(PHOTO CREDIT: YASUYOSHI CHIBA/AFP/Getty Images)

FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:

A 7.1 magnitude earthquake shook northeastern Japan today, the strongest aftershock since the massive 9.0 earthquake and tsunami that followed devastated the nation four weeks ago.

One of the big concerns of course is possible further damage to the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant. The Tokyo Electric Power Company - or TEPCO which runs the plant - said there were no serious incidents as a result of the aftershock.

Or so they say...

Radioactivity from the plant has poisoned the surrounding land, air and ocean. Millions of people have been exposed. And millions more could be… as radioactivity has been picked up in food and drinking water. And detected in faraway places like California.

This week, workers plugged a crack at the plant that had been gushing contaminated water into the ocean for weeks. As a result, TEPCO says radiation levels in the water off the coast there have dropped dramatically.

Yesterday, the head of the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation said the Fukushima accident is not expected to have any serious impact to the health of the Japanese people. He said "We have seen traces of iodine in the air all over the world now, but they are much, much, much lower than traces we have seen at similar distances after Chernobyl."

But not everyone is feeling so certain.

In South Korea, more than 130 primary schools and kindergartens were closed today outside Seoul. People there are worried that windy, rainy weather could be carrying radioactive material from nearby Japan. North Korea also aired warnings on television for its people to stay indoors during the rain and to take a full shower if caught outside in a storm. Even here in the United States, some chefs are using sensors to test levels of radiation in the fish they plan to serve in restaurants.

Here’s my question to you: Do you believe you're being told the truth about the nuclear accident in Japan?

Interested to know which ones made it on air?

FULL POST

(PHOTO CREDIT: TORU YAMANAKA/AFP/Getty Images)

FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:

Inspectors from all over the world are trying to figure out how dangerous the Japan nuclear situation actually is. It can't be good: hydrogen explosions, fuel rods exposed, reactors overheating, radioactive vapor being released into the atmosphere.

The director of the International Atomic Energy Agency said today the situation at the Fukushima Daiichi power plants is unlikely to become another Chernobyl. Really? Why is my BS detector on red alert? And what happens if a series of major aftershocks rock that region?

France's nuclear watchdog today said the situation at Fukushima is worse than Three Mile Island, the 1979 meltdown at a plant in central Pennsylvania. That was the worst nuclear accident in U.S. history so far.

No one was injured at Three Mile Island and no one died, but the situation was considered so serious that the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission ramped up safety standards after the accident and stopped the construction of new reactors for about 30 years.

But we've got growing demand for energy in this country… and nuclear power has been poised to make a sort of comeback. In the past few years a handful of power companies have applied for permits to build new reactors.

Republican Congressman Devin Nunes of California introduced a bill earlier this month that would call for the construction of 200 new nuclear reactors by the year 2040. President Obama has touted nuclear power, saying it may be part of the solution to the energy and global warming issues facing the U.S.

It all sounded good until last Friday in Japan. Now you can bet approval for new nuclear construction will be hard to come by whether the world is running out of oil or not.

Here’s my question to you: Should the Japan earthquake stop any future construction of nuclear power plants?

Interested to know which ones made it on air?

FULL POST