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One of the biggest earthquakes

ever recorded has hit Japan.

It triggered a tsunami

that coursed
several miles inland,

washing away everything
in its path.

The situation there is...

is nothing less
than apocalyptic.

But the big concern continues

to be that nuclear power plant,

the Fukushima Daiichi,
uh, nuclear plant...

There's been
another major explosion

at the Fukushima nuclear plant.

Only 50 brave employees

are still at the plant,

trying to stave off
a total meltdown.

They are risking their lives
to avoid this meltdown

that could be historic
and terrible

for the whole country.

At 8:15,

a weather plane reports
from Hiroshima

that conditions are good.

At 9:15, the bomb is dropped.

On the
first day of November 1955,

the United States Atoms
for Peace exhibition

opened in Hibiya Park, Tokyo.

America's ambassador to Japan,
John M. Allison,

conveyed a message
from President Eisenhower.

That the exhibit stands
as a symbol

of our countries'
mutual determination

that the great power
of the atom shall be dedicated

to the arts of peace.

A message
from Prime Minister Hatoyama

praised the greatness
of atomic science

in the present century.

Here at the nuclear power plant,

highly trained professionals
work hard to protect safety.

Knowing the dangers,

that's where
operator education starts.

Twenty-four hours a day,

we generate, deliver,
and protect.

Safety is our first priority.

We are TEPCO.

I've been assembling things

since I was a kid, you know?

If a package would come
or a box would come,

my dad would always say,
"Let Carl put it together."

And the first thing I'd do is
bust out the instruction sheet

and get right to the parts list,
and lay out the parts,

making sure there was 24 nuts
and 24 bolts.

I was just very particular.

I just... It's just
a natural-born way, uh...

way for me,

and I've been working
in nuclear power now,

just over 40 years,
all over the globe.

The US, Spain, Switzerland,

Sweden, Taiwan, Japan.

Loved working in Japan, too.
I just loved it.

It was a beautiful day.

March. You'd think March 11th
in Japan might be cold,

but it was sunny,
beautiful, clear.

Oh, my God! This is weird.

I've never experienced
the ground shaking like this.

I was in Unit 1
on the turbine building.

The sounds coming off
the structural steel...

like those old Japanese movies

where Godzilla was doing
that squeaky metal sound,

like that-that screech
he would make.

That's what it sounded like
to me, you know.

And I know I felt
the whole building shift

east and down.

Not inches.

It was in... it was...
It was in feet.

I got out
of the building

and I watched
the tsunami come in.

Water got higher and higher
as it went over the seawall.

You would think it's loud
but it's not.

It only started to make noise

when it started
to snap and crack,

and break things off
when it hit land.

I didn't think about the plants

till I watched it rush
around them.

I watched it just rush
around the four buildings,

off the highlands behind me,

like these big black
ominous clouds

came rolling in real low.

Almost felt like it pulled
the atmosphere down on us,

and began to snow even.

It felt like
the end of the world.

One of the
most powerful earthquakes

ever recorded has struck Japan.

The terrible devastation
in northeastern Japan.

The destruction there,
simply epic.

The death toll mounting,
exact numbers unknown.

Local television
has shown shocking pictures

of entire towns being swept away

by a wall of water
kilometers wide

as people run for their lives.

Fears that the eventual toll

could be
in the tens of thousands.

The tsunami waves

that followed moved so quickly,

at a speed
of 800 kilometers an hour,

that they proved to be
an unstoppable

and devastating force.

I was working as a journalist

for the New York Times.

I was based in Tokyo

where I'd been living
for eight years.

After the earthquake struck,

we had decided to head north

to where the tsunami caused
most damage.

It was like entering hell.

The tsunami
had basically ripped away

everything that was there.

So if you can imagine

just like a... a field,

like a plane,

uh, from the surface
of the moon.

Dark grey mud
covering everything.

An occasional piece
of a home, or building,

or even an occasional home

that had somehow
randomly survived.

Uh, big pools of water,

things were on fire,

and mounds of debris.

You know, pieces of buildings,

and fishing boats,

and crushed buses,
and mangled cars.

Uh, there were dead animals,

dead pets,
and of course dead people.

No one survives that tsunami.

You either get out of the way
or you're dead.

Kan and the
Democratic Party of Japan

were a very inexperienced
government.

This was their first time
in office since 1955.

And they now had to deal with

an extremely challenging set
of circumstances.

The country
was in complete chaos.

Thousands of people
are missing,

and they have
this developing situation

at Fukushima
that had the potential

to be many, many times worse
than Chernobyl.

That disaster
involved one reactor.

Fukushima involved six.

Japan now telling

the UN nuclear watchdog,
the IAEA,

that they have
a heightened state of alert

that has been declared
at their nuclear power plant.

This is the Fukushima,
uh, nuclear power plant.

Radiation levels are up,

according to
the Kyodo News Agency,

eight times the normal level

at a monitoring station
outside the plant,

1,000 times above normal

in a control room
inside the plant.

The worst case scenario

would be a cataclysmic meltdown
of the reactors

called a China Syndrome.

And what that refers to is
the... something like 100 tons

of uranium fuel
is inside the reactor.

It melts out of control.

It melts down,
which means it collapses

to the bottom of the vessel,

like a... just a lump
of like lava almost.

If you can't cool it,

which they can't
because there's no electricity

to pump water into the reactor,

it rises to a temperature

of something like
2,000 degrees.

It burns
through the vessel itself.

It'll melt through the vessel,
drop into the building,

almost like bore its way
through the concrete

'cause of the heat,

it escapes into the earth
and is out of control.

And if that were to happen,

experts talked about the loss
of northern Japan.

The entire northern half
of Honshu becomes uninhabitable

if this thing
gets out of control.

I watched four TEPCO guys

pulling on a van or something,

and they got out,
and they all walked towards me

'cause I was right
at the top of the stairs.

And they all walked down
that stairs,

they were all
in their TEPCO uniforms,

and they were all
about 35 years old, I'd say.

Like, they were all, like,
in their mid-30s.

We just all made eye contact
as they went by.

They went down that stairs,

and they were probably part

of the operations group
or whatever.

And I remember those four guys
going down,

probably had to stay
and work that mess they had.

When we parted ways
and I went up that hill,

uh, to get to my rental car,

you know, I didn't know
they were gonna be headed

for a meltdown
in less than 24 hours.

I didn't know at that time

how bad things were gonna get.

This could be
a catastrophe in the making,

Japan's nuclear power plants.

Officials say cooling systems

in some reactors have failed

and some radiation has leaked.

The next 24 hours
are considered crucial.

What's meant to happen

inside a nuclear
power station is this.

In the reactor,
the rods of nuclear fuel

go through
the process of fission.

The atoms splitting
and releasing energy.

Water is pumped in
and flows around the fuel

where it heats up
and turns into steam.

That drives generators
to make electricity.

But if a reactor runs dry,
as one did today,

the fuel rods overheat and melt.

And that may have started
in three reactors.

The nuclear fuel could then sink
to the bottom of the reactor,

the beginning
of what's known as meltdown.

But provided the steel wall
of the container does its job,

there shouldn't be a leak.

This was my first experience

of a severe accident
of this sort.

I would not hide anything.

But as Prime Minister,

I would also not say anything
I could not be certain of.

That was my policy.

I told the special advisor
I would go to Fukushima.

"Please make preparations."

I was joined
by the Chairman

of the Nuclear
Safety Commission.

I clearly recall asking,

"Is there any danger
of an explosion?"

To which the Chairman
answered with conviction,

"An explosion is out
of the question."

We arrived in a war zone.

The hallway
was full of workers,

several of whom
were lying on the floor.

Some were wrapped in blankets.

In the conference room,
they explained,

"We are considering
whether to vent manually.

We will decide
in the next hour."

I said,
"We couldn't wait that long."

To which they replied,

"We will create
a suicide squad."

This nuclear accident

placed the very existence
of our country in danger.

Our ability to evade a crisis

depended on venting
these reactors.

When I saw
the explosion on TV,

it was over an hour
after it had happened.

And I hadn't received
a word from TEPCO.

I ordered
my executive secretary,

"Get me
some information quickly."

Everyone in the country,
in the world,

knew of the explosion,

but we had no information
or explanation.

The blast was seen

and heard for kilometers.

Reactor 1 at Japan's Fukushima
Nuclear Power Plant explodes,

sending radioactive gas
spewing skywards.

People talk about 2011
as being a triple disaster.

But really it was
two separate things.

There was the tsunami
and the earthquake

which were an act of nature
that killed tens of thousands.

Then there was
the nuclear accident

which was actually something
completely different.

The nuclear accident was
an entirely man-made disaster.

When we started
looking into it,

even in those first days,

TEPCO was making mistakes.

Now, there was a big gap

between the plant
and headquarters in Tokyo.

The plant was repeatedly asking,

"Could you send up batteries

so we can restart
our cooling systems?"

Uh, "Can you send up generators
on trucks?"

But TEPCO management
was in such chaos

that they just continually sent
the wrong items.

It's like
the wrong size batteries.

Or it's stuff you don't need,
you know. It-It's...

There's... At some point,
there's a pile of unused,

unneeded objects

that just builds up
in the parking lot.

Also the drivers
of these trucks

that are being sent from Tokyo

refused to go to the plant.

They refused
to go near the plant,

it's too dangerous.

So they stop
at this TEPCO dockyard

that's two hours
south from the plant,

and drop off their stuff there.

And then the TEPCO workers
at the plant

are told to drive down
and get it.

So no one
is coming to help them.

On top of all that,
Reactor 3 is now out of water

and has started
to produce masses of hydrogen.

Concerns are now being raised

over three separate
nuclear reactors at Fukushima

following an explosion
at one yesterday.

There are worries
that the reactors could overheat

leading to meltdown.

There are also safety issues

at two other nuclear sites.

Officials are reassuring
the public

that there is
no immediate danger,

but an exclusion zone
around Fukushima

has been extended.

The evacuation of people
from the area

now runs into the hundreds
of thousands.

Strong aftershocks

are still being felt
across the country,

adding to the risks
the rescuers face.

The problems
at the nuclear plants

are making a bad situation
even worse.

Huge swathes of the country

still have
no electricity supplies.

On television here,
they're looking for reassurance

from the experts.

But it's hard
for the Japanese public

to be sure about the level
of risk they face.

We are working aggressively

to support our Japanese ally

at this time
of extraordinary challenge.

Search and rescue teams
are on the ground in Japan

to help the recovery effort.

A disaster assistance
and response team

is working
to confront the aftermath

of the earthquake and tsunami.

As I told Prime Minister Kan
last night,

the Japanese people
are not alone

in this time of great trial
and sorrow.

The US military,
which has helped...

Honestly,

I think
the Japanese government

worried about an American
getting too involved

with the nuclear disaster.

I think there was a perception

in Prime Minister Kan's mind

that we would take over
if they failed.

So they wanted to be able
to fix it themselves.

But these reactors
were American in design.

So it was only a matter of time

before the US government
sent someone.

We've also deployed
some of our leading experts

to help contain the damage
at Japan's nuclear reactors.

And that someone was me.

I'm Charles Casto.

I'm a nuclear
safety consultant.

I've worked in nuclear power
for over 45 years.

I'd never been to Japan.

I knew very little
about the country.

So I was sort of plopped down

in the middle of a...
an international disaster

with really no understanding
of the culture,

the language, the people.

Although I did know
the facility,

the nuclear plant very well,

um, because I worked at a plant

almost identical
to Fukushima Daiichi.

So, I had been an operator
and instructor at that plant.

That's partially the reason
that I was chosen

to lead that effort.

When I landed,
we rushed to the embassy,

and I was thrust
in a secure video conference

with US government
and US military

to discuss next steps.

The US has a large
military presence in Japan.

Over 80,000 people.

So we had our concerns.

Not a lot of information,
a lot of speculation.

So one of the...

You know, one of my goals
was try to reduce that chaos.

But, um...

it was days
before we felt comfortable

we were getting
good information.

Many days.

It seems yesterday's explosion

in the plant's Unit 1 reactor

was caused by a buildup
of hydrogen gas

inside the building.

It destroyed its walls,
but the containment chamber

surrounding the nuclear core
remained intact,

preventing a potentially
catastrophic radiation leak.

But it's now thought
that a partial meltdown

in a second reactor
at the plant, Unit 3,

is highly possible.

A complete meltdown
could release uranium

and dangerous byproducts
into the environment.

So on the 14th,
the team at the plant

were using a small fire truck

to pump water into Reactor 3.

And so this... this single
fire truck with these hoses

is the only thing
cooling the reactor.

And they're now having to use
seawater to do this,

which is something
TEPCO told them not to do

because seawater would ruin
the longevity of the reactor.

But at this point,
saving the reactor

is out of the question.

They just need
to do anything they can

to get on top of this.

But they just
don't have the tools

to stop the hydrogen buildup.

Japan's nuclear crisis
worsened today

when a second reactor building
exploded.

The suspected hydrogen explosion
did lead to the release

of some radioactive material
into the air.

Officials have been
giving assurances

the containment structures
that house nuclear material

remain intact.

But it's becoming clear
that those assurances

are not based on any certainty

about what's going on
inside the reactors.

A short while ago,
the plant owner,

the Tokyo Electric
Power Company,

announced that water levels
in Reactor Number 2

are dangerously low,

raising the specter
of a nuclear meltdown.

As soon as Unit 3 is lost,

Unit 2 starts to go downhill.

And for various reasons,
Unit 2 is worse

than Unit 1 or Unit 3.

The-the pressures
are much higher.

And so the big fear
was that the reactor

would actually blow up,
like a balloon popping,

in a Chernobyl-style rupture
of the reactor itself.

And that's when
they start talking about...

you know, can we even
control the plant?

You know,
why are we even staying?

TEPCO management
then calls the government

to say, "We don't think
we can deal with this.

We may have to evacuate."

I was speechless.

If they withdraw now,

the very existence
of this country

would be in jeopardy.

We had to contain the accident.

And we had to be prepared

to lose life in the process.

I told them,

"I'm going
to TEPCO headquarters.

Make preparations."

Looking in
from the outside,

the situation was completely
dysfunctional and disconnected.

First meeting was,
"Look at our track record.

Like, how good...
how strong it's been."

Well, that's over, you know.

That was my thought.

TEPCO couldn't get
a hold of the situation.

And the government also seemed
to be completely ill-informed.

Prime Minister Kan had experts

who he would listen to.

They came up
with this popcorn scenario.

Like a chain reaction.

One reactor
would set off another,

then another, and then another.

It could just get worse,
and worse, and worse out there.

So he had
immense pressure on him.

He wanted everything,
as you might imagine,

wanted everything faster,
stronger, bigger.

I was sent there to help.

They didn't want to listen
to an American,

which is understandable
given our history.

I arrived at TEPCO headquarters

a little after 5:30 a.m.

A number of monitors
were lined up

in the operations room.

One of them was connected
to Fukushima Daiichi.

I addressed everyone.

Good evening.
The situation at Japan's

Fukushima nuclear plant
has gotten worse.

While a Tokyo Electric official
said in a press conference

that he does not believe

a critical event is imminent,

a senior
nuclear industry executive

told the New York Times

that Japanese nuclear managers
are, quote,

"Basically
in a full-scale panic."

After the Unit 4 explosion,

TEPCO did evacuate the plant.

Kan agreed to the evacuation

of most people from the plant

if a small number would stay

to-to... basically,
to man the fire trucks.

They had three fire trucks

that were pumping water
into the reactors.

That was it. That was the
entire response at that point,

was three fire trucks.

Kan wanted enough people
to stay

to man those fire trucks

and to monitor the reactors,

and a total
of 69 people stayed.

They're known
as the Fukushima Fifty,

but there were
actually 69 of them.

They were staying
so the others could leave.

Uh, and... they stayed knowing

that they may not come back.

Japanese engineers

marshalled all
their remaining tools today

in the week-long struggle

to prevent
a full-blown nuclear disaster.

Filmed just yesterday

from a military helicopter,

this shaky footage
is the best image we have yet

of the crippled
Fukushima nuclear plant.

No workers can be seen outside.

With radiation
at such high levels,

it's simply too dangerous.

The dense steam
is believed to be rising

from a storage pool holding
100 tons of nuclear fuel.

And alarmingly, two more pools
nearby are also heating up.

Normally, at least five meters
of cooling water

cover the rods,
stopping them from overheating

and protecting workers
from a deadly radiation.

But reports now indicate

the pool
has run completely dry,

a potentially
catastrophic development.

Radiation levels there
are believed to be lethal.

No one can go near.

Seven days into this crisis,

no one is any clearer

on how this nuclear emergency
will end.

At this moment, 70 brave souls
are still working

at the stricken
Fukushima plant in Japan.

They are trying to prevent
a nuclear meltdown

and apparently suffering
great radiation.

We've obtained a statement

from the International
Atomic Energy Agency, Peter,

that says the levels
at the plant,

and I want
to make that very clear,

at the plant itself,

are enough to kill a man

within five hours.

A few dozen workers

at the Fukushima nuclear plant

finally were able to restart
the reactor's cooling systems.

Workers have
entered a reactor building

at Japan's Fukushima
nuclear plant

for the first time
since it was damaged

by March's earthquake
and tsunami.

After the
Hyper Rescue Team came,

more and more people
arrived to help.

And they finally start to get
a handle on the disaster.

What follows
is civil suits, inquests,

and TEPCO executives
making public apologies.

It's also revealed
that TEPCO received a report

warning that a tsunami
of 15 meters

was possible
at the Fukushima plant.

But instead of acting on it,

TEPCO sat on the report

and only gave it
to nuclear authorities

on March 7th, 2011,

four days
before the disaster struck.

Japan is the nation that
invented the word "tsunami."

So the idea
that a Japanese plant

wouldn't be ready
for a tsunami looks ludicrous.

And yet they weren't.

When-when the waves hit,

the plant was literally caught
with its pants down.

You don't even...
even need a wave wall.

All you need
is a waterproof power system.

Like you have in a ship,
or a submarine, or something.

It-it wouldn't have taken
a whole lot.

And they just didn't do it

because to raise the risk
of a tsunami,

to raise the risk of something
like that happening,

would go against the orthodoxy
of the "safety myth."

If you questioned
the safety of a plant,

even something like, "Hey,

let's have a few more
backup systems,"

it could possibly
cost you your career.

And so people didn't do it.

They-they...
They had to toe the line.

And the plant was... was...
was left vulnerable

to something that
in Japan, frankly,

should have been... foreseeable.

The aftermath
of the accident

is still going on today.

And we are still decades
from cleaning up

the radioactive material
in the reactors.

Uh, it'll be my grandchildren
who see that cleaned up.

And after years of mothballing

the nuclear program in Japan,

it's firmly back
on the agenda.

They've restarted 14 reactors,

and there are plans
to build many, many more.

It's not just Japan.

Much of the world,
faced with climate change

and energy insecurity,

is now turning back
to nuclear power.

If... You know,
if there was a big lesson

from the accident,

it would be the necessity

of transparency
and-and coming...

being frank with people, right?

You would hope
that lesson has been learned.

But the government has
never been fully transparent

about what happened
in Fukushima.

TEPCO has never revealed
fully what happened.

We have very few records
of what was being said

or done at that time.

It feels like
any question of risk,

any question of what
can go wrong is gone,

and people just don't want
to talk about that.

We're back to, you know,
"Don't worry about it,

we'll take care of it,
everything's okay."

And their messaging
leaves us wondering,

has anything really changed?

...those brave emergency workers

who are walking
into a wall of radiation.

The operators there do
not see themselves as heroes.

You know,
they felt they were culprits

more than heroes,

that they caused the accident,
which they didn't.

Some told me that, you know,
we feel like Vietnam veterans.

You know,
that in America where...

You know, we think
we fought a noble battle

but our people don't think
this is a noble war.

So we're not heroes.

But for me,
unlike the military,

none of those
who stayed behind at that plant

expected they would have
to give up their life.

They, like anyone else
with a nine-to-five job,

turned up on the 11th
with their lunchboxes

to work their shifts.

Then they were faced
with all of this.

And they chose to stay.

And I think understanding that,

anyone would have to agree

that they are
absolutely heroic.