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BBC MUNDO RADIO
• Explosion at Fukushima nuclear plant
• Death toll said to be more than 1,700
• Up to 10,000 people in one town are missing
• 215,000 people are in emergency shelters
• Around 50,000 rescuers have been deployed
• Google launches missing person finder
Read the Guardian's latest news story on the nuclear alert
- guardian.co.uk,
In this story, residents of Sendai and Tokyo recall what happened when the disaster struck – and how they survived.
Among recent developments, it has been reported that three people are being treated for exposure to radiation from the Fukushima nuclear site, while a plant operator has confirmed there has been no damage to the container or the nuclear reactor following the earlier explosion.
•There has been an explosion at the Fukushima No 1 nuclear power plant in north-eastern Japan, close to the epicentre of the quake. Officials say the blast is not a meltdown and radiation levels were low because the explosion had not affected the reactor core container.
•Tens of thousands of people in the areas surrounding Fukushima No 1 and No 2 plants have been urged to evacuate.
•Japanese authorities are preparing to distribute iodine to residents in the evacuation zones to protect them against radiation exposure.
•Dozens of aftershocks, some as strong as magnitude 6, struck Japan on Saturday. Japan's state broadcaster has warned people in coastal areas that there could be further tsunamis.
•Around 1,700 people are estimated to have been killed, according to local media reports, but that death toll is expected to rise dramatically.
•Around 9,500-10,000 people are missing in the town of Minamisanrikucho in Miyagi prefecture, according to Japanese news reports.
•More than 215,000 people are in emergency shelters and around 50,000 rescuers have been deployed across the country.
•At least 1.4m homes are without water and around three million are without power.
An official at the agency said it has given the incident a rating of 4 on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES), which equates to an accident with local consequences. Three Mile Island was rated 5 while Chernobyl received the highest rating of 7, he added.
As the Saturday morning sun burst onto the coast of Minamisoma, you could not tell the border between the sea and land as the whole town remained submerged. The occasional spots of white concrete foundations were all that remained of the houses washed away in the deadly tsunami.
Mud-soaked residents searched frantically for members of their families unaccounted for since the quake. A 40-year-old woman found the name of her parents — but not the name of her husband — on a list of evacuees posted at the municipal office. "I wish he is safe," she said.
"The tsunami devoured all the farm fields in a moment," said Chusei Sato, a 61-year-old farmer. On Friday, he watched as the debris-laden monster rode over an embankment several meters tall, laying siege to the area. The massive wave was about 200 meters away when he first saw it, but was approaching him at an accelerating speed.
He managed to escape unhurt by rushing up a hill, but two of his relatives are missing. On Saturday morning, he searched the area where their houses once stood, and learned the whole neighbourhood had been swept away by the tsunami. All he saw were the muddy debris of destroyed houses and cars.
Satellite images of the north-east coast of Japan before (left) and after the earthquake and tsunami. Water is black or dark blue and the thin green line in the 'after' image indicates the shoreline. Photograph: Nasa
He writes that the "strong earthquake alert" broadcast on NHK radio warns:
Take precautions against strong shaking. Stay away from furniture that might fall. Get under a table if you can. Slow down in you are driving.
Watts adds:
"Although the range of threats is alarming, it is reassuring to have such up to date and detailed information. Without this I guess the casualties would have been much higher."
town of 17,000 seems to have only 3 buildings standing, hospital, some wedding place and one more building. rest are gone.
This town in Miyagi prefecture is just gone, incredible devastation, all buildings except hospital are gone, highway in pieces., ppl missing
•There has been an explosion at the Fukushima No 1 nuclear power plant in north-eastern Japan, close to the epicentre of the quake. Officials say the blast is not a meltdown but exterior walls of one of the reactor buildings have been destroyed. There are also concerns about Fukushima No 2 plant.
•Tens of thousands of people in the areas surrounding both plants have been urged to evacuate.
•Japanese authorities are preparing to distribute iodine to residents in the evacuation zones to protect them against radiation exposure.
•There are reports of dozens of aftershocks, some as strong as magnitude 6, striking Japan in the wake of Friday's devastating earthquake and tsunami. Japan's state broadcaster has warned people in coastal areas that there could be further tsunamis.
•Around 1,700 people are estimated to have been killed, according to local media reports, but that death toll is expected to rise dramatically. The official death toll now stands at 574, with 586 people declared missing and 1,105 injured.
•Around 10,000 people are missing in the town of Minamisanrikucho in Miyagi prefecture, according to Japanese TV reports.
•More than 215,000 people are in emergency shelters and around 50,000 rescuers have been deployed across the country.
•At least 1.4m homes are without water and around three million are without power.
The team of 63 UK fire service search and rescue specialists, two rescue dogs and a medical support team were organised by the Department for International Development (DfID).
Andrew Mitchell, international development secretary, said: "The Japanese government has appealed directly to us for help. We will immediately dispatch a team to help Japan search for survivors as quickly as possible. Our highly trained rescue teams will leave the UK this afternoon and travel directly to the disaster zone."
Train carriages lie overturned in Shinchi town, Fukushima prefecture, after being washed away by Japan's earthquake-triggered tsunami. Photograph: AP The Guardian's Jon Watts who is heading to Sendai from Tokyo texts:
"Just felt our first aftershock. NHK were very quick - seemed like we heard their alert before the car started to rock. It was a level 5 quake, not too bad. Commentators warn bigger aftershocks are likely and people living near the coast should be aware that there could be more tsunamis."
The central area and beachfront of Sendai city after the Japanese tsunami. Photograph: blaiseplant/Twitter
The blast destroyed the exterior walls of the building, the plant operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co, has confirmed there is no damage to the steel container housing the reactor, he added.
"We have confirmed that the walls of this building were what exploded, and it was not the reactor's container that exploded," said Edano.
Cargo containers thrown around by the tsunami in Sendai, northern Japan. Photograph: Itsuo Inouye/AP
He writes:
"Giant shipping containers have been swept inland and smashed against buildings, all around me are trees and rubble. The streets covered in mud that was swept inland. There are dozens and dozens of cars that were carried along, twisted and turned, and crushed by the wave. The gas and water have been cut off, fires are burning, and locals say hundreds of people died in this area."
Regan, professor of nuclear physics at the University of Surrey, said:
"It looks as if the coolant pumps had initially stopped working. They shut down automatically when the reactor shuts down, but there is a backup system running off a diesel generator - it looks as though that's the bit that failed.
"As a result there is no way of pumping heat out of the reactor, so it has to cool naturally. If the reactor gets too hot, in principle this means the fuel rods can melt - but it looks unlikely this has happened to any great extent in this case.
"To reduce the pressure, you would have to release some steam into the atmosphere from the system. In that steam, there will be small but measurable amounts of radioactive nitrogen - nitrogen 16 (produced when neutrons hit water). This remains radioactive for only about 5 seconds, after which it decays to natural oxygen.
"But if any of the fuel rods have been compromised, there would be evidence of a small amount of other radioisotopes in the atmosphere called fission fragments (radio-caesium and radio-iodine). The amount that you measure would tell you to what degree the fuel rods have been compromised. Scientists in Japan should be able to establish this very quickly using gamma ray spectroscopy as the isotopes have characteristic decay signatures. Current reports seem consistent with a small leak to relieve pressure.
"But we still need to establish the cause and exact location of the explosion, which is a separate issue. So far it looks like it's not the reactor core that's affected which would be good news."
"Getting information out of the nuclear industry is never easy (a legacy perhaps of its Cold War origins) and the Japanese political system is also notorious for keeping a tight lid on unwelcome news. This all means it will be hard to know what is exactly happening at any one time at Fukushima.
"But I have been talking to a top British nuclear engineer who visited that plant in Japan and he says it was built in the 1970s and is not as earthquake-proof as later models. He also said there had long been speculation about how strong was the containment dome over the top of the reactor - the final barrier for any radioactive emissions to be released into the environment.
"It is also not the first time there have been problems at Fukushima. There have been reports of a loss-of-power incident in June last year. I have also seen suggestions that one reactor at the complex began using MOX (mixed plutonium-uranium) fuel starting in September."
Here's a gallery of the scenes of devastation across Japan on Saturday.
Kan added that he had spoken to several world leaders, including President Obama, and around 60 countries had expressed their sympathies to the Japanese people.
He added:
"At present, after the talks among political party heads held a while ago, government officials including the prime minister and the minister of economy, trade, and industry, along with experts, are making all-out efforts to get hold of and analyse the situation, and to take measures."
Miles from the ocean's edge, weary, mud-spattered survivors wandered streets strewn with fallen trees, crumpled cars, even small airplanes. Relics of lives now destroyed were everywhere half a piano, a textbook, a soiled red sleeping bag.
Rescue workers plied boats through murky waters around flooded structures, nosing their way through a sea of detritus, while smoke from at least one large fire billowed in the distance. Power and phone reception was cut, while hundreds of people lined up outside the few still-operating supermarkets for basic commodities. The gas stations on streets not covered with water were swamped with people waiting to fill their cars.
A convenience store three miles (5km) from the shore was open for business Saturday, though there was no power and the floors were covered with a thick layer of grime.
"The flood came in from behind the store and swept around both sides," said shop owner Wakio Fushima. "Cars were flowing right by."
The city's Wakabayashi district, which runs directly up to the sea, remained a swampy wasteland with murky, waist-high water. Most houses were completely flattened.
Grief-stricken residents searched for their former homes, but many couldn't even tell where they had stood in the dark water. Occasionally there was something recognizable a chair, a tire or a beer cooler.
Papua New Guinea: The Boram hospital in Wewak suffered serious damage when it was flooded by waves. Around 50 of the 100 patients were evacuated to the police station compound where most are lying outside. Heavy rains are now reported in the area, causing concerns about sanitation.
The Solomon Islands: The worst damage was in the northern Isabel province. "The water is reported to have reached 50 metres inland and in one village, a house was destroyed and several canoes washed into the sea," said Oxfam representative Joe Weber.
Tonga: Oxfam programme manager Dolores Devesi, said: "There were no waves here, just big tides. People spent the night at consolidation points inland from the coast, but now there are lots of cars returning home."
Samoa: "There were warnings in place all night but the only wave activity looked smaller than Hawaii, which we saw on TV," said Women in Business Development Incorporated, an Oxfam partner agency.
He adds:
"Some say its impossible anyway given the design of the reactor. But I was down at Chernobyl two weeks ago to survey the clean-up there and it was certainly a sobering insight into how devastating an atomic accident can be.
"The Chernobyl plant is still highly radioactive - 25 years after that accident - and far from fully dismantled or decommissioned. The nearby town of Pripyat lies completely empty. 50,000 people were evacuated from there and told they would be back the following weekend. They never returned."
The four people injured in the nuclear plant explosion are conscious and their injuries are not life-threatening, it also reports.
Tania Branigan says that contrary to earlier reports the evacuation zone around Fukushima No 2 is only 10km (6 miles), not 20km. The evacuation zone around Fukushima No 1 plant is 20km, however.
He told the BBC:
"In these situations, Britain can offer help in the form of search and rescue teams or victim identification expertise. They have now asked for some help, we're nailing down the details of that and further announcement about that will be made later today."
Hague had this to say about possible British casualties:
"We have no confirmed British casualties as yet, but of course the picture will become clearer as recovery teams do their work, as communications are re-established in the affected area."
Ian Hore-Lacy, of nuclear industry body the World Nuclear Association, also said the blast may not necessarily have caused a radiation leak.
He told Reuters:
"It is obviously an hydrogen explosion ... due to hydrogen igniting. If the hydrogen has ignited, then it is gone, it doesn't pose any further threat. As far as we know there is no particular danger from radiation leaks. There may be, but we don't know that. There is no reason to suppose that there must be because of that."
Overnight reports had suggested that the incoming tsunami wave could be higher than many low-lying Pacific islands, with the potential to wash right over them. With thousands of islands to account for, it will be some time before the complete picture is available. However, early information suggests these islands so far appear to have avoided the worst-case scenario.
The BBC has a video of smoke coming from Fukushima plant No 1 following the explosion.
A the news agency reports that it is not clear if a reactor meltdown would cause a serious radiation risk, and if it did how far the risk would extend:
Yaroslov Shtrombakh, a Russian nuclear expert, said a Chernobyl-style meltdown was unlikely.
"It's not a fast reaction like at Chernobyl," he said. "I think that everything will be contained within the grounds, and there will be no big catastrophe."
In 1986, the Chernobyl nuclear reactor exploded and caught fire, sending a cloud of radiation over much of Europe.
Pressure has been building up in Fukushima reactor it's now twice the normal level and Japan's Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency told reporters Saturday that the plant was venting "radioactive vapors." Officials said they were measuring radiation levels in the area. Wind in the region is weak and headed northeast, out to sea, according to the Meteorological Agency.
The reactor in trouble has already leaked some radiation: Operators have detected eight times the normal radiation levels outside the facility and 1,000 times normal inside Unit 1's control room.
Ryohei Shiomi, a nuclear official, said that each hour the plant was releasing the amount of radiation a person normal absorbs in a year.
He has said that even if there were a meltdown, it wouldn't affect people outside a six-mile (10-kilometer) radius an assertion that might need revising if the situation deteriorates. Most of the 51,000 residents living within the danger area had been evacuated, he said.
•Japan's prime minister Naoto Kan has declared a state of emergency at two nuclear power plants as engineers try to establish whether a reactor at one of the stations has gone into meltdown.
• Diesel generators that normally would have worked as back-ups to keep cooling systems running had been disabled by tsunami flooding.
• Power supply systems to provide emergency electricity for the plants were being put in place, the World Nuclear Association said.
• Both plants are light water reactors operated by the Tokyo Electric Power company (or Tepco).
Fukushima Daiichi No 1 plant
– Japanese media said officials had detected caesium, one of the elements released when overheating causes core damage, around a reactor at Fukushima No 1 plant in Futuba, 150 miles (240km) north of Tokyo. The plant has six reactors, three of which have been shut down for maintenance.
– The Tokyo Electric Power Company (Tepco) said it did not believe a meltdown was under way, but Ryohei Shiomi, an official with Japan's nuclear safety commission, said that it was possible.
Fukushima Daini No 2 plant
– has four reactors, and in units 1, 2 and 4 of them the operator has said it has lost cooling ability.
– Tepco says pressure is stable inside the reactors of the Daini plant but rising in the containment vessels.
• Both plants have been declared to be in a state of emergency by the government, and an evacuation of the 80,000 residents who live within the 10km zone around both plants is underway.
Here's a round-up of events so far in Japan on Saturday.
•There are growing fears about damage to two nuclear power stations following Friday's 8.9 magnitute earthquake. There has been an explosion at a building at one of the plants, Fukushima No 1 in Futuba, 150 miles (240km) north of Tokyo. Japanese authorities have extended the evacuation area at the Fukushima No 2 plant to 10km, the same distance as for Fukushima No 1 plant.
•The death toll from the disaster is expected to exceed 1,300, with most deaths due to drowning. The official death toll currently stands at 413, with 784 people missing and 1,128 injured.
•The tsunami swept about six miles (10km) inland in some areas. Police said between 200 and 300 bodies were found along the coast in Sendai, the biggest city in the area near the quake's epicentre.
•Police estimate that more than 215,000 people are taking refuge in emergency shelters in the east and north of the country. Many survivors have been trapped overnight on rooftops, surrounded by a sea of mud and water. Around 50,000 rescuers have deployed to the region.
•Tsunami warnings for most of Japan have been lowered, although there is still a risk of large waves along the north-eastern coast.
•The tsunami rolled across the Pacific at jet speed but had weakened before it hit Hawaii and the West Coast of the US. Initial reports suggest limited tsunami damage to Pacific island nations.
For more details of events in Japan overnight and this morning, please check our earlier live blog.
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