By NORIHIKO SHIROUZU and REBECCA SMITH TOKYO—The design and
safety record of the damaged power plant at the center of
Japan's nuclear crisis are coming under scrutiny, even as
authorities continue to struggle to keep its overheating
reactors under control. The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power
complex, where workers are battling to prevent dangerous
releases of radioactive material, is Japan's oldest, with six
reactors that all came online in the 1970s. The boiling-water
reactors—an older nuclear technology—are housed in six square
buildings lining a stretch of coast in northeastern Japan,
giving the plant access to seawater if needed and making
possible transporting heavy equipment by ship. Past Nuclear
Incidents The plant was central to a falsified-records scandal a
decade ago that led its operator, Tokyo Electric Power Co.,
known as Tepco, to briefly shut down all its plants and led to
the departure of a number of senior executives. Nuclear experts
say that led to a number of disclosures of previously unrepo