not at so great a risk of course the b. radiation is carried by particles in the air but it diminishes geometrically with distance so hopefully the levels ten kilometers away or twenty kilometers away are not nearly as high at the moment well what about the a precautions that people can take with trying to get as many insights as possible so the government has asked the public to wear masks stay indoors is that enough what else should people be doing the easiest thing that they can do within their homes perhaps that's to protect themselves if radiation levels do get out of control. yes well and good government seems to be giving very good advice of course the difficulty again is the difference between the type of material being vented here and at daiichi a meeting the likelihood is it is mostly steam. in charitable. vaporised

. big prize graphite would have materialized as as dust or affected people as dust so staying inside would have been the best option is seen applies to daiichi but of course if the water condenses and enters the water supply. may get undrinkable so people wearing masks keeping their doors and windows shut and keeping their air circulation systems such as heating and air conditioner switched off is about all you can do i mean. the government has given excellent advice and in that situation there really isn't anything else you can do if radiation levels are high the government as you mentioned will administer anti-radiation medications such as such as i heating pad and let's talk about what the government is a doing earlier you mentioned that there is still a chance to contain savage that shame up power plants but looking at pictures you

see an explosion it seems massive let's put it into perspective what else can the government how have they been handling this and what else can they did is it going to be an issue of that power is it going to be an issue of machinery what does it entail to contain something like this. yes when there is an excellent question it's difficult to answer knowing exactly what's happening on the ground the military and the firefighters who who are in the vicinity working on this problem are certainly specially trained to deal with this kind of emergency. i can imagine i can. speculate that they are attempting to cool. the remaining reactor core using a high pressure water if the roof of the building is off then about water will simply vaporize into radioactive steam the amount of water required to cruel the

reactor core will be significant so there simply seem to be two options one is to continue trying to deliver water to that reactor core and the second is simply to evacuate as many people as possible so obviously unfortunately emergency workers in the vicinity will be receiving. quite dangerous levels of radiation. at this point the best thing that the public can do what the government can do for the public is to move people as far away as possible. we have the whole world watching what's going on in japan memories of chernobyl come up and have been repeated now or what is the effect for the rest of the world sub have been mentioning it's an issue of the winter carrying radiation of the seas being at contaminated what exactly is it impact the implication of such a disaster on the rest of the world. well hopefully first of all hopefully this

disaster will be compared to chernobyl relatively we can hope for a relatively small scale disaster as i mentioned only one out of the six power reactors at fukushima daiichi seems to have exploded or not the reactor itself but the building around it probably due to the build up of high pressure steam yes of course depending on the prevailing winds and the and sea conditions that radiation will be carried elsewhere in the world and i i i don't want to. i'm speculating without having more facts but i would personally like to be cautiously optimistic that even the nature of this reactor given the fact that it is a light water boiling water reactor cooled by water. this radioactive material will. either not be carried too far or

the effects of the damage will be will be contained and this will not be a situation comparable to charitable when radioactive dust clouds reached your north america will your they're living in tokyo i'm just curious i've japan's buildings are have been designed and built to withstand earthquakes but what about the nuclear power plant has it been designed to withstand earthquakes you know it's the pan is other but the cost of those means that say three tectonic plates it's definitely prone to earthquakes then you have a nuclear power plant but for my first question is can it has been decided it's been designed to withstand such quakes and a second question is is the risk is that such a great risk to have a nuclear power plant in the first place in a country like japan. yes the question of whether or not going to japan should have nuclear power is of course uppermost in many people's minds tonight of

course yes these these reactors have been built for any eventuality not only earthquake but some kind of. external damage from some sort of accident rather. external impact from a car or airplane and these reactors are built to last now as as i mentioned these daiichi reactors are quite old now they're approximately forty years old or the oldest one was built and nine hundred seventy nine and i believe the number six reactor was completed in the early one nine hundred eighty s. . the technology of the earthquake prevention and earthquake proofing technology such as it is as it moved on since then as you as you've seen the effects of this very powerful earthquake on tokyo have been quite minimal we are very fortunate that japan has incredibly strict building codes and unlike the situation in kobe

it seems as though these codes have been followed and the buildings in tokyo and other parts of japan have resisted the quake the nuclear reactors would have been built to even stricter standards so these these fukushima daiichi reactors were built to contain it to withstand rather the impact of a significant tectonic event and problem in this case does not seem to be the structure of the reactor itself rather the fact that the for some reason the electricity supply provided by the backup generators and backup easily generators failed and now these generators would be on site they would be very. to the reactor and i don't know what would cause them to fail other than the transmission lines to

the reactor or the earthquake damaging the diesel generators and cells as i mentioned they did seem to work for approximately one hour before shutting down and the plant was forced to switch over to batteries which can only last a matter of hours i imagine by now the power power has been established that reactor to dr who in systems but the water pumped into that reactor would have superheated so quickly that the pressure built up would have caused this explosion and destroyed the building so yes of course improvements can always be made and new generations of light water reactors are certainly safe i would say i'm off two minds about whether japan should have nuclear power in terms of the current global environmental situation it's a better alternative and fossil fuels but of course given today there are significant dangers in a country such as making just tell us the

a reaction of the people in tokyo i mean it's a couple of hundred of kilometers away from the actual plant but how are people reacting are they are they in a panic are they just are they going out to buy as remedies to a possible radioactive contamination so how are people in tokyo reacting to the names. and at the moment we since it's it's now evening here most people are in their homes so they're probably watching events unfold on television. so there certainly is no panic in the streets. i would imagine that people in tokyo are more concerned about this event the explosion that number one than they were about the the after effects of the quake itself as a. we have been receiving aftershocks for the past twenty four hours and in fact we've had a few small tremors while i've been talking as you. magnitude three quake.

has hit sendai in the rocky area. about four five pm today so so other small crates are critics are still occurring i would say the nuclear issue is more pressing for people in tokyo but the citizens of tokyo have reacted remarkably well to this event they are of course train from childhood to be prepared for such an eventuality the communal spirit of the people in the streets today and yesterday has been an absolute joy to watch actually as a foreigner. being on the streets especially foreigners are not often smile that in japan but people in the streets in the past they have been smiling helpful i hope and each other concerned with each other's welfare there is no panic there is no certainly no riot rising and looting crime people are working together to help each

other and help those who need it i imagine people are concerned about the nuclear situation but no there is certainly no panic the country at least in the south is handling the news quite calmly. good a bit of a positive news there given the circumstances thank you very much for it taking out for your time christopher assignments from international christian university in tokyo. again it just to remind you of what's been going on a breaking news at this hour attempt to happen as officials have confirmed the explosion at the if daiichi power plant and it had all see on your screens up white smoke billowing up from the plant at least four people were injured by the extent of the damage is unknown at this time but there are few. years of the possible meltdown and the nuclear safety agency says it's collecting information about the blast it's still unclear where exactly it occurred why and again the extent of the

damage is unclear but what we do know some of the information trickling in the roof of the fukushima reactor has collapsed and radioactivity is said to be rising rapidly all residents living within a twenty kilometer radius of the nuclear plant are being evacuated just to remind you about the precautions the government is taking it was a ten kilometer radius now it's extended to a twenty kilometer radius people are asked to evacuate and they are also being urged to a save electricity amid fears of power supply cots and earlier a state of emergency was declared at five nuclear reactors after the generators pumping cooling water had failed it had failed because following an earthquake eight point nine magnitude earthquake that struck on friday afternoon and then there was a tsunami a massive tsunami that followed well evacuations have been taking place thousands of residents have already been moved amid fears of the leak at

a second plant in here by the prime minister himself and said prime minister noda khan had said that he does not rule out a leak at the second plant looking at the death toll from the catastrophes the official number of deaths in japan after the tsunami is over seven hundred but there are local reports claiming that thousands are missing and the a number is expected to rise well it is not just japan now that is on high alert of course you have russia's far east which is located to the north of the country is very close to the disaster area so they're also on high alert the u.n. nuclear watchdog the international atomic energy agency is currently urging japanese authorities to provide them with information as to the damage and possible effects of the blast now. we've been getting a speculation on what could have happened but we still need laughter information from what exactly happened now dr robert cheik of say

a research associate professor of nuclear history and culture at. gave us his new album explosion. having studied the history of these incidents in the past i know that at this reactor there had been attempts to reduce the pressure inside the reactor core and to cool the reactor to avoid a meltdown. to see an explosion as we saw in that building obviously indicates a failure in those efforts. clearly the situation in this reactor is not under control that there's an explosion of that sort that blows the building apart so it would. it's hard to say exactly what it reflects but it would certainly indicate the likelihood of a partial meltdown in the potentiality of four meltdown in order to keep the fuel of a nuclear power plant cool if you will is cooled with with water the water the heat

of the reactor rods will will boil that water will escape. which will be somewhat radioactive so new water needs to be continually pumped through in order to cool these rods don't know what's failed in these in these reactors is the cooling system because if it's a dependency on electricity in order to run the cooling system so with no access to electricity the backup generators that were initially these plants did fail because of the tsunami and the earthquake and so generators battery driven generators had been brought in in order to pump the water and cool the fuel rods it appears as though they were having trouble maintaining the flow of water to cool these rods and with the water boils away in the rods are. exposed and the robots will begin to melt and the fuel will begin to melt down when this happens to be a much larger release of radiation into the environment than is released by. the

water boiling away so it would appear given the fact that there was an explosion in this building the likelihood that there is remaining water cooling these rods would have to be very slim at this point clearly any exposure to radiation at all down for the human body and bad for human health. there's been warnings already on japanese television and in the region to take precautions to minimize exposure to radiation and people are now being told to stay in their homes rather than to evacuate which would be an indicator of the presence of radiation in the atmosphere but it's not a simple matter to keep radiation outside of the house although it will minimize exposure so a lot of people in those areas and the people in the downwind areas are certainly in. risk. i mean exposures that could lead to health problems depending on the size of the of the releases any amount of radiation that enters the atmosphere the

nearby atmosphere there's a possibility the areas around the plants could be. pretty. much like the area around from the all as areas that wouldn't be needed and it wouldn't be ensured that a worst case scenario if there were cage to contain that area into a small area as possible his goal so people there people in those areas should be guidances of the government officials but they should definitely take steps to minimize their exposures at any rate to radiation. well again breaking it in this hour japanese officials have confirmed the explosion at the fukushima daiichi power plant in japan there are reports that at least four people were injured but the extent of the damage is unknown at this time and there are fears of a possible meltdown at the nuclear safety agency says it is. collecting information on the blast at the moment it is unclear as to where exactly the blast occurred within the plant itself but we do know that the roof of the of fukushima reactor

has collapsed and radioactivity is said to be rising rapidly and the government has announced that residents living within a twenty kilometer radius of the plant are being evacuated that has just been extended from a ten kilometer to a twenty kilometer radius and they're taking precautions certainly the public has also been urged to save electricity and fears of power supply cuts they've also been urged to stay indoors and there are reports that the government is preparing to secure the safety of people in the area earlier a state of emergency was declared at five nuclear reactors after the generators responsible for pumping cooling water had failed now according to the experts we've been talking to they run on electricity apparently that has been caught then they were running on batteries but it only lasts for a few hours which is the reason why there was a danger of overheating temperatures going up and now we're seeing pictures of the

white smoke from the explosion that was confirmed by the japanese government again all this is happening after the eight point nine magnitude earthquake that struck japan on a friday in the north east coast of the contrary and it resulted in a massive tsunami of course there were evacuations along the coast a line because of damage of the a tsunami as well as fears of leaks of a radiation leak at the first plant as well as a possible one of a second plant also in the northeast of the country the fukushima plant number one and number two now there's a possible leak as well so evacuations have been taking place apparently around fifty one thousand residents nearby have been evacuated to shelters set up by the government now the official. the death toll in japan and that is from the devastation caused by the earthquake the tsunami is now at over seven hundred but

there are local reports claiming a thousands are missing i would is japan who is on high alert emergency services are also on high alert in russia's far east we know that is it is located very close to the area of the disaster to give you an idea it is located to the north of japan the u.n. a nuclear watchdog the international atomic energy agency is currently urging japanese authorities to provide them with information as to the diamond and the possible effects of the blast but we heard from them they said that they are still gathering information but we do need to know exactly what has happened we are seeing smoke at the moment ecologists to evolve a lot of from greenpeace believes that japan has been playing a dangerous game with its nuclear power for some time now. seven difficult that bill press had to say that a similar fate because in the end invent the caesar was similar fate was a magnitude eight point three and it was eight point. zero was totally predictable

that was a big man and it was a story i'm referring now for russian geological speciality that isn't easy or teasing to pass up nuclear power station on the places where you have first breaks as a normal so seeing. as it shows the games that he cannot construct he cannot produce a few power but specific within justice to do it on this dangerous areas and so there is you see you're basically saying that there is just no way back to nuclear power plants can exist safely in an area such as japan it's just awful simple as that what you're saying. your black power can not be safe you know a little bit cool things if you using the things like japan where you can expect from those if you want to is still fragile already on a watch. and if you. write me and you see she was shot she was tall and one of those was the freddy one of those big jim was on one side and the

on but that was enough for the construction you have five holes from big but this season was two thousand. and. one what potential victim was evil and the only have an example of should not believe a platform of the most probable cause to made shows that the one hundred six thousand people die because of trouble explosions you can imagine what would happen if the density of population and bolts of them shallow and the wings. of china. so. i found was that moment when you. predict something but if you look at it from much more serious than. if you look forward to that and that's a good one to give no real information about that as to then why then did so to see the effect they get their surroundings. will be in place that make you feel to just

give us some idea from radiation levels that are seen as very dangerous to two human beings we already saw that the rain in the in the radiation levels that is has been rising about how dangerous is it up walking level should we be a ringing alarm bells there. that the level of the radiation but i would not recommend to leave. which would then feature my. things there is a normal look for these fifteen to twenty. and what is happening on their good service station what was reported even if they're all like five to eight cells in general already which is don't leave the brokerage for leaving and if they do a similar level or even surround the area and if you pull the. plug on the lights. you never afraid.

as you rightly mentioned earlier the human cost is really the most important the safety of the people living and within the vicinity even as far away as the capital what is the advice you would give to people within the area contaminated by radiation what could they do with them reach easily done to protect themselves. to just see if indeed why is. there still. standing that they. just know that that was already over with the family for example was. that is the most effective thing to raise that it was. anything which was. you know dishes that i didn't get but just the potential you. people use their lives and their decision to ripley's. believe it great this year. just to remind you of our breaking news story this hour the explosion at

a nuclear power plant in japan has been a confirmed by the government so there was indeed an explosion at the fukushima power plant that's a north east of the country there was reportedly shaking and a lot of white smoke as we've been showing you in the pictures we're getting from japan now the roof of the fukushima reactor also collapse that was the latest that we had gotten but the government said that they are still trying to get as much information as they can as to what exactly happened where the explosion took place within the clouds but at least four people were injured in the blast has increased fears of a possible meltdown and radiation legal at the moment the radiation levels is reported be about a thousand times normal level the prime minister not a con also said that there are fears he does not rule out a leak in the second plant which is also within the fukushima complex of their evacuation area has been expanded to a twenty kilometer radius around the plant from a ten kilometer one now the day began with a government declaring

a state of emergency at five nuclear reactors after the generators which is response which are responsible for pumping cooling water hadfield's that followed friday's record eight point nine magnitude earthquake and it resulted in a massive tsunami the official number of deaths that is from the devastation caused by the earthquake the tsunami in japan is now over seven hundred but that number could rise as thousands are reported to be missing or thousands more have been moved and it fears of a second to plant new york by the u.n. nuclear watchdog the international atomic energy agency is calling on the japanese authorities to provide them with urgent information as to the damage and possible effects of the blast well of course we will be up. david you on this story throughout the day do stay with us here on r.t. for our continuing coverage of the if events unfolding right now in japan the

latest is confirmed reports of an explosion at the fukushima power plant do stay with us on our team my colleague will be with you shortly. for the full sleep we've got. the biggest issues get a human voice face to face with the news makers.