JAPAN: 'Fukushima 50' nuclear plant worker speaks of 'desperate' struggle to avert catastrophe

Record ID: 216011

  • Title: JAPAN: 'Fukushima 50' nuclear plant worker speaks of 'desperate' struggle to avert catastrophe
  • Date: 6th March 2013
  • Summary: KORIYAMA CITY, FUKUSHIMA PREFECTURE, JAPAN (FILE - MARCH 12, 2011) (REUTERS) SOLDIER BEING SCREENED FOR RADIATION
  • Embargoed: 21st March 2013 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Japan
  • Country: Japan
  • Topics: Accidents,Environment
  • Reuters ID: LVA20HD7MD9S7HZR5GI0V401ENPF
  • Story Text: As the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant melted down following the March 11, 2011 tsunami, catastrophe loomed and thousands fled.
    One of the few that stayed at his post was Atsufumi Yoshizawa, part of a largely anonymous corps of several hundred engineers, soldiers, fire-fighters and workmen, lauded as the 'Fukushima 50' by the international press but mostly unknown in Japan.
    In a rare interview he recalled what made him stay behind -- even as the crisis threatened to spiral out of control and thousands of his colleagues fled the steadily rising radiation.
    "We had a strong sense of duty -- we knew if we didn't stay, there wouldn't have been anyone else who could've sorted it out. But there was also something else, we had this kind of paternal feeling towards the nuclear plant we had worked with for so long. It was like almost like our child, and we wanted to save it," the 54-year-old father-of-two said at plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Company's headquarters in Tokyo, his company uniform immaculately pressed.
    After a Magnitude 9.0 quake and tsunami struck the plant on March 11, three reactors melted down and radiation forced tens of thousands of residents to evacuate the area near the plant. Most of the 6000 workers at the plant that day left their posts behind.
    Radiation as high as 800 trillion bequerels per hour for cesium seeped from the reactors, with levels for exposure reaching nearly 400 millisieverts per hour. A single dose of about 1000 millisieverts causes acute radiation sickness, and the global average exposure from natural background radiation is 2.4 millisieverts across an entire year.
    However, after a hydrogen explosion at a reactor building three days later, fears mounted that thousands of spent fuel rods stored at an adjacent damaged reactor would melt and spew radiation even further, forcing the evacuation of the Tokyo greater metropolitan area, 240 km (150 miles) away and home to some 35 million people.
    In the days following the disaster, workers and emergency personnel fought a frantic battle to cool the reactors with water from hoses and helicopters.
    "It was a really desperate situation, we were fighting against the odds. The radiation was going up and up, and if we hadn't been able to get water in to cool the reactors, it would've all been over. I think all of us there shared that feeling," Yoshizawa said.
    Tepco managed to avert the worst scenario by pumping water, much of it from the sea, into Daiichi's damaged reactors and spent fuel pools, eventually stabilising them by December 2011.
    But two years on, Fukushima Daiichi and the area around it still resembles a vast wasteland, with high radiation levels hampering a cleanup that is expected to take decades.
    It's a stark reality that Yoshizawa says dampens the high praise bestowed on him by the international media.
    "I don't think we're heroes at all. We were simply doing our job when a massive crisis hit our place of work. It's a crisis that's stopped many people from returning home even to this day, has spread radiation all over the place, and has had a serious impact across the world. We can't forget the fact that the responsibility for that lies with our company," Yoshizawa said.
    Even now most of the workers who stayed behind are unknown.
    When former Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda honoured eight of them in October 2012, six elected to remain anonymous, even concealing their identities from the Japanese premier.
    Others speak of depression and stigma, worries that family members could become the target of bullying as a result of their exposure to radiation at the plant.
    Yoshizawa said his own internal measurements were about 50 millisieverts, the annual limit for U.S. nuclear workers, but added his colleagues who worked outside the control centre likely had a far higher count.
    In the interview, Yoshizawa did not mention whether he had suffered any illness that might be related to his exposure to radiation.
    "Looking back at it now, it's clear we had to go through a terrible ordeal -- it's impossible to say that it hasn't left a mark. Those of us who went through what we did then, well, my feeling is we've suffered an injury, both in mind and in body," Yoshizawa said.
    Decommisioning the nuclear plant is expected to take up to four decades, but cleanup of the communities nearby has scarcely begun.
    The Japan Center for Economic Research, a Tokyo-based think tank, has estimated that decontamination costs alone in the Fukushima residential area could cost as much as 600 billion U.S. dollars.
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