TOKYO, Nov. 7 (Xinhua) -- The operator of Japan's crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant said Thursday it successfully retrieved a small amount of melted fuel from one of the damaged reactors.
Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings (TEPCO) said an amount of melted fuel was extracted from the bottom of No. 2 reactor's containment vessel with a gripper on the tip of a telescopic device.
The sample was placed in a special container for transport before being sent for analysis at the Japan Atomic Energy Agency's facility in neighboring Ibaraki Prefecture, it added.
It is the first time TEPCO has removed the melted fuel from one of the reactors at the Fukushima plant. An estimated 880 tons of fuel debris remain in No. 1, 2, and 3 reactors struck during the 2011 nuclear disaster.
TEPCO is currently in the decades-long process of decommissioning the power plant, which suffered core meltdowns that released radiation after being hit by a 9.0-magnitude earthquake and an ensuing tsunami on March 11, 2011, resulting in a level-7 nuclear accident, the highest on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale.
The deadly debris retrieval was initially planned for 2021 but was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic and technical difficulties. TEPCO hopes the small amount of debris taken out will provide valuable data for large-scale removal. ■