Mistaken radiation readings unforgivable, Japanese official says

PanARMENIAN.Net - Mistaken radiation readings given out by the operator of Japan's crippled nuclear plant were "absolutely unforgivable," the government's chief spokesman said on Monday, March 28, as highly radioactive water was found to have leaked out of a reactor.

Engineers have been battling to control the six-reactor Fukushima complex since it was damaged by a March 11 earthquake and tsunami that also left more than 27,000 people dead or missing across northeast Japan.

Fires, explosions and radiation leaks have repeatedly forced them to suspend work, including on Sunday when radiation levels spiked to 100,000 times above normal in water inside reactor No. 2. Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), the plant operator, had earlier said it was 10 million times the normal level.

"On one hand, I do think the workers at the site are getting quite tired," Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano told a news conference. "But these radiation tests are being used for making various decisions on safety and therefore these mistakes are absolutely unforgivable."

A partial meltdown of fuel rods inside the reactor vessel was responsible for the high levels of radiation at reactor No. 2 but Edano said the radiation had mainly been contained in the reactor building.

TEPCO later said radiation above 1,000 millisieverts per hour was found in surface water in channels outside the reactor. That is the same as the level discovered on Sunday. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says a single dose of 1,000 millisieverts is enough to cause hemorrhaging.

The underground channels did not flow into the sea but the possibility of radioactive water seeping into the ground could not be ruled out, company officials told a news conference, Reuters reported.