Japanese nuclear regulatory officials have raised the classification of the disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant to a level 7, only the second catastrophe in history to receive such a rating.
As the Los Angeles Times reports, the move comes a day after three major aftershocks within 10 minutes rattled northeastern Japan, already reeling from the nuclear crisis and trying to recover from the massive earthquake and tsunami that struck on March 11.
However, officials say that the heightened disaster classification issued Tuesday wasn’t based on new quake damage but rather a fresh calculation of the impact of radiation released from the complex, which has contaminated vegetables, air, tapwater and seawater.
While the Fukushima disaster qualifies as a level 7 according to the International Atomic Energy Agency scale, meaning it is “a major accident,” officials stress that the damage has been far less than at Chernobyl, the site of the 1986 meltdown that was the only previous level-7 disaster. Chernobyl, located in Ukraine, spewed roughly 10 times as much radioactive material into the environment as has Fukushima.
“At Chernobyl, the reactor itself exploded,” said Minoru Ogoda of Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency. “At Fukushima some radioactivity has leaked from the reactor, but the reactor itself continues to keep most of the radioactive material inside. In that sense, this is different from Chernobyl.”
Fukushima previously was graded a level-5 accident, same as at Three-Mile Island, the Pennsylvania complex that suffered a partial meltdown in 1979.
An estimated 27,000 Japanese are dead or missing as a result of the disaster. The government Monday expanded the evacuation zone that people are to leave to avoid long-term radiation exposure to communities as far as 25 miles from the Fukushima plant.
Related Posts:
Amid Aftershocks, Japan Widens Radiation Evacuation Zone
Radioactive Water Leak Plugged at Japanese Nuclear Plant
Soaring Radiation Points to Long Struggle at Japanese Nuclear Plant
