Workers Continue Efforts to Prevent a Nuclear Disaster in Japan
18 March 2011
HMother and daughter receive radiation scanning in Fukushima, northern Japan, one week after a massive earthquake and tsunami.
This is IN THE NEWS in VOA Special English.
A huge earthquake and tsunami destroyed a large part of northeastern Japan last week. Survivors and rescue workers stopped for one minute on Friday to remember the hour when the earthquake struck.
The quake and tsunami killed at least six thousand people. More than nine thousand others are missing. About three hundred eighty thousand people have left their homes after they were heavily damaged or destroyed. Those displaced are now living in more than two thousand shelters.
There are shortages of food, water and fuel. Each day more roads are being reopened for trucks to take supplies to the survivors. But some communities remain cut off.
On Friday night, Prime Minister Naoto Kan spoke of the problems in a speech to the nation. The Prime Minister said he understands that people in shelters are cold and do not have enough food. But he said the government is doing all it can. And he said he hopes to return a sense of security to the survivors soon.
Helicopters gather water off Japan's northeast coast on their way to the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant.
Mister Kan also said the crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power center is the worst Japan has ever faced. He said police, firefighters and military workers were risking their lives to prevent a wider disaster. On Friday, workers continued to direct water on the damaged reactor buildings. It was an attempt to cool the highly radioactive fuel rods from overheating. Workers used powerful hoses to shoot fifty tons of water on the buildings. But the military and civilian firefighters had to keep their distance and limit the time they could be in the area because of the radiation.
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