the water level in tanks. The enormous tanks are identical to the container that was announced last week to have leaked 300 tons of highly toxic water and sparking a hike to the threat level to "serious." TEPCO will investigate the cause and look further if there were any...

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Radiation Near Japanese Plant’s Tanks Suggests New Leaks

Today's post was shared by The New York Times and comes from www.nytimes.com

A crisis over contaminated water at Japan’s stricken nuclear plant worsened on Saturday when the plant’s operator said it had detected high radiation levels near storage tanks, a finding that raised the possibility of additional leaks. The operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, or Tepco, said it had found the high levels of radiation at four separate spots on the ground, near some of the hundreds of tanks used to store toxic water produced by makeshift efforts to cool the Fukushima Daiichi plant’s three damaged reactors. The highest reading was 1,800 millisieverts per hour, or enough to give a lethal dose in about four hours, Tepco said.