Mid-afternoon, 11th March 2011, a magnitude 9.1 earthquake c75kms off-shore, mid-way up the east coast of Honshu, Japan’s largest island, sets off a massive tsunami which sweeps into Honshu’s east coast. Three onshore waves build up to 40 metres in height, wash up to several kilometres inland, and cause the deaths of around 19,000 people.
Damage from the earthquake and tsunami causes a reactor meltdown at the Daiichi nuclear power-plant between the small towns of Futaba and Okuma on the Fukushima coast. The meltdown releases radio-active material into sea-water, ground-water, and air. A plume of radio-active material blows inland.
as close as we got to
the reactor