Japan:High radiation levels found in Tokyo + Related News
Laaska News Oct. 13,2011
High radiation level affects school routes
High radiation in Tokyo residential area
High radiation levels found in Tokyo
High radiation levels have been observed in Tokyo’s Setagaya Ward.
Experts commissioned by the ward said on Thursday that up to 3.35 microsieverts per hour was detected 1 meter over a sidewalk near a residential fence.
The ward found a high of 2.707 microsieverts per hour a week ago in a 1-by-10-meter area, and made it off limits to protect schoolchildren and others.
The experts found that the most recently detected radiation is highly limited, as levels fall by almost half about 1 meter from the fence.
They added that up to 0.7 microsieverts per hour was recorded 4 meters from the strip.
The ward says it will work with residents to gauge radiation levels inside the fence and collect and analyze leaves at the site.
Environment official Yoko Saito says the survey has provided a rough picture of high-radiation spots. She says the ward will use the findings to find out the cause of the high levels and consider countermeasures.
High radiation level affects school routes
Tokyo’s Setagaya Ward has changed school routes in order to keep children away from the small area where a relatively high level of radiation has been detected.
On Thursday morning, about 10 teachers and local officials stood at an intersection to redirect children on their way to a nearby elementary school.
Some children were accompanied by their parents. A mother of a first-grader said she is worried that her child may have passed along the radiation contaminated site every day for over 6 months since the Fukushima accident.
The ward had already made the 10-by-one-meter area along a sidewalk off limits after announcing the finding on Wednesday.
But the ward decided to change school routes in response to concerns voiced by parents.
A ward official said the changes in the school routes will stay in place until the ward determines what caused the high level of radiation and decontaminates it properly.
High radiation in Tokyo residential area
A sidewalk in Setagaya ward, in the western part of Tokyo, has shown a radiation level of 2.707 microsieverts per hour, much higher than other areas in the same ward.
Setagaya ward put the 10-meter by 1-meter area on the roadside off limits, as elementary school children walk by on their way to and from a nearby elementary school.
The ward tried to decontaminate the spot earlier this month by using a high-pressure washer, but it only brought down the highest radiation reading by about 0.1 microsieverts per hour.
The ward is consulting experts to figure out what to do about the highly contaminated area.
The radiation dose at a place with a reading of 2.7 microsieverts per hour would accumulate to 38.88 microsieverts a day, and to 14.2 millisieverts a year, in line with assumptions used by the science & technology ministry. The ministry assumes that people spend 8 hours outdoors and 16 hours indoors every day.
The exposure of 14.2 millisieverts a year is lower than the government designated evacuation level of 20 millisieverts per year.
NHK.
Radiation levels spike at locations in Tokyo
TOKYO, Oct. 13 (Xinhua) — Radiation levels at areas in Tokyo and Chiba prefectures were found Thursday to far exceed current levels in Fukushima prefecture, home to the crisis-hit No. 1 nuclear power plant located 200 km north of Tokyo.
An area along a sidewalk in Tokyo’s Setagaya Ward, frequently used by elementary school children, was found to have airborne radiation measuring 3.35 microsieverts per hour and a children’s amusement park tested positive with 5.82 microsieverts in the Funabashi district of neighboring Chiba prefecture, local authorities said Thursday.
By way of comparison, the latest readings taken from inside the evacuation zone in Fukushima prefecture, the central to the world’ s worst nuclear accident in 25-years, measured 2.17 microsieverts per hour, according to local prefectural officials.
An investigation is currently underway to determine whether the troubled nuclear plant in Fukushima is responsible for the high doses of radiation detected in and around Japan’s capital city and Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujimura said Thursday that nuclear agencies and government authorities will increase monitoring activities around the country.
The two hotspots have been cordoned off and authorities have attempted to reduce the concentration of radiation by using water and “other” methods, local media said, but the levels have remained worryingly high despite the counter-measures, sparking widespread panic around Japan’s primary metropolis.
Compounding public fears, city officials in the neighboring port city of Yokohama said on Wednesday that radioactive Strontium above ordinary levels had been detected on the roof of a residential building in the city — itself located 250 km south of the No. 1 plant in Fukushima prefecture.
Officials said that 195 becquerels of Strontium-90, which can cause bone cancer and leukemia, was detected in deposits on the rooftop, sparking concerns the contamination may have spread further afield.
It is the first time Strontium-90 at a concentration of more than 100 becquerels per kilogram has been detected beyond 100 km from the troubled plant in Fukushima, the officials said.
Radiation dosages of up to 47 times higher than normal levels have also been detected from processed radioactive waste at a facility used for storage in Aomori Prefecture, in northern Japan.
According to Kyushu Electric Power Co. who discharged the spent nuclear fuel rods to be processed in Britain, levels of up to 190 becquerels of both beta and gamma rays were detected in three storage canisters. The utility firms said Thursday that workers are trying to decontaminate the radioactive canisters.
Laaska News.
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