Hamburg, Germany’s largest and Europe’s second-busiest port, has assembled a special group to ensure operators are ready to deal with every eventuality. Although relatively little shipping traffic comes from Japan, Hamburg’s office of interior affairs said the city would not be taking any chances.
“We want to see a radiation limit set,” city spokesman Frank Reschreiter told Deutsche Welle, adding that the Federal Office for Radiation Protection is currently working on just that. “It should extend beyond national borders and should apply to any ship passing into EU waters.”
But not everyone considers it necessary to do more than is already being done. Alfons Guinier, Secretary General of European Community Shipowners’ Associations says that, as long as vessels adhere to the Japanese authorities’ guidelines, they should not pose a threat when entering EU waters.