After numerous failed attempts, the Fukushima reactor’s melted uranium has been located by a remote-controlled drone the size of a shoebox.
No bigger than a loaf of bread, the “Mini-Manbo” (or, “little sunfish”) exploration robot has become the first to survive a perilous trip into the heart of the Fukushima reactor since the Japanese nuclear site’s meltdown in 2011. After a three-day journey of only 20 feet into the irradiated water that drowns the reactors, Mini-Manbo recorded footage of fuel debris in a major leap forward for potential cleanup efforts.
Naraha Remote Technology Development Center’s Director of Research and Development, Shinji Kawatsuma, is part of the next step: to extract the melted fuel so the site can one day become habitable once again. “I’ve been a robotic engineer for 30 years, and we’ve never faced anything as hard as this,” he said. “This is a divine mission for Japan’s robot engineers.”
To do this, the NRTDC is exploring reality both virtual and physical. While virtual reality rooms allow their workers to personally explore the environment, hangar-sized full scale replications of the plant can be used to test run the advanced technology that will be required for any level of success.
Tokyo Electric Power Company, or “Tepco,” is pleased with the result. Tepco General Manager Takahiro Kimoto said that “[Tepco] didn’t know exactly where the fuel was, or what it looked like. Now that we have seen it, we can make plans to retrieve it.”
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