Has Japan 'lost the race' to prevent a total nuclear meltdown?

Nuclear fuel apparently melts through the bottom of a container at one of the Fukushima reactors, heightening fears of a major meltdown

A father holds his feverish son in a Japanese emergency center.
(Image credit: Getty)

The disaster at Japan's troubled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant is getting worse: Trace amounts of plutonium have been found in the soil outside the plant, the seawater outside the reactors has radioactive iodine-131 at levels 3,355 times above what's considered safe, and, according to former GE nuclear safety researcher Richard Lahey, Japan appears to have "lost the race" to save reactor 2 from a full nuclear meltdown. Here, a brief guide to the unraveling situation:

How has Japan "lost the race"?

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