Father Trying to Keep Memories with Children from Being Destroyed by Disaster (1)
March 9, 2012
Eiji Sato, a father of three children, lives in an inland city of Miyagi Prefecture, but he loved visiting a coastal area in the northeastern part of the prefecture for fishing. The area had many good fishing spots and bashing places, but when he visited there a few weeks after the tsunami disaster, he saw many broken pieces of breakwaters and other port facilities widely scattered on the shore.
Sato, an employee of a used car dealership, currently works as one of tsunami-damaged vehicle surveyors in Minami Sanriku Town on contracts with the prefecture. While surveying the situation in the town, he sometimes passes by Nagasuka Beach. Carefully kept in his mobile phone are photos of sand pictures drawn by his daughter, the youngest of the three children, on the beach at Nagasuka a few years ago. “My children sometimes ask me, ‘How is the beach now?’ but I do not talk about it in detail,” Sato said, “because the area was damaged so seriously.”
Shizukawa in the heart of Minami Sanriku Town, among Sato’s survey areas, was extensively damaged by the tsunami waves. The tide pulling backward was much stronger than the oncoming tide, according to Sato. Houses and buildings were damaged by not only the tsunami waves themselves but also by objects brought up and pulled back on the retreating waves, he said. Actually, the back front of Shizukawa Hospital on the mountain side was hit by various objects which came on the backward waves. Among such objects was a severely damaged boat, which remains deserted on the roof of an extended part of the first story of the hospital building. Vehicles crashed into the four-story building and a few of them remain inside the building. It is difficult to pull them out, because they have got into the building deep, Sato said. As the building is to be demolished before long, these vehicles will have to be recovered then, he said. Shizukawa Hospital, with about 120 beds, was located about 300 meters from the sea and a total of 75 people were dead there.
About 200 meters from the hospital to the mountain side were the town office building and an adjacent structure designed as the town’s antidisaster headquarters. But they were also destroyed by the tsunami waves. Nothing remained there except the red frameworks of the three-story antidisaster headquarters building. When the waves came to the area, about 30 town employees were working inside the building. They climbed up to the roof, but the tide reached far above the height of the roof. About 10 of the 30 people survived the attack of the tide while clinging to an antenna pole and parts of higher structures on the roof.
The victims at the building included Miki Endo, a 24-year-old town employee, who continued to call residents to evacuate through the town’s antidisaster voice alarm system from a broadcasting room on the second floor of the building until the last minutes. Endo was believed to have climbed up to the roof along with her colleagues. But she was not among the survivors there when they confirmed their safety with each other after the waves began to recede. Her body was found near the shore five weeks later and it was identified as hers by her fiancee and her parents.
The tsunami disaster claimed about 900 lives in Minami Sanriku, but her repeated call for evacuation helped to save the remaining people in the town, which had a population of some 17,000 before the mishap. On a desk established in front of the skeletonized building were flowers and other items dedicated to the victims.
March 9, 2012
Eiji Sato, a father of three children, lives in an inland city of Miyagi Prefecture, but he loved visiting a coastal area in the northeastern part of the prefecture for fishing. The area had many good fishing spots and bashing places, but when he visited there a few weeks after the tsunami disaster, he saw many broken pieces of breakwaters and other port facilities widely scattered on the shore.
Sato, an employee of a used car dealership, currently works as one of tsunami-damaged vehicle surveyors in Minami Sanriku Town on contracts with the prefecture. While surveying the situation in the town, he sometimes passes by Nagasuka Beach. Carefully kept in his mobile phone are photos of sand pictures drawn by his daughter, the youngest of the three children, on the beach at Nagasuka a few years ago. “My children sometimes ask me, ‘How is the beach now?’ but I do not talk about it in detail,” Sato said, “because the area was damaged so seriously.”
Shizukawa in the heart of Minami Sanriku Town, among Sato’s survey areas, was extensively damaged by the tsunami waves. The tide pulling backward was much stronger than the oncoming tide, according to Sato. Houses and buildings were damaged by not only the tsunami waves themselves but also by objects brought up and pulled back on the retreating waves, he said. Actually, the back front of Shizukawa Hospital on the mountain side was hit by various objects which came on the backward waves. Among such objects was a severely damaged boat, which remains deserted on the roof of an extended part of the first story of the hospital building. Vehicles crashed into the four-story building and a few of them remain inside the building. It is difficult to pull them out, because they have got into the building deep, Sato said. As the building is to be demolished before long, these vehicles will have to be recovered then, he said. Shizukawa Hospital, with about 120 beds, was located about 300 meters from the sea and a total of 75 people were dead there.
About 200 meters from the hospital to the mountain side were the town office building and an adjacent structure designed as the town’s antidisaster headquarters. But they were also destroyed by the tsunami waves. Nothing remained there except the red frameworks of the three-story antidisaster headquarters building. When the waves came to the area, about 30 town employees were working inside the building. They climbed up to the roof, but the tide reached far above the height of the roof. About 10 of the 30 people survived the attack of the tide while clinging to an antenna pole and parts of higher structures on the roof.
The victims at the building included Miki Endo, a 24-year-old town employee, who continued to call residents to evacuate through the town’s antidisaster voice alarm system from a broadcasting room on the second floor of the building until the last minutes. Endo was believed to have climbed up to the roof along with her colleagues. But she was not among the survivors there when they confirmed their safety with each other after the waves began to recede. Her body was found near the shore five weeks later and it was identified as hers by her fiancee and her parents.
The tsunami disaster claimed about 900 lives in Minami Sanriku, but her repeated call for evacuation helped to save the remaining people in the town, which had a population of some 17,000 before the mishap. On a desk established in front of the skeletonized building were flowers and other items dedicated to the victims.
