Tokyo Electric Power Co. turned down requests in 2009 by the nuclear safety agency to consider concrete steps against tsunami waves at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, which suffered a tsunami-triggered disaster two years later, government documents showed Friday.
"Do you think you can stop the reactors?" a Tepco official was quoted as telling Shigeki Nagura of the now-defunct Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency, who was then assigned to review the plant's safety, in response to one of his requests.
The detailed exchanges between the plant operator and the regulator came to light through the latest disclosure of government records on its investigation into the nuclear crisis, adding to evidence that Tepco failed to take proper safety steps ahead of the world's worst nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.