Japanese regulators were so unprepared for a serious accident at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant that the emergency response center they set up nearby didn't even have an air filter to screen out radioactive particles, according to an interim report by an independent panel charged with investigating Japan's worst nuclear disaster.
Japanese regulators were so unprepared for a serious accident at the
Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant that the emergency response center they
set up nearby didn't even have an air filter to screen out radioactive
particles, according to an interim report by an independent panel charged with
investigating Japan's worst nuclear disaster.
Meanwhile, key personnel at plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co. (9501.TO)
didn't understand the workings of the emergency cooling system for Unit 1--the
first reactor to go out of control--a situation the report blasted as
"extremely improper." Engineers on the ground shut down another
system that supplied vital cooling water to Unit 3, without ensuring that an
alternative water source was available, leaving the overheating reactor without
a water supply for nearly seven hours, the report said. If the cooling had gone
properly, "damage to the reactor may have been lessened," the report
said.
Such problems are among key mistakes singled out by the report, the first
official attempt to determine what caused the nuclear accident that occurred
after the March 11 earthquake and tsunami knocked out power at the Fukushima
Daiichi plant.
The 500-page document, based on 900 hours of interviews with 456 people
involved in the accident, comes nine months after radioactive releases from
meltdowns at the plant made much of the surrounding area uninhabitable. It
describes a nuclear regulator and plant operator so unprepared for a serious
nuclear disaster that they didn't have the proper systems in place to deal with
it, and didn't always know how to use the mechanisms they had. And it stands in
stark contrast to Tepco's assertion that it made no major operational errors in
its post-accident response.
Yet the 10-person panel, comprised of experts ranging from a former prosecutor
to a specialist in nuclear medicine and a
Fukushima
mayor, doesn't have the power to compel hearings, and didn't assign blame to
individuals or suggest any action be taken against them.
In contrast, similar investigations in the
U.S.
are
often conducted by bodies with subpoena power, and accompany or are quickly
followed by inquiries into criminal or civil liabilities of the companies and
people involved. The
U.S.
government, for instance, had started criminal and civil investigations into
the April 2010 oil spill in the
Gulf of Mexico
by
June of that year.
The report notes that the panel's investigation is still incomplete because
there hasn't been time to interview many of the government officials
involved--including former prime minister
Naoto
Kan.
The
panel hopes to wrap up its final report by the summer of 2012.
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