Minutes des réunions de la cellule de crise

Le gouvernement a rendu publiques les minutes des réunions de la cellule de crise mise en place après le début de l'accident nucléaire à la centrale Fukushima Dai-ichi le 11 mars dernier.

Ce jour-là, le séisme et le tsunami ont coupé les alimentations extérieures de la centrale et endommagé les générateurs de secours. Premier ministre à l'époque, Naoto Kan a déclaré l'état d'urgence sur le site et pris la tête de la première réunion de la cellule de crise, organisée le soir du 11 mars. Il y a quelques temps, des révélations ont fait état de l'absence des minutes de cette réunion, comme des suivantes.

Ces révélations ont soulevé une vague de critiques dans l'opinion, qui a contraint l'Agence de sûreté nucléaire et industrielle, la NISA, à réagir. Elle a interrogé les personnes ayant participé à ces réunions et étudié leurs notes afin de reconstituer les minutes. Le document final a été rendu public ce vendredi.

Son contenu révèle que, dès la première réunion, l'un des participants a évoqué le scénario du pire. D'après lui, une hausse de la température des coeurs pouvait intervenir huit heures environ après l'épuisement des circuits de refroidissement de secours, avec pour conséquence la fusion du combustible.
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The government has released pieced-together minutes from its task force meetings after the crisis at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant began on March 11th of last year.On that day, the earthquake and tsunami knocked out external power and disabled the plant's backup generators. Then Prime Minister Naoto Kan declared a state of emergency at the nuclear plant, and presided over the first meeting of the task force on the evening of March 11th. But it was recently discovered that no minutes of that or subsequent meetings had been taken.In response to public criticism, the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency interviewed those who had taken part in the meeting and studied their notes in order to prepare the minutes, which were released on Friday.The minutes of the task force's first meeting show that an unidentified participant spoke about a worst-case scenario. The participant said meltdowns could occur if the core temperatures of the reactors were to rise after backup cooling batteries were exhausted, after about 8 hours.The government had not yet issued an evacuation order at the time. But the record also shows that another member of the task force told the meeting that it may be necessary at some point to evacuate people from an area within 10 kilometers of the plant.At the 3rd meeting, held after noon on March 12th, then National Policy Minister Koichiro Gemba pointed out the possibility of meltdowns occurring at the plant and asked whether a 10-kilometer evacuation radius would be sufficient.At the time, an evacuation zone was set up within 10 kilometers of the plant. The zone was expanded to 20 kilometers after a hydrogen explosion occurred at the Number 1 reactor at 6:25 PM on March 12th.The minutes offer no detailed accounts of how decisions were made on crucial matters, such as reviewing the evacuation zones. This makes it difficult to examine the government's decision-making process in handling the disaster.