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Sendai, Japan • Radioactivity levels have soared in the seawater outside the troubled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant, safety officials reported Saturday, igniting fresh concerns about the spread of highly radioactive material and the risks involved in completing an already dangerous job.
Samples taken 360 yards offshore from the plant Friday showed radioactive iodine levels 1,250 times the legal safety limit. Earlier in the week, the levels of iodine-131 in the water had been closer to 100 times the limit.
And Japan's government revealed a series of missteps by the operator of a radiation-leaking nuclear plant on Saturday, including sending workers in without protective footwear in its faltering efforts to control a monumental crisis.
As of Saturday, some signs of progress were evident at the plant: Fresh water was being pumped in to cool three nuclear reactors, rather than seawater, which leaves salt deposits that can impair the cooling process. And the lights were turned on in the control room of the second reactor.
Nevertheless, the world's chief nuclear inspector said Saturday that Japan was "still far from the end of the accident" that has stricken its Fukushima nuclear complex and continues to spew radiation into the atmosphere and the sea. Yukiya Amano, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, acknowledged that the authorities were still unsure whether the nuclear cores and spent fuel were covered with the water needed to cool them and end the crisis.
He cautioned that the nuclear emergency could go on for weeks, if not months, given the enormous damage to the plants.
Government spokesman Yukio Edano urged Tokyo Electric Power Co. to be more transparent, two days after two workers at the Fukushima complex were burned when they stepped in radioactive water.
The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, or NISA, said TEPCO was aware there was high radiation in the air at one of the plant's six units several days before the accident. —
Radiation detected around globe
Traces of radioactive material from Japan's troubled reactors have been detected by sensitive instruments designed to monitor nuclear tests.
Extremely small amounts of the radioactive isotopes iodine-131 and zenon-133 reached a monitoring station at Las Vegas' Atomic Testing Museum this week, said Ted Hartwell, manager of the Desert Research Institute's Community Environmental Monitoring Program.
And detectors in Germany's Black Forest mountains have picked up radioactive iodine blowing in from Japan's Fukushima plant site 5,590 miles away.