Fukushima level 7

One month after the tsunami the Fukushima nuclear crisis was upgraded
from a level 5 nuclear incident – an accident with wider consequences – to a
level 7 incident – a major accident.

This is the maximum level and puts it in the same category as Chernobyl. At the
time, many found the classification to be misleading as the severity of the disaster
was determined by measuring the total amount of radiation emitted over the
month. Ten times the amount of radiation had been emitted at Chernobyl over a
much shorter time span.

In addition, the authorities in Japan evacuated the area far more quickly and, to
date, no one has suffered ill effects from the radiation from Fukushima.

The next article looks at the levels of radiation in the population six months after
the meltdown.

(Text: © The Open University/Image: © Silver Spoon, viaCreative

(https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:INES_en.svg), Wikimedia
Commons Attribution-Share
Alike 3.0 Unported Licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0))