The death toll from the earthquake/tsunmani that belted Japan could exceed 10,000 making it the country’s worst crisis since World War II:
The death toll from Japan’s devastating earthquake and tsunami on Friday is expected to exceed 10,000, Japanese news services announced Sunday.
There are already 1,300 confirmed dead and 10,000 people are missing in just one town.
The nuclear threat also loomed over the parts of the ravaged country.
About 190 people were within a six-mile radius of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant when its roof blew off Saturday, raising radiation levels rose. Officials have confirmed 22 people have been contaminated.
Officials said an explosion at a third reactor at the plant was possible but downplayed the risk of an actual meltdown.
The devastating, 8.9-magnitutude quake and tsunami appeared to have shifted the coastline by about 8 feet in some areas and shifted the earth on its axis by nearly 4 inches, according to reports from geophysicists.
With 300,000 people already displaced, the lack of electricity and fuel was hitting survivors and resident around the country hard.
At least 2 million people in Japan’s freezing cold northern region were completely without power.T
Look at these shocking before and after photos via the BBC.
Meanwhile, there’s a state of emergency at a second nuclear power plan.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.