Filed at 11:20 a.m. ET
TOKYO (Reuters) - A leak of high-pressure steam at a Japanese
nuclear power plant killed four workers on Monday but authorities
said no radiation escaped in the accident, which took place on the
anniversary of the 1945 atomic bombing of Nagasaki.
The incident was one of three at separate plants across Japan on
Monday and is sure to increase public distrust of the industry in a
country that depends on nuclear power for a third of its energy
needs.
``Radioactive materials weren't contained in the steam that
leaked out...there is no impact from radiation on the surrounding
environment,'' an official from the Nuclear and Industrial Safety
Agency (NISA) told a news conference.
Police initially said five workers had been scalded to death when
a pipe burst, but later corrected the figure to four.
Seven others were injured, three seriously, officials said.
The accident occurred in a building housing turbines for the
Number 3 reactor at the Mihama nuclear plant in Fukui prefecture,
320 km (200 miles) west of Tokyo.
``Staff rushed in screaming,'' said a woman who was working in
the plant's canteen. ``I put in a container all the ice I could find
and gave it,'' she told Kyodo news agency.
The temperature of the leaking steam would have been about 142
degrees Celsius (288 Fahrenheit), experts said.
An official at Kansai Electric Power, the operator of the plant,
said the 826 megawatt nuclear generation unit shut down
automatically when the steam leaked from the turbine, which is in a
separate building.
Kansai Electric said there were no plans to shut any other of its
plants for checks.
The workers involved, who were preparing to shut down the plant
for maintenance anyway, were all contractors. Officials said 221
people were in the building at the time of the rupture.
``We are now investigating the cause,'' Kansai Electric spokesman
Ikuo Morinaka told a news conference.
The Mihama plant was the first nuclear plant built by Kansai
Electric. The No. 1 reactor began service in November 1970.
OTHER INCIDENTS
A NISA official said a 600 millimeter (24 inch) hole had been
found in a pipe that feeds steam into the turbine.
A trade ministry spokesman said there was no technical problem
with the nuclear reactor's core at the plant.
In a separate incident at a nuclear plant, Tokyo Electric Power
-- Japan's biggest electricity producer -- said on Monday it had
shut a nuclear power generation unit at its Fukushima-Daini plant
because of a water leak.
TEPCO was forced to close all its 17 nuclear power plants
temporarily by April 2003 after admitting it had falsified safety
documents for more than a decade.
The revelations severely undermined public confidence in the
nuclear industry and a number of towns in Japan have held
referendums in the past few years and voted against construction of
more nuclear plants.
Later on Monday, a garbage disposal site at a nuclear power plant
in Shimane prefecture, western Japan, caught fire but was quickly
extinguished, Chugoku Electric Power Company said.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi told reporters he did not have
details of the Mihama incident. ``But I think we must do our best to
investigate the cause, prevent a repeat and to implement safety
measures.''
The only previous fatal accident at a Japanese nuclear power
plant was in 1967, in a fire at a plant in Ibaraki prefecture just
north of Tokyo. There was no radiation leak.
The worst previous incident at a nuclear facility was at a
uranium processing plant in Tokaimura, a town north of Tokyo.
That took place on September 30, 1999, when an uncontrolled
nuclear chain reaction was triggered after three poorly trained
workers used buckets to mix nuclear fuel in a tub.
The resulting release of radiation killed two workers and forced
the evacuation of thousands of nearby residents.
The latest incidents come as oil prices are hitting record highs.
Japan imports all of its oil, most from the Middle East.
A Tokyo-based oil trader said it was unlikely the shutdown of the
plant, which was planned anyway, would have an impact on oil demand
or prices because Kansai tended to use liquefied natural gas as an
alternative fuel when its nuclear plants were off-line.
``I think the impact (on the oil market) will be small,'' the
trader said.
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