Читать книгу Meltdown - Yoichi Funabashi - Страница 30

It was getting on to two hours after the explosion. Kan had called Chief Cabinet Secretary Edano, Kaieda, Hosono, Fukuyama, and Ito into his office, and was discussing the evacuation area with them. Madarame and Kukita, deputy chair of the Nuclear Safety Commission, joined them. Kan fired off questions in rapid succession.

“What’s going to happen next? What’s going to blow next?”

“What’s happening inside the reactor?”

“Is it okay to evacuate people?”

Madarame explained falteringly. Everyone was irritated. Kan pressed him.

“How large an area? What should we do?”

Chief Cabinet Secretary Edano was at his wits’ end. How should he explain the explosion to the nation in his press conference? The Internet was starting to be flooded with posts about “atomic rain falling.” Edano’s staff had already considered saying something to the effect that “people should not be fooled by vicious rumors” in the press conference, but decided against it, as “any such announcement could possibly add to the panic.”

While “atomic rain falling” was, at best, a hoax, in less than an hour after the explosion, the radiation dose at the monitoring post in front of the main gate at Fukushima Daiichi NPS recorded 1,015 microsieverts/hour (1.015 millisieverts).⁵⁶

However, this information didn’t reach Edano. The only information Edano had at hand was the TEPCO press release material that “there was a loud noise in the vicinity of Unit 1 and white smoke had risen” and “two TEPCO workers and two associate workers involved in plant safety operations had been injured,” as well as a police report that “an explosion was heard and smoke had been spotted.”

But the radiation level measured afterward showed no increase. Kan, Edano, and Fukuyama discussed the question. Fukuyama asked Edano, “How about postponing the press conference a bit until you have more detailed information?”

They had no information whatsoever. They were up to their necks in unknowns. Giving a press conference would be like admitting to the nation that “the government didn’t know.” Wouldn’t that only heighten people’s lack of trust in the government?

“Mmm.”

After deliberating for a time, Edano categorically stated, “No, let’s do it. There’s been a lot of footage broadcast. If we push the conference back, people will wonder, ‘What is the government doing, is it hiding something?’ It’ll only make people more nervous. Let’s do the press conference as planned.”

Kan backed Edano up, saying, “Yes, go ahead.”

Edano went ahead with the press conference “empty-handed.”⁵⁷

5:47 P.M. Chief cabinet secretary press conference. Prime minister’s office press room.

“As has already been reported by the media, some kind of an explosive event has been reported at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station, but it hasn’t been verified as of yet that it was the reactor itself.”

“Some kind of an explosive event” was an expression that had come to Edano on the spur of the moment in desperation.

At 8:40 p.m., Edano gave a second press conference.

“It has been verified that the explosion collapsed the wall of the building, it was not an explosion in the containment vessel. The reason for the explosion was vapor arising from water in the containment vessel, which was running out, dropping down. The vapor entered the space between the containment vessel and the outer housing, and in the process turned into hydrogen, which, when mixed with oxygen, led to the explosion.”

In other words, it was acknowledged that the “explosive event” was a “hydrogen explosion.” Edano, however, added the following point.

“Even though the Unit 1 (RB) is no longer standing, the containment vessel is still sound. External monitors, in fact, show a drop in [radioactive] exposure, so cooling of the core is ongoing.”

AROUND NINE P.M. ON MARCH 12. Keisuke Sadamori, prime ministerial secretary, was called in by Edano. Sadamori was an ex-METI man.

“Is it true that this kind of thing is circulating?”

With a fierce look on his face, Edano showed him some photos. National news was broadcasting photos of the reactor building after the explosion, which were used by the TEPCO’s Fukushima office to explain the situation to Fukushima Prefecture. He hadn’t known that TEPCO had taken these photos, nor had he received any reports from TEPCO. Edano told Sadamori, “Has the Kantei received any photos from TEPCO? Check the facts out.”

Edano called TEPCO president, Masataka Shimizu, on the spot.

“What on earth is going on at your company?”⁵⁸

10:05 P.M., MARCH 12. The fourth Nuclear Emergency Response Headquarters meeting. Kaieda reported.

“I have received a report from TEPCO that radiation levels of over 500 microsieverts/hour (0.5 millisieverts) have been measured by a monitoring car on the outskirts of the plant.”

Genba explained the need to “assume the worst-case scenario.” Not answering this directly, Kan said, “Is it possible that it will be Chernobyl-style? Will there be a meltdown, like Three Mile Island?”⁵⁹

THE FOLLOWING DAY, MARCH 13, SUNDAY. Shimizu visited the Kantei at around two p.m. He met Edano in his office and explained the situation with the explosion at Unit 1. He asked cautiously, “May I also pay my respects to the prime minister?”

Edano took him to the prime minister’s office and introduced him to Kan. Edano thought he was going to explain about the Unit 1 explosion, but Shimizu began by explaining the rolling blackouts that were to start the following day. And when he had finished, he made as if to stand up. Kan had listened to him in silence, but indicated to Shimizu to hold his horses and said, “Is that all you have to say?”

“TEPCO hasn’t shown up at all since the explosion. Don’t you think there’s something wrong with your communication channels?”

At the sixth meeting of NERHQ, at 9:35 p.m. on March 13, Kan stated the following:

“Unfortunately, the situation at the Fukushima nuclear plants remains alarming. This earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear emergency are the greatest crisis our country has faced since World War II.”⁶⁰

With the hydrogen explosion at Unit 1, Kan’s opinion of Madarame plummeted. Hardly any of the nuclear experts, however, foresaw a hydrogen explosion in the reactor building. It wasn’t just Madarame who failed to see it coming.⁶¹

Around this time, support for Edano appeared from an unlikely quarter. Bloggers suddenly started posting: “Get some sleep, Edano!” “Hang in there, Edano!”

On March 13, three young employees of the cabinet public relations office split into three eight-hour shifts and started a round-the-clock disaster Twitter account (@Kantei_saigai = @Kantei_disaster). It consisted mainly of links to videos of the press conferences at the Kantei, messages from the prime minister and ministers, and an explanation of radioactive exposure (“What’s a microsievert?”) by Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Tetsuro Fukuyama.

The support for Edano, however, was triggered by Internet users who had seen Edano’s press conferences live on TV and who had created the hashtag #edano_nero (#edano_get_some_sleep).

Edano had been giving press conferences every day, and sometimes several times a day, since March 11. He had remained cool, chosen his words well, and answered the reporters’ questions articulately. Still in his mid-forties, he was young, had a good complexion, and his little round body was clad in disaster gear. His performance was popular with young people. He received messages of encouragement from women in their twenties and thirties.

The #edano_get_some_sleep call was encouragement from his supporters saying he was doing a great job, to keep it up, but to find some time to catch forty winks. Edano himself had no time to browse the Web. He just heard about it from the head of PR’s secretary.⁶²

A short time after #edano_get_some_sleep, someone started a #kan_okiro (#Kan_wake_up) hashtag. This severely lambasted Kan. The Kantei staffers were scared stiff about Edano—or, perish the thought, Kan—finding out.⁶³

How difficult was it to communicate with the people in a time of crisis? Edano was soon to find that out the hard way.

It was the job of the chief cabinet secretary, with the exception of prime ministerial press conferences, to give two official cabinet press conferences each day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, to the Kantei press corps. Each ministry had its own press corps and press conferences, and briefing sessions were virtually a daily occurrence there as well. The emergence of the Internet and Twitter rocked the foundations of the existing government monopoly on information and official assessments and positions.

In 2010, 78 percent of Japan’s population was using the Internet. The Internet was still relatively new during the 1995 Hanshin-Awaji earthquake. It had taken off rapidly in the fall of that year, but in Japan’s case, it was that large-scale earthquake that accelerated the spread of the Web. In the Great Eastern Earthquake, the Web was the main media for checking on friends’ and family’s safety.

The Web also played a huge role in the Fukushima nuclear emergency. Tying up with global information and assessments, and using an open information space, an infinite number of information communities emerged on the scene.

Aware that people were becoming increasingly anxious about rising levels of exposure and resident evacuation, Edano started frequently using the phrase, “There will be no immediate impact on health.” And this claim was not wrong. Nevertheless, even if it was a fact that there would be no “immediate” impact, what about the long-term? How could people remain at ease if there was going to be an impact on their health at some point? He needed to cover both bases in his explanations, but only covered one. That was what made people anxious.

His remark at that time that “there will be no immediate impact on health” was criticized over and again in the National Diet. In response, Edano defended himself, saying, “In the first two weeks after March 11, I gave a total of thirty-nine press conferences, and I said there would be no immediate impact on health or life in seven of those” (House of Representatives Defense Budget Committee, November 8, 2011).

This was perceived as though he was trying to deny his statements on the accident, which reduced his popularity. One year after the appearance of #edano_get_some_sleep, tweets started expressing disappointment.

“At the time, everyone tweeted #edano_get_some_sleep out of sympathy for him trying to deal with the situation all through the night. A year later, he’s pushing to reopen the Oi Nuclear Station. I feel like tweeting ‘stop taking such stupid actions’ and #edano_stay_asleep.”⁶⁴