The WSJ confirms that people within a six-mile (i.e. 10-kilometer) radius were already being shipped out hours ago. Also, an update on the control room, where radiation levels reached 1,000 times the normal rate earlier:
Radiation levels aren’t supposed to rise in a control room, which is designed to allow operators to continue working during emergencies and is equipped with filtration systems and other design features to protect workers from radiation exposure. Nevertheless, experts said that a level that is 1,000 times normal probably isn’t immediately harmful.
The technicians on the scene battling this thing must be signing years of their lives away, if not decades.
Reuters: Japan’s nuclear authorities said on Saturday that radioactive pressure was successfully relieved at the No.1 reactor at Tokyo Electric Power’s Fukushima Daiichi plant by opening valves.