According to the HuffPost, the US Navy is headed to Japan with fresh water to assist in the cooling process at the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant in Japan. Currently plant works are pumping salt water into the system to cool down the crucial system but concerns have risen about the corrosive nature of salt water. Read the full article after the jump.
U.S. naval barges loaded with fresh water sped toward Japan’s overheated nuclear plant to help workers who scrambled Saturday to stem a worrying rise in radioactivity and remove dangerously contaminated water from the facility.
Workers at the stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi plant have been pumping seawater in a frantic bid to stabilize reactors that went haywire after a tsunami knocked out the complex’s crucial cooling system earlier this month.
Plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. is now rushing to inject the reactors with fresh water instead amid concerns about the corrosive nature of the salt in seawater, Hidehiko Nishiyama of Japan’s Nuclear and Industry Safety Agency said at a briefing Saturday.
The switch was the latest tactic in frantic efforts to gain control of the nuclear power plant located near the coast, 140 miles (220 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo.
Low levels of radiation have been seeping from the plant since a magnitude-9 earthquake and the ensuing tsunami on March 11, forcing an evacuation of families living within 12 miles (20 kilometers) of the plant.
Elevated levels of radiation have been found in raw milk, sea water and 11 kinds of vegetables, including broccoli, cauliflower and turnips, prompting several countries to halt some food imports from Fukushima region.
Tap water in several areas of Japan, including Tokyo, also measured at levels two times higher than the government standard for infants, who are particularly vulnerable to cancer-causing radioactive iodine.
On Friday, nuclear safety officials revealed that they suspected a breach in one or more of the plant’s units, possibly a crack or hole in the stainless steel chamber around a reactor core containing fuel rods or the concrete wall surrounding a pool where spent fuel rods are stored.
Suspicions were aroused when two workers suffered skin burns after unexpectedly encountering water that was 10,000 times more radioactive than levels normally found in the units, NISA said.
