Official Says Nuclear Standards Must Be Revised, Could Mean Years of Delays

A magnitude 6.4 quake struck off Vancouver Island on Friday, some 175 miles northwest of Vancouver on Canada's Pacific coast, but no damage was reported in the city, eyewitnesses said.

A committee appointed by Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) after the Fukushima nuclear accident in March this year has recommended that India’s nuclear power plants (NPPs) should have an emergency facility that will remain functional during calamities like earthquake or tsunami.

Three people were killed Tuesday when a 6.6-magnitude earthquake hit Indonesia's Sumatra island, officials said.

A 6.6-magnitude earthquake hit the northern part of Indonesia's Sumatra island on Tuesday, the US Geological Survey said.

Further illustrating the doggedness of its stand towards the US, a WikiLeaks cable shows that the Left in Kerala was sceptical of even philanthropic gestures from the country.

A typhoon that pummelled western Japan left at least 20 people dead and more than 50 missing, said reports on Sunday, after swollen rivers swept away buildings and landslips crushed houses.
One of the victims drowned after flood waters gushed into his car and streets were submerged in scenes that rekindled memories of the March 11 tsunami disaster. Thousands of people were left stranded.

Nuclear safety has emerged as a key issue following the tsunami disaster at Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Complex in Japan. Scientists are calling on the nuclear establishment to adopt natural measures to protect nuclear installations against tsunamis.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh asserted on Wednesday that there would be no compromise on the safety of nuclear installations and officials had been instructed to ensure that such units had world-class safety facilities.

Indian nuclear reactors will get a facility that automatically shuts them down in case of a devastating earthquake, as part of the ongoing upgrade of safety features that is being implemented after the nuclear disaster in Japan.