MANILA, Philippines — Japanese authorities said two Filipinos are among those who died in the earthquake-triggered tsunami that devastated Japan last March 11.

Grace Agnes Oprecio Hiruta, 45, and her 12-year-old daughter Maria were identified by the former’s husband, Masahiro Hiruta.

According to the Philippine embassy in Tokyo, the Fukushima Iwaki Central Police Headquarters reported to the Philippine Honorary Consulate in Morioka that the Filipinos' remains were recovered at a house of a certain

“Mr. Suzuki” in the Fukushima city of Iwaki. Their deaths were tsunamirelated, the report stated.

The family of Mrs. Hiruta in Parañaque has been apprised of the incident.

“We expressed our sincere condolences to the family,” Philippine Ambassador to Japan Manuel Lopez said in a statement.

The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) is now coordinating with the relatives of the deceased and is providing them appropriate assistance.

The DFA likewise said some 48 Filipinos remain missing.

There are some 300,000 Filipinos working and living in Japan.

The DFA said they will need R13 billion to repatriate the Filipinos in Japan if the alert level is raised to three.

Radiation fears
As this developed, experts said there is a need to install radiation detectors in the airports as a preventive measure against the threat of radiation amid Japan’s nuclear woes.

Dr. Wenceslao Llauderes, treasurer of the Philippine Society of Nuclear Medicine, said we should be more watchful of incoming visitors from Japan. “This is just like A (H1N1). If there is one or two that has been affected, the risk is already there,” he said.

Llauderes said radiation could stay on the surface of objects such as on clothes and other materials. It can also be inhaled and can be transmitted via droplets of saliva and when coughing or sneezing. Surface contamination can be removed when the clothes or material has been washed as soap and water can remove contamination outside the body.

But when a person has ingested water tainted with radiation, he or she should be quarantined for eight days until the radiation comes out of the body naturally through urine and perspiration, he said.

There is no medicine for this, he said. It should be excreted by the body naturally.

Meanwhile, weariness and anxiety percolated Tuesday among people who left their homes near Japan's radiation-shedding nuclear complex as workers tried urgently to cool an overheated storage pool and methodically to reconnect critical cooling systems.

In another day of progress and setbacks, a pool holding spent nuclear fuel heated up to around the boiling point, a nuclear safety official said. With water bubbling away, there is a risk that more radioactive steam could spew out. “We cannot leave this alone and we must take care of it as quickly as possible,” said the official, Hidehiko Nishiyama.

It wasn't clear if crews had to retreat to stop work hooking up electrical systems and checking machinery to power up cooling systems. (With reports from NYT, AP, and Jenny F. Manongdo)

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Original story appears below.

MANILA, Philippines – DFA sources have revealed that there have been two confirmed Filipino casualties in the devastating Japan earthquake last Friday, March 11. The victims were a woman and a child, their names of which have yet to be officially released by the Department of Foreign Affairs.

Also, it was reported via press conference that roughly $3 billion pesos will be needed to evacuate the 300,000 Filipinos who are in Japan.

However, forced evacuation will only be done if the Japan crisis reaches a critical alert level 3.