Areas are still flooded from the tsunami near Sendai, Japan and yet another aftershock it the east coast of Japan, 40 miles from Sendai, knocking out the power in the northern part of the country on Thursday morning. It was orginally measured to be a magnitude 7.4 but was downgraded by the U.S. Geological Survey in Golden to be a magnitude 7.1 aftershock of the 8.9 earthquake. It is the strongest aftershock since several were recorded on March 11. Another two were killed as a result of the aftershock and over a 100 injuries were reported. A tsunami warning was issued following the quake, but was then taken off and announced that there was no tsunami threat to Hawaii.
The operator of the Fukushima nuclear power plant said there was no sign that any more damage was done. The plants spent fuel pools lost cooling capacity briefly when the power went down, but resumed shortly after just the way it was supposed to work. There is no evidence of any radiation to have leaked so far. It is constantly being monitored right now. Japan cannot afforded to have more destruction to its nuclear power plant.
I thought I had heard that the aftershocks were making it difficult to make progress on the power plants (which was already difficult given the radiation seepage). A hyperlink to your source would be appreciated.
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