CMAT heads back to Japan

RICHMOND (NEWS1130) – They’re on their way back to Japan.  The Canadian Medical Assistance Team is hoping things go a little better this time around.

“You know, you always watch on the news when these big events happen and think, ‘What can I do to help out?'”

And after that it didn’t take long for Chris DeVries to get on board within 36 hours of getting the call, he gathered his gear and is ready to go for an unknown period of time.

In addition to providing supplies and water purification, he says the team will set up a makeshift hospital to deal with overcrowding.

He admits he’s feeling pretty anxious.  “To be honest, at this stage, we don’t really know for sure what we’re going to face when we get there.”

The first group came back disappointed last week because of nuclear concerns.

Martin Matz is a team member from Courtenay on Vancouver Island.

He explains the group is better prepared for radiation this time as everyone who is going has some training in bio-hazard, nuclear, and explosive situations.  “We will be monitoring this very closely, and if the radiation levels go too high we’ll have to pull out or go to a safer area.”

Before the team headed out this morning Ada Jang with the Lotus Life Charity Society handed the team a cheque for $5,000.  “We heard about CMAT on News1130 and we did some research…they were taking a 600-pound NOMAD water purification system over to Japan.  We find that very interesting and unique… and another cheque will be coming in soon.”

Japan today

The nuclear safety agency says one of the fuel pools at reactor number 2 is almost bubbling.  If water in that pool boils away and the fuel rods are exposed, more radiation will be released.

Crews are working to restore power as quickly as they can.  Owners of the Fukushima plant say it suffered more tsunami damage that originally thought, affected the cores and reactors one and two.

The death toll from the disaster continues to climb.  Currently, 9,100 people are dead while 13,800 are missing.