from the passivic ocean. we are still feeling aftershocks here, causes a lot of anxiety in japan as it did in haiti last year after january 12th earthquake there the aftershock continued for a long time. many people to this day refuse to go in their homes in haiti scared the homes will collapse from the aftershocks and that is the situation in japan, a lot of anxiety after the 8.9 earthquake and tsunami that just kill sod many people this had is gary tuchman in the earthquake zone in japan. japanese officials say it s pos able minor meltdown has already happened at a nuclear plant in northeast japan. monitors detected what may have been the melting of a fuel rod at the plant but they say there s no sign of dangerous radiation levels in the area. on cnn s state of the union today, candy crowley asked japan s ambassador to the united states about efforts to cool the reactors. it is better to put in clearwater, but we do not have
escape to the outside. a partial meltdown is bad news. you know, the reactor you know is going to be a dead reactor. but it doesn t have to lead necessarily to the same sort of environmental consequences that we saw with chernobyl. it s all about containment at that point. and then when we talk to you again the next hour, these two $2 billion nuclear plants had to be shut down as a result of what s taking place. all of this at a time that japan is facing some major economic woes. we ll talk about with what this potentially could mean for japan and possibly even beyond, jim walsh, thanks so much. thank you. in a moment, some more domestic news, including how likely is it that a federal government shutdown could occur this week. we ll tell you, after this. pr. at meineke i have options on oil changes. and now i get free roadside assistance with preferred or supreme. my money. my choice. my meineke.
going, it s not a democratically-elected leadership and they re going to keep building. other countries, perhaps south korea, which is right across the water from japan, other countries may want to take a pause here. so i think it will play out politically in different places. these japanese reactors currently in trouble, they were likely built with the notion of ground motion. but this was an 8.9 quake and it seems like anything, in would be difficult for anything to withstand that kind of velocity, that kind of power. i think that s right, fredricka. and when you look at the design specifications for many of the nuclear facilities in japan, not just the power plants, but reprocessing plant or fuel assembly plants, everything else, they were built to withstand earthquakes, but not an 8.9-earthquake. in part because it seems so unlikely. this is the strongest earthquake that has ever hit japan. so you wouldn t, if you re building these plants and trying to weigh costs and benefits,
arrangements to get them back to the states. and they would, you know, let us know as they progress on. i did get to talk to danny. he sounds good. and the great news, he s alive. all of his co-workers are together. they did have a few hours sleep. and they re all loorking forward to coming home to their families. about where is he in japan right now? as far as i know, they re somewhere in tokyo. okay. so he is at least made it about 200 miles south to tokyo. after being at that nuclear plant where there was trouble. has he told you anything more about what he thinks happened there? no. not really. he s just all i ve told you before. and until i get to see him and talk to him and to know what s happened, i know they re all traumatized. it s a lot to go through. all these disasters at one time. it s got to be a lot to take in.
plants here. cnn contributor and international security expert, james walsh joins us with what s happening in japan and if that could potentially happen here. the u.s. has reactors, some areas where there is motion. do we need to worry that something like that could happen in the u.s.? well, of course there are earthquakes, particularly california is a place where we ve had a lot of earthquakes. california is not a state that would have an earthquake at the magnitude at 8.9-quake that japan has suffered. but of course it s going to be a concern. and we shouldn t be surprised that political leaders are now growing cautious about it. we ve seen this in of the past. in 1979 when we had the three mile island accident and even after chernobyl. you saw people pull back from nuclear power because of the concerns, because people have basic fear of radiation. so i think that s going to play out differently in different countries. china is probably going keep on