This was originally posted on Saturday, March 12 at 2:01 PM EST. It has been updated multiple times, and some of the information at the top may be outdated. Please see the bottom of this post for the most recent news.
Jump straight to the latest updates.
Fears of a potential nuclear catastrophe are high in northern Japan, where multiple explosions have occured at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station and the cooling systems at three separate reactors are suffering problems. Officials have reported that a partial meltdown has likely occured at the reactors, though the extent of the damage to the core is not yet clear. The emergency at the plant comes on top of the devastation caused by an 8.9 earthquake and a 33-foot tsunami.
Details are still emerging about what's happening at the plant. There was a blast on the site on Saturday afternoon at Unit 1, followed by explosions at Unit 3 on Monday and Unit 2 on Tuesday. The plant is about 160 miles north of Tokyo, and residents within a 12.6-mile radius have been evacuated. There are six boiling-water reactors on the site, though only three were in operation at the time of the earthquake. These systems rely on an influx of water to cool the reactor core. But the water systems rely on electricity, and the earthquake cut off the electricity supply. It also appears that something—either the initial quake, the tsunami, or aftershockes—knocked the site's back-up generators offline. Without the cooling system bringing in water, the core of these reactions will start to overheat—which in turn will heat up the water already in the system and causes more of it to turn to steam. Emergency responders are in a race against the clock to bring in new water supplies to prevent the core from getting too hot, which could cause a meltdown.
Tokyo Electric Power Company, the owner of the plant, has been flooding the reactors with a mix of sea water and boric acid, which is used to absorb the neutrons and prevent further nuclear reactions inside the fuel rods. They have encountered multiple problems, however, with keeping water levels up in the three troubled reactors. Leaving the rods exposed causes them to heat up faster and increases the liklihood that they will sustain damage.
From the original post:
The New York Times reported Saturday that Japanese officials have said it occurred in a turbine facility, not in the actual reactor container. But the International Atomic Energy Agency—the United Nation's arm that serves as watchdog on nuclear energy issues around the world—said on Saturday that Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency informed them that the explosion occurred at the Unit 1 reactor.
CNN is reporting that the responders working on this site are planning to bring in sea water to cool the reactor.
Residents within a 12.6-mile radius of the plant have been evacuated, with radiation levels near the site reportedly very high. Residents in a 6-mile radius around the nearby Fukushima Daini nuclear power plant also have been evacuated. The IAEA reports that officials are developing plans to hand out in these areas iodine tablets, which are used to block the absorption of radiation.
I'll be providing updates on this developing story below:
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