All language subtitles for Fukushima.A.Nuclear.Story.2015.720p.WEBRip.x264.AAC-[YTS.MX].en

Meet Pio d'Emilia.
an Italian journalist in Tokyo.

His story begins on 11 March 2011.
the day of the earthquake, the tsunami

and the Fukushima Disaster

A 4 year investigation

Go to number two.

12/06/2013

Pio d'Emilia.

More than two years have gone by.

The negotiations in order to
enter have been long...

and difficult.

And now that we are finally here,
with tickets in our hands,

we all look a bit like children.

those with a photo camera or video camera
must sit by the window.

Like those who used to
come here

to admire the safety of Fukushima
Daiichi's nuclear power plant.

and this will be the formal main ride

from the village to Fukushima daiichi,

which is 20 kilometers away from here.

Fukushima

a nuclear story

act I
beyond imagination

They say you either embrace Japan
or you reject it.

You either adapt, giving up your culture,

or you remain a stranger, a poor gaijin

I'm a journalist.

I've lived in Japan for more than 30 years.

I love and hate this country.

I know it, and I ignore it.
I accept it, and I oppose it.

As if it were my own country.

I can happily sleep on a tatami,

but I cannot give up some
of my old and healthy habits,

such as my coffee.

Above all, I will never get
used to earthquakes.

I live on the sixth floor of
an old building,

and every time there is one
even a small one,

it makes me panic.

If I would have been
at home,

at 2.46 p.m. on the 11th of March, 2011,

I would have panicked

a lot.

I'm in Tokyo's central city in Akasaka.

there is
a very strong earthquake happening.

all the buildings are swaying.

look at the crane! look at how the crane
over that building is swaying!

the earth hasn't stopped shaking yet.

they have broadcast a warning on television

telling people to get out in the streets,

but as you can see
there is no commotion.

how strong is the earthquake?

7.9 on the Richter scale.

and the tsunami is coming.

where?

in Sendai. it's about 22 feet high.

back at home, I realized that we have survived
the largest earthquake ever recorded in Japan.

9 degree on the Richter scale at the
epicenter in the northeast of the country,

and felt as a magnitude of 7.4 in Tokyo.

then,

the tsunami arrives.

A tidal wave breaks over along 400 miles
of the coast of Tohoku.

In some places, it exceeds 30 meters and
reaches up to 6-7 kilometers inland.

A whole region. beautiful. with it's
wooden, plastic, aluminum houses

gets invaded quickly
and swallowed by water.

It's hard to believe the first death tolls
report so few known victims.

It's hard to believe those who say that
nuclear power plants are safe.

The most serious situation is a Fukushima
Daiichi nuclear power plant,

one of the 19 facilities existing
in the country,

located 300 kilometers northeast of Tokyo.

It's owned by Tepco,

one of the 10
electricity companies of its kind.

With its six nuclear power reactors,

the power plant is one of the most
important nuclear facilities in the world,

and considerable as the safest nuclear
station in spite of his 40 years.

During the endless minutes of the
earthquake,

the power reactors in
operation 1, 2, 3, 5, 6

automatically stop

and the operators activate
the security procedures.

The earthquake hits the plant hard.

The high voltage mast fall,

and the power station is isolated from
the national electric supply.

Emergency diesel generators
turn on automatically,

providing electricity to the
cooling systems

which have the task of reducing
heat inside the power reactors

once they have stopped working.

Barely an hour after the earthquake,

a wave of 14 meters devastates
the nuclear power plant.

Crossing over the dam built for
the protection of the nuclear plant

against waves of 6 meters maximum height.

In a few minutes, the water fills all of
the technical rooms,

damaging the emergency generators
located in the underground basement.

Two workers drown.

Without electricity all monitoring
indicators are out of use.

Nobody knows what is happening
inside the reactors.

The magnitude of the emergency
is not clear.

tepco's top managers are abroad to promote
Japanese nuclear technology,

and the news broadcast by television is too
contradictory to be true.

I have to do something.

I call the manager, but the phone and
the internet aren't working anymore.

To reactivate electricity in a control panels,

the plant's director Masao Yoshida

orders the workers to extract
the batteries from their cars

and sends others to buy batteries
in the nearest supermarket.

The workers succeed in restoring the electrical
power of the panels in the control room,

but the internal pressure indicators
of the reactors

reveal the situation in all its gravity.

If they don't act immediately,
three reactors may explode.

In order to decrease pressure,

you need to release the radioactive gas

that has accumulated inside
the reactors,

but in order to do so, Tepco must ask the
Prime Minister for permission.

Naoto Kan, who is also an engineer,
gives the green light.

The circuits do not have enough power to
open the valves.

Manual opening seems to be
the only option,

but the related procedures are not set out
in the instruction manual.

Citizens that live within an area

less than two miles
from the power plant

are advised to move away,

and those who live
between two and six miles away

are advised to stay at home.

It's the first time that the Japanese
government has declared a nuclear emergency

but we all remember the accident
in the nuclear facility of Tokaimura

in the Ibaraki Prefecture in 1999,

where two workers were killed and about
100 people were contaminated.

Of course, I remember it.

Tokaimura,

they gave the news
of the accident three days later,

and the death toll and
injured only ten days later.

Here in Tokyo, there have been neither
significant damages nor any victims.

People aren't panicking and
they start getting ready to

spend the night in public
places, offices, at friends houses,

or in the open air.

it's eight in the evening here.

there has never been this much
coming and going at this time of the day.

this is the working class district.

everyone is moving
towards the collection center

with their helmet
and a bag of things to eat.

I don't know what to do.

I can stay in Tokyo, where I will probably
perceive more news.

No, it's better to try
to get to Iwaki by car

to come close to the damaged
nuclear power plant.

Nothing

impossible.

The roads are blocked in the nuclear power
plant's direction and not vice versa.

Perhaps a lot of people
are trying to reach the north

to obtain news of their relatives.

Even the railway network is interrupted.

The country is split in two.

I have to go back to Tokyo and try to
catch a plane to Akita.

The only way to get the Fukushima is from
the opposite side.

Alarmed by Tepco's long silence,

Khan wants to understand clearly the
gravity of the situation.

He arrives at the nuclear disaster site.

He takes charge, sending a team of workers
to manually open the valves.

Having evacuated the population within a
radius of three kilometers,

the controlled release of radioactive vapor
seems to be the acceptable solution.

People start to believe that the worst
phase of the emergency is now over.

But in order to understand what's happening,
I need to go back to my school days.

Revisit some physics and the lessons on
how nuclear power plant works.

Fukushima Daiichi's reactor
type General Electric Model of 1978,

when in operation is like
an enormous pressure saucepan.

The nucleus contains bars of fuel
made of uranium.

The fission of uranium nuclei produces
radioactive atoms,

which continue to generate residual heat
for days after the reactors are rest.

The heat in the reactor's core is
generated by nuclear fission.

Boiling water produces
steam,

which goes directly to the turbines
and rotates them to produce electricity.

The condensed steam then goes back into
the reactor.

The extraction and replacement of the fuel

is usually performed by means
of an overhead crane

acting between the reactor
pool and the adjacent one.

During this operation, the two pools are
completely flooded.

The transfer of fuel rods
is performed underwater

through a common gate
that works like a valve.

Keeping the fuel isolated from the
environment

and refrigerated at every stage

is therefore a matter of
fundamental security.

And this is obtained
through different containment barriers

designed a bit like a matryoshka.

The first barrier is the capsule of iron,
the core of the reactor.

The second barrier is the shell of
reinforced concrete.

The walls of the building
are the last barrier between the reactor
and the atmosphere.

At 3.46 p.m. on the 12th of March,

cameras document a huge explosion

that shatters the top of reactor
building number one

and seriously injures four workers.

Among the operators at Fukushima Daiichi
and the watching world,

panic escalates.

Fortunately, the first reconnaissance shows

only the top of the building has exploded,

not the reactor, which seems to
be still intact.

The radiation levels have not risen
when compared to their values

before the explosion.

All the radio channels are playing
funereal music,

not a good sign.

Even when Hirohito was dying,

the music
was more cheerful.

I drive without stopping until dawn

when I
find myself in Kesennuma.

my god!

The tsunami is spared only a few
reinforced concrete buildings.

The rest has been wiped out, run out and
regurgitated without any order or restraint.

None of the authorities have arrived yet.
three days have passed....

This is the situation of this...

Hallo.

Look...

Kesennuma is a city of
about 60,000 inhabitants

and it is one of the four capitals
of Japan's tuna fishing industry.

- Now you see it's completely destroyed.
- Be careful.

the tsunami is coming. be careful.

is it coming now?

Yes, the water level is rising.

But she doesn't run away.

She stays there.

Her husband is sick.

He isn't able to get out of bed

and she has no intention of
abandoning him here.

BANK OF KESENNUMA

BANK CLOSED DUE TO TSUNAMI
WE APOLOGIZE FOR INCONVENIENCE

Roma Olimpiade!

Olympic Games in Rome?
The Olympic Games?

50 years ago.

Ah...it was in 1960.

in 1960.

He was an athlete, of what?

Captain of eight rowing team.

Where is your home?

Where was your home?

- There ... that one.
- That one.

So, the Japanese Self-defense forces
have come to help.

This is one of the first groups
of soldiers to receive orders

as to how to organize themselves.

No one is screaming.

Nobody despairs.

No one asks for help.

Here we are between Kesennuma and Matsua.

There is a never-ending line to buy
the last things left in the supermarket.

The line is perfectly in order.
they have been here for six hours.

Inhabiting seek to solve their problems

rather than questioning
the nuclear emergency.

Fukushima is still far away in every sense.

The pressure in the reactors
increases again.

They must be cooled and stabilized in
order to avoid the worst possible outcome.

Due to the lack of fresh water, the use
of seawater seems to be the only solution.

But it means the irreversible
damage of all reactors.

Masao Yoshida, director
of the nuclear power plant,

was the one to make the difficult decision.

In direct violation of Tepco's orders,

which were in favor of saving
the expensive reactors

from the corrosive effects of salt.

I didn't reach Fukushima.

I came back here to Akita.

And I'm afraid for the first time.

Is it right to stay?

I have a family in Italy.

Five children.

Is it right to risk it?

I trust this government and
especially the prime minister.

But the problem is can this government
trust Tepco and the nuclear industry?

Naoto was a simple and
honest person

who would never allow the
contamination of his people.

I decide to call him directly,

taking advantage of our old friendship.

But I can't reach him.

When I cannot talk to him, or I have to
address a delicate matter.

I get in contact with his wife, Nobuko.

Hello, Kan speaking.

Hi, it's Pio.

Ah, Pio-San! How are you?

Well, Worried. And I’m still working,

but both the company and my wife
tell me to come back.

Here everyone has fled.

Yes, I understand.

You know,

I get that the foreigners are leaving.

if I were a foreigner maybe I'd leave, too.

I would go back home,
but this is our home.

Where do you want us to go?
We have to have faith, and wait.

Right...

But the problem is knowing
if they are giving us

the correct information,
if they telling us the truth.

in other words,
if we can believe the Tepco authorities.

At the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant,

they realize that the core of reactors 1,
2 and 3 have already been damaged.

In a desperate move, the government sends
a team of specialized firemen

in an attempt to curb the
most severe situation,

the one in the third reactor.

The men have hardly arrived,

When a massive explosion destroys the
whole upper part of the building 3,

also involving building 4.

Some of the embassies are stoking fear
irresponsibly.

Most of the foreign press exaggerates,
distorts, or myths,

or often it invents fact.

Americans minimize the accident,

the French warn of inevitable apocalypse.

The reactors that are used in Fukushima
and the rest of Japan

are made in the United States,

and the American industry intends
to continue with their business enterprise.

On the other hand, France would like to
sell its state-of-the-art reactors,

which they say are safe.

The only official sources I know are the
Japanese National Agency for Nuclear Safety,

that is more similar to a
censorship agency,

and the International Agency for
Atomic Energy, for Atomic Energy.

The only thing that can help me understand
is going directly to the power plant.

Camera is revealed a third powerful
explosion in the building of reactor 2.

The walls remain intact, but a part of the
reactor suffers serious damage.

Tepco abandons all hope
of saving the situation,

and considers the possibility of
evacuating all its employees.

Naoto Kan decides to go personally to
the headquarters in Tokyo

and forces the president Shimizu
not to abandon a ship.

Doing so would imply the
uncontrolled meltdown of all reactors,

thus putting the
very existence of Japan at risk.

You know it, but you find it difficult to
maintain the consonant awareness

that behind every broken window, every
destroyed car and every upturn boat,

that lies the story of a person,
of a family, of an entire country.

My parents are still here.

My sister was found. my mother not yet.

Here, you have no peace

if you know that a loved one
was not accepted worthy in the after wold

and still wanders in the
world which he is no longer part of.

They watch over the bodies,

wash them,
dress them with care,

put makeup on them.

After choosing no auspicious day for the
cremation,

they get ready by placing their
most prized possessions next to them,

finally proceeding to the right of shikotsu

the delicate meticulous right of
collecting the bones in the urns.

It's such an intense moment.

I deliver this to you.

The shikotsu ritual is celebrated also for
pets.

But the tsunami also caused the suspension
of cremations for lack of fuel.

So just two and half gallons?

I give two.

It was necessary to resort
to collective burials,

which to the Japanese are
considered as sad and offensive.

The tsunami swept everything away,

including the right to feel pain,

to remember and
to mourn the dead.

I'm very worried
about the situation at the nuclear plant,

which is very dangerous and unpredictable.

At lunchtime on the 16th of March,

Emperor Akihito is speaking
with a live broadcast.

It's the first time that an Emperor uses
television to speak directly to the people.

There are those who remember
his father,

Emperor Hirohito's dramatic speech
on the radio,

announcing the end of the war.

Now Japan is fighting for
the life of its people,

as it did back then.

Tepco, pressured by the government,
takes its decision.

About 50 men are left there to deal with
the situation.

They operate in extreme conditions.

Separated from the rest of the world,
contaminated by radiation,

without any news from family
members affected by the tsunami,

they fight to cool reactors,

restore electricity and security systems.

Often, by means of luck.

It's time to decide what to do,
and in a hurry.

The majority of my Italian
and foreign colleagues

have already left the country
and moved to the south.

Even if I wanted to go back,

Tokyo airports are now closed or clogged.

In case the situation worsened,
I would feel safer here in the north,

protected by a mountain
range rather than in Tokyo or Osaka,

where the wind would
propel the radioactive cloud.

As for a possible speedy escape,

from Akita you can fly directly to Korea,

or by car you can easily reach the island
of Hokkaido.

from the capital city of Sapporo you
can get to the entire world.

American drones during
the aerial reconnaissance

discovered the water in the spent fuel pool
on top of reactor number four is evaporating

and the spent fuel rods which have just
been extracted are still hot

and are likely to
be exposed to the air.

Naoto Kan orders the
army to use helicopters

in order to dump water taken
directly from the sea.

A high level of water in the pool must be
maintained at any cost.

Unlike the reactor, there is no structure
that can contain the fishing.

Flying over reactor number four,

the helicopters are exposed to
excessive doses of radiation

and strong wind also prevents the drivers
from performing their necessary maneuvers.

The only alternative is the use of
powerful water cannons at broad range,

pointed directly at the pool,

a maneuver which is defined
by many as a desperate one.

We decided to evacuate people
who lived 12 miles away

from Fukushima Daiichi's plant.

You see here the sign says.

"danger beyond this point,
12 mile regulated traffic zone."

With this brief intrusion, I don't run any
risk.

I just have to stay for a little while and
not leave any part of my body uncovered.

This is a secondary internal route
of Futaba.

the last town two and half miles away
from the nuclear plant.

Nothing has changed
since the people escaped.

Earthquake, tsunami, nuclear fallout,

This is the area that undergone
all three of them.

the navigator is not going mad.

It indicates roads that no longer exist.

Now we are one mile away
from Fukushima Daiichi.

the nuclear plant that is threatening
japan and the rest of the world.

Here is the power plant station.

It's better for me to leave
or these people will stop me soon.

The situation seems to improve.

The water level in the In the pool of
reactor number four suddenly rises again,

and the level of
radiation begins to fall.

The reactors remain unapproachable,

but the workers can go back to the control
room without incurring any serious risks.

At the end of March 2011, seawater is
substituted with distilled water.

However, the cooling circuit is no longer
watertight.

The use of seawater, in addition to the
fresh water, stabilizes the reactors.

But results also in the release of
more than 11,000 tons

of radioactive water into the ocean,

causing great concern amongst
the international community.

The accident is classified at the highest
level of the INES scale.

Most of the national media
begin accusing a prime minister

of managing the
emergency irresponsibly.

Before the accident, Naoto was in
favor of nuclear energy.

Now he has changed his point of view.

Well, changing ideas in politics comes
with a very high price.

Not everyone wants to pay it.

Naoto Kan tendered his resignation from
his position as Japan's prime minister,

following the agreement with the
opposition.

And after having attained
a series of incentives

for the development
of renewable energy.

The director of Fukushima Daiichi's plant,

Masao Yoshida, has been forced
to resign from his position

to be admitted to hospital and
submitted to urgent medical treatments.

The manager will be replaced with the new
director Takeshi Takahashi.

Japanese prime minister Yoshihiko Noda

declared to the nation that the reactor
would reach the cold shutdown state.

Today, Japan closed down, officially,
for a necessary emergency maintenance,

the last of its 54 still working nuclear
reactors.

The new prime minister Shinzo Abe announces
the intention of going back to nuclear.

The gradual reopening of
the old power plants

and the resuming of work on those
still under construction.

The government's decision causes various
protests all over the country.

Follow me!

ACT II
THE INVISIBLE ENEMY

FIRST FROM THE REGION. FROM YOUR HANDS.
THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY OF JAPAN

Were you afraid to die?

As you know, on the morning of the 15th,

I personally went to Tepco's headquarters.

The situation was tragic.

and Tepco's executives were considering
the option of evacuating the plant,

of leaving it to its destiny.

I was furious.

I told the executives
that such a thing was unthinkable,

that the
whole of Japan was at risk.

And that instead, we should hold up until
the end

to avoid tragedy.

The future of Japan was at stake.

We could not run the risk of contamination

for who knows how long.

Something had to be done,

even if that
meant putting our lives at risk.

And this meant everyone,

us politicians, Tepco's executives,

the army, the fire brigade,
the police, everyone.

So this is the emergency control
headquarters.

The dynamic of the meltdown was almost
identical in all three damage reactors.

During the earthquake, the
reactors shut down,

but in the absence of cooling,
water evaporated in the core.

The fuel rods were then
left exposed,

quickly reaching a temperature of about
3 ,000 degrees Celsius.

And thus melted, forming a
kind of magma called corium,

releasing large quantities of
hydrogen,

a highly explosive gas.

The pressure in the pool and the reactors'
capsule thus rocketed.

And to prevent the reactors' explosion,

the technicians were forced to expel
radioactive gas

into the atmosphere
through the central chimney stack.

But the gas seeped into
the center of the building

because of the many gaps
caused by the earthquake.

The hydrogen reacted violently with the
oxygen in the air,

and the explosion destroyed the top part
of building 1, 3, and 4,

apparently without
damaging the reactors.

During the explosion, there were large
releases of radioactive materials

which carried by the wind settled
on the sea,

lands and cities of the Fukushima district.

Thank you all for waiting.

I introduce to you Mr. Takeshi Takahashi,
Fukushima Daiichi's plant director.

My name is Takeshi Takahashi,

I took on the role of plant director
in December of 2011,

succeeding my predecessor,
Mr. Masao Yoshida.

First of all,
I want to apologize sincerely

to people around the world
for the damage caused by this incident.

Apologies play an important role in
Japan's culture.

Also, Tepco's president,
Shimizu, has apologized,

but the apologies have
not been appreciated.

As often as the case in Japan,

it was just a formal apology and not
a taking of responsibility.

Indeed, Tepco deemed the incident
as sotagai

which means unpredictable,

because in their opinion, nobody could
have predicted a 14 meter high tsunami.

How can you live in the fear that your
child might get cancer, leukemia?

For example, because you bought an
affected milk carton.

Japanese people left alone, organized
themselves alone.

New associations, solidarity groups,
self-managed initiatives are soon born.

Full body screening and food analysis are
carried out autonomously.

In some private houses, domestic markets
are organized at the weekend.

Moms from that area come together
to buy products from distant crops,

from provinces
that are considered to be safe.

Also, because online commerce is
dramatically growing,

and with it, scams.

In a country where citizens were used to
leaving their goods unattended on the streets,

where shoppers left money and
exchange for produce,

people have lost their trust,

especially in the authorities.

This is the most serious
and hidden collateral damage

produced by
Fukushima's accident.

The disappearance of that harmony,
that politeness and that equilibrium,

that Japanese people call wa.

Not to mention deaths caused by broken
hearts, by depression, by stress,

and about suicide committed in the situation
of desperation or for mere calculation,

because in Japan, insurance
pays and also well, in cases of suicide.

Yesterday my husband asked me
if I had thought about leaving.

He said to me.

"I have to earn money for you,
I have to stay here to work,

to allow you to live.

This way you can leave."

And I said, "And what are we going to do
about the mortgage?"

And he answered,

"I made some calculations,
if I die, the insurance company...

will be there to pay."

Fukushima is an entirely domestic tragedy.

It happened in a time of peace.

While Hiroshima and Nagasaki were
tragedies caused by a foreign force,

which put World War II to an end.

The Japanese people
came out of the tragedy defeated,

but strengthened in their spirit.

Traditionally, the Japanese
respect winners,

and do not seek revenge if victory
was obtained honestly.

Whether they are forces of nature,
such as tsunamis or earthquakes,

or whether they are valiant men like
General Douglas MacArthur,

they try to imitate them and then,
if possible, to overcome them.

But radiation has no form, has no smell,

does not make any sound.

It's an invisible, sneaky enemy,

and to fight it, will take
at least 40 years.

There are many complicated procedures,

the hardest one will be
the removal of the corium

from the reactors
that were subjected to meltdown.

It's an operation
that has never been attempted before.

We are aware

that one of the biggest problems
of this plant

is the huge volume of contaminated water

that contains large number
of radionuclides.

In order to manage this growing quantity
of water we have built some tanks,

and we are continuing to build new ones.

Now let's talk about the removal
of the spent fuel.

The pool inside still contains
more than 1,500 rods of spent fuel

and this pool is in the top floor
of the building.

Our plan is to enclose
the rods of spent fuel

in a container
lowered directly into the pool.

The container is then lifted vertically
by the crane

and moved horizontally

When it has reached the right position,

the container is then lowered
to the ground.

the container is then carried

to the communal pool created
for depositing the spent rods.

We will then to be able to continue
the general decommissioning

with increased safety.

We expect to complete this task
in about a year.

And in eternity to dispose,

they were talking about
this in Onkalo, in Finland.

The Finnish government has decided to bury

4,500 tons of nuclear waste,

which comes from its nuclear plants

in a complex system of
underground catacombs

designed to last at least 100,000 years.

Well do you know what the problem is now?

It is deciding in what language
to write the notice

at the entrance of this storage facility,

considering that the languages
we use now

will probably extinct in 100,000 years.

Above all. the aim is
to avoid pointing out

that radioactive cemetery,

the most dangerous that ever existed,
lies below.

There is another kind of repository
linked to nuclear energy.

And it is an outdoor repository.

It is the one for the Hinan-sha,
the nuclear power refugees.

People living here are all from Odaka.

There were supposed to be
a few hundred people,

then thousands of people,

then hundreds of thousands of people.

There are people that
have had to abandon their homes,

their land, their
roots, may be forever.

And are forced to
live in these temporary houses,

a nightmare almost worse than radiation.

This is what happened to my friend Yoshida
and to his family.

IDOKAWA

The government would want us
to return to our houses.

but we have to wait

for the result of decontamination.

Everything depends on this result.

Can you hear me? One, two, three, check...
One, two, three, check...

Asami is a young and brave freelance
journalist

who from the very first days strive to
understand how the situation really was.

She is the one who accompanied us more
than once in the no-go zone.

And she is the one who introduces us to
Matsumoto,

a local boss, who provides
workforce for Tepco

and is agreed to hide us in his car

to pass through the
ever -increasing controls.

He is a very educated guy,
even if his past is questionable.

He spent six years in prison.

He is a member of the yakuza.

If during the first
days of the emergency,

entering the forbidden
zone was discouraged.

Now, entering the exclusion zone is
severely prohibited.

But we can't stop.

We decide altogether to violate the ban.

We are convinced that in such cases,
the journalists not only have a right to,

but must do so.

Also, because the forbidden zone exerts a
special, almost perverse attraction.

There is still the presence of life,
but a life that smells of death.

In the first days of May,
after two months of guilty forgetfulness,

the government has issued its cruel verdict.

For first class domestic animals,
cats, dogs, rabbits, hamsters

The owners can now decide
to go and get them.

And if they have survived,
take them to specialized centers

where they will be checked
before being given back,

who knows when, to their rightful owners.

Okuma Machi, a few miles
from Fukushima nuclear energy plant.

A city which has now become a ghost town

and where only some dogs and cats survived.

A group of Japanese people
comes now and again to feed them.

For all the other animals,
pigs, cows, poultry, sheep, horses,

there is what Japanese media
call inaccurately

Sweet death.

The government has decided that they
should be given lethal injections.

But before someone decides
who will perform this task,

these poor animals,
by now abandoned,

dying one after the other of starvation,

amidst excruciating suffering.

And they become useless compost
for now useless land.

Look, this is a museum of terrors.

The carcasses of cows still lie here,
after two or three months.

In the back of this group
that is desperately trying to survive,

eating who knows what rubbish.

There is also dead bodies of pigs.

pigs which eat each one another.

The government has decided
that places which show values

above one microsievert per hour

are unfit for habitation.

This is the limit that sets the boundary
of the no-go zone,

which previously corresponded to an area

of a 20 kilometer radius
from the nuclear plant.

In a second moment, the boundaries were
reset based on contamination levels.

But without taking hotspots into account,

they are spread all over even beyond
the limit of 20 kilometers,

and they often mark very high values,

which are incompatible with human life.

Three, two, one, zero... Look! Over!

The radiation here is over
the dosimeters capacity,

which is one millisievert.

Maybe it's better if we leave immediately.

These are people who lived in the area.

They have only an hour.
They do not have time.

Good morning.

They are some of the displaced persons,

the house owners,

The government has granted them one hour

in which they are allowed
to enter their house

and fetch their most
important treasure possessions

which they have left behind
in the emergency escape.

Also, the hospital in Futaba was quickly
abandoned.

Why are there so many beds outside,
so many wheelchairs?

Because for some days the patients
were left alone,after some days

the patients were carried out
here with their beds.

Unfortunately, it is said that during
the transportation some of them died,

if I remember correctly, 14 of them died.

Not everyone is obeyed the order to
abandon the forbidden zone.

Some, like Naoko Takahara

and his family have decided to stay
in their home in Naraba.

His mother is 94 years old.

She is very fragile
and has not left her bed.

My mother.

Good morning.

He's a guest.

Good morning.

His name is Pio. And he said good morning.

I come from Italy.

He comes from Italy.

Transporting her to another place

would properly have caused her to
die from broken heart.

This happens to often,
among the displaced.

Unfortunately, in this last period
the situation has gone worse.

It's not like the first days

when we talked about the honesty
of Japanese people.

In addition to burglaries in houses,

they are starting to rob cash machines.

Right now we are
inside one of the supermarkets

that was open 24 hours a day.

Look, this is the cash machine,
you can see it's ransacked.

Totally ransacked.

Could you see the sea from here before?

No, you could not.

My great-grandfather was buried here,
dad is there.

Here lies the grandfather
of my grandfather.

Here lies my grandfather
and here my great-grandfather.

He died three days before my birth.

Masao Yoshida fukushima's nuclear
power plant brave director dies,

worn out by an incurable illness

with his decision to disobey tepco by
injecting sea water into the reactor

He is de facto save the country.

NUCLEAR ENERGY ENLIGHTENS OUR FUTURE

ACT III
THE MIRACLE

In 1954, when the rivalry with the former
Soviet Union was becoming increasingly strong,

and the world was divided into two blocks,

the United States Department of Defense
secretly carried out an experiment,

its codename being Castle Bravo.

This experiment was a nuclear test,

consisting in the explosion of a hydrogen bomb.

American scientists made a mistake
in their calculations,

underestimating the power of the explosion,

which was three times
stronger than expected.

The Japanese fishing vessel, Daigo
Fukuryu Maru, was in the surrounding waters

and was hit by the radioactive
fallout.

The 23 fishermen had to be hospitalized
immediately.

Kuboyama Aikichi, the Marconi
operator aboard the vessel,

died a few months later from
Acute radiation syndrome.

Radio and television interrupted their
broadcast to spread the news.

Traces of radioactivity were found in
tuna, fish in the Pacific Ocean,

and this forced the culprit to come out in
the open and confess the truth.

In little time because of fear of
radiation, panic spread.

From that moment on, the people of Japan

have been totally forthright
in rejecting nuclear energy.

The American government concerned about
the spread of anti-American

and anti-nuclear sentiment in Japan,

a country it considered a military and
economic base of great importance,

took appropriate measures, by involving
all Japanese communications media

using words such as peace,
justice and security

for the promotion of nuclear energy.

Shoriki Matsutaro, a war criminal suddenly
reinstated by the Americans

and who in the meantime had become
a powerful lobbyist and media tycoon

played a very important role.

He was a great admirer of American culture

and he was convinced that
the nation's economic prosperity

depended on the friendship with the U.S.

From the columns of the newspaper Yomiuri
Shimbun

and from his own private TV channel, Nippon
Television,

he launched a powerful and
effective pro-nuclear campaign.

In a few years, he succeeded in defeating
the anti-nuclear movement in his country

and in persuading the majority of citizens
that embracing nuclear power

was not only a wise, but rather
an indispensable choice.

In 1954, U.S. President Eisenhower carried
out the program atoms for peace

to sweep away the
memory of the bombing of Japan.

And after only two years following the
Daigo Fukuryu Maru incident

a symposium on nuclear energy for
civil purposes

was organized and took place
Symbolically in Hiroshima.

Matsutaro was chosen as the president
for the new commission for nuclear energy.

the construction of the country's first
nuclear power plant was soon announced.

Thus, it was that the country which would
probably have been the last in the world

to espouse nuclear energy,

became one of it's main and
most convinced supporters.

How long have you been working
at Fukushima daiichi?

Twelve, thirteen years.

When you start,

Were you in favor of nuclear energy?

Yes, I was.

And now?

I changed my mind.

The nuclear gypsies, the nuclear power
plant's seasonal workers,

number in the thousands,
and they are immediately recognizable.

They seem distracted almost absent,
but in reality, they are looking at you.

They make you perceive that they have
something to say, and they do

If you go to visit them in small taverns in
the neighborhood of the nuclear power plant.

they are paid three or four hundred
dollars a day to be contaminated.

Although, after the agency
and the contractors get their part

very little ends up in their own pockets.

In Fukushima, they represent
almost 90% of the workforce,

and they withstand most of the radiation.

There are those who, in
order to earn more,

fake the dosimeters, or take up double
shifts using different names.

A sacrifice prompted by despair,

by necessity of making
ends meet at any cost.

Apparently, it's a tradition.

I was told about it by
Kenji Higuchi,

a photographer who became famous
in the 70s for his reportages

inside Japanese nuclear power plants.

I never tolerated the idea that to produce
energy you had to damage humans.

contaminate them forever.

clean energy, they said: a total lie.

Well, the former president Kan
had decided to abandon nuclear energy,

but then Abe announced that he wanted
to start the reactors again

Terrible, it's more than irresponsible

The situation is this: we can't build
nuclear power plants anymore.

And now what do we do?
We sell our technology to other countries.

It's an irresponsible thing.

Here it's not about producing energy.

It's only about making money.

In the middle of the night,
I called my boss at GE and I said,

my recommendation is that
we tell the U.S. utilities

that GE cannot support the
continued operation of these plants.

And my boss said to me, "well, it can't be
that bad, Dale.

And keep in mind that if we have to shut
down all of these Mark 1 plants,

it will probably mean the end of GE's
nuclear business forever."

Please never open the windows.

just, please don't take
any photograph on the film.

this building almost all the window
glasses were shattered

by their hydrogen explosion
of the unit number one.

And the rest of the building is
heavily damaged,

So there is a covering over the building.

I wonder how the triple nuclear meltdown
at Fukushima daiichi could remain hidden

for more than two months,
which is long for a country such as Japan.

I am convinced that experts,
the real insiders knew it.

But no one, especially Tepco, wanted to
use the word meltdown.

Damage to the reactors,

well, they played with words,

played for two months.

Then finally, in May, they used
the right one.

Reactor two's building is the
only one still in one piece,

but it's the source of the most
dangerous radioactive leakage.

The explosion that happened inside the
building damaged the base of the reactor,

causing the flood of various rooms in
underground conduits.

Every day, hundreds of tons of radioactive
waters spill into the ocean.

What is the opinion of Kan?
Does he have the idea?

Where is the core? Nobody knows,
not even the robots manage to get near.

At what stage is the meltdown?

Tepco doesn't know,
the media doesn't know...

What is the opinion of Kan?
Does he have an idea?

What is the opinion of Kan,
Kan "the engineer"?

We now know for sure

that the core made a hole in the
metallic base of the cylinder

and came out completely.

Everything is written here, in the report
from the government investigation committee.

Because of the radiation, no one,
not even the robots,

can approach close enough to understand
how much concrete separates

the corium from the
ground and the aquiferous.

The cisterns that collect the
hundreds of thousands of tons

of radioactive liquids,
are no longer sufficient.

Leaks everywhere infiltrate the ground.

Some argue that it would be best
to throw everything overboard

because fishing in the area
has already been compromised

and the Pacific Ocean is so big.

But nobody really knows what
the real long-term effects will be.

The radioactive substances
infiltrate the food chain

and polarize on the top where we stand

with our debates and our fears.

The machines and the vehicles
and the tanks

that washed away
are still left in this area.

And on the time of the
earthquake, the tsunami height

in this area was a
15 meter high.

The building on the right-hand side of
was heavily damaged by the tsunami.

And when the earthquake occurs,
we do not have that temporary sea wall.

So this area has a direct hit by the
tsunami.

Quite a lot is going on inside the bus.

Tepco's men aren't allowing us to film,

they interrupt all the time,
they talk with a loud speaker...

It is not clear what their problem is

since there is no longer
a functioning power plant,

there is no danger of terrorism.

there is a danger of information.

The information later supplied by workers
confessed by the executives

and then confirmed through
concrete examples

In the 641 pages of the
Kurokawa report,

talks about a man-caused catastrophe.

Everything but sotagai.

So where is this reactor?

What?

The new construction, where is it?

300 feet away from here.

It's what we would like to see...

We are going by foot... isn't that enough?

If you don't want to comply with my orders
you can just leave... understood?

Wait, I am just asking,
I an asking a question for information...

Then let's go!
Please walk along this side.

Please stay on the left side of the street.

We are going on foot to see the building
next to reactor number four.

We managed to convince them,

they didn't want to let us at first,
but now we are going.

stay on the left side of the street.

you do not move to the right.

Here they are all
a bit nervous, hysterical...

The Kurokawa report shows that the
direct causes of the accident

were all foreseeable prior
to March 11, 2011.

Tepco was too quick to cite the tsunami
as the cause of the nuclear accident

and deny that the earthquake
caused any damage.

The direct intervention by the Kantei,

including Prime Minister Kan's visit to
the Fukushima Daiichi plant,

disrupted the chain of command
and brought disorder

to an already dire situation
at the site.

The accident was the result of collusion
between the government,

the regulators and Tepco and the lack of
governance by said parties.

With their behavior,
they have betrayed the right of Japan

to be safe from nuclear risks.

You human beings just like us,
we're the same, do you have a heart?

Are you hiding behind doors?
Don't you want to be serious?

It has become a weekly appointment.

This is already the fourth time
that Japanese people in Tokyo gather here.

They meet in front the Parliament,
outside the Prime Minister's residence

to express non-violently,
and ever more creatively,

their opposition to nuclear power,

and most of all to the reopening
and reactivation of the nuclear plants

already established
by the Japanese government.

but not yet carried out...

I wonder how it is
possible that as of today,

there hasn't been any
indictments for trial.

Let alone a conviction.

All the criminal investigations that have
been started have already been closed.

We shall no longer prosecute.

Everybody is guilty, no one is guilty,
as in war.

If there is no guilt,
there is no responsibility,

and there is no sin,
if there is no repentance.

So this place is good enough,

so please stay closer to each other.

Finally we are in front
of the reactor number four.

Here the radiation levels
are still very high,

more than 1,500 microsieverts per hour...

Is it true that if something goes wrong
we are truly in danger of an apocalypse?

meanwhile the real risk is
to leave these rods

where they are now,
on the roof of a building.

Right before the incident,
a routine maintenance,

which consists of the replacement
of the spent fuel,

was taking place at reactor 4.

To perform this maintenance, you have to
flood the room above the reactor

so that water level is even with
that of the pool

that contains the new fuel.

When the cooling system stopped working,

in the room above the reactor 4,
there was only water.

while in the beside pool there are
all the fuel rods incandescent

which made water in the pool boil.

if the fuel had been left uncovered,

there would be yet another meltdown
occurring, but this time, outdoors.

Have did happen, the consequences
would have been devastating.

Tokyo would have been totally destroyed.

The reason why this
meltdown didn't actually happen

has remained a
mystery for a long time.

It was only after several
months that we got to understand it

thanks to work
of the commission of inquiry.

Due to pressure increase in the reactor
pool,

the gate valve that separates the reactor
pool from the fuel storage pool

broke down, causing the water to pour out
into the adjacent fuel storage pool.

Had the gate not broken, the pool water
would have continued to evaporate

thereby causing the meltdown
within a very short time.

Tokyo is safe by chance.

The myth of nuclear energy of it being
economic,

safe and clean has been swept away.

This disaster has forced
Japan to face up to a question

that many other countries
have already dealt with.

Nobuko was right.

In the face of Fukushima, we are all
Japanese.

Don't film me...

This indicates that we are
currently producing

nine kilowatts
and we are selling it to Tepco.

The increasing global energy demand
is saying

that the path to renewable energy
is important,

but it is not enough in itself.

While the dream of nuclear fusion
of an infinite energy,

clean energy for all is
still there waiting for us

At the other side of history,
Fukushima's heroes were not enough.

A bigger disaster has been avoided
because a gate valve broke.

We have been spared because miraculously

something in the country of technology

did not work.

On August 26th 2014, for the first time a Court ruled
that Tepco is responsible for the suicide of a woman
who became depressed after the accident
and it must pay $472,000 in compensation.

Five years after the incident,
and despite public promises to return to full fledged production
the government has managed to restart only 2 reactors
among the 52 available in the country.

In the meantime public opinion,
once strongly in favour of nuclear energy,
has now turned against it.