Article from NHK News :
" Tokyo Electric Power Company has detected high levels of radioactive strontium in soil inside the compound of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
Strontium can cause cancer and like calcium it tends to collect in bones once humans inhale it.
Up to 570 becquerels of strontium 90 per kilogram of dry soil were detected in samples taken from 3 locations. They were taken on April 18, about 500 meters from the Number 1 and 2 reactors, between the surface and about 5 centimeters deep. The level detected is about 130 times higher than the previous high, which was measured in Fukushima Prefecture after nuclear tests in the atmosphere, and before the accident at the nuclear plant.
Tokyo Electric Power Company also said it found 4,400 becquerels of radioactive strontium 89 per kilogram of dry soil taken from the same location.
Earlier in March, strontium was detected in soil and plants outside the 30-kilometer zone around the Fukushima plant.
A director of the Japan Chemical Analysis Center, Yoshihiro Ikeuchi, says humans could inhale strontium when wind stirs up the radioactive substance, but the amounts would be very limited. He says the current levels won't be a health hazard to plant workers wearing face masks, but monitoring of strontium levels in the air is needed."
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