CNN news 2012-03-02 加文本

cnn news 2012-03-02

CARL AZUZ, HOST, cnn STUDENT NEWS: It`s February 29th, and we are ready to leap into today`s headlines. Hi, everyone, I`m Carl Azuz, coming to you from the cnn Newsroom in Atlanta, Georgia.

First up, the race for delegates. In order to win the Republican Party`s presidential nomination this year, a candidate has to get 1,144 delegates. Here`s where things stood before Tuesday`s primaries in Arizona and Michigan.

AZUZ (voice-over): Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney had 127 delegates, 38 for former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, 37 for former Senator Rick Santorum and 27 for U.S. Representative Ron Paul.

AZUZ: Different states award delegates in different ways. Some of them, like Arizona, have a winner-take-all primary. Others like Michigan`s give out delegates proportionately, proportional to however many votes candidates get.

AZUZ (voice-over): There were 59 delegates up for grabs on Tuesday. The results came in after we produced today`s program, but you can check them out in the "Spotlight" section on our home page.

The Dow Jones industrial average gives investor and analysts an idea of how the entire stock market is doing. When trading ended yesterday, the Dow was over 13,000 points. It was the first time in nearly four years that the Dow has finished a day above that mark. It`s not technically significant, though. It`s more of a psychological milestone for the economy.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Is this legit? A Geiger counter measures the intensity of earthquakes.

Nope. Geiger counters measure radioactive materials. The devices are named for their inventor, nuclear physicist Hans Geiger.

AZUZ: Radioactivity has been a main concern in parts of Japan after the meltdown to the nuclear power plant almost a year ago. The government set up a mandatory evacuation zone around the plant. It was 121/2 miles in every direction.

Kyung Lah was one of the journalists who was allowed a close-up look at the plant recently. Here`s her report.

KYUNG LAH, cnn REPORTER (voice-over): A year after these reactors at the Fukushima nuclear plant exploded in a triple meltdown, reporters were reminded this is still one of the most hazardous places on the planet.

We wore head to toe protective gear: full facial respirators and hazmat suits. And then we drove up to the world`s worst nuclear accident in 25 years.

LAH: This is our first look on the ground at the reactors. This is the heart of the nuclear problem in Japan. What you`re seeing over my shoulder are the reactors. There are four of them. The two that you see over my right shoulder, those are two of the reactors that exploded in the early days of this disaster.

When you take a look at the reactors, you can see that they have a long way to go. This is a year after this disaster, and you can see that the force of the explosion crippled those buildings. You can understand how so much radiation spewed from this point when you`re standing here.

LAH (voice-over): An army of 3,000 workers are now work daily in shifts to control the melted nuclear fuel and contain the further spread of the radiation. Inside the onsite crisis management building at the plant, a control center monitors their progress and safety 24 hours a day.

"The highest risk we see still is if something goes wrong with the reactors" says plant manager Takeshi Takahashi. The plant is in cold shutdown, but the nuclear fuel needs constant cooling, and the situation is far from over.

TEPCO says the plant won`t be decommissioned for at least 30 to 40 years. The challenges -- evident as we drive around the Fukushima plant. Debris, still mangled from the tsunami, sits untouched, because of radiation concerns.

These blue tanks and these larger gray ones hold water contaminated with radiation. TEPCO is continuously challenged with finding more space for the water. Work conditions and safety, while they`ve improved since the early days of the disaster, remain a constant concern -- Kyung Lah, cnn, at the Fukushima Nuclear Plant.