YOKOHAMA, Japan — Toshiba Corp. unveiled a remote-controlled robot with tongs Monday that it hopes will probe the inside of one of the three damaged reactors at Japan’s tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant and grip chunks of highly radioactive melted fuel.

The device is designed to slide down an extendable 36-foot-long pipe and touch melted fuel inside the Unit 2 reactor’s primary containment vessel.

Toshiba unveiled a device carrying tongs that comes out of a long telescopic pipe to probe one of three damaged reactor chambers at Japan's tsunami-hit Fukushima nuclear plant. Associated Press/Mari Yamaguchi

The reactor was built by Toshiba and GE.

An earlier probe carrying a camera captured images of pieces of melted fuel in the reactor last year.

Robotic probes in the two other reactors have detected traces of damaged fuel, but the exact location, contents and other details remain largely unknown.

Toshiba’s energy systems unit said experiments with the new probe planned in February are key to determining the proper equipment and technologies needed to remove the fuel debris.

That will be the most challenging part of the decommissioning process, which is expected to take decades.

The three reactors at the Fukushima plant suffered core meltdowns after a massive 2011 earthquake and tsunami damaged key cooling systems.

In last year’s probe, a camera developed by Toshiba Energy Systems & Solutions Corp. and the International Research Institute for Nuclear Decommissioning found large amounts of deposits in that area, including parts that resembled pebbles or gravel.

The 12-inch-long robot unveiled Monday will carry a radiation dosimeter, thermometer, LED lights, a camera and a pair of tongs as it slowly slides down from a pipe.

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