US, Japan Forces Search for Missing Tsunami Victims

Thousands of Japanese and American forces joined together Friday in a final three-day sweep to search for those still missing after the 9.0 earthquake and devastating tsunami hit Japan three weeks ago.
 

The operation involves 120 aircraft and 65 ships and will cover the three prefectures hit hardest by the disaster that has killed 11,400 people and left more than 16,500 missing.
The quake and tsunami also knocked out cooling systems at the Fukushima nuclear plant, causing it to leak various forms of radiation.

In an address to parliament Friday, Prime Minister Naoto Kan criticized the plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, for having inadequate defenses against a tsunami.  But, the Japanese leader assured the public that there is no danger of contamination outside the 20-kilometer exclusion zone imposed around the nuclear plant.

Nuclear industry experts from the U.S., France and elsewhere are in Japan Friday, or heading there, to offer assistance to TEPCO. Specialized robots also are being sent to help where it is too unsafe for humans.

Radiation leaking from Japan's crippled Fukushima nuclear plant has been detected in nearby water, in beef and even in dead bodies left behind by the earthquake and tsunami.

Authorities are considering what to do with 1,000 dead bodies near the plant, saying it may be too dangerous to collect them because of fears the corpses are too contaminated with radiation.  Police sources warn that if the families of the victims cremate the bodies, as is the tradition in Japan, it could release more radioactivity into the environment.

And TEPCO says radioactive iodine was detected in the groundwater beneath one of the reactors at levels 10,000 times above normal.  Japan's Kyodo news agency says this is the first time radiation has been found in groundwater.