say they ought to be doing this or ought to be doing that but in many ways it is an unprecedented problem an they re having to innovate the fixes on the fly here, aren t they? yeah, i would say from my particular arm chair that what the japanese could be doing is learning from past crises. we had one at 3-mile island, ukraine, in the then soviet union, had one at chernobyl, and we know there are situations of uncertainty and they are in that situation now, and so one of the best things they could do is be absolutely honest about what they don t know. one of the things they said was right on the money, and that is that they don t have a plan right now that they have confidence in of how to shut down this situation, so that that stops, so that the radioactivity moving into the environment ceases, coming from the reactor core or from the spent fuel ponds
hours that may have come from the reactor core. plutonium is a heavy metal. it doesn t travel very far. so i think the hope here is that most of the radiation is contained to the area immediately around the plant. the worry is that either it gets down into the ground water and then travels outside of the plant area, or that there s a subsequent explosion, a steam explosion, something inside the reactor, and then that like chernobyl would carry up material up into the atmosphere and be spread by the atmosphere. but so far, it s localized, and the best hope is that it will remain localized. jim, it s been going on three weeks now that we ve been watching these events unfold. tell me, is the trend line going in the right direction at this point? i mean, we obviously get distracted by libya and other crises around the world. if we come back three weeks from now and say is this solved, are we more likely to be fully resolved in terms of risks at
that have piping and electric wiring and that kind of thing. these are the tunnels we are speak about. these are filled with water. they have been dumping water in to cool out the reactor core and then you have the radioactive water already in there. some of that water, you know, if they can t transport is out of there, they have a hard time doing that. some of that assumingly has been drifting and pooling in these tunnels. like all substructure type of tunnels they need some sort of draining in the event water gets in there and some of those drainch tube you would assume gets out into the ocean and no confirmation of that. when you re talking about 3,000 times now the radioactive iodine that is in the air it s 131
plant. this is one of the most deadliest substances known to human kind. a speck will give you cancer, several specks can kill you. there is no safe level of plutonium. so finding it anywhere is dangerous. it s been very small amounts so far. but it s an indication say the japanese government officials that the containment areas around the reactor core has been breached. either in the reactor vessel itself, or in some of the piping going into the reactor. it s a sign that the radioactivity that s been generated inside the reactor is now coming out to the outside atmosphere, the ground around it, it s a dangerous sign that this could get a lot worse. just to clarify now, though, the epa is saying that if this plutonium is inhaled or ingested, that s when you said it s very dangerous, but that external exposure poses little health risk. do you agree with that? that s exactly right. it s a beta emitter. you can hold plutonium in your
day after news that the containment structure surrounding one reactor is damaged. workers found small amounts of plutonium that have leaked out from the reactor core. translator: if you look at the types of plutonium, the composition is different from the fallout. because of this, we believe this plutonium is likely to come from the reactor, which is troubled today. if we are going to detect higher level of plutonium we need to take higher measures. our intention is to continue with the monitoring. you re watching world one live from london. we head to new delhi and talk and meet the people that are trying to end the suffering there. . you know when to hold em.