By Ayako Mie 
 
 As Japan’s nuclear crisis escalates along with the danger of radiation release, public distrust is mounting against electricity-provider Tokyo Electric Power Co. 
 
 Associated Press Tepco’s Masataka Shimizu bowed his head during a press conference Monday. 
 
 One question: Was the company too late in apologizing to the people of Japan? 
 
 Tepco’s chief executive officer, Masataka Shimizu, apologized in public for the first time on Sunday, 29 hours after the first explosion. The following Monday, Tepco expressed deep regrets in a press release about the explosion. Before that, the official line repeatedly used in its releases was, “We are still investigating the matter.” 
 
 The apology was repeated in Tepco’s press release Tuesday, issued after the latest explosion at the No. 2 reactor at the Fukushima Daiichi plant. But one local Japanese TV reporter wasn’t satisfied. At one of a lengthening series of briefings, he grilled the Tepco official on hand about the exact meaning of the apology. 
 
 “Are you apologizing because things have crossed a critical line?” the reporter asked. 
 
 “We simply realized that our apology was not enough and wanted to express the company’s deep regrets,” the Tepco official replied. 
 
 “I’m not asking about how you feel,” the reporter snapped back. He demanded that the company stick to disclosing more facts and to take action. 
 
 Tuesday’s press conference also provided a reminder on Tepco’s apparent lack of agility on releasing information. It couldn’t answer how many workers at the plant were being evacuated after the explosion, saying the company would find out and get back to reporters with the exact number. 
 
 Read this post in Japanese/日本語訳�?��?��?�ら≫ ||||| >>> good morning. breaking news. japan 's nuclear crisis takes a dire turn. high levels of radiation spewing from the damaged nuclear plant following an explosion at a third reactor and a fire in a fourth. an official is calling it, quote, a very bad scenario as officials work to contain the risk today, tuesday, march 15, 2011 . 
 
 >>> welcome to "today" on this tuesday morning. i'm meredith vieira . 
 
 >> officials in japan are saying the radiation leaking from the crippled nuclear power plant is enough to impact human health . 
 
 >> the big concern is the number 2 reactor which exploded on monday sending more radiation into the air and then a fire at reactor 4 broke out. that one had been shut down for maintenance before the quake. all but 50 employees of the plant have been evacuated. in a nationally televised address japan 's prime minister urged anyone living near the plant who had not already evacuated to seal themselves indoors and warned of the very high risk of more leaks. 
 
 >> you hear the story and i think about the bravery of the 50 people who remain at the plant trying to cool the reactors at great personal risk. 
 
 >> you wonder if they will have to leave as well and then what's going to happen? 
 
 >> what's the outcome of that? 
 
 >> in tokyo , slightly elevated radiation levels have been detected. we'll get the latest on an extremely tense situation straight ahead. 
 
 >> there is a rare piece of good news. rescuers found a 70-year-old woman alive in her home four days after it was swept away by the tsunami. ann curry has details and a closer look at the toll this crisis is taking on people there. let's begin on this tuesday morning with the nuclear crisis. robert bazell , nbc's chief science correspondent, is in tokyo . good morning to you. 
 
 >> reporter: good morning, matt. the nuclear crisis in japan has taken a turn for the worse. many people are saying it's ominous. that explosion in reactor number 4 blew a hole in the cement containment facility allowing radiation to leak. the fire in the other reactor is allowing some radiation to get out. there are several reactors at the fukushima site. one of them in the cement dome. so far the metal cylinder has not broken but radiation is escaping. 
 
 >> the danger seems to have significantly increased over the past couple of days. 
 
 >> reporter: the japanese prime minister naoto kan told people the radiation wasn't a widespread hazard and there was no need to evacuate beyond the 12 miles already established. those leaving have been checked for radiation. all the but the most essential personal nel have been told to leave the site. they offered public apologies. 
 
 >> translator: this is a very poor, very bad scenario. 
 
 >> reporter: satellite photos before and after show the damage. the fire that broke out today is at a reactor that was shut down for maintenance before the earthquake and was not releasing large quantities of radiation. experts agree the total amount of radiation isn't a significant health hazard beyond the area of the reactor. 
 
 >> the amount of radiation that's likely to be released is going to be relatively small compared to an accident like chernobyl. 
 
 >> reporter: it's not chernobyl for sure, but it's worse than mile islan d. 
 
 >> bob, we mentioned that tokyo is 170 miles south of the power plant . i understand there is -- maybe chaos is too strong a word but there are a lot of people who are uneasy in tokyo trying to get out of the country any way they can. is that correc is that correct? are you seeing that? 
 
 >> reporter: mostly foreigners are trying to get out. people aren't leaving tokyo who live here. no one is saying the radiation levels are posing a threat at this time. a lot of foreigners who have the option of getting out are looking at this and saying, well, it's not so bad right now. there has not been this catastrophic leak of radiation everybody fears but let's not wait around for that to happen. if it did nobody's getting out of anywhere. that's the mentality driving a lot of people to book flights and trains to get as far as from here as they can. 
 
 >> robert bazell in tokyo , thank you very much. ||||| TOKYO — Japan’s nuclear crisis intensified again Wednesday, with Japanese authorities announcing that a containment vessel in a second reactor unit at the stricken Fukushima Daiichi plant in northeastern Japan may have ruptured and appeared to be releasing radioactive steam. That would be the second vessel to be compromised in two days. 
 
 The vessel had appeared to be the last fully intact line of defense against large-scale releases of radioactive materials from that reactor, but it was not clear how serious the possible breach might be. 
 
 The announcement came after Japanese broadcasters showed live footage of thick plumes of steam rising above the plant. 
 
 Yukio Edano, the chief cabinet secretary, said the government believed the steam was coming from the No. 3 reactor, where an explosion on Monday blew out part of the building surrounding the containment vessel. 
 
 The reactor has three layers of protection: that building; the containment vessel, and the metal cladding around fuel rods, which are inside the reactor. The government has said that those rods at the No. 3 reactor were likely already damaged. 
 
 A spike in radiation levels at the plant as the steam was rising forced some of the relatively few workers left at the plant to retreat indoors, suspending some critical efforts to pump water into several reactors to keep them cool. 
 
 Earlier in the morning, the company that runs the plant reported that a fire was burning at a different reactor, just hours after officials said flames that erupted Tuesday had been doused. 
 
 A government official at Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency soon after said that flames and smoke were no longer visible, but he cautioned that it was unclear if the fire, at the Reactor No. 4 building, had died out. He also was not clear if it was a new fire or if the fire Tuesday had never gone out. 
 
 There are a total of six reactors at the plant. 
 
 The developments are troubling reminders of the difficulties the company is having in bringing the plant, which has suffered multiple explosions since Saturday, under control. And the confusion is emblematic of days of often contradictory reports about what is happening at the plant. 
 
 The company, Tokyo Electric Power, says it cannot know for sure what is happening in many cases because it is too dangerous for workers to get close to some reactors. 
 
 The situation became especially dire on Tuesday, when releases of radiation led the company to pull most of its workers from the plant. 
 
 Among the authorities’ main concerns are pools for spent fuel rods at several reactors at the plant, including Reactor No. 4, where the pool has lost some of the water needed to keep the fuel rods stable. The rods are still radioactive and potentially as hot and dangerous as the fuel rods inside the reactors. 
 
 Minoru Ogoda, the official with Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency, said a proposed plan to use helicopters to put more cold water into the pool was looking unlikely. 
 
 The hole or holes in the roof caused by an earlier blast did not appear big enough to allow sufficient amounts of water in, he said. 
 
 He said Tokyo Electric would probably try to spray water into the reactor building through a gaping hole in the wall blasted open by the explosion. 
 
 That explosion on Tuesday was caused by hydrogen gas bubbling up from chemical reactions set off by the fuel rods in the pool, Japanese officials said. Inspectors from the United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission said they had been told by Japanese authorities that what was burning was lubricating oil from machinery near the pool. 
 
 Concern remained high about the storage pools at two other reactors, Nos. 5 and 6. None of those three reactors at the plant, 140 miles northeast of Tokyo, were operating on Friday afternoon when an offshore earthquake with a magnitude now estimated at 9.0 shook the site. A tsunami rolled into the northeast Japanese coastline minutes later, swamping the plant. 
 
 At least 750 workers were evacuated on Tuesday morning after a separate explosion ruptured the inner containment building at Reactor No. 2 at the Daiichi plant, which was crippled by Friday’s earthquake and tsunami. The closely spaced but apparently coincidental explosions at Reactors Nos. 2 and 4 together released a surge of radiation 800 times as intense as the recommended hourly exposure limit in Japan. ||||| TOKYO | 
 
 TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan's prime minister was furious with the power firm at the center of the nuclear crisis for taking so long to inform his office about a blast at a stricken reactor plant, demanding "What the hell is going on?." 
 
 Kyodo news agency reported that Naoto Kan also ordered Tokyo Electric Power Co on Tuesday not to pull employees out of the Fukushima plant north of Tokyo, which was badly damaged by last week's earthquake and has been leaking radiation. 
 
 "The TV reported an explosion. But nothing was said to the premier's office for about an hour," a Kyodo reporter quoted Kan telling power company executives. 
 
 (Writing by Jonathan Thatcher; Editing by John Chalmers)
– Now that Japan’s Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power station has experienced its third explosion in four days and radiation is spreading, “We are on the brink. We are now facing the worst-case scenario,” says one expert. In an extensive New York Times piece detailing the timeline and series of problems that led to this point, another expert says, “It’s way past Three Mile Island already.” Adding to the tension: As radiation levels threaten their health, workers are leaving the plant—and if all workers abandon it, a meltdown is all but certain. Even if officials manage to avoid a full meltdown, they face only risky options. They can keep flooding the reactors with seawater and venting the steam, hoping the winds don’t carry it toward Tokyo or Korea, or simply hope that the overheating will die down on its own, enclosing the radioactivity inside the plants. The prime minister (who, Reuters adds, is unhappy with the power company for taking an hour to alert his office about the latest blast) has asked for calm, but warned that there is “a very high risk” of further radiation leaks. The PM isn’t the only one unhappy with Tokyo Electric Power Co.: The Wall Street Journal notes that public distrust is growing—as is resentment that the company took a full 29 hours before apologizing in public. Meanwhile, MSNBC reports, half a million people are in evacuation centers without water, electricity, or oil, facing freezing temperatures. Click to read more about the spreading radiation.