Japanese nuclear plant workers, for the first time, removed a small amount of melted fuel from one of the Fukushima Daiichi plant reactors damaged in the devastating 2011 earthquake and tsunami, officials said on Thursday.

Tokyo: A difficult operation to remove a small piece of radioactive debris from Japan's stricken Fukushima nuclear plant using a robotic device was completed successfully, the plant operator said Thursday, after technical issues halted earlier attempts.

A robot has delved into the radioactive ruins of Fukushima to retrieve a tiny chunk of spent nuclear fuel. It’s the first time solid fuel debris has been removed from the plant – but they’ve still got a hell of a long way to go: 880 tons of the stuff to be precise.

Tokyo Electric Power Company announced it has successfully completed the trail removal of a sample of fuel debris from the primary containment vessel of unit 2 at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.

Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings' former chairperson, who led the emergency response after a meltdown at its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant and was accused of being responsible for failing to prevent the disaster as top management,

The sample was collected from a mound of molten fuel debris from the base of Fukushima's reactor number 2's primary containment vessel. The fuel sample was then transferred to an enclosed container after retrieval by workers in full HAZMAT gear.