We use cookies on this website. By continuing to use this site without changing your cookie settings, you agree that you are happy to accept our privacy policy and cookie policy and for us to access our cookies on your device.
Title:JAPAN: Residents spend night in evacuation shelters, nuclear plant functioning properly
Date:14th March 2011
Summary:Clip 1:
SOUMA, JAPAN (MARCH 13, 2011) (REUTERS)
VARIOUS OF ROAD LINED WITH DEBRIS
WRECKED HOUSE SURROUNDED BY DEBRIS
WRECKED CARS
KAWAMATA, JAPAN (MARCH 13, 2011) (REUTERS)
EXTERIOR OF EVACUATION CENTER AT NIGHT
VARIOUS OF BOXES BEING BROUGHT INTO EVACUATION CENTRE
VARIOUS OF EVACUEES INSIDE SHELTER
Clip 2:
FAMILY
Clip 3:
WOMAN ON MOBILE/ CELL PHONE
(SOU
Embargoed:
Keywords:
Reuters ID:
Story Text:Japan's nuclear safety agency said on Sunday (March 13) there was no problem with the cooling process at Tohoku Electric Power Co's Onagawa nuclear power plant and that a rise in radiation levels there was due to radiation leakage at another plant in a neighbouring prefecture.
The agency said a report from Tohoku Electric shows that cooling systems at all three reactors at the Onagawa complex, which were automatically shut after a massive earthquake and tsunami on Friday, are functioning properly.
But the cooling system pump has stopped at the Tokai No.2 nuclear power plant in Japan's Ibaraki prefecture, Kyodo news reported, in the wake of the massive earthquake that has crippled other reactors in the country.
Upturned cars and debris littered the roads on the coastal town of Souma in the Fukushima region.
The 8.9 magnitude earthquake forced residents to go further inland into Kawamata where evacuation shelters have been set up.
"I have been told that the plant was 100 percent safe from big tsunamis and typhoons," said seventy-three-year-old Masao Takahashi who is spending his second night in the shelter.
Boxes of aid have been arriving into the shelter which will be home to dozens of families for the next few days and weeks.
And to many, the horrors of Friday's earthquake and the tsunami that followed were still much too fresh.
"I was swept by the tsunami and the water level went up to my chest. Only once I was 100 meters away did I start to feel safe," said forty-three-year-old evacuee Harue Watanabe.
Japan fought on Sunday to avert a meltdown at three earthquake-crippled nuclear reactors, describing the massive quake and tsunami, which may have killed more than 10,000 people, as the nation's biggest crisis since World War Two.
The world's third-largest economy is struggling to respond to a disaster of epic proportions, with more than 1 million without water or power and whole towns wiped off the map.
The earthquake was the fifth most powerful to hit the world in the past century. It surpassed the Great Kanto quake of Sept. 1, 1923, which had a magnitude of 7.9 and killed more than 140,000 people in the Tokyo area.
The 1995 Kobe quake killed 6,000 and caused $100 billion in damage, the most expensive natural disaster in history. Economic damage from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami was estimated at about $10 billion.
END