JAPAN’S BATTERED FUKUSHIMA NUCLEAR PLANTS A global catastrophe waiting to happen? | BREAKING NEWS | Sky Valley Chronicle Washington State News

Japanese emergency workers spray water to try to cool reactor units at the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant in 2011. CLICK TO ENLARGE

(INTERNATIONAL) -- Akio Matsumura is a former UN diplomat who is very worried about the damaged Fukushima-Daiichi power plants in Japan.

He believes the highly radioactive spent fuel assemblies at the plants present a clear threat to the people of Japan and the world, noting that Reactor 4 and the nearby common spent fuel pool contain over 11,000 highly radioactive spent fuel assemblies, many of which are exposed to the open air.

“The cesium-137, the radioactive component contained in these assemblies, present at the site is 85 times larger than the amount released during the Chernobyl accident. Another magnitude 7.0 earthquake would jar them from their pool or stop the cooling water, which would lead to a nuclear fire and meltdown. The nuclear disaster that would result is beyond anything science has ever seen. Calling it a global catastrophe is no exaggeration,” writes Matsumura in a new article sounding the alarm on what he says is a very bad moon rising.

Matsumura is puzzled. He says if political leaders really understand the situation and the potential catastrophe, “I find it difficult to understand why they remain silent.”