Fifteenth Anniversary of East Japan Great Earthquake

Fifteen years have passed since East Japan Great Earthquake hit northeastern Japan and great tsunami wave washed coastal area of the region facing the Pacific Ocean on March 11, 2011. Over 26 thousand people are still in their evacuation, losing their home with radioactive contamination by severe accident in Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant caused by tsunami. Although Japan has learned lessons from the disaster, it is still not ready for next great earthquake. 

The earthquake took 19,782 lives, most of whom were taken away by tsunami. 2,550 people are still missing. 122,053 houses fell down. The evacuees, which counted 470 thousand in the peak time, were reduced to 26 thousand, but they still cannot get back their home, because the government of Japan designates 309 square kilometers of land in Fukushima prefecture as unsuitable for living.

 

While coastal area of Miyagi and Iwate has mostly recovered from devastation of tsunami, Fukushima prefecture is still suffering from the severe accident in nuclear power plant. The evacuees, especially families with small children, cannot go home because their hometown has not reconstructed without sufficient infrastructure, including supermarkets, hospitals or schools, for the residents to spend ordinary life.

 

To clean up the land of Fukushima, the government of Japan and Tokyo Electric Power Company scraped soil and concentrate that radioactively contaminated earth in the intermediate processing facility located in towns of Futaba and Okuma, Fukushima. The soil amounts to 14 million cube meters. When it decided to build the facility in Fukushima in 2015, the national government promised that the earth would be removed out of Fukushima by 2045. However, there is no specific place so far for the earth to go.

 

The government of Japan imposed special tax for reconstruction on the people, since the great earthquake occurred in 2011. It has already spent 33 trillion yen for the reconstruction. However, the reconstruction effort is still on its way. It designated five years between FY2026 and FY2030 as the third period of intensive reconstruction of devastated area. Most of that effort will be made for reconstruction of Fukushima.

 

Japanese archipelago is sometimes called “nest of earthquakes.” Great earthquakes consecutively hit the islands, located at the eastern edge of Eurasia continent. It is predicted that another great earthquake is likely to occur in southwestern Japan, which is named Nankai Trough Great Earthquake. Cities and towns in southwestern Japan are expected to be ready for it.

 

Nevertheless, municipalities in southwestern Japan are not ready enough for evacuation or reconstruction. Although “preemptive reconstruction,” which requires planning for possible reconstruction from natural disaster, is needed, only a few cities have plans to build their new town on the hill, where they can escape from another great tsunami. Most people cannot realize a devastation of a great earthquake, except the sufferers who lost their loved one or sweet home.