Japan exec: 750 workers pulled out from nuke plant

Around 750 workers at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in northeastern Japan were pulled out due to higher levels of radiation leakage at the facility, a ranking Japanese official told GMA News on Tuesday. In a phone-patch interview with GMA News TV's News To Go, Noriyuki Shikata, spokesperson of Japan Prime Minister Naoto Kan, said the decision to evacuate the plant workers was made as a safety precaution against higher levels of radiation at the power plant, which suffered a nuclear accident following Friday’s massive earthquake and tsunami. "So far we have not heard of any [new] casualties but for the sake of safety outside, the Tokyo Electrical Company decided to reduce the number of workers on site," Shikata said. Last Friday’s magnitude-9.0 (upgraded from 8.9) earthquake and the ensuing tsunami that hit northeastern Japan triggered an automatic shutdown at the nuclear plant, but damaged its cooling system, eventually leading to what has been described as a “level-4 nuclear accident" – the worst since the Chernobyl meltdown in the Ukraine in 1986. Shikata added that monitoring operations and efforts to cool down the reactors at the six-reactor nuclear power facility located in the Fukushima prefecture continue "with minimum number of workers remaining." On his Twitter account, Shikata said the biggest pullout of workers was in the building that houses Reactor No. 2, which is currently the most closely monitored by authorities. "As for Unit 2, the number of on-site workers has been reduced from 800 to 50, but injection of water is continuing," he said. Workers at the facility are rushing to continue pumping sea water into the damaged facility to prevent the nuclear rods in the reactors from getting too hot and emitting radiation into the air. In the GMA interview, Shikata also said the government continues to evacuate people living within the 20 to 30 kilometer radius of the power plant. "The number of people very close to the plant is I think still minimum in terms of the need for evacuation," he assured. Despite being one of the most industrialized nations in the world, Shikata said the country learned "very precious lessons" on how to respond to such a disaster. "This is something we have to share with the rest of the word in tems of maintaining safety in nuclear power plants," he said. Shikata also thanked other countries including the Philippines for sending either financial assistance or medical teams to help in the relief operations. "We deeply appreciate the offer of help from the global community," he said. He said the Japanese government is in close coordination with the Philippine embassy in Japan to ensure the safety of Filipinos there.—Mark D. Merueñas/JV, GMA News