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To improve communications in the effort to defuse the crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, the first-ever meeting between the leader of the Ground Self-Defense Force's Central Readiness Force (CRF) and the plant's chief was held on April 21, 2011.
“We’re really, really sorry,” said Masao Yoshida, head of the stricken Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, bowing deeply upon seeing Maj. Gen. Masato Taura, CRF deputy commander.
The meeting was held in an isolated building within the Fukushima plant housing crucial facilities and equipment, such as communications and power supply systems.
Taura was commanding the CRF’s operations to help deal with the nuclear crisis from J-Village, a soccer-training complex not far from the crippled nuclear plant, which had been turned into the staging ground for efforts to bring the reactors under control.
After more than a month of leading the desperate efforts to contain the nuclear crisis while remaining in the building, Yoshida looked haggard.
Taura had intended to discuss with Yoshida measures to ensure quick and effective communications between TEPCO and the CRF in emergencies.
Taura decided to meet with Yoshida after he was unable to communicate with the utility when a powerful earthquake measuring lower 6 struck Fukushima Prefecture on April 11, exactly one month after the Great East Japan Earthquake struck. He was alarmed by his frustration in trying in vain to obtain accurate and detailed information about the situation at the plant.
As the major general was unsure why the head of the plant was apologetic upon their meeting, Yoshida said, “It’s about the explosion at the No. 3 reactor.”
“Although the temperature (in the reactor building) was rising, I didn’t think the situation was so dangerous and asked the SDF to spray water (on the reactor),” Yoshida explained. “I’m sorry for what happened.”
On the morning of March 14, some members of GSDF’s Central Nuclear Biological Chemical Weapon Defense Unit were injured by a hydrogen explosion at the No. 3 reactor. Yoshida thought Taura had come to complain about the incident.
After making it clear that he was not there to talk about the explosion, Taura proposed direct communications between them in emergencies.
“We are also preparing to rescue workers at the plant (in the event of an emergency),” he added.
Since the rescue mission was being planned and prepared for in profound secrecy, Taura couldn’t discuss it in any detail. He did the best he could to give some ideas about the highly secret mission to Yoshida, who was fighting a truly difficult battle to defuse the nuclear crisis as the head of the plant.
Yoshida was moved to tears as he learned how far the SDF was prepared to go to save TEPCO employees.
The meeting between Taura and Yoshida, which lasted only 10 minutes or so, established a reliable system of emergency communications between the two organizations.
Around that time, the Defense Ministry received a secret request from the prime minister’s office.
The government had developed a plan to lay pipes connecting the crippled reactors directly with a location on a hill some 1.5 kilometers away. They would be used by the SDF to inject cement into the reactors if it became impossible to cool them, according to the plan.
Eventually, it was decided that TEPCO would carry out the necessary work, but the SDF made preparations to deal with all imaginable worst-case scenarios.
When some three months had passed since the nuclear disaster broke out, the CRF units deployed around the Fukushima plant for various missions were finally relieved of their duties and returned to their respective bases.
They included the Central Nuclear Biological Chemical Weapon Defense Unit, which decontaminated polluted areas and sprayed water on the reactors from the ground, a helicopter brigade that dropped water on the reactors from the air, deputy commanders sent to the front line of dealing with the crisis and an airborne brigade prepared for evacuating residents.
On June 10, the Central Readiness Brigade, which had made preparations for the secret mission to rescue TEPCO employees at the nuclear plant, returned to Camp Utsunomiya, its base in Tochigi Prefecture.
The first thing senior officers of the brigade did on returning to the camp was to shred materials concerning the secret mission.
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