Workers succeed in entering buildings of 3 troubled reactors: TEPCO+

TOKYO, May 19 Kyodo -
The operator of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant said Thursday workers have entered the buildings housing three troubled reactors to check what happened inside them after hydrogen explosions took place in the early days of the nuclear crisis.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. said it sent workers into the No. 3 reactor building Wednesday afternoon, following the entry of workers into the Nos. 1 and 2 reactor buildings. One worker who worked inside the No. 2 building suffered from heat stroke.
But as the utility known as TEPCO did not announce the information until Thursday morning, the company faced criticism over its stance on information disclosure.
The government's nuclear regulatory agency said it was informed of the workers' entry into the No. 3 reactor building Thursday morning, with spokesman Hidehiko Nishiyama acknowledging communication with the company was insufficient. TEPCO apologized for the delay.
As for the situation inside the No. 2 reactor building, TEPCO said it confirmed through a 15-minute survey Wednesday morning it would be difficult for people to engage in restoration work there for more than 15 minutes because of the high humidity and temperature.
The radiation level was found to be up to 50 millisieverts per hour on the first floor of the building. Three puddles existed and water was sprinkling from an area above one of the puddles. The workers did not find any major damage in the equipment, but TEPCO said it plans to further examine the situation.
The survey inside the No. 3 reactor building, meanwhile, took place for about 10 minutes from 4:30 p.m. Wednesday. Two workers measured the radiation level of some areas inside the building, which was up to around 160 to 170 millisieverts per hour.
The two were exposed to radiation of 2.08 and 2.85 millisieverts, respectively, TEPCO said.
As the working environment in the plant is expected to become tougher toward the summer, TEPCO official Junichi Matsumoto said in an afternoon press conference the company plans to create more air conditioner-equipped rest areas that would have a total capacity to accept some 1,000 workers by the first half of July and prepare for what is called ''cool vests'' for workers.
TEPCO is trying to contain the nuclear crisis triggered in the wake of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami in line with a road map that aims to bring the crippled Nos. 1 to 3 reactors to a stable cooling condition by mid-July and to a condition called ''cold shutdown'' by around January at the latest.
The three reactors and a spent nuclear fuel pool inside the No. 4 unit lost their key cooling functions after the plant located on the Pacific coast was hit by the quake and giant tsunami.