Radiation

Radiation:Government officials stressed that the amount of radiation that had been released by the Fukushima Daiichi unit 1 reactor after an explosion at the facility appeared to be relatively low, and international authorities said the situation had not yet become a major public health threat.

Japanese officials reported the release of radiation from two nuclear reactors in Japan that were damaged in Friday’s earthquake and tsunamiThe 8.9-magnitude quake caused a power outage that disabled the reactor’s cooling system, sparking thousands of evacuations and fears of a massive nuclear disaster.

As authorities in Japan know better than those in any other nation, the extent of the risk from a nuclear power plant ultimately depends on how much and what kind of radioactive material is released.