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Radioactive sediment found miles from Japan nuclear crisis zone
Officials in Yokohama, Japan’s second largest city, are investigating soil samples after a radioactive substance was found in sediment atop an apartment building about 155 miles (250 kilometers)  from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, according to news reports.
The discovery has raised concerns that leaked radiation from three Fukushima reactors that suffered meltdowns after the March earthquake and tsunami may be more widespread than thought, The Japan Times reported Wednesday.
The findings come after a travel alert issued by the U.S. government last week, warning Americans in Japan to avoid areas near the stricken reactors.
The alert recommends that U.S. citizens stay away from areas within 20 kilometers (12 miles) of the nuclear facility. The State Department also admonished Americans to stay away from territory northwest of the plant in a zone that Japan calls the "Deliberate Evacuation Area." The zone includes Iitate-mura, the Yamagiya district of Kawamata-machi, Katsurao-mura, Namie-machi and parts of Minamisoma.
The radioactive isotope strontium-90 was detected on a rooftop by a private agency responding to a resident's request, The Japan Times reported.
Strontium-90 has been found in Japan at concentrations up to 20 becquerels before the nuclear crisis, The Japan Times said. The latest discovery found the strontium-90 level at 195 becquerels, according to the paper.
Since strontium-90, which has a half-life of 29 years, is widely dispersed in the environment and the food chain in trace amounts, external exposure is minimal, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. With internal exposure at high concentrations, strontium-90 can accumulate in the bones and is “one of the more hazardous constituents of nuclear wastes,” according to the EPA.
Meanwhile Wednesday, Tokyo Electric Power Co., the embattled utility whose territory includes the nuclear crisis zone, held a disaster drill at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power, according to news reports.
Japan's whaling could put lives at risk, New Zealand says
New Zealand joined Australia on Wednesday in criticizing Japan's decision to resume whaling in Antarctic waters later this year and Tokyo's announcement that it will increase security for its whaling fleet.
"The Japanese government (is) making noises that have an ominous feel about them," New Zealand Foreign Affairs Minister Murray McCully said.
Michihiko Kano, Japan's fisheries minister, said at a news conference Tuesday that a patrol boat from the Fisheries Agency would accompany the Japanese whaling fleet when it heads for the Southern Ocean in December to "strengthen the protection given to the research whaling ships."
The addition of the patrol boat to the whaling fleet comes after last season's whale hunt in the Southern Ocean was cut short when anti-whaling activists from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society blocked strikes on the animals. Sea Shepherd said its actions saved 800 whales, and it promised last week to be back in force this season.
Japan vows to resume whale hunt; activists promise fight
Japan says it will hunt whales in the Southern Ocean this winter and will send a Fisheries Agency ship to guard its whalers against promised intervention by a conservation group.
"The Fisheries Agency will send a patrol boat and take increased measures to strengthen the protection given to the research whaling ships," Fisheries Minister Michihiko Kano said at a news conference Tuesday.
At its annual meeting in July, the International Whaling Commission passed a resolution calling on its member countries "to cooperate to prevent and suppress actions that risk human life and property at sea."
Last winter, Japan cut its planned December-to-April hunt two months short after anti-whaling activists from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society repeatedly interfered with the whaling vessels.
Sea Shepherd claims it saved 800 whales by its actions during last season's hunt. Japanese whalers killed 171 minke whales and two fin whales during the Antarctic hunt, according to IWC figures.
4 killed as typhoon approaches Japan
[Updated at 11:35 p.m. ET] Four people in Japan have been killed amid heavy rain from a powerful typhoon that is expected to make landfall Wednesday afternoon, authorities there said.
The center of Typhoon Roke, which had sustained winds of up to 167 kph (103 mph) Wednesday morning, could hit Japan's Tokai region, which includes Nagoya city - or the Kanto region, which includes Tokyo - in the afternoon, Japan Meteorological Agency chief forecaster Yutaka Kanda said at a news conference.
As of 8:45 a.m. Wednesday, Roke's center was 280 kilometers southwest of Nagoya, where about 1 million people had been urged to evacuate.
An evacuation order for about 80,000 residents of Nagoya was lifted, according to local media reports.
Heavy rain fell in central and western Japan from the typhoon's outer bands on Tuesday and Wednesday. Some downpours came at up to 50 millimeters (2 inches) an hour, and some parts received more than 450 millimeters (17 inches) over a day, according to Japanese public broadcaster NHK.
FULL STORY
On the Radar: Japan typhoon, SeaWorld hearing, Listeria deaths
Three things you need to know today.
Japan typhoon: About 80,000 residents have been ordered to flee and more than 1 million people were urged to evacuate Nagoya, a city in central Japan, Tuesday as a typhoon was expected to hit the area.
Despite the evacuation warnings, a little more than 60 people had evacuated the city by Tuesday afternoon, the city government said. More were expected to leave in the evening as the storm came closer.
Typhoon Roke was packing winds of 185 kph (115 mph) and was predicted to make landfall with heavy rain some time Wednesday, said CNN meteorologist Jennifer Delgado.
The storm was expected to hit south of Osaka and could drench some areas with about 250 mm (10 inches) of rain, Delgado said.
Two areas in the Nagoya were ordered to evacuate because of the threat of flooding from the Shonai River, officials said.
SeaWorld hearing: A federal hearing continues Tuesday to determine whether SeaWorld Orlando should be charged with a willful violation in the 2010 death of killer whale trainer Dawn Brancheau.
Monday was the first day of the hearing at the Seminole County Courthouse in Sanford, Florida.
In February 2010, as park guests watched in horror, Brancheau, 40, was pulled into a SeaWorld pool and drowned by a 12,000-pound killer whale named Tilikum. Brancheau had been sitting on the Shamu Stadium's pool edge during a private show.
After a lengthy investigation, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration - the federal agency that works to prevent workplace injuries - cited SeaWorld of Florida in August 2010 for willfully endangering employees by not taking proper safety precautions.
Listeria deaths: Up to seven deaths in four states may be linked to a Listeriosis outbreak that the Centers for Disease Control believes originated at a cantaloupe farm in Colorado, the Denver Post reports.
The deaths have been reported in Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Missouri, according to the Denver Post report. Overall, 35 cases are reported in 10 states, the Post said.
Jensen Farms recalled its cantaloupe harvest on September 14, the Post reported.
Japan feared evacuation of 30 million in nuclear crisis, ex-PM says
After the March 11 earthquake and tsunami off Japan damaged the Fukushima Daichi nuclear reactor, the Japanese government was presented with a scenario which would have required the evacuation of half of Tokyo and the entire width of the main island of Honshu, former Prime Minister Naota Kan says in an interview with Kyodo News.
The evacuation zone would have covered all areas within 200 to 250 kilometers (125 to 155 miles) of the nuclear reactor, meaning about 30 million people in Tokyo and its surrounding areas would have needed to be moved, according to the Kyodo report in The Japan Times.
Kan said he feared such an evacuation would have resulted in chaos, according to the report.
"I wasn't sure whether Japan could continue to function as a state," he is quoted as saying.
Kan also said Japan was not prepared for the disaster resulting from the 9.0-magnitude quake.
"We had never foreseen a situation in which a quake, tsunami and a nuclear plant accident would all happen at the same time," he is quoted as saying.
Kan resigned in August after widespread criticism of how his government handled the aftermath of the quake. His approval rating plummeted.
As of early September, more than 75,000 residents who live within 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) of the crippled nuclear plant were still unable to return to their homes because of high radiation levels.
Toshio Nishizawa, president of Tokyo Electric Power Co., which operates the Fukushima plant, has said he hopes to achieve the second phase of a cold shutdown of the plant before a January deadline.
6.6-magnitude quake hits Japan
A 6.6-magnitude earthquake struck Saturday morning near the east coast of Japan's main island of Honshu, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
The quake happened at 4:26 a.m. local time, about 67 miles (108 kilometers) east-southeast of Hachinohe, Japan, according to the USGS.
FULL STORYQuakes hit off Cuba, Japan and New Zealand
[Updated at 10:39 a.m. ET] The U.S. Geological Survey has revised downward the magnitude of Thursday morning's earthquake off Cuba to magnitude 5.1 from magnitude 6.0.
[Updated at 5:20 a.m. ET] A magnitude 6.0 earthquake hit off the southeastern coast of Cuba early Thursday, the U.S. Geological Survey reported.
The quake was centered 77 miles north of Montego Bay, Jamaica, and 370 miles southeast of Havana, Cuba. It hit at 4:43 a.m.
Forty-three minutes earlier, a magnitude 6.2 earthquake rumbled off the east coast of Japan, the USGS reported. No tsunami warning was issued.
Both quakes were shallow, striking at a depth of six miles.
And seven minutes before the Japan quake, a magnitude 6.0 quake was recorded off the coast of New Zealand, according to the USGS.
On the Radar: Possible N. Korea defectors, Minnesota fire, Thailand floods
Three things you need to know today.
North Korea defectors: Nine possible North Korean defectors who sailed to Japan were moved to a refugee facility in the southern part of the country Wednesday afternoon, according to government officials.
Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Osamu Fujiwara said the nine people would be temporarily held at an immigration facility. Earlier in the day, Fujiwara disputed local reports that they would be sent to South Korea.
The small wooden boat carrying nine men, women and children onboard claiming they were from North Korea was spotted off Japan's western coast Tuesday morning.
A fisherman saw the boat drifting about 25 kilometers (15 miles) off the coast of Noto peninsula of Ishikawa prefecture and reported it to authorities.
It is rare for North Korean defectors to sail to Japan's coast. According to coast guard records, there have been only two other cases.
Minnesota fire: A wildfire in a northeast Minnesota woodland grew by nearly tenfold Tuesday, giving off a pall of smoke that stretched from the Canadian border to southern Wisconsin.
Minnesota Gov. Mark Dayton called in National Guard helicopters to assist firefighters as the Pagami Creek fire, in the remote Superior National Forest, spread from about 11,000 acres on Monday to more than 100,000 by Tuesday afternoon, said Doug Anderson, a spokesman for the firefighting effort.
The blaze started in mid-August after a lightning strike, but jumped about 16 miles eastward on Monday - "unprecedented for northern Minnesota," said Lisa Radosevich-Craig, another spokeswoman for the fire command.
No injuries were reported and no buildings had been destroyed, but 36 homes in the nearby community of Isabella were evacuated as a precaution, she said.
Thailand floods: Heavy rains and flooding have killed at least 87 people in Thailand in recent months, local authorities said.
The deaths occurred between July 29 and September 12, according to the Interior Ministry.
Flooding is still affecting 16 provinces, with Phichit  in the north among the hardest-hit.
Twenty-three people died in Phichit province, mostly from drowning, according to officials.
On the Radar: Vermont flooding, Obama speech, Japan leader
Three things you need to know today.
Vermont flooding: Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Craig Fugate plans to tour flood-damaged communities in Vermont on Tuesday.
Rain from Hurricane Irene spawned raging floodwaters that washed out or otherwise damaged 263 roads and bridges, Gov. Peter Shumlin said. Hundreds of people remained trapped in communities, he said Monday.
"It's just devastating," Shumlin said. "Whole communities under water, businesses, homes, obviously roads and bridges, rail transportation infrastructure," he said. "We're tough folks up here but Irene ... really hit us hard."
Obama to address vets: President Obama travels to Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, on Tuesday to speak at the 93rd American Legion National Convention.
Mostly veterans are expected to be in attendance at the Minneapolis Convention Center event.
As the president continues to push his economic recovery message, a senior administration official told CNN “I am sure a good chunk of it [speech] will be about how service members and their families have been impacted by the economy.”
New Japanese PM: Japan's parliament elected Yoshihiko Noda as the country's new prime minister Tuesday, making him the country's sixth new leader in five years.
Noda won 308 out of 476 possible votes.
The prime minister-elect will officially take over his new post after a ceremonial endorsement by Japan's emperor, which is expected to happen Wednesday.
Ahead of the vote, former Prime Minister Naoto Kan officially submitted his resignation, as did his Cabinet, clearing the way for Noda's election.
Group urges Japan to delay school near crippled nuclear plant
An environmental group on Monday urged the incoming Japanese prime minister to delay the start of school near a nuclear plant crippled by a massive earthquake and tsunami six months ago.
Fukushima city schools are scheduled to reopen Thursday.
The March 11 disaster triggered the worst nuclear crisis since Chernobyl, as cores overheated and spewed radioactive material into surrounding areas.
Greenpeace said the government's decontamination plan is lacking, adding that its team found average radiation doses remained high in areas decontaminated by the government.
FULL STORYJapan redesigns nuclear safety agency after Fukushima
Japan's nuclear safety agency will be placed under the control of the country's Environment Ministry, a top government official announced Monday in a move stemming from the triple meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant.
Monday's decision will take the day-to-day regulation of nuclear plants out from under the Ministry of the Economy, Trade and Industry, which has promoted the use of nuclear energy, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano said.
The agency has been tentatively designated the Nuclear Safety Agency, but Edano said he and other Cabinet members hope to add the word "regulatory" to the name before long.
FULL STORY
Scientists: March 11 tsunami produced Antarctic icebergs
The tsunami spawned from the March 11 earthquake off eastern Japan broke up parts of an Antarctic ice shelf that hadn't moved in 46 years, scientists say.
Though the tsunami waves were only about a foot high when they reached Antarctica, their consistency was enough to crack the 260-foot-thick ice and split off icebergs with combined surface areas more than twice the size of Manhattan from the Sulzberger Ice Shelf, the scientists report in a NASA statement.
It was the first time scientists have been able to tie icebergs directly to a tsunami, according to NASA.
The tsunami waves traveled 8,000 miles and took 18 hours to reach the ice shelf, the scientists said, giving them time to validate theories on how an earthquake can affect geography a hemisphere away.
"In the past we've had calving events where we've looked for the source. It's a reverse scenario - we see a calving and we go looking for a source," Kelly Brunt, a cryosphere specialist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, said in the NASA statement. "We knew right away this was one of the biggest events in recent history - we knew there would be enough swell. And this time we had a source."
Typhoon threatens to drench China's east coast
Chinese authorities are warning residents along the country's eastern coast to prepare for sustained torrential rains and strong winds as one of the strongest typhoons in recent years approaches.
Typhoon Muifa is forecast to hit China's eastern coast in Zhejiang province, south of Shanghai, late Saturday or early Sunday, forecasters told the state-run news agency Xinhua.
Rainfall from Muifa will cover a million square kilometers (386,000 square miles) as the typhoon lingers for up to 11 days, Lou Maoyuan, deputy chief of the Zhejiang Provincial Meteorological Station, told Xinhua.
Waves from Muifa could reach 40 feet (12 meters) in the East China Sea and almost 15 feet (4.5 meters) along the coast near Shanghai and Zhejiang, forecasters told Xinhua. Authorities called more than 9,000 vessels back to harbors, the news agency reported.
Meanwhile, Muifa was raking the Japanese island of Okinawa on Friday, Stars and Stripes reported. Almost 18 inches of rain had fallen on the island in 24 hours, and wind gusts of almost 100 mph were recorded at the U.S. Air Force's Kadena Air Base.
Japanese broadcaster NHK reported 30 injuries from the storm on Okinawa.
Japanese soccer player dies at 34
One of Japan's top male soccer players died Thursday, two days after suffering heat stroke following a practice.
Defender Naoki Matsuda, 34, who played in 40 matches for Japan's national team, including the 2002 World Cup tournament, suffered cardiopulmonary arrest after practice Tuesday, The Japan Times reported.
He died shortly after 1 p.m. Thursday, Kyodo News Service reported.
"On behalf of FIFA and the worldwide family of football, I wish to extend our condolences to you, to the Japanese football community and, most importantly, to Naoki Matsuda's friends and loved ones. Please let them know that today the football community stands by their side," Joseph S. Blatter, president of the international soccer's governing body, said in a statement.
Matsuda played 385 Japan Football League games for Yokohama F. Marinos from 1995 to 2010, according to The Japan Times.
Hiromi Hara, Japan Football Association technical director, fought back tears after being informed of Matsuda's death during an unrelated press conference Thursday, Kyodo reported.
The death comes less than three weeks after the Japanese women's national team captured the Women's World Cup in an emotional victory over the favored U.S. team.
On the Radar: Weather, food recall, Syria, New Orleans trial, famine in Somalia
Extreme weather - The heat wave is taking a deadly toll across the nation, particularly on athletes, as two football players and a coach died during summer football practices this week. The heat wave, now in its second month, is responsible for record-setting electricity use in Texas and dozens of deaths across the U.S. heartland.
Meanwhile, Tropical Storm Emily is bringing heavy rains to Haiti on Thursday, heading directly over Port-au-Prince, where many quake victims live under precarious conditions. Nearly 12,000 U.N. peacekeepers are on emergency standby.
And Typhoon Kabayan, forecast to be a category 4 storm, could hit or pass Okinawa, Japan, late Thursday. The typhoon has boosted monsoon rains over the northern Philippines.
Turkey recall - Cargill Meat Solutions Corp. announced an immediate recall of 36 million pounds of ground turkey meat because it may be contaminated with salmonella bacteria. Cargill's plant in Springdale, Arkansas, processed the fresh and frozen ground turkey products between February 20 and August 2, the company said. At least one person has died and 76 have been sickened in 26 states.
Pearl Harbor skull may be from Japanese aviator
U.S. military forensics scientists in Hawaii are investigating whether a skull unearthed during dredging at Pearl Harbor may be from a Japanese flier killed in the December 7, 1941, attack.
Historian Daniel Martinez tells CNN affiliate KHON-TV that based on where the skull was found, it may be that of an aviator from a Japanese torpedo plan that was attacking battleship row and was hit in its engine by anti-aircraft fire from the destroyer USS Bagley.
"Once they came over Hickam Field, they lowered to an altitude of about 35 feet and they're moving across that water at about 150 knots. Well that projectile stopped that plane right in its tracks," Martinez told KHON.
Japan's character seen in women's World Cup victory
At perhaps the most tense time in Sunday’s FIFA Women's World Cup final - preparations for the penalty kick shootout - TV cameras showed Japanese coach Norio Sasaki smiling and laughing with his players. Cameras focused on the U.S. women showed a different mood, with expressions of grit, focus and determination.
The contrast was stark, and that wasn’t a surprise to Sasaki.
"It seemed to me there was more pressure on the Americans," he said.
It was a remarkable moment for Japan, a country that has had little to smile about this year, and a keen insight from the coach of a team that had not beaten the Americans in 25 games.
But Sasaki’s assessment was spot-on.
On the Radar: Shuttle set to leave, heat staying, Japan typhoon
Three things you need to know today.
Hatch closed - At 9:19 a.m. ET on Monday, the hatch between the space shuttle Atlantis and the International Space Station will be closed for the final time and the shuttle will prepare for a return to Earth.
Tomorrow, the shuttle will undock from the station and fly around it so visual inspections of both the space station and the shuttle's thermal protection system can be performed.
Atlantis is scheduled to land at Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 7:06 a.m. on Wednesday, bringing an end to three decades of space shuttle flight.
Hot temperatures - A heat wave will continue to roast the country's midsection even as it spreads to the east, according to the National Weather Service.
The hottest spots from Oklahoma through South Dakota should see highs of more than 100 degrees Fahrenheit, and top temperatures are forecast in the 90s for most of the rest of the country - with the exception of some mountain and coastal regions, according to the weather service.
On Sunday, daily temperature records were broken from Alpena, Michigan, south to Miami, Florida.
"Heat index values" - how hot it feels outside - have been running over 125 degrees Fahrenheit in the worst-hit areas, the National Weather Service said. The scale designed to describe how intense heat feels also includes factors such as humidity.
Japan typhoon - Workers in Japan scrambled Monday to build a protective covering over a damaged nuclear reactor ahead of an approaching powerful typhoon, an energy company spokesman said.
Typhoon Ma-on should strike Japan well south of the damaged No. 3 reactor at the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
But the Tokyo Power Company, which is responsible for the plant wracked by the March 11 tsunami that struck northeast Japan, is constructing a "roof-like structure to prevent rain from entering holes on the turbine building," spokesman Satoshi Watanabe said.
The energy company says it aims to complete construction late Monday.
Japanese PM ready to abandon nuclear power; utility to inject gas into reactor
Japan's energy plan needs to be completely revised and must eliminate the nation's dependence on nuclear power, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said Wednesday, according to The Daily Yomiuri.
"I have realized that nuclear accidents cannot be prevented completely with the conventional safety measures we have at present," he said.
It's a sharp about-face for Kan. His government approved a plan just last year that called for 14 new nuclear reactors by 2030 and an increase in nuclear energy production from 26% to 53% of total electricity generated, The Daily Yomiuri reported.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. planned Thursday to inject nitrogen into the last of the damaged reactors at the tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, Kyodo News Agency reported.
The inert gas will help stabilize the reactors as the utility aims for a cold shutdown by January at the latest, Kyodo reported.
TEPCO already has new water circulation systems working at all three reactors to keep their temperatures under control.
Meanwhile, the Fukushima municipal government says it plans to cleanse the entire city of radioactive contamination, Yomiuri Shimbun reported. The city is about 30 miles from the damaged plant.
The effort, which could take nearly 20 years to complete, would involve pressure-washing buildings and scraping off the top layer of soil.
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