In the wake of escalating radiation fears brought on by the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant crisis, Haneda and Narita airports have created public web pages with twice-daily updates on radiation levels near their facilities.
Emphasizing the continuing safety of the areas, and with the goal of curtailing misinformed rumors, the two sites update the radiation level at 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. in both English and Japanese.
Narita airport set up its detector in Hokotashi, Ibaraki Prefecture, some 50 kilometers from the airport, while Haneda's detector transmits from nearby Kawasaki city. As of Monday at 9 p.m., the reading near Narita airport was 0.95 millisieverts per year, and 0.39 millisieverts per year near Haneda. Both are actually below the world average exposure of 2.4 millisieverts per year.
Japan's foreign ministry has emphasized that the level is far below anything considered harmful to human health.
The websites are http://www.narita-airport.jp/en/index.html and http://www.haneda-airport.jp/inter/en/
© Compiled from news reports
7 Comments
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gaijintraveller
Error 404 Remove the index dot htm and you get the Narita site. You can find links giving radiation information on government websites such as the Chiba Prefectural site.
The Haneda site gives up-to-date information on duty-free shops, flights and so on. It gives "!Important Information" on radiation dated 19th March.
With the goal of curtailing misinformed rumors. Ironically, the whole article is misinformed rumour.
KnowBetter
Don't let the 'passengers to be' going to those airports that the dose from flying will FAR exceed those local levels. No, no, no, not the truth please!
futonsleeper
"Narita airport set up its detector in Hokotashi, Tsukuba Prefecture, some 50 kilometers from the airport" I don't understand why Narita's detector is in another prefecture???- to me 50kms is not 'near'. ...misinformation for sure...
BPoint
I've always wanted to go to Tsukuba Prefecture....;)
HumanTarget
Considering the detector is located closer to the Fukushima plant than the airport is, I don't think they are trying to hide anything, futonsleeper.
dirisaya
At least they're giving some reading. Better than none at all. Perhaps not knowing would make people feel better?
My country main international airports is already screening all passengers and cargo arriving from Japan.
wanderlust
There are dozens of radiation detectors in use in Japan; Kanagawa prefecture alone has 8 in the Yokosuka area around Global Nuclear Fuel, a nuclear fuel rod maker, and another 5 around the Toshiba factory in Kawasaki that makes components for nuclear reactors.