LOS ANGELES — California is closely watching the crisis at a Japanese nuclear plant, but officials downplayed the threat that a radioactive cloud blown across the Pacific could pose for the US West Coast.
While radioactivity could reach the United States from the quake-hit Fukushima plant, the levels would not be high enough to cause major health problems, said the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC).
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Some experts disagreed, notably pointing to the west-east jet stream, but NRC — which was asked by Japan on Monday to send nuclear experts to deal with the crisis — said even the Pacific island state of Hawaii faced little risk.
“Right now it’s quite possible that there could be some radiation floating over the United States. But we don’t think that it would be particularly harmful… even in a worst case scenario,” spokesman David McIntyre told AFP.
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The radioactive cloud of steam and gases blown into the air by the explosions at the reactors in the Fukushima nuclear plant are unlikely to pose a major health risk, radiation experts said yesterday – although any future explosion could change the situation.
Relief agencies said the main threat for those who had survived near- drowning in the tsunami would be pneumonia, caused by fluid retained in the lung.
Thousands of corpses litter coastal towns but outbreaks of diseases such as cholera are considered a low risk in a developed country.
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