Japan Nuclear Reaction Contained
By SHIHOKO GOTO Associated Press Writer
10-01-99 0129EDT
TOKAIMURA, Japan (AP) -- As hundreds of thousands of worried residents awaited
word that it was safe to venture outside again, company officials admitted clear
violations of in-house safety rules resulted in Japan's worst accident at a nuclear plant.
Officials said the accident at the uranium processing plant had been contained, but only
after sending three workers to the hospital -- two in critical condition -- and prompting
the government to urge more than 310,000 people to stay indoors and keep their windows
closed.
``I've been worried sick,'' said Katsunori Sukegawa, a construction worker who
had been working about a half-mile from the plant in northeastern Japan when the leak was
first detected Thursday morning.
Sukegawa was among a flood of townspeople who gathered at a community center
here to be tested for exposure to radiation from the accident. Municipal authorities
expected 10,000 people to show up at the Tokaimura community center alone.
Police in white protective gear set up blockades at all major streets to keep
vehicles out. About 150 people in homes near the plant were evacuated. Schools were shut
down, train service was halted, and farmers were warned not to harvest their crops until
they could be tested for safety.
Local Gov. Masaru Hashimoto said radiation levels outside the plant were back to
normal today. But he said he wanted more time before lifting an advisory for more than
310,000 residents within a six-mile radius of the plant to stay indoors.
Police, meanwhile, began investigating whether criminal negligence was involved.
And Japan's top government spokesman admitted Tokyo's response was slow, and flawed.
``Unfortunately we must admit that we were behind in dealing with this
accident,'' Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiromu Nonaka said today. ``We admit that in deciding
how serious the accident was, our assessment was inadequate.''
Nomura added, however, that the accident would affect Japan's overall nuclear
power policies or development. He said the government has asked the United States, Russia
and the International Atomic Energy Agency to share information and know-how.
Energy Secretary Bill Richardson said the United State and Russia were prepared
to send a joint team of nuclear experts to help Japan deal with the problem. As of late
Thursday, no request for such assistance had been received.
The accident was the most serious ever at a nuclear facility in Japan, and is
the first time one has accidentally gone critical -- meaning that the fission reaction
becomes self-sustaining.
Workers at the plant mistakenly set off the fissioning early Thursday, spewing
radioactive gas into the air of this town of 33,000 about 70 miles northeast of Tokyo.
Makoto Morita, a spokesman for JCO, Co., which operates the plant, admitted that
in-house safety rules were violated. Police were questioning company officials, according
to local police spokesman Yukio Hiraoka.
``We have no words to express our apologies,'' Morita said. ``We cannot escape
our responsibility.''
Morita said the workers had been mixing uranium with nitric acid to make fuel
for a nuclear power plant. He said they are believed to have put 35 pounds of uranium into
the tank -- well over the 4.8-pound safety limit.
JCO is owned by Sumitomo Metal Mining Co., one of Japan's largest business
groups.
The three workers remained in intensive care today. Though the condition of the
two more seriously exposed had improved, doctors said they were still in critical
condition.
Hisashi Ouchi, 35, and Masato Shinohara, 39, were in shock and had diarrhea,
fever, a high white blood cell count and reddened skin -- all symptoms of radiation
sickness. The third worker, Yutaka Yokokawa, 54, was alert and able to walk. Several dozen
other people were exposed to the radiation, according to town officials. But none required
hospitalization, they said.
The radiation in the accident came from neutrons produced in the fission
reaction, said Ken Maruoka, an official at the Science and Technology Agency. When the
reaction stopped, neutrons ceased to be produced and the radiation level returned to
normal.
Reported levels of radiation at the scene were nothing like that at the world's
worst nuclear disaster, at Chernobyl, said Dr. Richard Toohey, a radiation safety expert
with the Radiation Emergency Assistance Center and Training Site in Oak Ridge, Tenn.
Toohey said he would not expect a significant release of radioactive material
that would endanger the public, both because of the amount of material involved and the
fact that there was no explosion to spread the radioactivity.
Radiation reported outside the Japanese site was reported to be about five times
natural background levels, he said, not a very scary height. The exposed workers inside
the site, however, received radiation of up to 4,000 times the level considered safe.
Accidents have plagued the nuclear power industry in Japan -- a land so poor in
natural resources that it relies on atomic energy for about a third of its electricity.
Another accident at a nuclear facility in Tokaimura in 1997 exposed 37 people to
radiation. JCO's safety violations this time are sure to damage the already shaky faith of
many in the nation's nuclear policy.
