Nuclear Meltdown

Officials: No nuclear risk to North Pacific fish

(Agencies)
Updated: 2011-04-18 09:30

ANCHORAGE, Alaska - Federal and state of Alaska health officials say North Pacific fish are so unlikely to be contaminated by radioactive material from the crippled nuclear plant in Japan that there's no reason to test them.

Dangerous levels of radiation have been reported off the coast of Japan from the Fukushima reactor complex.

But a spokeswoman for the federal Food and Drug Administration tells the Anchorage Daily News that the ocean is so huge, and Alaska fisheries so far away, that there is no realistic threat.

Alaska's food safety program manager, Ron Klein, says the FDA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have demonstrated that Alaskans have no cause for worry.

Klein says that based on the work they're doing, no sampling or monitoring of our fish is necessary.