Crack at Japan plant spills radiation into sea: TEPCO

Workers discover a crack in a pit at the crippled nuclear plant leaking highly radioactive water into the sea.

TOKYO: Japanese workers struggling to contain a crisis at a crippled nuclear plant discovered Saturday a crack in a pit leaking highly radioactive water straight into the sea, the firm operating the facility said.

As emergency crews rushed to cement the crack, the Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO) said it is also preparing to take samples from the ocean near the Fukushima nuclear plant to determine the level of contamination.

"Today, at about 9:30 am (0030 GMT), workers found that some water, with a radioactivity of 1,000 millisievert per hour, had accumulated in a pit near reactor number two's water intake facility," a TEPCO official said.

"They then found that a 20 centimetre crack had emerged in the pit and that radioactive water was leaking directly into the sea."

TEPCO plans to fill in the crack, while checking radiation levels in sea water at three locations 15 kilometres offshore in addition to four spots where they have already taken samples, he said.

Since the six-reactor Fukushima plant's cooling systems were knocked out by the March 11 quake and tsunami, the danger of radioactive leaks into the environment has been the top concern.

TEPCO said earlier that radioactive iodine-131 in groundwater below Japan's stricken nuclear plant was significantly higher than the safe level set by the government.

The Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA) confirmed that a crack had been found, saying TEPCO was trying to get a clearer picture of how the leak originated.

"TEPCO is checking where the water accumulating in the pit came from," said NISA official Hidehiko Nishiyama.

TEPCO said it was also investigating if other cracks remained in the facility causing leaks into the environment.