Five injured in blast near Japan nuke facility

["Sandy Perle" <sandyfl@earthlink.net>]

To follow-up on Bjorn's info on the Thai worker, I have found no 
confirming information on the wire services. I did find this article 
though, different subject.

Five injured in blast near Japan nuke facility

TOKYO, March 10 (Reuters) - Five people were injured in an explosion 
at a Japanese research facility near a nuclear reprocessing complex, 
but there were no signs of radioactive leaks, police said on Friday. 

The midday explosion at the Institute for Environmental Sciences in 
Aomori Prefecture, about 580 km (360 miles) northeast of Tokyo, took 
place about a mile (1.5 km) away from low-level nuclear waste storage 
facility and nuclear reprocessing complex . 

The research institute deals with radioactive materials, but the 
blast occured in a facility which does not keep such material, a 
police officer said. 

Researchers were apparently pouring liquid oxygen into an 
experimental device when the explosion occured but the exact cause of 
the accident was under investigation, he added. 

Japan nuclear energy policy has been widely criticised following a 
series of accidents over the past five years, most recently the 
country's worst-ever nuclear accident in September at a uranium 
processing plant. One worker died from that accident and more than 
100 people were exposed to radiation. 

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