*Guest entry by Gina Holmes, Public Affairs team, Ottawa
A little over a year after the Japan earthquake, what appears to be a deserted school in Kawauchi has a lot of activity going on inside. Despite the fact that only 14 students have returned, the procedures taken every day just to make sure each student’s lunch is safe to eat are rigorous.
Pictured above is a piece of equipment that hooks up to a laptop to monitor the radiation level. “Each ingredient has to be checked – the potatoes take 30 minutes, the rice takes 30 minutes. Altogether the process takes four or five hours each day,” says the principal, Toshihiko Takahama.
Similar machines have been provided by Japanese Red Cross Society, along with body scanners, to measure radiation exposure in the prefectural capital Fukushima City.
The school also plans to build a sealed room with the windows concreted over for use as a shelter in the event of another disaster.