Requirements: Identify the question you decide to answer at the top of your post. Prompt responses should answer the question and elaborate in a meaningful way using 2 of the weekly class readings (250 words of original content). Do not quote the readings, paraphrase and cite them using APA style in text citations. You can only use ONE multimedia source for your minimum 2 sources each week. The readings must be from the current week. The more sources you use, the more convincing your argument. Include a reference list in APA style at the end of your post, does not count towards minimum word content.
Select ONE of the following:
1) Describe two tsunami mitigation systems that failed during the 2011 Tohoku earthquake.
2) Describe the evacuation approach of the Japanese during the event. What can be improved?
Institut du développement durable
et des relations internationales
27, rue Saint-Guillaume
75337 Paris cedex 07 France
Disaster Evacuation from
Japan’s 2011 Tsunami
Disaster and the Fukushima
Nuclear Accident
N°05/13 MAY 2013 | GOVERNANCE
Reiko Hasegawa (IDDRI)
JAPAN’S 2011 DISASTER: RESPONSES TO NATURAL AND INDUSTRIAL
CATASTROPHES
The triple disaster that hit the Tohoku region of Japan on 11 March 2011
triggered a massive human displacement: more than 400,000 people
evacuated their homes as a gigantic tsunami induced by a magnitude 9.0
earthquake engulfed the coastal areas, and the following nuclear accident
in Fukushima released a la
rg
e amount of radioactive materials into the
atmosphere. This study analyses the disaster response, with a particular
focus on evacuation of the population, and social consequences of this
complex crisis, based on intensive fieldwork carried out one year after the
catastrophe. It reveals that the responses of the Japanese authorities and
population were significantly different between a natural disaster and an
industrial (man-made) accident.
TWO EVACUATION PATTERNS: RISK PERCEPTION VERSUS VULNERABILITY
Being prone to both earthquakes and tsunamis, Japan had been preparing
itself against such risks for many years. A tsunami alert was immediately
issued and the population knew how and where to evacuate. In contrast,
the evacuation from the nuclear accident was organised in total chaos, as
a severe accident or large-scale evacuation had never been envisaged—let
alone exercised—before the disaster. The population was thus forced to
flee with no information as to the gravity of the accident or radiation
risk.
In both cases, the risk perception prior to the catastrophe played a key role
in determining the vulnerability of the population at the time of the crisis.
SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES FROM THE DISASTER: DIVIDED COMMUNITIES
AND FAMILIES
While tsunami evacuees are struggling with a slow reconstruction
process due to financial difficulties, nuclear evacuees are suffering from
uncertainty as to their prospect of return. One year after the accident,
the Japanese authorities began to encourage nuclear evacuees to return
to the areas contaminated by radiation according to a newly established
safety standard. This triggered a vivid controversy within the affected
communities, creating a rift between those who trust the government’s
notion of safety and those who do not. The nuclear disaster has thus
become a major social disaster in Japan dividing and weakening the
affected communities.w
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Copyright © 2013 IDDRI
As a foundation of public utility, IDDRI encourages
reproduction and communication of its copy-
righted materials to the public, with proper credit
(bibliographical reference and/or corresponding
URL), for personal, corporate or public policy
research, or educational purposes. However,
IDDRI’s copyrighted materials are not for commer-
cial use or dissemination (print or electronic).
Unless expressly stated otherwise, the findings,
interpretations, and conclusions expressed in the
materials are those of the various authors and are
not necessarily those of IDDRI’s board.
Citation: Hasegawa, R. (2013), Disaster Evacua-
tion from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the
Fukushima Nuclear Accident, Studies No.05/13.
IDDRI, Paris, France, 54 p.
The author would like to thank both the French
and Japanese DEVAST teams for their signifi-
cant inputs and contributions in producing this
study, especially Dr Francois Gemenne (IDDRI),
Project Leader of the French DEVAST team, and
Dr Alexandre Magnan (IDDRI) for the very great
support they extended throughout the implemen-
tation of the project. The author also received
valuable and insightful advice from Dr Michel
Colombier, Scientific Director of IDDRI, and
Professor Claude Henry of Sciences Po/Columbia
University (Chair of the Scientific Council of
IDDRI). Special thanks go to Ms Rina Kojima, who
worked as an intern during the fieldwork in Japan.
Without her help, many of the interviews would
have simply been unrealisable. The field research
was successfully conducted thanks to Associate
Professor Norichika Kanie of the Tokyo Institute
of Technology (TITech), who kindly hosted IDDRI
researchers in his office during the field mission,
and also to Mr Shinji Tanada, Ms Yui Nakagawa
and Ms Miho Akatsuka, who provided valuable
assistance in conducting field visits. My sincere
thanks are also extended to all the evacuees and
municipal officers who agreed to be interviewed
despite their difficult circumstances. Lastly, the
author would like to express sincere gratitude to
the French National Research Agency (ANR) and
the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST),
which provided the necessary funding for the
project implementa
tion.
For more information about this document,
please contact the author:
Reiko Hasegawa – reiko.hasegawa@iddri.org
ISSN 2258-7535
IDÉES POUR LE DÉBAT 05/2011 3IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from
Japan’s 2011 Tsunami
Disaster and the Fukushima
Nuclear Accident
Reiko Hasegawa (IDDRI)
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES 4
LIST OF ACRONYMS
AND ABBREVIATIONS 4
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 5
1. INTRODUCTION 9
2. METHODOLOGY 9
3. THE GREAT EAST JAPAN EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI 15
3.1. Overview of the event 15
3.2. Disaster response and evacuation 15
3.3. Perception of risk 17
3.4. Prospects of resettlement 19
3.5. Post-disaster challenges 20
4. THE FUKUSHIMA DAIICHI NUCLEAR POWER PLANT
ACCIDENT 22
4.1. Overview of the event 22
4.2. Disaster Response and Evacuation 23
4.3. Perception of risk 28
4.4. Prospects of return 30
4.5. Post-disaster challenges 35
5. COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE TSUNAMI
EVACUATION AND THE NUCLEAR EVACUATION 42
6. CONCLUSIONS 44
REFERENCES 46
APPENDICES 48
Appendix 1: Questionnaire for evacuees
(tsunami and nuclear) 48
Appendix 2: Questionnaire for
self-evacuees (only nuclear) 49
Appendix 3: Questionnaire for
municipalities 50
Appendix 4: List of meetings and seminars
attended during the field research 52
Appendix 5: Map of nuclear power plants
in Japan 53
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES
Table 1. Number of persons interviewed 11
Figure 1. Age of evacuees interviewed 11
Figure 2. Gender of evacuees interviewed 11
Table 2. Target municipalities for interviews 13
Map 1. The Tohoku region and three heavily
affected prefectures 14
Map 2. Map of Fukushima Prefecture 14
Map 3. Example of a hazard map
(Rikuzentakada City) 17
Figure 3. Photos of temporary shelters
(prefabricated housing) 19
Figure 4. Changes in the number
Fukushima evacuees 23
Figure 5. Changes in the total number of
evacuees 23
Table 3. Chronology of the Government’s
evacuation orders/recommendations 24
Map 4. Official evacuation zones prior
to 30 September 2011 24
Figure 6. Trends in public opinion on nuclear
energy 31
Map 5. Reorganisation of the evacuation
zone (as from August 2012) 32
Table 4. The government’s proposal on the
reorganisation of the evacuation zone 33
Figure 7. Changes in willingness to return 34
Figure 8. Willingness to return according
to age 34
Map 6. Radiation contour map
of the affected region 40
Table 5. Comparative analysis of the two
evacuations 43
LIST OF ACRONYMS
AND ABBREVIATIONS
AAR Association for Aid and Relief
ADRA Adventist Development and Relief
Agency
ANR Agence nationale de la recherche
(France)
FoE Friends of the Earth
ICANPS Investigation Committee on the
Accident at the Fukushima Nuclear
Power Stations of Tokyo Electric Power
Company (appointed by the Cabinet
Office)
IIC Independent Investigation Commission
on the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
JST Japan Science and Technology Agency
M Magnitude
METI Ministry of Economy, Trade and
Industry
MEXT Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports,
Science and Technology
MHLW Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare
NAIIC Fukushima Nuclear Accident
Independent Investigation Commission
(appointed by The National Diet)
NISA Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency
(under METI)
(replaced by the Nuclear Regulation
Authority in September 2012)
NGO Non-governmental organisation
NSC Nuclear Safety Commission (under the
Cabinet Office)
(integrated into the Nuclear Regulation
Authority since September 2012)
NUMO Nuclear Waste Management
Organization of Japan
OCHA United Nations Office for the
Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs
TEPCO Tokyo Electric Power Company
TITech Tokyo Institute of Technology
UNU United Nations University
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 1 5IDDRI
3. THE GREAT EAST JAPAN
EARTHQUAKE AND TSUNAMI
3.1. Overview of the event
On 11 March 2011, a magnitude 9.0 earthquake
struck off the Pacific coast of Tohoku in north-
eastern Honshu, the main island of Japan. The
tremor triggered a tsunami that had a mean inun-
dation height of 10–15 m and a run-up height of
40 m in some places (Mori and Takahashi, 2012:
pp.1 and 13). According to the National Police
Agency, 15,871 people lost their lives, with 2,778
people missing (feared dead) and 6,114 people
injured, as on 10 October 2012.13 Nearly 400,000
houses were either severely damaged or comple-
tely destroyed. The Cabinet Office estimates
the direct financial damage from the disaster at
approximately 16.7 trillion yen (€167 billion).14 It
was the most powerful earthquake ever recorded
in Japan,15 and one of the world’s biggest earth-
quakes after the 2004 Indian Ocean Earthquake
(M 9.1–9.3). The then Japanese Prime Minister,
Naoto Kan, described the disaster as the worst
crisis that Japan has had to face since the Second
World War.
According to the official figure, the disaster dis-
placed a total of 386,739 people, recorded at one
week after the disaster.16 In March 2012, one year
on from the disaster, the number was still as high
as 344,290,17 which indicates that most of the evac-
uees had not yet returned to their home or reset-
tled in permanent shelters. Half of these evacuees
originate from the Fukushima Prefecture and most
were displaced following the nuclear
accident.
The number of evacuees who left on account of
the earthquake and tsunami alone can thus be es-
timated at around 170,000 people.
These evacuees are currently accommodated
in three types of temporary shelters: prefabricat-
ed houses, private apartments and public-sector
apartments. As early as April 2011, one month af-
ter the disaster, prefabricated houses were erected
13 Source: National Police Agency (http://www.npa.
go.jp/archive/keibi/biki/higaijokyo.
). (in Japa-
nese)
14 Source: Cabinet Office (http://www.bousai.go.jp/oshi-
rase/h23/110624-1kisya ). (in
Japanese)
15 Source: Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). (http://
www.jma.go.jp/jma/en/2011_Earthquake/2011_Earth-
quake.html). (in Japanese)
16 Source: Cabinet Office (http://www.cao.go.jp/shien/1-
hisaisha/pdf/5-hikaku ). (in Japanese)
17 Source: Reconstruction Agency (http://www.recon-
struction.go.jp/ topics/ 120413hinansya ). (in Japa-
nese)
to house the displaced population. By May 2012,
a total of 52,858 prefabricated houses had been
constructed for the disaster evacuees, of which
48,884 units are currently occupied.18 There were
68,317 families living in private apartments, with
rent covered by the government. Public-sector
apartments, which were initially built to provide
housing for public servants, were also utilised as
evacuee accommodation. There were 19,041 of
such apartments occupied by the evacuees.
3.2. Disaster response
and evacuation
This sub-section presents the major findings from
the field interviews on the disaster response and
evacuation process induced by the earthquake and
tsunami.
Evacuation with a tsunami warning that
underestimated the gravity of the situation
Japan is a country prone to earthquakes and
tsunamis due to its geological conditions. Over
the years, it has thus developed an adaptation and
disaster prevention mechanism using advanced
technologies. The coastal communities of Tohoku
in particular had prepared themselves for the
eventuality of a disaster, as they have already
experienced many tsunamis. When the earth-
quake hit the Tohoku region on 11 March 2011, the
tsunami warning was issued by the Japan Meteo-
rological Agency (JMA) only three minutes after
the earthquake, and immediately disseminated
to the municipalities likely to be impacted (JMA
2011b: p.3). The warning was then transmitted
through loudspeakers installed in these coastal
towns for the purpose of public broadcasting. The
disaster prevention mechanism was thus acti-
vated as planned. However, the field interviews
revealed that the system had many shortcomings.
First, the estimated tsunami height announced in
the warning was considerably different from the
actual tsunami height. The JMA issued a warning
of a 6 m tsunami for Miyagi Prefecture and no
more than a 3 m tsunami for Iwate and Fukushima
Prefectures (JMA 2011a: p.3). On hearing this
alert, some residents decided to stay on the second
floor of their house instead of evacuating to higher
ground. In addition, the fact that these coastal
towns had 5–10 m breakwaters built along the
coast for protection against the inflow of tsunami
waves further delayed the residents’ decision to
flee. One evacuee from Ofunato City said:
18 Source: Reconstruction Agency (http://www.recon-
struction.go.jp/topics/120521genjototorikumi ). (in
Japanese)
STUDY 05/20131 6 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
When I first heard a tsunami warning for 3
metres, I thought that it would be all right be-
cause the breakwater in our town is higher than
that.
The survey conducted by the JMA in June 2011
on the post-disaster evacuation following the
tsunami alert also collected the similar testimo-
nies from tsunami survivors (JMA, 2011a: p.5).
During our interviews, a couple of evacuees also
mentioned that those who had already evacu-
ated to higher ground even went back home after
hearing the expected height of tsunami, thinking
that they would survive in their house. Further-
more, citizen volunteers from the Community
Fire Brigade19 went to the coastal area to close the
breakwater gates, a task allocated to them by the
contingency planning, expecting the breakwater
to be high enough to stop the tsunami. Many of
them lost their lives as the tsunami engulfed the
breakwaters. In reality, the tsunami that hit the
three prefectures had a 10–15 m mean inundation
height and a 40 m run-up height in some places. It
was only after the arrival of the tsunami that the
JMA amended the height to ‘more than 10 m’ for
all three prefectures. As a result, despite the early
tsunami warning, many residents were caught by
surprise when the actual tsunami arrived.
Later, it was also discovered that the govern-
ment possessed GPS-controlled tide gauge equip-
ment, installed off the coast of Tohoku by the
Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and
Tourism (MLIT), which had accurately predicted
the height of the tsunami prior to its arrival on the
coast. According to the presentation made by the
Member of Parliament, Itsunori Onodera, at the
House of Representatives on 2 February 2012, the
information from the GPS gauge was transmitted
to the JMA before the tsunami arrived, but the
JMA did not take this into account until after the
event as it was neither part of their procedure nor
integrated into their method of calculating the tsu-
nami height.20
The second shortcoming of the tsunami warning
was the way in which the warning was disseminat-
ed. The alert is usually transmitted by the relevant
municipal offices via loudspeakers installed all
19 This is a voluntary fire corps formed by the residents of
each community/district in towns and cities. It partici-
pates in and helps the activities of fire fighters on a com-
munity level in case of fire and disasters.
20 The testimony of Itsunori Onodera (Liberal Demo-
cratic Party) at the House of Representatives during the
Budget Committee of the House of Representatives on
2 February 2012 can be viewed on the following site:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efGa86LURHg (in
Japanese).
over town. The interviews with evacuees and local
authorities found that many of these loudspeak-
ers did not function either because the earthquake
had knocked down the speaker poles or because
transmission had been disrupted by the power cut
following the earthquake. According to the survey
conducted by the JMA after the disaster, 17 out of
27 affected municipalities responded that their tsu-
nami alert transmission system had broken down
and did not function properly at the time of the
disaster (Fire and Disaster Management Agency,
2011: p.7). This indicates that the installed system
was simply not well adapted to the magnitude of
the disaster and thus not reliable during the actual
crises.
Thirdly, according to the interviewed survivors,
even when the public speakers were functioning,
the warning message issued by the municipal
office was given in such a polite and calm tone
(‘Please evacuate’) that the residents did not fully
appreciate its gravity. The field research found
that only 3 out of 28 interviewed evacuees had
been prompted to flee on account of the tsunami
warning transmitted by the local authority over
the loudspeakers. The majority of residents fled
after actually witnessing the tsunami, on the ba-
sis of their own judgement or previous experience,
listening to the radio broadcasts, or being directly
warned by the community fire brigade on patrol.
In summary, the tsunami warning during the
11 March disaster, although timely, suffered from
failings with respect to an assessment of the grav-
ity of the tsunami, the transmission system used
and an inadequate communication of the level of
risk.
Relief operations and a limited capacity
to accept aid
In the field, local governments – both municipal
and prefectural authorities – were the main coor-
dination bodies for relief operations. The inter-
views with municipal officers and aid workers
from NGOs made it clear that the affected local
authorities in the remote coastal region of Tohoku
often lacked experience in working with civil orga-
nisations such as NGOs and citizen volunteers,
and were simply overwhelmed by the number
of offers. In Ishinomaki City, according to the
Director of Peace Boat Disaster Relief Volunteers
Centre (PBV), the offer of volunteers was initially
turned down by the local authority on the grounds
that the city had no coordination or reception
arrangements in place for the volunteers. In addi-
tion, one municipal officer from the same city
recalled during the interview that food aid was
sometimes wasted when the person in charge of
evacuation centres, often municipal officers, did
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 1 7IDDRI
not know how to distribute it properly. According
to him, when food aid of rice balls arrived in an
evacuee camp, the camp manager realised that
the number of rice balls was not enough to distri-
bute to everybody in the camp and thus decided to
simply throw them in the garbage in order to avoid
strife and chaos in the centre. In other instances,
the municipal officials managing the distribution
of relief items required the donating organisa-
tions and companies to provide ‘each survivor
with items that were exactly the same in brand,
type and size’ and, as a result, ‘many resources
were wasted or used inefficiently’ during the relief
operations (Yeoh, 2012: p.8).
The Secretary General of the Association for Aid
and Relief (ARR), which operates mainly in devel-
oping countries, also pointed out the cultural hesi-
tancy to accept aid, specific to Japanese society.
The relief operation in Tohoku made him aware
that, compared to beneficiaries in other countries,
the Japanese population generally lack the capac-
ity to seek help and accept assistance. When help is
offered, Japanese people tend to decline, either to
preserve their dignity or out of concern not to in-
convenience others. Another aid worker from AAR
recalled one scene:
When I arrived at a house badly damaged by
the tsunami, there was a woman still living in-
side the house without any electricity, water or
food. There was no heating stove either. When I
asked her what I could bring to help her, she said
‘No, don’t worry about me. There are people who
are in greater need than I am’.
In Japan, an industrialised country with a func-
tioning social welfare system, the local authori-
ties were simply not used to receiving help and
thus quickly became overwhelmed by all the of-
fers of assistance that came in from all over Japan
and abroad. Thus, the field interviews found that
the population’s cultural hesitancy to receive as-
sistance compounded the difficulties that volun-
teers, NGOs and other private donors encountered
in delivering aid to the needy during the relief
operations.
3.3. Perception of risk
The affected region of Tohoku had long been aware
of the tsunami risk and was thus highly prepared
for the eventuality prior to the disaster. This sub-
section attempts to analyse how this perception
influenced individual decisions to flee and disaster
mitigation during the actual crises.
High perception of tsunami risks
Prior to the 11 March disaster, the affected
coastal cities had already been expecting a major
earthquake (M 7.4) to occur with a 99% prob-
ability within the next thirty years, and the To-
hoku region had thus prepared intensively against
such risk (Mori and Takahashi, 2012: p.2). In the
Hazard map of Takada district
Municipal
Office
Stairs
Public loud speakers
Evacuation route
First Evacuation Point
Evacuation Centres
Watergate
Map 3. Example of a hazard map (Rikuzentakada City)
STUDY 05/20131 8 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
estimation, the tsunami was predicted to have a
10.2 m run-up height in Rikuzentakada City and
7.3 m in Naraha town.21 On the basis of these esti-
mates, the municipalities had created hazard maps
to mark out the zone at risk of flooding in the re-
spective cities (Map 3). Based on the hazard maps,
evacuation drills were organised regularly. All of
the evacuees interviewed mentioned that they had
been informed of such risk prior to the disaster. In
addition, most of them were familiar with tsunami
disasters and knew what to do in such an event,
having learnt from previous experiences and sto-
ries told by the elderly.
The shortcomings of hazard maps
The field survey found that the hazard maps desi-
gned to prepare the residents against tsunamis did
not always help to save lives in the actual
disaster.
According to the local government employee of
Rikuzentakada City that we interviewed, the map
had indeed helped to raise the awareness of those
residents living in the predicted inundation zone
and prepare them for an eventual tsunami. On
the other hand, it also created a feeling of reas-
surance for those who lived outside the predicted
inundation zone, giving them the impression that
they were safe from the tsunami risk. Another map
shown by the same official during the interview
indicated the location of houses whose residents
lost their lives, and clearly shows the causal rela-
tionship between the hazard map and the survival
of individuals. On the map,22 it was evident that
victims resided just outside the predicted inun-
dation zone indicated on the hazard map – those
residents who were not included in the tsunami
drills. This suggests that the perception of risk and
the disaster preparedness did, in the vast majority
of cases, influence the survival of individuals at
the time of disaster.
Location of emergency evacuation points
All four evacuees interviewed in Ishinomaki City
referred to the disaster as ‘man-made’, critici-
sing the local authority for insufficient prepare-
dness against a tsunami risk. In Ishinomaki City,
which had the highest death toll (3,47123) of all the
affected towns, survivors accuse the shortcomings
of the municipality’s disaster preparation as a main
21 Information provided by Rikuzentakada City and
Naraha town councils during the interview.
22 The map was shown to us by the official of Rikuzen-
takada City during the interview but he declined to pro-
vide us with a copy of such a sensitive document out of
respect for the victims’ families.
23 Source: Miyagi Prefectural Government (http://www.
pref.miyagi.jp/kikitaisaku/higasinihondaisinsai/
pdf/09071600 ) (in Japanese).
cause of this high fatality rate. One of their accusa-
tions targets the location of emergency evacuation
points. These points were generally designated at
schools and public buildings but also at public car
parks or a flat field. Originally intended as gathe-
ring points in case of fires or earthquakes, some of
them were situated on lower ground close to the
shoreline or on river banks. When the earthquake
hit on 11 March 2011, many inhabitants gathered
at these emergency points instead of taking refuge
on higher ground, quite simply because these
places were regularly used during disaster drills
as the first assembly points. As a result, some of
these residents lost their lives as the locations were
completely inundated by the tsunami. One of the
most tragic examples is the case of Okawa primary
school in Ishinomaki City. Teachers decided to
take the children to the emergency evacuation
point located on the river bank instead of climbing
the hill just next to the school, because it was the
evacuation point designated in the contingency
manual. As a result of this decision, 70% of the
school children and teachers lost their lives when
the tsunami travelled up the river.24
These instances indicate that the evacuation
points were not necessarily adapted to tsunami
disasters and that the residents were not adequate-
ly informed or trained for tsunami evacuations in
Ishinomaki City. This lesson needs to be properly
addressed in future disaster planning.
Vulnerability created by previous tsunami
experiences
During the interviews, municipal officials and
evacuees mentioned that having previous tsunami
experiences had sometimes adversely affected
individuals’ decision to flee and hence their
survival during the 11 March tsunami. It is often
assumed that people with previous disaster expe-
rience respond more effectively to a subsequent
disaster and that the lessons learnt from past
experience help them to avoid similar mistakes
in the future. As Alexandre Magnan argues in the
context of adaptive capacity to climate change, in
societies regularly exposed to natural hazards, the
experience of risk may confer a certain ability to
respond to a changing climate and to integrate its
effects (Magnan, 2010: p.8). Yet in the case of the
11 March disaster, although experience did help to
24 The newspaper, Mainichi Shimbun, ‘3.11 shogen: jidou,
nakisakebi outo, gakkou saita no giseisya’ (Author’s
translation: Testimony of 3.11: screaming and vomiting
pupils, the worst death toll for schools), 19 April 2011;
the newspaper, Yomiuri Shimbun, ‘hinan yori giron data
40 fun, giseisyatasuu no ookawasyou’ (Author’s transla-
tion: 40 minutes of discussion instead of evacuation pro-
duced many victims), 13 June 2011.
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 1 9IDDRI
save lives of many, it also created a feeling of reas-
surance with respect to risk and thus made some
of the population more vulnerable. The popula-
tion in these coastal cities had their perception of
the tsunami risk shaped mainly by the experiences
of the 1960 Chile Earthquake (M 9.5), which
produced a 6 m-high tsunami that took 142 lives,
and the 2010 Chile Earthquake (M 8.8), which
occurred almost one year before the 11 March
disaster and induced a 1 m-high tsunami affecting
the region. The field interviews found that these
recent experiences had given the inhabitants a
rather fixed idea that the biggest tsunami likely
to hit their cities would be around 6 metres high.
Moreover, in the past, all of the tsunami warnings
issued by the JMA and transmitted via the munici-
palities had always predicted much higher waves
that those that actually occurred, thus creating
a misperception that an actual tsunami would
always be much smaller than the one predicted
by official warnings. Given such convictions, the
population underestimated the height and gravity
of the tsunami that hit on 11 March 2011. Several
evacuees also asserted that the experience of the
foreshock (M 7.3) that struck on 9 March 2011,
two days before the 3.11 also led the population
to underestimate the tsunami risk of 11 March. At
the time of the foreshock, a tsunami warning was
announced but the tsunami that actually arrived
was only 0.5 m high.
Another fixed idea based on previous experi-
ences involves the time lag between the occur-
rence of an earthquake and the arrival of the ensu-
ing tsunami. According to the interviews, the past
tsunami experiences of the local population had
given them the idea that a tsunami would arrive
10–15 minutes after an earthquake. During the 11
March disaster, the tsunami reached the shoreline
30–40 minutes after the earthquake in the towns
(JMA, 2011b: p.10), contrary to the population’s
expectations. As a result, many of those who had
evacuated to higher ground immediately after the
earthquake decided to return home once the fif-
teen minutes had elapsed, convinced that no tsu-
nami would follow on from the earthquake, and
were hit by the enormous tsunami that arrived
thirty minutes later.
From these instances, we discovered that the
lessons learnt from previous experiences had para-
doxically sometimes been a contributing factor to
the population’s underestimation of the risk or its
misinterpretation of the danger signs during the 11
March disaster, and that their experience had not
always helped to mitigate the impacts. The inter-
views with tsunami survivors led us to the follow-
ing factual conclusion: while risk perception based
on former experience did indeed help to save lives
of many, in the face of an extreme disaster that ex-
ceeded all assumptions in terms of its magnitude,
it also produced the reverse effect by creating false
assumptions as to the level of risk.
3.4. Prospects of resettlement
From the interviews, we learnt that most of the
evacuees wish to resettle on new land located
on higher ground either because they no longer
feel safe living in the place where their houses
had been swept away or because it is not emotio-
nally possible to return as they are deeply trau-
matised by the loss of family members. One year
after the disaster, the resettlement process began
but evacuees were encountering many adminis-
trative and financial obstacles. The resettlement
Figure 3. Photos of temporary shelters (prefabricated
housing)
Photo (top): A prefabricated housing unit in Ofunato City,
Iwate
Prefecture, for tsunami evacuees. Taken by R. Hasegawa on 22
March 2012. Photo (bottom): A prefabricated housing unit in
Iwaki City, Fukushima Prefecture, for nuclear evacuees. Taken by
R. Hasegawa on 5 April 2012.
STUDY 05/20132 0 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
plan proposed by the government has three main
components. First, the local authority purchases
the land owned by each evacuee affected by the
tsunami. With the money from this sale, evacuees
are expected to purchase new land for resettle-
ment. Although the cost of house construction is
not covered by the scheme, evacuees are entitled
to receive financial assistance of up to around
€30,000 as well as a special low-interest housing
loan set up by the government worth up to
€146,000 in order to rebuild their houses.25
The field research found that evacuees were
finding it very hard to resettle despite the various
forms of government assistance. First, there is a
problem of ‘double loans’. Some evacuees contin-
ue to pay for the mortgage of a house swept away
by the tsunami. For these evacuees, it is extremely
difficult to commit to another housing loan, even if
it is part of the government scheme. Furthermore,
many of them are still unemployed as their offices
and factories were destroyed by the tsunami and
have not yet been reconstructed. Secondly, pur-
chasing the new land for resettlement is difficult
simply because land located on higher ground is
scarce in some cities or because landowners are
sometimes unwilling to sell land that has been in
the family for generations. In other instances, the
land is sometimes protected as a natural reserve
and cannot be purchased, or landowners cannot
be found as they are either dead or living abroad.
Another obstacle stems from one of the condi-
tions laid down by the government resettlement
scheme: at least five evacuee families must join
together and decide collectively to resettle in the
same place in order to benefit from the scheme.
This condition was initially aimed at maintaining
community ties, but it is instead creating many
problems on the ground as the population is now
scattered around different parts of the town or
sometimes outside the town. This means that it is
extremely difficult for the evacuees to get in touch
with friends and former neighbours who would
agree to resettle together.
Lastly, the field interviews found that the man-
agement of resettlement schemes was very poorly
synchronised by the local authorities. Many mu-
nicipal governments lost patience with what they
considered to be a slow or inadequate process and
began their own assistance schemes to comple-
ment the government scheme. The problem is that
they started these without consulting neighbour-
ing towns, which has sparked off jealousy among
the different communities and made it difficult to
reach a consensus within the evacuee community.
25 Source: Cabinet Office.
For example, Ishinomaki and Rikuzentakada Cit-
ies have proposed to purchase the tsunami-affect-
ed land for 70–80% of its original value, while
Higashi-Matsuyama City (just next to Sendai City)
has offered the evacuees up to 80–97% of the land
value.26 As a result, evacuees in some localities
began to renegotiate the terms of resettlement
schemes with the municipal administration, thus
causing further delay in the whole resettlement
process.
In this context, the resettlement process for
evacuees is not advancing at a full speed. The situ-
ation is exerting an additional psychological strain
on the evacuees, who have already suffered from
the loss of close relatives or friends and now find
themselves in the plight of displaced persons in
camps and temporary shelters.
3.5. Post-disaster challenges
The following points are developed to illustrate the
situation and challenges facing tsunami evacuees
and the affected communities one year after the
disaster.
Reinventing the affected communities –
‘building back better’
Prior to the disaster, Tohoku was already a margi-
nalised region facing the challenge of an aging
population and the migration of its youth to
larger cities in search of better job opportunities.
In 2010, 26.3% of the population in Tohoku was
over 65 years old, 3.3% higher than the national
average (and compared to 16.8% in France).27 The
economy of Tohoku was mainly based on agricul-
ture and fisheries, with the average wage standing
17% lower than the national average.28 This trend
is likely to accelerate in the wake of the disaster.
One year after, reconstruction operations were
intensified in the affected towns. The govern-
ment budget for reconstruction amounts to €150
billion for the year 2011 and €37 billion for 2012.29
Yet, so far, the authorities’ reconstruction efforts
have seemed to focus more on rebuilding the
physical infrastructures – the traditional notion of
26 Source: Japan Institute of Construction Engineering
(JICE) (http://www.jice.or.jp/sinsai/sinsai_result.
php?q=%93y%92n%94%83%82%A2%8E%E6%82%E
8&t=2). (in Japanese)
27 Source: Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communica-
tions (http://www.stat.go.jp/data/kokusei/2010/
kihon1/pdf/gaiyou1 ) (in Japanese).
28 Source: Cabinet Office (http://www.esri.cao.go.jp/jp/
sna/data/data_list/kenmin/files/contents/pdf/gai-
you2_1 ) (in Japanese).
29 Source: Reconstruction Agency (http://www.recon-
struction.go.jp/).
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 2 1IDDRI
reconstruction – and less on smaller but innovative
social and economic projects to revitalise the com-
munities.30 During the interviews, several evacu-
ees expressed concern that many young people
were leaving the town due to the lack of job op-
portunities after the disaster. According to them,
the reconstruction works created many temporary
job opportunities but these were confined to the
construction sector and contracts were on a short-
term basis. Unable to find stable employment,
many young people, especially those with qualifi-
cations, began to leave the town for big cities. Ac-
cording to a survey of 1,033 evacuees in Iwate, Mi-
yagi and Fukushima Prefectures conducted by the
newspaper, Asahi Shimbun, between January and
March 2012, 40% of them were still unemployed
either because they had lost their jobs or their em-
ployers had suspended activity following the dis-
aster.31 The results of the same survey showed that
the affected cities, including Ishinomaki City, had
on average lost 6% of their population between
2011 and 2012 (excluding the number of dead and
missing due to the disaster) and, in the case of Ri-
kuzentakada City, the figure was 13.8%.32
Under these circumstances, rebuilding the af-
fected communities as they were before the dis-
aster seems not only inefficient but also unsus-
tainable both demographically and economically.
The affected municipalities are thus dealing with
the enormous challenge of implementing a well-
thought-out reconstruction plan to ensure a rapid
recovery from the disaster, whilst at the same time
dealing with the chronic problem of a shrinking
economy and aging population.
The elderly and persons with reduced
mobility were the hardest hit
The tsunami claimed many lives among the elderly
and persons with reduced mobility living at home
or in specialised facilities. During one interview, an
Iwaki City employee explained that, for those who
were living with their families, it was expected that
the family members would help them to evacuate.
But as the earthquake hit during the day, these
members were either at work or at school and were
unable to return home in time to rescue them.
The elderly and persons with reduced mobility
living alone at home were allocated to designated
neighbours to assist them in case of disaster. But,
likewise, these designated helpers were at work
30 The Japan Times, ‘Reconstructing Tohoku to fit today’, 2
April 2012.
31 Asahi Shimbun, ‘Jinko-gen keieishano-urei’ (Author’s
translation: Falling population, business owners’ grief),
11 March 2012.
32 Asahi Shimbun, Ibid.
and could not assist those who needed help to
evacuate. As a result, many lost their life as they
were unable to move from the house. According
to the 2011 White Paper on Disaster Prevention
edited by the Cabinet Office, 64.4% of fatalities
from the 11 March disaster were over 60 years old,
whereas the proportion of the population over 60
in the region was 31%. The mortality rate for those
in their seventies rose as high as 23.7%, and 21.8%
for those in their eighties.
As for persons with reduced mobility, it was re-
ported that their fatality rate was 2.5 times higher
than that for all the affected populations.33 Accord-
ing to a survey conducted by a network of associa-
tions for disabled persons, Japan Disability Forum
Miyagi, the average fatality rate among 13 affect-
ed municipalities in Miyagi Prefecture was 1.4%
while the rate for the persons with disabilities was
as high as 3.5% and 3.9% for those with physical
disabilities.
These statistics show that the disaster preven-
tion measures were flawed when it came to ad-
dressing the needs of vulnerable groups in case of
disaster, a lesson that should be taken into account
for the future disaster preparations.
Divided communities
The field interviews with evacuees found that the
disaster had caused tensions and divisions among
the local population, which still persisted one year
on. While stories of mutual help and solidarity
were often emphasised by the evacuees, they also
pointed up the different treatments and discrimi-
nations in the distribution of the aid received at
the time of disaster. It emerged from the inter-
views that the evacuees categorise themselves into
three groups: those who lost their houses and all
their belongings in the tsunami; those who lost
their houses but not their belongings due to the
earthquake; and those whose houses were only
partially destroyed. The third group of evacuees
was considered ‘less affected’ compared to the first
two groups and thus regarded as ‘less qualified’
to receive aid. As an evacuee from Rikuzentakada
City explained:
When someone from a partially destroyed
house came to an evacuation centre to get food
and relief items, the evacuees in the centre open-
ly complained that the person did not have the
right to receive assistance because her house was
not completely destroyed. After such experiences,
33 The newspaper, Nikkei Shimbun, ‘Higashinihon-
daishinsai no shougaisyasibouritsu, zentaino 25 bai.
Nigeokureta kanousei’ (Author’s translation: The fatal-
ity rate from the Great East Japan disaster is 2.5 times
higher among the disabled population: a possibility that
they were unable to evacuate in time)’, 30 July 2012.
STUDY 05/20132 2 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
those who were living in partially destroyed
houses with no electricity, water or food often
had to survive by their own means, hesitating to
seek help.
In addition, disparities also appeared depending
on the evacuation centres. Large evacuation cen-
tres that attracted media attention received many
offers of assistance from all over Japan, while small
centres were most often ignored. These experi-
ences have created jealousy and mistrust among
neighbours and friends, leaving deep scars in rela-
tionships that had been nurtured over generations
in these remote coastal communities.
While the public service is overwhelmed by re-
construction projects and the evacuee resettle-
ment process is stagnating, the economic and so-
cial disparities that existed among the inhabitants
before the disaster are also growing larger and
more visible. According to the aid workers inter-
viewed from Child Fund Japan in Ofunato City and
PBV in Ishinomaki City, both of which assist evacu-
ees in prefabricated housing units, evacuees with
financial means tend to move out of the temporary
shelters quickly as they construct their new home
without waiting for financial assistance from the
government, whereas the vulnerable and the mar-
ginalised are left behind. Those with a strong so-
cial network and personal connections also move
out rapidly as they easily find new job opportuni-
ties. Information Technology (IT) literacy is also
creating a new disparity. Evacuees who know how
to surf the Internet are able to find more informa-
tion on the various forms of assistance offered by
the authorities, NGOs and individuals, while those
who are not IT-literate have little access to such in-
formation as they rely solely on written material.
In the absence of an effective public service during
post-disaster recovery, this disparity is exacerbat-
ing the rifts in communities and leaving vulner-
able populations in even greater destitution and a
state of traumatism.
4. THE FUKUSHIMA DAIICHI NUCLEAR
POWER PLANT ACCIDENT
4.1. Overview of the event
The earthquake and the ensuing tsunami caused
serious damage to the installation of Fukushima
Daiichi nuclear power plant situated 230 km north
of Tokyo. This resulted in hydrogen explosions
and nuclear meltdowns of three of the six reac-
tors on site, due to the loss of all power supply and
subsequently of control of the cooling systems.
Tens of thousands of residents had to evacuate
their homes as radiation leaked into the atmos-
phere, the sea and the food chain. Japanese offi-
cials rated the incident at level 7 (the maximum) on
the International Nuclear and Radiological Event
Scale (INES) defined by International Atomic
Energy Agency (IAEA), which ranks the accident
as the largest nuclear disaster since the 1986 Cher-
nobyl accident (which is also rated at level 7). The
post-accident management measures, including
the decommissioning of the crippled reactors and
compensation for the nuclear evacuees, are esti-
mated at a cost of more than €200 billion.34
One year after the disaster, there were more than
160,000 evacuees, known as nuclear evacuees,
from the Fukushima Prefecture. They represent
47% of all the persons displaced by the 11 March
catastrophe.35 A total of 11 municipalities (113,000
residents) were forced to evacuate following the
government’s evacuation orders. In addition to this
forced displacement, there were also cases of vol-
untary evacuation where residents living outside
of the official evacuation zone became worried
about radiation effects and decided to flee on their
own. As the Japanese government and TEPCO re-
vealed the true scale of the radioactive contamina-
tion, there was a gradual increase in the number
of voluntary evacuees, also referred to as self-evac-
uees. It is very difficult to obtain official statistics
on the number of self-evacuees but we can esti-
mate these at 47,000 from the difference between
the total number of evacuees from the Fukushima
Prefecture and the number of forced evacuees
from the evacuation zone. In September 2011, the
number was estimated at 50,327 by the Fukushima
Prefecture.36 This trend was continuing one year
34 Source: Japan Centre for Economic Research (JCER)
(http://www.jcer.or.jp/policy/pdf/pe%28JCER20110
719%EF%BC%89 ). (in Japanese)
35
Source: Reconstruction Agency.
36 Source: MEXT. (http://www.mext.go.jp/b_menu/
shingi/chousa/kaihatu/016/shiryo/__icsFiles/afield-
file/ 2011/11/25/1313502_3 ).(in Japanese)
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 2 3IDDRI
after the disaster: the number of nuclear evacu-
ees is increasing rather than decreasing (Figure 4)
and is also pushing up the overall number of evac-
uees from the 11 March disaster (Figure 5). This
phenomenon is specific to the 11 March catastro-
phe and is not often observed for other types of
disaster.
4.2. Disaster Response
and Evacuation
This sub-section describes the evacuation process
implemented following the Fukushima nuclear
accident. The field interviews found that the
affected municipalities and population were
taken by surprise and that the evacuation was
organised in a chaotic manner, which reveals that
the scenario of a serious accident had never been
envisaged or adequately prepared for prior to the
accident.
Changes to the evacuation zones
From the onset of the crisis, the Japanese govern-
ment issued various evacuation orders with vastly
differing instructions and timing. From what
evacuees said in the interviews, this created a
great deal of confusion, uncertainty and distress
among the affected population. Table 3 gives the
chronology of the different evacuation orders
issued by the government. As shown in the list,
these orders were gradually expanded over a
three-month period starting on 11 March 2011 and
created four different evacuation zones (Map 4).
First, a compulsory evacuation order was issued
Figure 4. Changes in the number of Fukushima evacuees Figure 5. Changes in the total number of evacuees
Source: Japanese Reconstruction Agency.
for the zone within a 2 km radius37 from the
crippled station and then, in the space of twenty-
four hours, this was extended to a 20 km radius.
This area was designated as a ‘Restricted Zone’
with entry prohibited. Three days after issuing
the compulsory evacuation order, the government
then instructed residents living within a 20–30 km
radius from the station to shelter indoors, in what
was called the ‘Evacuation Prepared Area’. This
‘shelter indoors’ order continued for more than a
month and finally, on 22 April, the same residents
were advised to self-evacuate. On the same day,
the government issued a new evacuation order
to the area where a high airborne radiation level
had been detected and which was located outside
of the 20 km radius evacuation zone (‘Deliberate
Evacuation Area’ shown in Map 4). The residents
living in this area were instructed to evacuate
within a month. It was at this time that the govern-
ment began to take the threshold radiation dose
of 20 millisieverts38 per year (mSv/year) as a basis
for recommending evacuations. In June 2011, the
government began to identify ‘hot spots’ where
an air radiation dose of more than 20mSv/year
had been detected outside the evacuation zones
(‘Specific Spots recommended for Evacuation’
37 This first evacuation order was issued by the Fukushima
prefectural government as a precautionary measure.
38 The sievert (Sv) is a unit to measure the radiation dose.
1 sievert (Sv) = 1,000 millisieverts (mSv). The Interna-
tional Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP)
recommends limiting artificial irradiation of the public
to an average of 1 mSv per year, not including medical
and occupational exposure (ICRP 2007).
150 000
152 000
154 000
156 000
158 000
160 000
162 000
164 000
NOV
2011
DEC
2011
JAN
2012
FEB
2012
MAR
2012
APR
2012
MAY
2012
JUN
2012
325 000
330 000
335 000
340 000
345 000
350 000
NOV
2011
DEC
2011
JAN
2012
FEB
2012
MAR
2012
APR
2012
MAY
2012
JUN
2012
STUDY 05/20132 4 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
Table 3. Chronology of the Government’s evacuation orders/recommendations
2011 Target Orders Name of the Zone
11 March 2 km radius from the station Compulsory Evacuation (issued by the
Fukushima prefectural government)
Restricted Zone
3 km radius Compulsory Evacuation Restricted Zone
12 March 10 km radius Compulsory Evacuation Restricted Zone
20 km radius Compulsory Evacuation Restricted Zone
15 March Between 20–30 km Shelter indoors
Evacuation Prepared Area
22 April Between 20–30 km Shelter indoors or evacuation by own
means
Evacuation Prepared Area
Areas with air radiation dose more than
20 mSv/year
Evacuation within 1 month Deliberate Evacuation Area
16 June Spots with air radiation dose of over
20 mSv/year
Recommended for Evacuation Specific Spots Recommended for
Evacuation
30 Sept. Between 20–30 km Lifting of the order to shelter indoors or
evacuation by own means
Lifting of Evacuation Prepared Area
Map 4. Official evacuation zones prior to 30 September 2011
Source: Ministry of Industry, Trade and Economy.
Specific Spots recommended
for evacuation
Deliberate
Evacuation Area
Evacuation Prepared
Area
Restricted Area
Minamisoma
Namie
Futaba
Ookuma
Tomioka
Naraha
Hirono
Tamura
Koriyama
Fukushima
Iitate
Katsurao
Kawauchi
Kawamata
Fukushima Nuclear
Power Plant (No.1)
Fukushima Nuclear
Power Plant (No.2)
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 2 5IDDRI
shown in Map 4). In this fourth category, the
government first designates the spots after measu-
ring radiation levels on a house-by-house basis
upon a resident’s request and then issues a ‘recom-
mendation for evacuation’ instead of ‘orders’. If
the residents of the house qualified as a hot spot
decide to evacuate, the government provides
financial assistance.
On 30 September 2011, the government decid-
ed to do away with the second evacuation zone,
‘Evacuation Prepared Area’, situated within a 20–
30 km radius from the station. Then in March 2012,
it proposed reorganising the ‘Restricted Zone’ and
‘Deliberate Evacuation Area’ into three new areas
according to the airborne radiation level, thus cre-
ating a zone to which evacuees were expected to
return. This latest government proposal will be
analysed in detail in the following sub-section.
Through these different decisions, taken one
after the other by the government in a rather ad
hoc manner, both the affected municipalities and
residents were obliged to evacuate repeatedly from
one place to another with scant information about
their future prospects. The field interviews with
evacuees found that this caused significant psycho-
logical stress for the evacuees during their flight.
Improvised evacuation orders
The field survey revealed that at the outset of
the crisis, the municipalities had very little infor-
mation on the accident or the evacuation orders
issued by the government. Only Futaba town, one
of the two towns39 hosting the crippled nuclear
power plant, received the initial evacuation order
from the central government.40 The other three
municipalities that we interviewed, Naraha, Mina-
misoma and Iwaki, learnt of the first evacuation
order only through a television broadcast and
were not directly notified by the
government.
Naraha town, which hosts another nuclear power
plant (Fukushima No.2), managed to obtain some
information on the situation of the Fukushima
No.1 nuclear power plant from the plant operator,
Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO),41 thanks
to the relationship that it had built up with TEPCO
over the years. On the basis of this information,
Naraha town made the decision to evacuate the
entire population, while Minamisoma City, for
39 The other town that jointly hosts the crippled nuclear
station is Okuma town.
40 From the DEVAST interview with the municipality;
NAIIC, 2012: pp.50-61.
41 TEPCO is the largest of the ten electric utility companies
in Japan and the fourth largest in the world after the
German RWE, the French EDF and the German E.ON. It
was set up in 1951 and de facto nationalised in July 2012
after the Fukushima nuclear accident.
example, had nothing but the televised broad-
casts to guide its decision. According to the survey
conducted by NAIIC (NAIIC, 2012: pp.50-61),42
none of the affected municipalities, except two
towns hosting the damaged nuclear power station,
were informed officially of the evacuation order:
they had to decide on their own to evacuate their
residents.
According to the Disaster Prevention Guideline43
drawn up by the Nuclear Safety Commission of
Japan (NSC) in 1980 based on the Act on Special
Measures Concerning Nuclear Emergency Prepar-
edness, Field Emergency Response Headquarters
(referred to as the Off-Site Centre) should be set
up within 5 km of the power station in case of an
accident. The Off-Site Centre, comprising per-
sonnel from the nuclear regulatory agencies, the
nuclear operator and the concerned municipali-
ties, is in charge of managing the crisis and mak-
ing decisions about the evacuation zone. During
the 11 March disaster, this Off-Site Centre could
not function properly given that communication
equipment was damaged by the earthquake and
that the personnel who were supposed to assemble
there did not arrive as they judged the location of
the centre too close to the affected station and thus
too dangerous (Asahi Shimbun Special Reporting
Unit44, 2012: pp.72-74). Given these circumstances,
the Prime Minister’s Office in Tokyo took over the
role of the Off-Site Centre when the crisis broke
out. As a result, the procedure for issuing evacu-
ation orders was never applied as planned in the
disaster manual and the municipalities were left
without any specific advice as to how to proceed
with the evacuation.45 Thus, the mayors had no
choice but to act on their own initiative and evacu-
ate all the inhabitants regardless of the govern-
ment’s decisions.
As the municipalities were at a loss at what to
do, local residents took the advice of TEPCO em-
ployees, families and friends and fled before re-
ceiving the official evacuation orders. Among the
23 evacuees interviewed, only 9 had decided to
flee on the basis of the evacuation order from the
local authority. According to them, those who had
information from TEPCO employees were the first
to evacuate, as early as the night of 11 March, while
the majority fled on the following day.
42 The Fukushima Nuclear Accident Independent Investi-
gation Commission (NAIIC) set up by National Diet of
Japan.
43 http://www.bousai.ne.jp/vis/shir you/pdf/bousai_
shishin_h2208
44 Author’s translation of Asahi shimbun tokubetsu houduo bu.
45 Information collected from the interview with the
affected municipalities.
STUDY 05/20132 6 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
Privileged evacuees
Information on the preoccupying situation at the
power station thus first reached those who had
relatives and friends working for TEPCO at the
damaged station. Many evacuees interviewed told
the same story. On the night of 11 March, a large
number of residents had gathered in the evacua-
tion centres as aftershocks were continuing and
many houses had lost electricity. In the middle of
that night, a handful of residents who had relatives
and friends working for TEPCO started to receive
calls from these contacts on their mobile phones
and discreetly began to leave the evacuation
centres as they had been informed on the real state
of the accident and had been urged to evacuate
immediately. They thus learnt about the severity
of the accident and the need for evacuation even
before the municipality and most of the popula-
tion. What made matters worse is that they did
not inform their fellow residents in the evacuation
centres why they were leaving. As one evacuee
from Futaba town
explained:
On the night of the accident, the families of
TEPCO employees started to receive calls on their
mobile phones. After the conversation, they dis-
appeared from the centres. I managed to catch
one of them and asked why she was leaving. She
answered that she wanted to go back home in or-
der to pick up something. After she left, I realised
that her house had been completely destroyed by
the tsunami and so it was impossible for her to go
back home. Then, I understood that she did not
want to tell me that she was actually fleeing from
the town. I felt I was going crazy with fear when I
saw people sneaking out of the evacuation centre
in the middle of the night, one by one, while I was
left stuck and couldn’t do anything.
Those residents fortunate enough to know
someone in TEPCO thus escaped sooner, leaving
the others behind with no information. This inci-
dent deeply traumatised relationships among resi-
dents, a trauma that will probably take a long time
to heal.
Evacuation without preparation
The interviews with affected municipalities and
evacuees revealed that the organisation of the
evacuation had been chaotic, as the municipali-
ties had been trying to find ways to evacuate all
of their residents, a situation for which they had
never practiced before. Prior to the accident,
nuclear disaster drills were conducted mainly
for the employees of the plant operator and the
municipal offices along with a limited number
of residents living in the immediate vicinity of
the nuclear power station, and the crisis scenario
used had been of a minimal nature. Out of all the
29 nuclear evacuees interviewed during the field
research, one person had ever participated in such
an exercise. A municipal worker also admitted that
the participation of the residents was limited, a
maximum of 30 persons at a time, mainly elderly,
who were available during the day. The evacuee,
a school teacher in Futaba town, had taken part in
one nuclear disaster drill and described the exer-
cise as follows:
These drills lacked seriousness. The partici-
pants were gathered in the school yard where a
hot meal was prepared and served to everybody.
The atmosphere was rather festive. What’s more,
we were eating and chatting outside during the
exercise as if a radiation leak in the air was never
expected from a nuclear accident.
According to the Disaster Prevention Guideline
of the Nuclear Safety Commission, the zone with-
in an 8–10 km radius from the nuclear power sta-
tions is considered as an Emergency Planning Zone
(EPZ), targeted for nuclear disaster drills and prep-
arations. The guideline explains that the EPZ was
set up ‘based on the assumption that it is almost
impossible to occur technically’46 and that ‘between
8 and 10 km there would be little difference in the
response to the radiation effect’. In other words, as
Akira Imai puts it, ‘the nuclear disaster preparation
was to be implemented only within 8 km and no
further as the EPZ was designated on the basis of a
nearly impossible scenario’ and ‘this, indeed, con-
stitutes the basis of the notion in public policy that
nuclear power stations were accident-free’47 (Imai,
2012a: p.24). The NSC’s report on nuclear disaster
drills conducted during 2008 in 11 prefectures, for
example, shows that the evacuation exercise for
residents was conducted only within a radius of
1–3 km from the stations.48 Therefore, at the time
of the crisis, the municipalities and residents were
not at all prepared for such an evacuation and thus
completely at a loss. As a result, in the absence of
an organised evacuation led by the municipalities
as planned in the disaster manual, many people
self-evacuated, using their own cars if they were
lucky enough to have some fuel left. This created
an enormous traffic jam on the escape route and
delayed the whole evacuation process, leaving the
population significantly distressed.
46 Author’s translation.
47 Author’s translation.
48 Source: NSC (http://www.nsc.go.jp/senmon/shidai/
sisetubo/sisetubo019/ssiryo5 ). (in Japanese)
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STUDY 05/2013 2 7IDDRI
Evacuation without information
The field research also found that evacuees had
not been informed on the severity of the acci-
dent or the eventual radiation risk at the time of
evacuation. Even when residents were ordered to
evacuate by the municipal authorities, they were
not told how long the displacement was going to
last or what was happening at the nuclear power
station, let alone what the radiation risk would be.
As a result, many residents left without any extra
clothes, food or money, thinking that it would be
a matter of three or four days before they could
go back home. According to the NAIIC report,
only 20% of the residents in Futaba and Naraha
towns, both of which host nuclear power plants,
knew about the accident on the first day (NAIIC,
2012: p.52). The remaining 80% of residents learnt
about the accident only on the following day when
the evacuation order was finally issued by the
municipalities, twelve hours after the first evacua-
tion order issued by the government. The same
report revealed that only 10% of the residents were
aware of the first evacuation order issued by the
government.
The interviews with evacuees and municipali-
ties confirmed that the information on radia-
tion risk was not communicated to them by the
central and prefectural governments, despite the
fact that this (albeit incomplete) information had
been in authorities’ possession from the outset of
the crisis. The Japanese government had invested
a total of €130 million in developing the System
for Prediction of Environmental Emergency Dose
Information (SPEEDI) since the 1980s (Asahi
Shimbun Special Reporting Unit, 2012: p.21; Mat-
suoka, 2012: p.130). The system is designed to
predict the likely pathway of radioactive materi-
als emitted from a damaged nuclear power plant
and carried by winds and rains, by calculating
the weather and geographical conditions of the
concerned area. After the accident, it was dis-
covered that the Ministry of Education, Culture,
Sports, Science, and Technology (MEXT) was ac-
tively utilising the SPEEDI from the first day of
the accident to predict the pathway of radiation
leaks from the crippled station. This information
had even been communicated to the US army as
early as 14 March 2011, three days after the ac-
cident, through the Japanese Ministry of Foreign
Affairs upon a specific request made by the US
government (Matsuoka, 2012: p.130). Further-
more, this information was also transmitted to
the prefectural government of Fukushima as ear-
ly as 12 March 2011 via 86 e-mails sent by MEXT’s
Nuclear Safety Technology Centre. However, the
Fukushima Prefecture not only failed to inform
the concerned municipalities but also deleted
most of these e-mails.49 When interrogated as to
why this SPEEDI information had been deleted,
the Fukushima Prefecture explained that ‘these
e-mails contained attachment files that were too
heavy for our system to deal with’. When the gov-
ernment was interrogated as to why the informa-
tion from SPEEDI was not made public in a timely
manner, Special Advisor to the then Prime Minis-
ter Goshi Hosono explained that it was in order to
‘avoid panic among the population’.50
While the SPEEDI information was kept from
the public, MEXT dispatched a radiation monitor-
ing team to Namie town, which lay in the radioac-
tive pathway predicted by SPEEDI, as early as 15
March 2011 (Asahi Shimbun Special Reporting
Unit, 2012: pp.61-62). There, the team measured
a radiation dose rate as high as 330 microsieverts
(μSv) per hour (see Box 1).51 Namie town was situ-
ated outside of the official evacuation zone (31 km
north west of the nuclear station) and thus all the
residents were still living in the town. Information
on this high radiation dose rate was not communi-
cated to the Namie administration or the residents
and was made public only on the MEXT website
the following day: a point was indicated on a blank
map with no name shown for the place where this
dose rate had been detected. In the meantime,
the government spokesman repeated a televised
message that ‘this radiation dosage poses no
49 The newspaper Tokyo Shimbun, ‘Kakusan yosoku: fuku-
shima-ken ga sakujo syazai’ (Author’s translation:
The Fukushima Prefecture apologizes for deleting the
SPEEDI information’, 21 April 2012.
50 Asahi Shimbun Special Reporting Unit, 2012: p.76;
Joint Government/TEPCO Press Conference held on 2
May 2011 (http://www.cas.go.jp/jp/genpatsujiko/pdf/
godokaiken_110502 ). (in Japanese)
51 The newspaper, Tokyo Shimbun, ‘SPEEDI information
used by the government prior to being made public’, 12
June 2012; Asahi Shimbun Special Reporting Unit, 2012.
Box 1. Basic information on air radiation dose
levels
m Airborne radiation can be measured by a Geiger counter, which detects
particles of ionising radiation.
m 1 millisievert (mSv) per year is the reference dose level in normal
exposure situations, recommended by International Commission on
Radiation Protection (ICRP). It is the dose limit for artificial radiation
exposure (thus excluding natural radiation exposure) set for the public,
excluding medical and occupational exposures.
m 1 mSv/year can be calculated on average as 0.11 microsievert (μSv)/
hour.
m 0.001 Sv = 1 mSv = 1,000 μSv
m The average air radiation dose rate in Fukushima Prefecture before the
accident was 0.038 μSv/hour.6
STUDY 05/20132 8 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
immediate risk to human health52’ (Asahi Shimbun
Special Reporting Unit, 2012: p.54). Consequently,
many evacuees were unnecessarily exposed to
high levels of radiation during the initial phase of
the evacuation, especially those who fled to the
north-west of the station. This zone was in fact the
pathway of the radiation clouds that SPEEDI had
already predicted, but such information had not
been shared with those concerned. The SPEEDI
information was finally released to the public on
23 March 2011, twelve days after the accident, and
additional evacuation orders for residents living in
the area with high radiation levels were not issued
until 22 April 2011, one month after the public re-
lease. As the NAIIC report states: ‘Some residents
were evacuated to areas with high radiation lev-
els and were then neglected, receiving no further
evacuation orders until April’ (NAIIC, 2012: p.19),
and by acting in this way, ‘the government effec-
tively abandoned their responsibility for public
safety’ (Ibid, p.38).
Emergency response measures against
radiation exposure
In addition to the lack of information on the radia-
tion risk, other emergency measures implemented
by the authorities came under criticism in the wake
of the disaster. These measures involved, in parti-
cular, the emergency medical care aimed at redu-
cing the health effects of radiation exposure. The
final report by the Investigation Committee on the
Fukushima Accident commissioned by the Cabinet
Office examined some of these measures in detail,
notably the full-body screening procedure53 for
decontamination and the administration of stable
iodine tablets (ICANPS, 2011: pp.353-361).
Prior to the accident, the Fukushima Prefec-
ture had established an external contamination
screening procedure for residents, whereby those
exposed to high radiation levels would receive de-
contamination treatment in case of an accident.
In the procedure, the threshold level triggering
this treatment was set at 40 Bq/cm2 (equivalent
to 13,000 cpm).54 Two days after the accident,
the prefectural government decided to raise this
52 Author’s translation.
53 The screening procedure involves measuring the level of
radioactive contamination on a person’s outer body by
placing dose measurement equipment over the body’s
surface. The medical team then is able to determine
whether or not a person has been contaminated by radi-
oactivity and thus needs to be decontaminated.
54 The becquerel (Bq) is a unit of radioactivity. 1 Bq rep-
resents the amount of radioactive material that will
undergo one nucleus decay per second. Counts per min-
ute (cpm) is a measure of the detection rate of ionisation
events due to radioactivity.
screening level to 100,000 cpm: eight times higher
than the pre-accident level. The Nuclear Safety
Commission of Japan (NSC), although it had ini-
tially expressed some concerns, finally endorsed
this threshold level on 19 March 2011. As a result,
full-body decontamination procedures, including
removal of contaminated clothes, showers and
other preventive measures such as administration
of iodine tablets, were not systematically applied
to people whose external contamination level read
below 100,000 cpm.
On 16 March 2011, the NSC recommended the
administration of stable iodine tablets for those
residents still inside the restricted zone within a
20 km radius from the crippled power station. In
line with the Basic Disaster Prevention Plan, all the
concerned municipalities had a sufficient stock of
stable iodine tablets for the residents in case of
an accident. However, the Fukushima prefectural
government did not communicate the NSC’s in-
struction to the concerned municipalities since it
had already confirmed that everybody had evacu-
ated and that nobody remained in the area (infor-
mation that was not correct according to our inter-
views with evacuees). The ICANPS interim report
published in December 2011 presents the case of
Miharu town, situated 50 km from the crippled
nuclear station. Assuming a high level of exposure
to radiation, the town decided on its own initia-
tive to advise residents to take stable iodine tab-
lets. When Fukushima Prefecture was informed of
this decision, it issued an order to the Miharu town
officials to suspend the distribution and recall the
tablets on the grounds that no such instruction
had yet been given by the central government. Dis-
regarding this instruction, the Miharu municipal-
ity decided to go ahead and distribute the iodine
tablets to the residents. As a result, apart from Mi-
haru town, no evacuees or other concerned popu-
lations in Fukushima took the stable iodine tablets
during the disaster due to absence of instructions
from the central and prefectural governments.
These examples show that the authorities did
not properly follow the emergency procedures that
were inscribed in their contingency manuals and
hence failed to provide a maximum protection to
the population against radiation exposures. These
incidents led the population to lose trust in the
handling of central and prefectural governments
in effectively mitigating the effects of the accident
and doing their best to protect their citizens.
4.3. Perception of risk
Prior to the accident, both evacuees and munici-
palities believed that the nuclear power station
was extremely safe and that a severe accident was
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 2 9IDDRI
almost impossible. The following section explores
the circumstances that existed in these commu-
nities before the accident and analyses how
this perception of nuclear risk heightened their
vulnerability when faced with an actual disaster.
Changes in the risk perception of nuclear energy
among both the evacuees and the general public
are also closely examined in order to demonstrate
the immediate and profound impact that the acci-
dent produced on Japanese society.
The myth of ‘absolute safety’
During the interviews, most of the evacuees
pointed out the myth of ‘absolute safety’ that had
underpinned their confidence in nuclear power
stations prior to the accident. During our field
survey, the majority of interviewees said that they
had believed that the nuclear stations were absolu-
tely safe. Most interestingly, a couple of evacuees
responded that they had previously never given
thought to the nuclear power plant as it had been
built long before their birth and they took its exis-
tence for granted. An evacuee from Naraha town
recalls:
TEPCO used to tell us that its nuclear power
plant was the safest in the world and that the oc-
currence of an accident was impossible. We were
all brainwashed by them…
As another evacuee from Futaba town
remembers:
Every year TEPCO organised a town festival
through which they carried out their informa-
tion campaign, telling the residents that the nu-
clear power station was absolutely safe. I won-
dered, if it was so safe, why do they have to come
every year to tell us the same thing? TEPCO also
transferred 10,000 yen (€100) to all the house-
holds in town every year [as a sign of apprecia-
tion for hosting its nuclear facilities]. When I
think of it now, why did they regularly send us
money if their station was so safe and there was
nothing to feel guilty about?
Although few in number, there were also evacu-
ees who had been sceptical about this myth. These
evacuees are mainly people who had worked on
site for TEPCO or those who, as members of their
Local Nuclear Resident Committee, had been in
regular contact with TEPCO and the state nuclear
regulatory agencies.55 Those who were connected
55 This committee is composed of residents and members
of the town assembly to represent the residents’ inter-
ests in matters concerning the nuclear power plant. It
had regular contacts with the plant operator, TEPCO,
and the nuclear regulatory agencies.
in some way with the nuclear facility knew that the
nuclear power stations were not failsafe, but they
did not share their opinion with others at the time
as it was considered as taboo for them to question
the safety of nuclear installations. Their ultimate
interest was to maintain the presence of the nu-
clear power plant on account of the benefits that
it brought to their community, and questioning its
safety was regarded as compromising this mutual
interest (see the section below ‘Nuclear-dependant
communities’).
Since the introduction of nuclear energy in 1955,
the myth of ‘absolute safety’ – according to which
a severe nuclear accident could never occur in Ja-
pan – has been nurtured by nuclear advocates in
industry, government and academia, initially in
order to convince rural communities to accept the
installation of nuclear power stations and later to
gain the population’s continuing support. Accord-
ing to Yoichi Funabashi and Kay Kitazawa, who are
the main authors of the report of the Independent
Investigation Commission on the Fukushima Nu-
clear Accident (IIC) established by the Rebuild Ja-
pan Initiative Foundation, this myth was regarded
as necessary by nuclear proponents in order to
overcome the general public’s strong opposition
to nuclear power, an aversion that had its roots in
the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
(Funabashi and Kitazawa, 2012: p.14). The authors
explain that the disaster risk in the nuclear energy
sector had been deliberately downplayed by these
interest groups over the years. As time passed, the
myth became ingrained in the thinking of nuclear
regulators and plant operators, who also finally
came to believe that an accident was impossible
(IIC, 2012: p.298). The myth went as far as to mis-
construe and distort common-sense logic. The IIC
report describes the myth as ‘the notion of safety
where questioning is forbidden and logic is for-
mulated in such a way as to preserve an already
established idea’.56
At a symposium organised by Waseda Univer-
sity in March 2012, Professor Shunichi Murooka
of Waseda University presented an interesting ex-
ample to illustrate how this myth functioned prior
to the disaster.57 He explained that, in the wake of
the Chernobyl accident, many nuclear facilities in
Europe installed vent filters in order to avoid pol-
luting the air with highly radioactive materials in
56 P.324; author’s translation.
57 Presentation made by Professor Shunichi Morooka
(Waseda University) at the Symposium on ‘One Year
after the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Fukush-
ima Nuclear Disaster: The Cause, Impact, Countermeas-
ure and Reconstruction from a Complex Mega Crisis’,
held at Waseda University on 8 March 2012.
STUDY 05/20133 0 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
the event of a severe accident. In Japan, however,
the authorities and the nuclear operator consid-
ered that, if they fitted such filters, this would send
out a message to the public that a severe accident
might indeed happen one day and they therefore
decided against this precautionary measure. Ac-
cording to Professor Murooka, had these vent fil-
ters been installed, the Fukushima accident would
not have emitted as much radioactive material in
the air as it did. The same logic governed the or-
ganisation of disaster drills for residents. When Ni-
gata Prefecture, host to one of the nuclear power
plants, planned to conduct nuclear accident drills
for an earthquake scenario in 2010, the former Nu-
clear and Industrial Safety Agency (NISA), which
reported to METI, advised that such drills would
cause ‘unnecessary anxiety and misunderstand-
ing’ among residents and thus suggested that they
should not be implemented (Funabashi and Ki-
tazawa, 2012: p.14). In Futaba and Naraha towns,
disaster drills were conducted on a minimal scale
with a minor incident scenario in which only those
residents within the immediate vicinity of the
power station were to be evacuated. In the logic of
the safety myth, disaster preparation in itself had
become a source of contradiction: if the nuclear
power stations are so safe, why prepare the resi-
dents for an accident that would never happen? As
a result, the local population was not sufficiently
prepared for a disaster and eventual evacuation
and, prior to the accident, their risk perception
of nuclear power plants remained very low or, in
some cases, non-existent.
The safety myth shattered after the disaster
All the evacuees interviewed, except a few of those
who were employed directly by the nuclear power
plants, said that they had completely lost confi-
dence in the safety of nuclear power plants and
wanted their towns to abandon nuclear energy.
This tendency is also observed within the general
public. Opinion polls taken prior to the accident
showed that the majority of the Japanese popu-
lation were in favour of stepping up the nuclear
share of the energy mix. In the 2009 census
conducted by the Cabinet Office, close to 6
0%
of the respondents were in favour of promoting
nuclear energy and another 20% were for main-
taining the current nuclear energy production.58
In total, almost 80% of the respondents approved
of nuclear energy in 2009. However, in June 2011,
three months after the accident, the opinion poll
conducted by the Nippon Housou Kyoukai (NHK),
Japan’s national public broadcasting organisation,
58 The survey result available in Japanese at: http://
www8.cao.go.jp/survey/tokubetu/h21/h21-genshi
revealed a complete turn-around with those in
favour of nuclear energy falling sharply to 28%,
while the proportion of those preferring a reduc-
tion or halt of nuclear energy rose to 66%.59 One
year after the accident, in March 2012, the same
opinion poll found 71% were in favour of phasing
out and abandoning nuclear energy, while only
23% were in favour of promoting or maintai-
ning nuclear energy.60 Figure 6 below summa-
rises these results and shows a reversal in public
opinion toward nuclear energy in the wake of the
Fukushima disaster.
Among the nuclear evacuees, this U-turn is even
more pronounced. According to the survey con-
ducted by Professor Akira Imai from Fukushima
University in February 2012, the opposition to
nuclear energy among the Fukushima evacuees
rose to 82% (Imai, 2012a: p.33). Considering that
an absolute majority of the local population sup-
ported the nuclear installation prior to the disas-
ter (Kainuma, 2011), a fact also confirmed by our
interviews, the change of opinion is most striking
among the evacuees from those municipalities
hosting the nuclear power plants. During the inter-
views, many voiced strong opposition to restarting
the nuclear power stations (all the stations were
in temporary shut-down for stress tests at the time
of the interviews) and to nuclear energy in gen-
eral, stating that there was no such thing as
100%
safe nuclear power generation. At the same time,
they also emphasised that the specific situations
of the municipalities hosting nuclear power plants
should be taken into account for any decision on
whether or not to abandon nuclear energy. Being
acutely aware of the benefits that a nuclear power
plant also brings to a town in terms of job creation
and economic prosperity (see the section ‘Nuclear-
dependant communities’), they did not wish to
impose their opinion in favour of ceasing nuclear
activities on the other hosting communities.
4.4. Prospects of return
The prospect of return for nuclear evacuees
remained uncertain one year after the disaster. The
following sub-section analyses the situation facing
nuclear evacuees with respect to their return and
explores why the evacuees remain ambivalent on
this question.
59 The survey result available in Japanese at: http://
www.nhk.or.jp/bunken/summar y/yoron/social/
pdf/110709
60 The survey result available in Japanese at: http://www.
nhk.or.jp/bunken/summary/yoron/social/pdf/120401.
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 3 1IDDRI
The question of return is highly politicised
Unlike the return of tsunami evacuees, the return
of nuclear evacuees has become a highly politi-
cised issue one year on from the disaster. In the
aftermath of the Fukushima accident, as early
as 19 April 2011, the government raised the dose
limit for public exposure to radiation from 1 mSv/
year to 20 mSv/year.61 Accordingly, the authori-
ties, including the Fukushima prefectural govern-
ment and several affected municipalities, began
to emphasise that it was safe to return and live
in areas with an annual radiation dose of less
than 20 mSv. Policy priorities have thus focused
on decontamination operations to ‘cleanse’ the
affected communities of radiation and on the early
return of evacuees. On the other hand, our field
research found that the majority of evacuees are
still anxious about the radioactive contamina-
tion of their houses and communities and remain
highly sceptical about the effectiveness of deconta-
mination operations. They are thus still undecided
about their return.
In March 2012, one year on from the accident,
the government proposed a new plan to reorgan-
ise the evacuation zone into three categories de-
pending on the air radiation doses measured.62
The first area, which has an air radiation dose of
less than 20 mSv/year, is designated for intensive
61 The reference dose for artificial irradiation for the pub-
lic, excluding medical and occupational exposures,
in ‘regular exposure situations’ defined by Interna-
tional Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP)
is 1 mSv/year (ICRP, 2007). The Japanese government
refers
to the ICRP’s recommendation on the reference
dose fixed for ‘existing radiation exposure conditions’,
applied to occupational exposure situations and residual
exposure situations after a nuclear reactor accident, to
justify its decision to raise the dose limit to 20 mSv/year.
The reference dose for ‘existing radiation exposure con-
ditions’ is between 1–20 mSv/year according to ICRP.
62 Source: METI (http://www.meti.go.jp/earthquake/
nuclear/pdf/20120330_02f ).
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
2005 2009 JUN
2011
OCT
2011
MAR
2012
Promotion
Status Quo
Abandon (Phase-out)
Don’t know
Figure 6. Trends in public opinion on nuclear energy
Source: Cabinet Office for 2005-2009 and NHK census for 2011-2012.
decontamination operations and the early return
of evacuees. The second zone is defined as an area
with a radiation dose of between 20–50 mSv/year,
with return not deemed feasible for at least two to
three years. The third zone is the area with more
than 50 mSv/year, where the return will be diffi-
cult for at least the next five years (Table 4).
Table 4. The government’s proposal on the reorganisation
of the evacuation zone
Area Name Threshold
Radiation Dose
(airborne)
Timing of Return
1 Areas for which
evacuation orders
are ready to be
lifted
Less than 20 mSv/
year
Intensive
decontamination
and early return
2 Areas in which the
residents are not
permitted to live
Between 20-50
mSv/year
Evacuees cannot
return for at least
2-3 years
3 Areas where it is
expected that the
residents will find
it difficult to return
to for a long
time
More than 50 mSv/
year
Evacuees cannot
return for at least
5 years
Source: Reconstruction Agency.
Box 2. The government’s compensation scheme
for nuclear evacuees
The compensation scheme for the nuclear evacuees following the reorganisa-
tion of the evacuation zone was disclosed by the government in July 2012.
The main elements of the scheme are as follows:
Psychological damage caused by the evacuation
In addition to the reimbursement of transportation and accommodation costs
related to the evacuation, TEPCO will pay 100,000 yen (€1,000) per person
per month from the date of the accident until the date when the evacuation
orders are lifted by the government.
Damages to fixed-assets (houses and land)
As for private houses and lands located in the third zone (difficult to return
to for 5 years), TEPCO will pay compensation equivalent to the pre-accident
value of such assets. Those located in the first and the second zones will be
compensated proportionally to the number of years the elapse until the lifting
of evacuation orders for these zones.
Damages to household effects
The amount of compensation varies according to the size of families. For
example, a family of two adults and two children will receive between
€50,000–67,000 on the basis of the newly classified areas.
Economic damages
TEPCO pays an amount equivalent to the salary that an evacuee was earning
prior to the accident (for a period of two years) and compensates for loss of
business earnings based on the average profits that business owners were
making before the accident (calculated on the previous five years for agricul-
ture and forestry businesses, and three years for other business activities).
Source: METI. For further details, the following documents are available on the METI website in
Japanese: http://www.meti.go.jp/earthquake/nuclear/pdf/institution ; http://www.meti.go.jp/pr
ess/2012/07/20120720001/20120720001-1
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Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
Area 1: Areas to which evacuation orders
are ready to be lifted
Area 2: Areas in which the residents
are not permitted to live
Area 3: Areas where it is expected that
the residents have difficulties in returning
for a long time
Restricted Area
Deliberate Evacuation Area
Map 5. Reorganisation of the evacuation zone (as from August 2012)
Source: Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 3 3IDDRI
However, this proposal raised many concerns
among the affected communities, obliging the
government to hold consultations with each mu-
nicipality. In August 2012, only 5 out of 11 affected
towns had officially adopted the plan, while the
other 6 were still in consultation and undecided.63
According to the interviews, their main cause for
concern was that the proposal splits towns into
three areas each benefiting from different levels
of financial assistance (Box 2), which is likely to
create jealousies among the residents and threat-
en the cohesiveness of the community. Secondly,
it creates patches of land to which residents can
return while the rest remain restricted access are-
as (Map 5). During the interviews, several evacu-
ees questioned the feasibility of returning to such
areas if vital social infrastructures such as clinics,
schools and shops are located in the second or the
third zone and thus simply not accessible. Third-
ly, many evacuees, especially those with small
children, are deeply anxious about radiation ef-
fects if they return. They remain sceptical of the
new safety standard of ‘less than 20 mSv/year’,
despite the government’s reassurances.
Since the redefinition of the evacuation zone,
the government, Fukushima Prefecture and sev-
eral affected municipalities have mobilised to
encourage evacuees to return to the localities
classified as Area 1, which has annual air radia-
tion dose below 20 mSv. For the municipal gov-
ernments, the question of return is a matter of
their own survival: if the residents do not return,
the town will disintegrate and ultimately disap-
pear from the map, thus putting their existence
and identity into jeopardy. With slogans such as
‘Without the revitalisation of Fukushima, there
is no revitalisation of Japan’64 and ‘Don’t give up
Fukushima!’, the authorities are setting priority
on the ‘normalisation’ of the Fukushima disaster
situation and urging the evacuees to return and
reconstruct their lives. The majority of evacuees,
however, are still fearful about the risks of radia-
tion. One evacuee from Naraha town expressed
his frustration:
The government forced us to evacuate in the
first place. Now it’s trying to force us to return
without much information. When it comes
to the issue of return, I feel as if we will do it
at our own risk. We don’t know whether the
63 Minamisoma, Iitate, Tamura, Kawauchi and Naraha
have accepted the government’s proposal. Tomioka,
Okuma, Futaba, Namie, Katsurao and Kawamata have
not yet made a decision.
64 Prime Minister’s speech at a press conference on 2 Sep-
tember 2011 available in Japanese at: http://www.kantei.
go.jp/jp/noda/statement/2011/0902kaiken.html.
government will compensate the medical fees
when we get sick [from radiation effects] after
returning.
The authorities’ emphasis on return is thus
making the evacuee communities mistrustful of
the public authorities and becoming a source of
grievances. Meanwhile, the municipalities are
confronted with the extremely difficult task of
making the right choice for a future that both en-
sures the evacuees’ best interests and maintains
their community’s cohesiveness and identity.
The nuclear evacuees’ unwillingness to
return
During the field research, the majority of evacuees
said either that they wished to return but knew this
would not be possible, or simply that they did not
wish to return. This clearly shows the reality that
nuclear evacuees are facing on the ground. Most
express a wish to return, which in fact means that
they will not probably return considering the situa-
tion, but they do not want to state this outright. In
the field interviews, the DEVAST research team
often felt that the evacuees were hesitant to give a
clear response to the question of return, as return
is closely linked to their community’s cohesive-
ness and survival; any expression of unwillingness
to return could be seen as lacking solidarity and
betraying their community. The issue of return,
therefore, has become an almost taboo subject and
a fault line dividing the evacuee communities.
Professor Akira Imai from Fukushima University
conducted a panel survey among the nuclear evac-
uees in which same questions were asked to same
interviewees over time. He then analysed how
their opinions had evolved. The first survey was
conducted three months after the accident in June
2011, the second six months after in September
2011 and the third twelve months after in February
2012 (Imai, 2011a; 2011c; 2012a). The survey find-
ings show that the willingness to return decreases
with the passage of time and an increasingly real-
istic picture of the hometown situation (Figure 7).
The evacuees who expressed their wish to return
in June 2011 represented 61.7%, whereas in the lat-
est survey conducted in February 2012 this figure
had dropped to only 36.1%. In addition, a clear di-
vision of opinion was observed between the gen-
erations under the age of fifty and the over-sixties
(Figure 8). According to a resident survey con-
ducted by Naraha town in February 2012, the pro-
portion of evacuees aged between twenty and fifty
who expressed a willingness to return was around
34%, while more than half of those aged over sixty
declared their wish to return (Takaki, 2012). In the
same survey, over half of the respondents (56%)
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Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
stated that a decrease in the radiation level was a
condition of their return, with their second biggest
concern being the rehabilitation of basic social in-
frastructure (29.7%). During our own interviews,
evacuees also raised the issues of employment
prospects and the decontamination of their houses
as conditions of their return. But the phrase that
we heard repeatedly in all the municipalities is:
‘people under sixty years old will probably not re-
turn as they are afraid of the radiation effects on
their children’. If this turns out to be the case, the
return of the evacuees aged over sixty will also
pose enormous challenges. Several of those inter-
viewed raised the following question: ‘if there are
no shops open in town, no doctors and nurses in
the clinics and no helpers in elderly homes, how
can we return and rebuild our lives?’. The prospect
of return therefore remains uncertain and contin-
ues to cause a great deal of psychological stress for
the evacuees.
The government’s contradictory policies for
return
During the interviews, the municipal workers
and evacuees from the towns hosting the nuclear
power plants often expressed frustration at the
contradictory policies proposed by the govern-
ment with regard to return. In March 2012, when
the government proposed a reorganisation of the
evacuation zones, it also put forward a plan to
set up an interim storage facility for the contami-
nated soil collected during the decontamination
operations around the two nuclear power plants
in Fukushima Prefecture. To this end, it officially
requested the four hosting communities65 to accept
the plan. However, both the municipalities and the
evacuees criticised this plan as being at odds with
the government’s policy for decontamination and
65 Futaba, Okuma, Tomioka and Naraha towns.
the early return of evacuees. They fear that if they
accept the installation of an interim storage faci-
lity, they will not be able to return to the commu-
nity given that highly irradiated soil will be stored
in the vicinity.
The field interviews clearly evidenced a situa-
tion of ‘passing the buck’ between the central and
municipal governments on the issue of return.
Municipal governments sometimes asked the cen-
tral authority to make a decision on their return
to ensure that the final responsibility for assisting
their returning and for assuring the welfare of the
returning communities would remain with the
central government. On the other hand, the cen-
tral government insists that it is up to each munici-
pality whether or not to accept the plan for the re-
organisation of the evacuation zone. In reality, the
municipalities and evacuees have had little choice
but to accept the plan as no other alternatives are
proposed by the government. As things stand, nei-
ther the government nor the municipality have
forced evacuees to return and thus neither party is
ultimately responsible for the future of returnees.
Decontamination or contamination-
transfer?
Evacuees refer to the decontamination of their
community as a key condition for their return.
Yet, during our field survey, most of them were
profoundly sceptical as to its effectiveness. Imai’s
survey revealed that 80% of the evacuees were
unconvinced by the results of the authorities’
decontamination operations since these are
proving much less efficient than initially expected
(Imai, 2012a). The standard decontamination
operation involves removing topsoil, cutting away
undergrowth and pressure washing roof tiles and
asphalt roads.66 In reality, the Fukushima evacuees
66 Source: Ministry of Environment (http://josen.env.
go.jp/material/download/pdf/josen ).
0,0% 20,0% 40,0% 80,0% 100,0% 120,0%
3 months after
6 months after
12 months after
Wish to return Wish to return if possible
Do not wish to return so much Do not wish to return
Undecided Others
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
20s
30s
40s
50s
60s
Over 70s
Total
Wish to Return Do not wish to return Do not know
Figure 7. Changes in willingness to return Figure 8. Willingness to return according to age
Source: Akira Imai, The Third Resident Survery, 2012. Source: Naraha town’s resident survey in February 2012.
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 3 5IDDRI
and residents have discovered, using their own
Geiger counters, that if it rained or snowed after
the operation, the radiation level went up again.67
The survey conducted in Fukushima City by the
international NGO, Friends of the Earth, showed
that, after a decontamination operation, the radia-
tion level had decreased by only 6.7% on average
at 1 m above the ground (Yamauchi, 2011). Another
problem is that the removed contaminated topsoil
is put into plastic bags and stockpiled next to the
site or inside the city limits, given that so far no
specialised storage facility has been designated to
stock the contaminated soil satisfactorily. As long
as the removed soil is left on site, radiation levels
in the area are not likely to decrease to any great
extent. Furthermore, when roads and roofs are
cleaned with water, the contaminated water ends
up in the sewers or is absorbed into the surroun-
ding fields and remains radioactive. This means
that the decontamination operation is merely
transferring radioactive materials from one place
to another. Once materials become contaminated,
their radioactivity cannot be eliminated simply
by ‘cleansing’. One evacuee from Futaba town
expressed his frustration as follows:
There are many farmers in our town. When
we return, if we cannot eat what we grow on our
farms and we cannot drink the water because it
comes from the contaminated river, how are we
going to live?
Another evacuee also from Futaba town added:
There are many radiation hot spots in individ-
ual houses as well. The authorities say ‘it’s safe
to live in your area because the radiation level is
OK but please don’t get close to the four corners
of your house [where the rain water drops from
the gutter]’. When I actually went to my house
and measured the radiation level, I was shocked
to detect a very high radiation level around the
gutters and the corners of window frames. It is
impossible to live in a house that has hot spots in
different places.
In addition, radioactivity is often concentrated
in the vegetation and soil of nearby hills, moun-
tains and river banks. Many evacuees remarked
that decontaminating the mountains was an al-
most impossible task. As the affected communi-
ties are often in a rural setting surrounded by hills
and mountains, the evacuees are highly sceptical
about the effectiveness of the decontamination op-
erations and the prospects of their eventual return.
In this context, some evacuees have started to
67 Information obtained from the evacuees and the resi-
dents of Fukushima City during our interviews.
question whether it is useful for the government to
pursue its decontamination policy, which receives
a large slice of the reconstruction budget.
4.5. Post-disaster challenges
This sub-section presents the major challenges
facing the evacuees, the residents of Fukushima
Prefecture, the affected municipalities, the govern-
ment and the Japanese population at large one
year after the Fukushima accident.
Discrimination towards the ‘contaminated’
Some evacuees that we interviewed complained
that they had suffered from discrimination both
during their displacement and in their place of
refuge. In the early stages of the crisis, the evacuees
from Fukushima Prefecture were considered as
‘contaminated’ by the rest of the population. They
often met with different forms of discrimination
and, in some cases, were openly avoided by the
public. As Japanese vehicle number plates indicate
the place of registration, evacuees who fled by
car were easily identifiable. A couple of evacuees
mentioned that the cars with a Fukushima number
plate were banned from using certain roads
or entering certain localities. An evacuee from
Okuma town recounted one of her experiences:
When I evacuated to Niigata Prefecture
[200 km west of the Fukushima Daiichi plant], I
was really discriminated against… For example,
when I went to a public bath to take a shower,
there was a hand-written notice saying ‘Entry
prohibited to persons from Fukushima’. I was
really shocked. Actually, I experienced the same
thing even in Aizu region [the western part of
Fukushima Prefecture; 100 km from the nuclear
station]. Although Aizu is part of Fukushima
Prefecture, I saw a notice saying that the place
is reserved for non-Fukushima people. Moreover,
every time I parked my car in a supermarket car
park, when I came back to my car, there were no
cars parked around mine. In fact, because of my
number plate, everybody could see that I came
from the area included in the evacuation zone.
So no one wanted to park their car close to mine.
Some evacuees also mentioned that their chil-
dren were often bullied at school in the towns
where they had taken refuge: they are seen as ‘con-
taminated’ or called ‘Mr/Miss Fukushima’ by other
pupils. As the crippled nuclear power station and
the Prefecture share the same name, ‘Fukushima’,
the accident has been amalgamated with the Pre-
fecture and the entire Fukushima region is now
viewed as ‘contaminated’ or ‘condemned’. The ad-
ditional traumatism of discrimination is one of the
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Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
key aspects that differentiates the nuclear evacua-
tion from the displacement caused by the tsunami.
The widespread image of Fukushima as ‘contami-
nated’ and the self-image of nuclear evacuees as
irradiated and discriminated against will have a
lasting effect in the minds of the evacuees and the
rest of the population.
Nuclear-dependent communities
When explaining the pre-accident context, the
municipal workers and evacuees from the towns
that host the nuclear power plants often referred
to the ‘special relationship’ they had enjoyed with
the plant operator, TEPCO. They describe it as a
relationship of ‘co-existence and mutual pros-
perity’. The municipal officers from both Futaba
and Naraha towns confessed that it was difficult
to criticise TEPCO even after the accident, as
they were only too aware of TEPCO’s substan-
tial contribution to the prosperity of their towns.
Hiroshi Kainuma explains, in his book entitled
Theory of Fukushima: How was the ‘Nuclear
Village’ Formed?,68 the process whereby a town
ends up becoming utterly dependent on the exis-
tence of a nuclear power plant for its economic
survival. Whenever a nuclear installation plan is
proposed, various upstream financial incentives
are generally offered by the government and the
nuclear operator so as to convince local residents
to support the plan. The sites targeted for these
nuclear facilities were often remote and sparsely
populated regions, largely impoverished and with
little industrial fabric. Traditionally, the men in
such localities have to move to bigger towns and
cities to find employment, leaving their wives
and children behind. However, when a nuclear
plant arrives and creates jobs for a hefty share
of a town’s population69 and the local govern-
ment receives large amounts of tax and subsi-
dies, the town’s economy flourishes and the
presence of nuclear industry becomes indispen-
sable to the residents’ livelihoods. According to
Kainuma, before the arrival of a nuclear facility,
these towns were among the poorest municipa-
lities in Fukushima Prefecture. Yet, by 1977, six
years after the arrival of the Fukushima Daiichi
nuclear power station, the residents from the two
hosting towns were earning the highest salaries
in the whole prefecture, even surpassing salaries
68 Author’s translation from the Japanese title: Fukushima
ron, genshiryoku mura ha naze umaretanoka?
69 From the interviews with the municipalities of Futaba
and Naraha. In addition to offering direct employment,
TEPCO also generated a great deal of indirect employ-
ment in these towns, such as restaurants for the plant
workers and hotels for the technicians who came peri-
odically to maintain the nuclear reactors.
in Fukushima City, the prefecture’s capital city
(Kainuma, 2011: pp.130-141). One evacuee from
Futaba town recalls:
Thanks to the nuclear power station, our men
did not have to look for a job away from the
town. Everybody’s life improved and we became
the richest in all Fukushima Prefecture. As a re-
sult, no industry developed in the town except
agriculture. When the station was installed dur-
ing the 1970s, I was earning 52,000 yen (€520)
per month at the agricultural cooperative. If
you worked with TEPCO during that period, you
earned 120,000 yen (€1,200), more than double
your salary!
But as the nuclear facility ages, it brings dimin-
ishing financial revenues to the town70 (IIC, 2012:
pp.329-330). Accustomed to a certain level of fis-
cal expenditure, these towns then begin to show
budget deficits as the income from the nuclear fa-
cility declines. For this reason, the municipalities
often ask the government to install more nuclear
facilities in their town in order to offset the short-
fall. The report from the Independent Investiga-
tion Commission71 calls it the ‘nuclear addiction’
of the host communities (IIC, 2012: p.330). During
one interview, a municipal employee of Futaba
town murmured:
TEPCO was good for us. Most of us benefited
from them in one way or another. I want to de-
nounce them on account of the accident, but I
also feel grateful to them for having given us a
prosperous life. It’s complicated. You know, be-
fore the accident, all the high school graduates
in Futaba town found jobs in town thanks to the
nuclear power plant. We had a privileged life.
During the interviews, many evacuees from
these communities voiced concerns about their
job prospects when they eventually return to their
hometowns. Since the government announced the
decommissioning of the four damaged reactors in
Fukushima Daiichi power plant, they are worried
that they will not be able to return to their former
jobs or find any other employment, given that
most of the local jobs were connected with the nu-
clear industry. In addition to problem of radioac-
tive contamination, the uncertainty of job oppor-
tunities further complicates the evacuees’ decision
to return.
70 The revenue from a fixed property tax paid by the
nuclear plant operator to the host community dimin-
ishes every year due to the depreciation of assets.
71 The independent investigation panel on the Fukushima
accident set up by the Rebuild Japan Initiative Founda-
tion.
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Controversy on the health risks of low-dose
radiation exposure72
On 19 April 2011, the Ministry of Education,
Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT)
set an interim reference radiation dose rate of
1–20 mSv/year for schools in the Fukushima
Prefecture, whereas the normal reference dose
rate for public exposure to radiation73 remained
at 1 mSv/year in other parts of Japan (ICPR,
2007).74 Since taking this decision, the authorities
have been using the annual dose rate of 20 mSv
(which is the upper limit of the 1–20mSv interim
dose rate) as the threshold value to mark out the
evacuation zones and declare an area safe for
return (see section 4.4. Prospects of return). To
justify this choice, the Japanese government refers
to the ICRP’s recommendation on the reference
dose rate for ‘existing radiation exposure condi-
tions’ including occupational exposure situations
and residual exposure situations after a nuclear
accident, which should be limited to between 1
and 20 mSv/year.75 The field interviews with the
Fukushima evacuees, residents and local NGOs
suggest that there are three main controversies on
this governmental decision.
First, the 20 mSv limit is not only applied to
adults but also to children, who are generally con-
sidered to be more sensitive to radiation effects
than adults.76 According to the ICRP recommen-
dation, 1–20 mSv/year is also the reference dose
for occupational radiation exposure applied to
workers at nuclear facilities or radiological depart-
ments in hospitals (ICRP, 2007). This means that
nuclear power plant workers and children in Fuku-
shima are placed under the same dose limit. Fur-
thermore, MEXT established the threshold dose
limit per hour for children to play in the school-
yard at 3.8 μSv/hour.77 However, this dose limit
was calculated from 20 mSv/year on the assump-
tion that children spend only eight hours outside
per day. If the average hourly rate is calculated
72 Low-dose radiation exposure means an exposure situa-
tion under the dose of 100 mSv.
73 Here ‘radiation’ means artificial radiation excluding nat-
ural background radiation.
74 Source: MEXT (http://www.mext.go.jp/b_menu/hou-
dou/23/04/1305174.htm).
75 http://www.irsn.fr/EN/Research/publications-docu-
mentation/Scientific-books/Documents/CIPR_103 .
76 Koide refers to the book, Radiation and Human Health,
published in 1981 and written by the late John W. Gof-
man, who was Professor Emeritus of Molecular and Cell
Biology at University of California, Berkley. Citing this
book, Koide mentions that ‘an infant under one year old
has four times more sensitivity to radiation exposure
than an adult aged 20–30 ‘ (author’s translation).
77 Source: MEXT (http://www.mext.go.jp/a_menu/sai-
gaijohou/syousai/1305173.htm).
normally from the 20 mSv annual dose78, this gives
2.28 μSv/hour. Thus, the hourly dose limit fixed by
the government for Fukushima school children is
1.5 μSv higher than the average hourly rate of the
20 mSv/year threshold fixed by the same author-
ity. Compared to school children in other parts of
Japan, where the reference dose remains 1 mSv/
year, the children in Fukushima are exposed to
the radiation level which is as much as 30 times
higher.79 On 1 May 2011, Tokyo University Professor
Toshiso Kosako, a specialist on radiation safety, re-
signed his position as special advisor to the Cabinet
in protest against this ‘3.8 μSv/hour’ and ’20 mSv/
year’ limit for children in Fukushima. He explained
in his resignation statement80 that ‘it is completely
wrong to use this standard for schools’ and this
limit must ‘be used in cases of exceptional or ur-
gent circumstances (for two to three days or one to
two weeks maximum)’, emphasising that ‘it is very
rare even among the occupationally exposed per-
sons to be exposed to radiation of 20 mSv per year’.
He concluded by saying that he could not possibly
accept that this dose level be applied to babies,
infants and primary school pupils, not only from
his viewpoint as an academic but also on account
of his humanistic beliefs. Despite many criticisms
from both inside and outside Japan against this
policy, the Japanese government has not yet re-
viewed its decision, and a radiation exposure dose
of 20 mSv/year is still tolerated for the Fukushima
population including children, with no fixed time-
frame (as at September 2012).
The second controversial issue involves the au-
thorities’ dissemination of information on the
health effects of radiation exposure. Since the
decision on a new reference radiation dose, the
authorities have started information campaigns
designed to reassure the public rather than to alert
them and raise their awareness of the radiation
risk. MEXT has issued a number of information
booklets on radiation intended for the general pub-
lic and schools, in which it repeatedly emphasises
that ‘a causal relationship between radiation expo-
sure and developing cancer is not clearly proven
under the accumulative exposure dose of 100 mSv’
(see Box 3) and that ‘under the exposure dose of
100 mSv, the probability of developing a cancer
is higher from other causes such as smoking or
78 20,000 μSv (20 mSv) / 24 hours / 365 days = 2.28 μSv/
hour.
79 The regular dose limit is around 0.11μSv/hour calculat-
ing on the basis of 1m Sv/year.
80 Cf. Professor Kosako’s statement of resignation at a press
conference held in Tokyo on 29 April 2011 (http://www.
japanfocus.org/events/view/83). (in-text quotations
translated by Izumi Tanaka and the author).
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Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
insufficient consumption of vegetables’81 (MEXT,
2011a: pp.10-12). In addition, a booklet issued on
24 June 2011 clearly states that ‘there is almost no
possibility of developing thyroid cancer due to the
recent Fukushima accident’. It concludes by saying
that ‘the psychological stress caused by the anxiety
of “being irradiated” has more harmful effects to
health than radiation exposure itself and that this
stress causes many health troubles’.82 These book-
lets do refer to the hypothesis underpinning the
ICRP recommendation for radiation protection:
the probability of developing a cancer is propor-
tional to the dosage exposed, even under 100 mSv
(ICRP, 2007). However, this message is only very
briefly mentioned, usually in one sentence, and
the focus is more on reassuring the public that
there is little cancer risk for exposure to radiation
doses of under 100 mSv.
81 Author’s translation.
82 Author’s translations.
One week after the disaster, the Fukushima
Prefecture invited Professor Shunichi Yamashita
from Nagasaki University, appointing him as Ra-
diation Risk Management Advisor for Fukushima
Prefecture. He has given talks on radiation risk
in all major cities in Fukushima, reiterating that
there is absolutely no health risk from radiation
exposure under 100 mSv per year and that chil-
dren can play outside without any problem.83
However, several months later he corrected this
information stating that ‘it was rather 10 mSv/
year, not 100 mSv/year, under which there is no
health effect’.84 A similar message was dissemi-
nated by other prefectural authorities such as the
Tokyo Metropolitan Government and public re-
search institutions such as the National Institute
of Radiological Sciences.85
Thirdly, this reference dose concerns only ex-
ternal exposure to radiation and does not include
the effects of internal exposure (Box 3). In its 2007
recommendation, ICRP urges that, in the case of
emergency exposure situations, an individual’s
total exposure dose from different sources be
taken into account when developing radiation
protection measures (ICRP, 2007). People living
in Fukushima most likely consume local produce
that could be contaminated by radioactive sub-
stances. The government policy, which focuses
only on the air radiation dose and external expo-
sure, thus tends to overlook other exposure risks
and fails to fully address the radiation protection
needs of the concerned population.
According to the field interviews, this situation
occasioned a great deal of confusion and distress
among the residents and evacuees of Fukushima
Prefecture, as they no longer knew whom or what
to trust concerning the risk related to radiation
exposure. Furthermore, such circumstance cre-
ated divisions and tensions among the affected
population depending on the individual opinion
and perception of the radiation risk, as explored
below.
83 Author’s translations. Lecture on Radiation Risk organ-
ised by Fukushima City Council on 21 March 2011, available
in Japanese at: http://wwwcms.pref.fukushima.jp/pcp_
portal/PortalServlet?DISPL AY_ID=DIRECT&NEXT_
DISPLAY_ID=U000004&CONTENTS_ID=23695
84 Ibid.
85 The official statement concerning the ‘safe-
under-100 mSv’ level is quoted in many Twitter messages
and on Internet blog sites (For example, http://blog.
livedoor.jp/wisteriabook/archives/3289454.html), but
today it is untraceable on the websites of those institu-
tions consulted at the time of the writing (September
2012). The author assumes that the pages were simply
erased or made inaccessible by the institutions after they
received criticisms from members of the public.
Box 3. ICRP guidelines (ICRP 2007)
The health effects from radiation: ‘deterministic effects’ and
‘stochastic effects’
Deterministic effects occur once a threshold dose of exposure is exceeded,
generally following high radiation exposure events. These effects include
skin redness, cataracts, infertility and, in the worst cases, death. Stochastic
effects such as cancer or heritable effects are caused by relatively low radia-
tion doses. For exposure to a radiation dose of more than 100 mSv, there is a
clear causal relationship established between the exposure dose and cancer
rate. But for exposure under 100 mSv, this causal relationship has not yet
been scientifically proven conclusively. Notwithstanding, the ICRP recom-
mendation is based on a hypothesis that there is also a proportional relation-
ship between exposure doses and cancer rates even under 100 mSv exposure.
The reference level* for three different exposure situations
(ICRP, 2007: p.102; Holm, 2007):
Between
20–100 mSv
Emergency
exposure
situations
Radiological emergency situations which
require urgent action in order to avoid
undesirable consequences.
Between
1–20 mSv
Existing exposure
situations
Occupational exposures in planned situations;
natural background radiation (radon in
dwellings); post-accident recovery situations
Under 1 mSv
Planned exposure
situations
Public exposures in planned situations
* An acute dose or an annual accumulative dose.
Two types of radiation exposure: ‘internal exposure’ and ‘external exposure’
External exposure is irradiation from external radioactive sources such as
airborne radioactive materials. Internal exposure is irradiation from radioac-
tive sources inside the body such as ingested contaminated food and water.
After the intake of radioactive materials into the body, the person is con-
tinuously exposed to radiation until the radioactive source has completely
decayed, a process that can take many years. The above reference dose does
not include such internal exposure.
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The plight of Fukushima residents –
the phenomenon of ‘self-evacuees’
In order to fully understand the grave social
consequences of the Fukushima nuclear disaster,
we must look at the situation in the Naka-dori
region of Fukushima. Fukushima Prefecture
comprises three regions (Maps 2 and 6): Hama-
dori on the coast, most of whose territory was
designated as evacuation zones, Naka-dori in
the middle, the political and economic centre
of the Prefecture, and Aizu located inland to the
west. In the Hama-dori region, many residents
were forced to evacuate on the government’s
orders, whereas the residents in the Naka-dori
region were reassured by the authorities that it
were safe to stay despite the elevated radiation
dose, which in some places was as high as that
of the official evacuation zones. For example, the
Onami and Watari districts of Fukushima City
have spots where radiation doses of 3.87 μSv/
hour and 10.36 μSv/hour were detected by the
residents and an NGO (Yamauchi, 2011).86 On 16
June 2011, the government began to designate
the areas identified as having a radiation dose
of more than 20 mSv/year (or 3.0 μSv/hour)87
as Specific Spots Recommended for Evacuation
(Specific Spots), and decided to provide finan-
cial assistance for the evacuation of the resi-
dents involved. However, these districts were not
finally designated as Specific Spots as the autho-
rities’ own readings showed a radiation dose
under the threshold level. Moreover, in May 2011,
MEXT disclosed information on the level of soil
contamination in Fukushima Prefecture, which
indicated that the amount of cesium-137 detected
in the soil of Fukushima City and other cities in
the Naka-dori region was more than 550 kBq/
m2 (kilobecquerels per square metre) (Kawata,
2011). This level equals the threshold contami-
nation level for the Strict Radiation Control Area
where residents were temporarily resettled after
the Chernobyl accident, fixed by the radioprotec-
tion regime of the former Soviet authorities at
the time.88
86 The newspaper, Mainichi Shimbun, ‘Higashinihon
daishinsai: fukushima daiichi genpatsujiko onami dis-
trict, menteki josen ha isshin ittai jisshi ichinen senryou
saijousou no basyo mo’ (author’s translation: One year
from whole-area decontamination operation – radiation
dose increased in some places), 17 October 2012.
87 The threshold hourly radiation dose required for an area
to be designated as a Specific Spot changes depending
on the municipality, as does the method of calculating
the hourly dose from the 20 mSv/year threshold value.
The 3.0 μSv/hour is the threshold dose adapted by Date
City, Fukushima (http://www.City.date.fukushima.jp/
profile/k-kaiken/pdf/h23/20111125-shiryo01 ).
88 Kawata,
2011.
In this context, the residents in the Nada-dori
region, fearing the radiation effects, started to
evacuate from their homes to other parts of Ja-
pan without any government assistance.89 Many of
these self-evacuees were mothers with small chil-
dren90 who had either financial means or family
connections outside Fukushima. Moreover, those
with Internet knowledge and thus able to obtain
information other than the official announcement
made by the government and Fukushima Prefec-
ture were among the first to flee. Meanwhile, oth-
ers, due to financial or family reasons were obliged
to remain in Fukushima, living with high levels
of anxiety about the radiation risk. To cope with
these fears, many of them are trying to convince
themselves that they can trust the authorities’ as-
surance that it is safe for them and their children
to live in Fukushima as long as the radiation dose
does not exceed 20 mSv/year.91 As a result, these
‘stayers’ started to criticise self-evacuees as well
as other residents who remain sceptical of the of-
ficial reassurances, labelling them as cowardly and
selfish. As one self-evacuee from Koriyama City
explained:
The words, ‘radiation’ and ‘evacuation’, have
become a taboo in Naka-dori region. Voluntary
evacuation is considered as an escape from the
hardship that the community is trying to over-
come collectively and thus labelled as an act of
betrayal… Mothers who oblige their children to
wear masks all the time or to refuse the lunch
served at school cafeteria [as schools in Fuku-
shima purchase local produce to cook lunch] in
order to protect their children from internal ex-
posure, are often considered by other mothers as
paranoid and annoying. In this situation, many
mothers have become depressive and developed
other psychological conditions, as their level of
anxiety and the pressures from society are be-
coming too high.
This is a tragic situation for both self-evacuees
and the residents who stay on. Self-evacuees often
89 In December 2011, the government decided to provide
compensation for self-evacuees from the selected 23
cities located mainly in the Naka-dori region of Fuku-
shima. However, the scheme targeted only those who
self-evacuated between 11 March and 31 December 2011,
and was a one-off payment of 80,000 yen (€800) for an
adult and 400,000 yen (€4,000) for a child or a preg-
nant woman.
90 In culturally traditional regions such as Fukushima Pre-
fecture, it is mainly the mothers who take care of the
children and generally stay at home as housewives. It is
thus easier for them to flee with the children while their
husbands stay on and continue to work in Fukushima in
order to financially support such evacuation.
91 From the interviews with the residents and self-evacu-
ees from the Naka-dori region of Fukushima.
STUDY 05/20134 0 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
Map 6. Radiation contour map of the affected region
Source: map created by Professor Yukio Hayakawa*, 11 September 2011.
Professor Yukio Hayakawa is a geologist at Gunma University (http://kipuka.blog70.fc2.com).
Fukushima
Tokyo
(Shinjuku)
Sendai
Koriyama
Iwate
8 μSv/h and more
* Sv/h (microsievert per hour)
Hama – Dori
Naka-Dori
Aizu
4 Sv/h and more
2 Sv/h and more
1 Sv/h and more
0.5 Sv/h and more
0.25 Sv/h and more
0.125 Sv/h and more
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 4 1IDDRI
feel isolated and abandoned in their place of ref-
uge, as their relationship with their hometown has
been cut off; they have lost friends and sometimes
their husbands if these opposed voluntary evacu-
ation and decided to stay in Fukushima. The re-
search team also learnt that self-evacuees often
evacuated during the night without telling any-
body in order to avoid uncomfortable encounters
with neighbours and friends. Once they evacuate,
it is difficult for them to return as they are stigma-
tised by the community. For those who stay, the
situation is no easier. In particular, mothers who
are worried about the radiation effects on their
children but do not have a choice of voluntary
evacuation are experiencing significant psycho-
logical distress. The resident survey conducted
in May 2012 by Fukushima City found that 34%
of the residents still wished to evacuate from the
City, with 89% of these respondents saying that
they were worried about the future health of their
children.92 Over a long run, this situation will have
devastating consequences for the welfare of the
population in the Naka-dori region. Yet, neither
Fukushima Prefecture nor the government has
set up any concrete programme to assist the self-
evacuees and the ‘stayers’, thus leaving a deeply
divided and broken community.
Divided communities and families
The nuclear accident is creating many rifts and
tensions in Fukushima’s affected communi-
ties. One of the main causes of these divisions
stems from the government’s decision to raise
the radiation dose reference level for Fukushima
from 1 mSv/year to 1–20 mSv/year, as well as
its emphasis that radiation exposures of up to
20 mSv/year, and in some cases up to an accumu-
lative dose of 100 mSv, have little effect on health.
This policy of reassurance, rather than precaution,
has created an atmosphere where those who chal-
lenge the official notion of safety are viewed as
anti-establishment, disturbing the harmony of the
community, and egoistic, jeopardising the commu-
nity’s joint effort to overcome hardship.
The main divisive issue for the evacuees is that
of return. Those who openly express unwillingness
to return are often regarded as selfish and disloyal
to the community to which they belong. This has
thus become a taboo subject among the evacu-
ees, as revealing one’s preference implies that the
person concerned is likely to be pigeonholed into
one of two boxes: ‘willing to return’ (loyal) or ‘not
92 The newspaper, Asahi Shimbun, ‘Ima demo hinan shitai,
fukushima shimin no 34%: shi tyousa’ (Author’s transla-
tion: 34% of residents in Fukushima City currently wish
to evacuate, the City’s survey found), 17 September 2012.
willing to return’ (disloyal). Fukushima university
professor Akira Imai, author of the three afore-
mentioned evacuee surveys, asserts that forcing
the evacuees to choose between ‘return’ and ‘no re-
turn’ should be avoided (as a policy) because this
transforms a situation of ‘not being able to return’
into one of ‘not wanting to return’ thus leaving
those who are anxious about the radiation risk and
reluctant to return to condemnation exposed to
judgement from the rest of the community (Imai,
2012b). Thus, whereas previously individuals had
had no choice but to evacuate and this common
plight had given them a sense of unity, the choice
of return is now dividing communities, stigmatis-
ing those reluctant to return and causing further
trauma to the evacuee communities.
Moreover, tension has also arisen between evac-
uee communities and host communities within
Fukushima Prefecture. Iwaki City, situated 30–40
km south of the crippled nuclear station, for ex-
ample, hosts the highest number of evacuees
(23,00093) from the evacuation zone due to its
geographical proximity. The interviews with the
evacuees and Iwaki residents revealed friction be-
tween the evacuee community and the city’s resi-
dents. This is mainly caused by the government’s
different treatment for the affected population.
During the first six months following the accident,
the northern part of Iwaki City was included in
the recommended evacuation zone and thus many
residents, including those who were living outside
of the designated zone, evacuated with or without
government assistance. In addition, the city’s agri-
culture and tourism industries have been hard hit
by radioactive contamination from the accident.
Life has become difficult for the residents but,
despite this hardship, they do not receive much
financial compensation or assistance from the gov-
ernment because the city has not been included
in any evacuation zone since October 2011 and
they perceive this situation as unfair. On the other
hand, the evacuees from the evacuation zone who
took refuge in the city receive various types of
compensation from the government. As an Iwaki
resident explains:
These evacuees who receive a lot of money
from the government act like the ‘new rich’ buy-
ing all the goods in a shop and always eating at
restaurants. They don’t work and spend all day
in a gambling house wasting the compensation
money. Plus, there are many car accidents in the
city because they are villagers and do not know
how to drive in a city.
93 Source: Iwaki City council. (http://www.city.iwaki.
fukushima.jp/info/dbps_data/_material_/info/zhi-
gai20120912 )
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Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
This situation is further isolating the evacuee
community from the host community and adding
more stress to their displacement.
Furthermore, residents from the Naka-dori re-
gion in the Fukushima Prefecture are divided on
the issue of evacuation. The interviews with self-
evacuees and the Naka-dori residents found that
those who self-evacuated are seen as ‘the privi-
leged’ or ‘the escapees’ within the community
and they thus often feel isolated and abandoned.
On the contrary, those who stay, mostly for eco-
nomic reasons,94 are frequently envious of those
who evacuate and often feel deprived and mar-
ginalised. Moreover, this division or tension does
not stop at the community level: it also penetrates
family relationships. Differing perceptions of ra-
diation risk are causing tensions within families
or couples both among self-evacuees and stayers.
The recent survey conducted by the Fukushima
City found that 62% of self-evacuees are living
apart from other family members and 71% of them
answered that they had no prospect of going back
to live together.95 The field interviews also found
that the majority of self-evacuees are mothers with
children, whose husbands have stayed behind in
Fukushima. The main reason for this separation is
the husband’s employment. In order to meet the
costs of voluntary evacuation, husbands often
stay behind in Fukushima to continue working.
A few self-evacuees also pointed to a difference
of opinion between husband and wife as a reason
for separation. In their view, in the traditional
communities of Fukushima, the husband and his
parents tend to give credence to the authorities’
reassurances on the radiation risk, whereas the
wife tends to worry about the radiation effect on
their children. These wives are sometimes treat-
ed as cowardly and naive by their husbands and
parents-in-law. Frustrated by their husbands’ in-
action, some mothers decide to evacuate on their
own, taking the children to their maternal grand-
parents’ house if this is located outside Fukushima
Prefecture. Equally, among the stayer families, the
wife becomes disillusioned with her husband due
to different opinions on radiation risk and fissures
appear in their relationship. Communities and
families in Fukushima are thus suffering from rifts
and weakening community ties that will take long
time to heal.
94 The survey conducted among the self-evacuees and resi-
dents in the Fukushima Prefecture by two NGOs, Friends
of Earth Japan and Fukuro-no-kai, in September-Octo-
ber 2011 revealed that residents stayed in Fukushima
mainly for economic or job-related reasons.
95 Asahi Shimbun, 17 September 2012, op.cit.
5. COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
OF THE TSUNAMI EVACUATION
AND THE NUCLEAR EVACUATION
From the field interviews, we found that the
pattern and consequences of the two evacuations,
one caused by the tsunami and the other by the
nuclear accident, were markedly different. In
particular, the evacuation process, the authori-
ties’ disaster response, the prospect of return and
the challenges facing the evacuees one year after
the disaster are significantly dissimilar, though
both displacements were induced by the same
combined disaster. This section attempts to iden-
tify the specific features of the two evacuations
through a comparative analysis. Table 5 illustrates
the main elements of these differences.
Firstly, as regards the reasons for evacuating,
evacuation from a natural disaster is ultimately
‘voluntary’ while nuclear evacuation can be com-
pulsory or ‘voluntary’ depending on one’s loca-
tion – in other words, depending on whether an
individual evacuates from within or from outside
the official evacuation zone. Certainly, evacu-
ation from a tsunami is not strictly voluntary in-
sofar as a person flees because his or her life is at
risk. By the same token, the self-evacuees from
Fukushima decided to evacuate because they felt
their lives and those of their children were under
threat. Nevertheless, the distinction between vol-
untary and compulsory evacuation impacts the na-
ture of post-disaster financial assistance that the
displaced receive from the state: financial aid on
compassionate grounds for the tsunami evacuees,
financial compensation for the nuclear evacuees
from the evacuation zones and little assistance for
the self-evacuees.
One of the specific characteristics of the nuclear
evacuation is that the displaced have tended to
flee further and are now dispersed throughout the
country, while tsunami evacuees are most often
displaced within the town or the same prefecture.
The main reason for this is that as nuclear evacu-
ation is induced by the risk of radiation, distance
is an important way for evacuees to protect them-
selves and feel safe. For example, half of the inter-
viewed population of Futaba town is currently dis-
placed outside Fukushima Prefecture.96 Another
distinct characteristic of the nuclear evacuation
is that evacuees were displaced many times com-
pared to the tsunami evacuation. Our field inter-
views show that nuclear evacuees changed their
place of refuge four or five times on average before
settling into temporary shelters. In contrast, tsu-
96 Source: Futaba town (http://www.town.futaba.fukush-
ima.jp/hinan.html/). (in Japanese)
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 4 3IDDRI
nami evacuees changed their place of refuge two
or three times on average. Many of the tsunami
evacuees first evacuated to hilltops to avoid the
tsunami, then moved quickly to emergency evacu-
ation centres such as schools and finally settled in
temporary shelters three to six months later. The
NAIIC report (NAIIC, 2012) also confirmed the re-
sult of our study and found that 70% of the nuclear
evacuees were displaced at least four times. One
of the main causes of this phenomenon is that the
evacuation zone was expanded over time by the
authorities, thus obliging the already displaced
population to flee further away each time. Over a
three-month period starting on 11 March 2011, the
authorities (Fukushima Prefecture and the gov-
ernment) issued a total of eight evacuation orders
and recommendations. Another reason for this
repeated displacement is that, at the time the nu-
clear evacuees fled, they were not informed of the
severity of the accident or the radiation risk level.
As a result, they initially sheltered in locations
close to their hometown and later evacuated fur-
ther afield once they learnt more about the status
of the accident and the radiation leak. This repeat-
ed flight inflicted both psychological and physical
distress on the nuclear evacuees.
As for psychological stress, both categories
of evacuees are currently deeply anxious about
their uncertain future, but the trauma of the nu-
clear evacuees appears to be persisting over the
longer term. The tsunami evacuees experienced
acute psychological stress immediately after the
disaster, having suffered the sudden loss of fam-
ily members, friends, and homes. However, the
trauma caused by this loss could subside with
time. Nuclear evacuees, on the other hand, are
suffering from a psychological stress that seems to
be increasing with time. The authorities provide
them with scant information about their future
and whether they will eventually be able to return
to their towns or homes, which means that they
are unable to take the next step in rebuilding their
lives. They feel blocked in permanent uncertainty
and this psychological imprisonment is taking a
toll on their health and well-being over time.
There is also a difference between the two evac-
uations with respect to the target of the evacu-
ees’ complaints. In the case of natural disasters,
it is hard to lay the blame for psychological pain
on a specific party. To vent their frustration, the
tsunami survivors thus tend to criticise their lo-
cal municipal office for its shortcomings as it was
the main actor in the disaster management. On
the contrary, the Fukushima nuclear disaster was
caused by human error as well as by a natural dis-
aster and the nuclear victims have well-defined
interlocutors for their complaints – TEPCO, the
operator of the nuclear power plant, and the gov-
ernment. The handling of the Fukushima accident
by TEPCO and the authorities is severely criticised
not only by the evacuees but also by the public at
large. In Imai’s survey (Imai, 2011a), 86% of the
evacuees said that they were not satisfied with the
government’s disaster response and 83% were dis-
satisfied with TEPCO.
The current challenges facing evacuees are also
quite dissimilar. For the tsunami evacuees, the
prime concerns are resettlement and the rebuild-
ing of their houses and lives. Nuclear evacuees,
however, are still a long way from the reconstruc-
tion phase as they are not even sure where they
will live in the near future. Their concerns are fo-
cused on the issue of return, decontamination and
compensation from the government. They are un-
able to make plans for the future and suffer from
the loss of their previous life and identity.
Finally, the issue of resettlement/return reveals
another marked difference between the tsunami
evacuation and the nuclear evacuation. First of
all, the resettlement of the tsunami evacuees is or-
ganised on a purely voluntary basis and individual
choice is fully respected by both the authorities
and the community. Resettling in a safe place is
Table 5. Comparative analysis of the two evacuations
Tsunami
(Natural Disaster)
Nuclear Accident
(Industrial/Man-Made
Disaster)
Nature of
Evacuation
‘Voluntary’ Imposed/’Voluntary’
Place of Refuge Within the City or within
the Prefecture
Outside of the City and
often the Prefecture,
scattered all over Japan
Frequency of
Displacement
2–3 times 4–5 times or more
Psychological
Stress
Acute stress
immediately after and
progressively less with
time
Stress of not knowing its
own future lingers over
a long term, increment
with time
Main Target of
Complaints
Municipal government Central government,
TEPCO
Challenges Resettlement of the
population, population
loss, building back
better
Issue of return,
decontamination,
community survival, loss
of identity
Reconstruction Concentrate on
infrastructure
Not yet reached this
stage
Resettlement/
Return
Safety of the population
is main concern,
individual choices
Highly politicised,
collective choices
Transparency of
Information
High Low
Decision-Making
on Return
Democratic Top-Down
STUDY 05/20134 4 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
the primary concern for the evacuees and the local
authority. Should they decide to settle elsewhere,
this does not put their loyalty to the community
or their courage in overcoming hardship into ques-
tion. The only obstacles faced for the resettlement
of these evacuees are of a financial and adminis-
trative nature. For the nuclear evacuees, on the
other hand, the question of return involves com-
pletely different stakes. First, the issue is highly
politicised: the authorities including the govern-
ment, the prefectural government and several af-
fected municipalities have been encouraging these
evacuees to return. The municipalities, in par-
ticular, have emphasised that the choice to return
must be made on a collective basis as the town’s
very existence is at stake. Priority is thus placed
on the cohesiveness of the community rather than
on individual choices. One of government officials
interviewed during our research repeated that ‘we
will not abandon Fukushima’. The authorities’ em-
phasis on the region’s recovery and their determi-
nation to ‘normalise’ the Fukushima disaster situ-
ation have had many serious consequences for the
residents and the evacuees.
This official stance on the question of return
has also impacted the transparency of the infor-
mation communicated on the level of radioactive
contamination, the effect of radiation on human
health and the effectiveness of decontamination
operations, all of which are key issues condition-
ing the nuclear evacuees’ decision whether or not
to return. While the majority of these evacuees
are hesitant about going back due to the lack of
information, the decision to return has often been
made by the municipal offices without any thor-
ough discussion or consultation with the evacu-
ees. Thus, when it comes to resettlement/return,
a democratic decision-making process is wanting
in the case of nuclear evacuees in a contrast to the
case of the tsunami evacuees.
6. CONCLUSIONS
The triple disaster that hit Tohoku on 11 March
2011 is the most serious crisis that Japan has had to
face since the end of the Second World War. Some
refer to the disaster as the second largest defeat
that Japan has experienced after its 1945 defeat. In
many ways, the disaster has served as a revelation
as well as a reality check for the democratic, pros-
perous, safe society that the country has aspired to
build over the last sixty-six years.
Our field study confirmed the assumption that
Japan had intensively prepared itself against
tsunami disasters. The disaster drills conducted
prior to the disaster and countermeasures such
as tsunami barriers constructed along the coast
indeed saved many lives. Yet, in some instances,
these preparations in fact created an excessive de-
gree of reassurance among the local population,
who came to believe that they were immune to
the risk of tsunamis and thus underestimated the
threat during the actual disaster. In other cases,
previous tsunami experiences had instilled a fixed
idea about tsunami risk in people’s minds, which
led them to misjudge both the need to evacuate
and the timing. In other words, the risk percep-
tion shaped by disaster preparations and previous
experience did not always lessen the population’s
vulnerability in the wake of extreme disasters such
as the 2011 Japanese tsunami. In addition, one of
the most serious shortcomings revealed by the
catastrophe was the lack of preparedness regard-
ing the evacuation of the elderly and persons with
reduced mobility. Given that Japan is facing the
growing demographic challenge of an aging popu-
lation, future disaster plans need to urgently ad-
dress this issue.
The Fukushima nuclear accident, on the other
hand, has revealed the total unpreparedness of the
Japanese authorities and the local population. The
evacuation of the population by the local authori-
ties amounted to chaotic improvisation and the
population was forced to evacuate with no infor-
mation as to the gravity of the situation or the risk
of radiation. Furthermore, the authorities did not
promptly or fully communicate information on ra-
dioactive contamination and health risks from ra-
diation exposure to the concerned population. The
choice of return tends to be a foregone conclusion
decided on more or less unilaterally by the author-
ities without much consultation with evacuees
and municipalities, and the collective choice for
return is encouraged at the expense of individual
choices and safety concerns. The displaced popu-
lation thus remains at a loss with little prospect for
the future. Moreover, the way in which the disas-
ter has been handled by the authorities has creat-
ed profound divisions and tensions in the affected
communities. The nuclear disaster has triggered
a major social disaster in which communities re-
main divided regarding both the perceived radia-
tion risk and the issue of return. The population
has lost trust in public authorities as well as among
themselves, which is threatening the social cohe-
sion and the sense of solidarity that previously ex-
isted within these communities.
What we have also seen in the case of the nu-
clear accident, in contrast to the tsunami case, is
that the likelihood of an accident was purposely
understated by the government and the plant op-
erator, creating the myth that their nuclear power
plants were almost failsafe. In the quasi absence
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
STUDY 05/2013 4 5IDDRI
of a realistic perception of risk, the municipalities
and population in the vicinity of the nuclear power
plants were extremely vulnerable and insufficient-
ly prepared for a severe accident and evacuation.
The disaster demonstrated, especially concern-
ing the exploitation of SPEEDI data, that Japan’s
advanced technology and financial capabilities
served little purpose when it came to improving
disaster preparedness and response, as there was
a lack of political will to use them effectively.
Japan is one of the world’s largest economies,
best known for its highly advanced technologies.
The experience of the 11 March triple disaster has
shown that even a country with such economic and
technological resources could not fully mitigate
the effects of the disaster or avoid a serious nuclear
accident. It suggests that no country is immune to
the risk of extreme disasters and that the basic as-
sumptions and disaster scenarios used to design
disaster prevention measures should be thoroughly
revisited, particularly in the current context of cli-
mate change. Moreover, the post-disaster manage-
ment of the Japanese authorities, particularly re-
garding the Fukushima nuclear accident, revealed
many shortcomings in terms of transparency of
information and democratic decision-makings vis-
à-vis the affected population. This confirms our hy-
pothesis that democracies do not always respond
better to disasters, especially a nuclear one. The
repercussions of the Japanese disaster thus go well
beyond the national borders and other democra-
cies can learn many relevant lessons.
STUDY 05/20134 6 IDDRI
Disaster Evacuation from Japan’s 2011 Tsunami Disaster and the Fukushima Nuclear Accident
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Imai, A. (2011a), “Genpatsu saigai hinansya no jittai
chousa (ichi-ji)” (author’s translation: The First Survey of
Nuclear Evacuees), The Japan Research Institute for Local
Government Monthly, Vol. 393, July 2011.
Imai, A. (2011b), “Higashinihondaishinsai to
Jichitaiseisaku: Genpatsusaigai eno taio wo chushin ni”
(author’s translation: The Great East Japan Earthquake
and Local Government Policy: Response to the Nuclear
Disaster), Public Policy Studies Association Japan, November
2011.
Imai, A. (2011c), “Genpatsu saigai hinansya no jittai
chousa (ni-ji)” (author’s translation: The Second Survey of
Nuclear Evacuees), The Japan Research Institute for Local
Government Monthly, Vol. 398, December 2011.
Imai, A. (2012a), “Genpatsu saigai hinansya no jittai
chousa (san-ji)” (author’s translation: The Third Survey of
Nuclear Evacuees), The Japan Research Institute for Local
Government Monthly, Vol. 402, April 2012.
Imai, A. (2012b), “Shinsai-taiken kara kangaeru jichiseido
no kadai: jichitaikan renkei kara karino machi made”
(author’s translation: Challenges to the local governance
system from the disaster experience), a presentation given
at the 16th Fukushima Reconstruction Forum on 25 July
2012, available in Japanese at: http://www5a.biglobe.
ne.jp/~tkonno/FK-News18-2
Independent Investigation Commission on the Fukushima
Nuclear Accident (IIC) (2012), Research Investigation
Report, Rebuild Japan Initiative Foundation, Tokyo,
available in Japanese at: http://rebuildjpn.org/
fukushima/report/
International Commission for Radiologic Protection (ICRP)
(2007), The 2007 Recommendations of the International
Commission on Radiological Protection, ICRP Publication
103, (French translation by the Institut de radioprotection
et de sûrté nucléaire (IRSN), Editions TEC&DOC, June
2009).
Investigation Committee on the Accident at the Fukushima
Nuclear Power Stations of Tokyo Electric Power Company
(ICANPS) (2011), Interim Report, 26 December 2011,
available at: http://icanps.go.jp/eng/interim-report.html
Investigation Committee on the Accident at the Fukushima
Nuclear Power Stations of Tokyo Electric Power Company
(ICANPS) (2012), Final Report, 23 July 2012, available at:
http://icanps.go.jp/eng/final-report.html
Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) (2011a), Tohoku
chiho taiheiyouoki jishin ni taisuru tsunami keihou
happyou keika to kadai (author’s translation: The process
and challenges of issuing tsunami warnings for the
earthquake that hit the Tohoku region off the Pacific
coast), 13 June 2011, available in Japanese at: http://
www.bousai.go.jp/jishin/chubou/higashinihon/2/1
Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) (2011b), Saigaiji
jishin tsunami sokuhou (author’s translation: Report on the
earthquake and tsunami alert in disasters “2011 Tohoku off
the Pacific Coast Earthquake), 17 August 2011, available in
Japanese at: http://www.jma.go.jp/jma/kishou/books/
saigaiji/saigaiji_201101/saigaiji_201101
Kainuma, H. (2011), “Fukushima” ron genshiryoku mura
ha naze umaretanoka (author’s translation: The Theory
of Fukushima: How was the Nuclear Village formed?),
Seidosya, Tokyo.
Kawata, T. (2011), “Dojou osen mondai to sono taiou”
(author’s translation: The radioactive soil contamination
and its management), a presentation given by a research
fellow of Nuclear Waste Management Organisation of
Japan (NUMO), at the 16th Atomic Energy Commission
meeting held on 11 May 2011, available in Japanese at:
http://www.aec.go.jp/jicst/NC/iinkai/teirei/siryo2011/
siryo16/siryo2
Koide, H. (2012), Genpatsu no uso (author’s translation:
The Lie of Nuclear Power), Fusosha, Tokyo.
Magnan, A. (2010), “For a better understanding of adaptive
capacity to climate change: a research framework”, Studies
No.02/10 May 2010, IDDRI-Sciences Po, Paris.
Matsuoka, S. (2012), “Fukushima Nuclear Accident and
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and Technology (MEXT) (2011a), Guide on
Radiation for School Teachers, 24 June 2011,
available in Japanese at: http://www.mext.go.jp/
Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami: Performance of Tsunami
Countermeasures, Coastal Buildings, and Tsunami Evacuation in Japan
ANAWAT SUPPASRI,
1
NOBUO SHUTO,
1
FUMIHIKO IMAMURA,
1
SHUNICHI KOSHIMURA,
1
ERICK MAS,
1
and AHMET CEVDET YALCINER
2
Abstract—In 2011, Japan was hit by a tsunami that was gen-
erated by the greatest earthquake in its history. The first tsunami
warning was announced 3 min after the earthquake, as is normal,
but failed to estimate the actual tsunami height. Most of the
structural countermeasures were not designed for the huge tsunami
that was generated by the magnitude M = 9.0 earthquake; as a
result, many were destroyed and did not stop the tsunami. These
structures included breakwaters, seawalls, water gates, and control
forests. In this paper we discuss the performance of these coun-
termeasures, and the mechanisms by which they were damaged; we
also discuss damage to residential houses, commercial and public
buildings, and evacuation buildings. Some topics regarding tsunami
awareness and mitigation are discussed. The failures of structural
defenses are a reminder that structural (hard) measures alone were
not sufficient to protect people and buildings from a major disaster
such as this. These defenses might be able to reduce the impact but
should be designed so that they can survive even if the tsunami
flows over them. Coastal residents should also understand the
function and limit of the hard measures. For this purpose, non-
structural (soft) measures, for example experience and awareness,
are very important for promoting rapid evacuation in the event of a
tsunami. An adequate communication system for tsunami warning
messages and more evacuation shelters with evacuation routes in
good condition might support a safe evacuation process. The
combination of both hard and soft measures is very important for
reducing the loss caused by a major tsunami. This tsunami has
taught us that natural disasters can occur repeatedly and that their
scale is sometimes larger than expected.
Key words: The 2011 East Japan earthquake and tsunami,
tsunami countermeasures, Sanriku coast, Sendai plain.
1. Introduction
On 11 March 2011, a strong earthquake of mag-
nitude M = 9.0 (JMA, 2011) occurred in East Japan,
generating a devastating tsunami. No one was
expecting an earthquake of this magnitude in Japan.
Japan is well known as a leading tsunami disaster
prevention country, because it has countermeasures
and evacuation plans set in place. Along the Sanriku
ria coast, where V-shape coastlines can cause a tsu-
nami wave to accumulate inside the bay, tsunamis can
easily be amplified to heights exceeding 10 m.
Therefore, many structural and non-structural tsunami
countermeasures were constructed along the Sanriku
coast (ABE and IMAMURA, 2010). Nevertheless, the
600 km Sanriku coast, which extends northwards
from Sendai and covers the Miyagi, Iwate, and Ao-
mori prefectures, was heavily damaged by the 2011
tsunami. Some of the damage was observed during
primary damage field surveys in Miyagi (SUPPASRI
et al., 2012a) and Iwate prefectures (YALCINER et al.,
2012). In this paper, the effectiveness of these coun-
termeasures during the 2011 tsunami, and the
mechanisms by which they were damaged, are dis-
cussed briefly; examples of breakwaters in Kamaishi
and Ofunato; tsunami gates in Fudai and Minami-
Sanriku; seawalls in Taro, Yamada, and Ishinomaki;
and control forests in Rikuzentakata and Natori are
discussed. The damage to houses in relation to the
materials that were used and number of stories is also
discussed; overturned reinforced concrete buildings in
Onagawa are presented as examples. Similar to the
lessons learned from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami
(SANTOS et al., 2007; SUPPASRI et al., 2012c), the les-
sons learned from this tsunami, including those
regarding the effects of the tsunami on a highland
1
International Research Institute of Disaster Science,
Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan. E-mail: suppasri@irides.tohoku.
ac.jp; shuto.nobuo@gmail.com; imamura@irides.tohoku.ac.jp;
koshimura@irides.tohoku.ac.jp; erick@tsunami2.civil.tohoku.ac.
jp;
2
Department of Civil Engineering, Ocean Engineering
Research Center, Middle East Technical University, Ankara,
Turkey. E-mail: yalciner@metu.edu.tr
Pure Appl. Geophys. 170 (2013), 993–1018
� 2012 The Author(s
)
This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com
DOI 10.1007/s00024-012-0511-7 Pure and Applied Geophysics
residence in Toni-Hongo, the Namiwake shrine in
Sendai, and damage data from historical tsunamis in
the Sanriku area, are discussed. Examples of suc-
cessful evacuations, for example the ‘‘Miracles of
Kamaishi’’ and ‘‘Inamura no Hi’’, the tsunami festival
in the Wakayama province are provided.
2. Historical Tsunamis that have Affected
the Sanriku Coast and Sendai Plain Areas
The Sanriku coast is often hit by giant tsunamis. If
we limit our discussion to tsunamis generated b
y
earthquakes over M8.0, the first historical tsunami is
the Jogan tsunami in 869, followed by the Keicho-
Sanriku tsunami in 1611, the Meiji-Sanriku tsunami
in 1896, the Showa-Sanriku tsunami in 1933, the far-
field tsunami from Chile in 1960, and the Great East
Japan tsunami in 2011 (Fig. 1; Table 1). The 1896
tsunami caused nearly 22,000 deaths (YAMASHITA,
2008a), the highest number of deaths caused by a
tsunami in Japanese history. In fact, large earthquakes
such as that which generated the Jogan-type tsunami
occurs, on average, every 800–1,100 years (MINOURA
et al., 2001). More than 1,100 years have passed
since the Jogan tsunami, so there was a high proba-
bility that a large earthquake and tsunami would
occur. However, with only one historical record of
the Jogan tsunami and the limited Jogan tsunami
deposit areas (mainly in Sendai and Ishinomaki
plains), information about the magnitude of this
earthquake and the probability of another Jogan event
required additional support data and verification.
Before the 2011 event, there was a 99 % proba-
bility that another M = 7.5–8.0 earthquake would
occur off of the Miyagi Prefecture within the next
30 years (Table 2) (SENDAI CITY, 2010). A series of
M7.4–M8.0 earthquakes have occurred in the Miyagi
Sea since 1793, and the average time between them is
37 years (SENDAI CITY, 2010). Many countermeasures
have been constructed in preparation for these tsu-
namis, which are predicted to damage the Sanriku
coast and the Sendai plain.
The Sendai plain is a low-hazard area compared
with the Sanriku coast. Historical records show there
have been no large tsunami events in the Sendai plain
area since the 1611 Keicho-Sanriku tsunami, whereas
the Sanriku coast was affected by great tsunamis in
37
38
39
40
41
0 10 20 30 40
L
a
ti
tu
d
e
Maximum tsunami
height (m)
2011
Tohoku
1960 Chile
1933
Showa
1896
Meiji
1611 Keicho
Figure 1
Historical tsunamis in the Sanriku area, the areas that were affected by the 2011 Tohoku tsunami, and the maximum tsunami height of
historical tsunamis
994 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
1896, 1933, and 1960 (Fig. 1). The primary concern
is for the ria coast, with its remarkable tsunami-
amplification property because of its narrow,
V-shaped topography, rather than the plain coast. In
addition, because of the location of the earthquakes in
1896 and 1933, which occurred in the north, the
Sendai plain was protected from these tsunamis
because it is located inside a bay behind the Sanriku
coast (Fig. 2). For instance, in Ofunato, maximum
runup heights of 38.2 and 28.7 m were recorded for
the 1896 Meiji and 1933 Showa tsunamis, respec-
tively. However, for these two tsunamis, maximum
runup heights of less than 5 and 3.9 m, respectively
(Fig. 1), were recorded in the Sendai plain (SAWAI
et al., 2008; YAMASHITA 2008a, b). The tsunami in
1960 that was generated by the great earthquake in
Chile also concentrated in, and mainly damaged, the
Sanriku areas. However, the 2011 tsunami was gen-
erated by a large earthquake, and its 500 km rupture
covered the whole area of the Tohoku region.
3. Tsunami Countermeasures
3.1. Tsunami Breakwaters
Large-scale tsunami breakwaters are present
along the Sanriku coast. They were constructed to
protect cities from future tsunamis, because of the
region’s long history of devastating tsunamis. The
tsunami breakwaters were designed to resist tsunamis
that are similar in strength to the 1896 Meiji Sanriku
tsunami. Two well-known tsunami breakwaters are
located in Kamaishi city and Ofunato city. In
Kamaishi, the tsunami breakwaters were constructed
at the entrance to the bay; they are 63 m deep and
hold the Guinness world record for the deepest
breakwaters (Fig. 3, left). Construction of the break-
waters was completed in 2009; they have a 300 m
opening and are 670 and 990 m long (KAMAISHI PORT
OFFICE, 2011). The two tsunami breakwaters in
Ofunato city were constructed after the city was
struck by a large tsunami with long-period waves
caused by resonance with the tsunami generated by
the 1960 Chilean earthquake (Fig. 3, right). The two
breakwaters are located at the bay entrance where the
water is 38 m deep; they have a 200 m wide opening
and are 290 and 250 m long (KAMAISHI PORT OFFICE,
2011). Construction of the breakwaters was com-
pleted in 1967 and successfully protected the city
from the Tokachi-oki tsunami in 1968.
However, the 2011 Tohoku tsunami was higher
than the designers expected. The tsunami caused
major damage to the breakwaters and inundated both
cities. Nevertheless, the breakwaters helped to reduce
Table 1
Historical tsunamis in the Sanriku area and the damage which resulted
DD/MM/YY Name Earthquake
magnitude
Damage Maximum tsunami
height (m)/location
9 July 869 Jogan [8.3 More than 1,000 deaths
2 Dec 1611 Keicho Sanriku [8.1 More than 5,000 deaths
15 June 1896 Meiji Sanriku 8.5 21,959 deaths and more than
10,000 houses
destroyed
38.2/Ryori area, Ofunato city
3 Mar 1933 Showa Sanriku 8.1 3,064 deaths and 1,810 houses
destroyed
28.7/Ryori area, Ofunato city
22 May 1960 Great Chilean 9.5 142 (in Japan) and 1,625 houses
destroyed
22 May 1960
11 Mar 2011 Great East Japan 9.0 19,000 deaths and more than 836,500
houses damaged and destroyed
40.5/Omoe-Aneyoshi area,
Miyako city
Table 2
Records of earthquakes in the Miyagi Sea
DD/MM/YY Lag time Magnitude
17 Feb 1793 8.2
20 July 1835 42.4 years 37.1 years on
average
7.3
21 Oct 1861 26.3 years 7.4
20 Feb 1897 35.3 years 7.4
3 Nov 1936 39.7 years 7.4
12 June 1978 41.6 years 7.4
Before 11 Mar 2011 33 years had passed,
so the possibility of
occurrence was 99 %
7.5–8.0
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 995
the impact of the tsunami (both tsunami height and
arrival time) on the cities, especially Kamaishi, where
many houses still remain (Fig. 4). Figures 5 and 6
show the performance of the Kamaishi breakwaters
and the mechanisms by which they were damaged
(PARI, 2011). The breakwaters were located on a
rock foundation. Thirty-meter-wide blocks were
arranged on top of the rock foundation along the
Figure 2
Comparison of the propagation patterns of the 1896 Meiji-Sanriku tsunami and the 2011 Great East Japan tsunami after 10, 30, and 60 min
996 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
direction of the axis of the breakwaters. The blocks
rose 6 m above sea level and were designed to protect
the city from a 5.6 m high tsunami. A tsunami height
of 6.7 m was measured at a GPS station in Kamaishi
Sea. On the basis of these data, two simulations were
performed for cases with and without breakwaters
(PARI, 2011). From the results, the height (mean sea
level, MSL) of the tsunami was 10.8 m in front of the
blocks and 2.6 m behind the blocks; therefore, the
blocks helped to reduce the tsunami height by 8.2 m
(Figs. 5, 6). With regard to inundation by the
tsunami, the breakwaters reduced the tsunami height
(at the shoreline) from 13.7 to 8.0 m and reduced the
runup height from 20.2 to 10.0 m (PARI, 2011).
Because of the strong current in the 30 cm spaces
between the blocks, the rock foundation was dam-
aged. Eventually, *70 % of the blocks were
destroyed. This process occurred slowly; as a result,
the arrival time of the tsunami inundation was
delayed by 8 min (from 28 to 36 min) (PARI,
2011). However, the tsunami breakwaters at Ofunato
were more seriously damaged and are currently
submerged in the sea. Possible reasons are that the
Ofunato breakwaters were constructed using earth-
quake resistance design of nearly 40–50 years ago
and the wave period of the strong tsunami current
Figure 3
Tsunami breakwaters in Kamaishi city and in Ofunato city (before the 2011 tsunami)
Figure 4
Damage from the tsunami inundation of Kamaishi city with a maximum runup height of 11.7 m (1/6/2011) and of Ofunato city with a
maximum runup height of 10.9 m (1/6/
2011)
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 997
might have been nearly the same as the natural period
of a wave inside Ofunato bay.
3.2. Seawalls
Seawalls are found almost everywhere along the
coasts of Japan. According to reports from Ministry
of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism
(MLIT, 2011), the length of the seawalls damaged
and destroyed in Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima
prefectures is *190 km out of a total length of
*300 km. According to the reports, tsunami over-
flows of \1 m caused a relatively small amount of
damage but overflows larger than 3–4 m completely
destroyed the seawalls because most of them were
designed to protect the land from high tides or
Figure 5
Mechanisms of damage to the Kamaishi breakwaters
Figure 6
Tsunami impact reduction performance of the Kamaishi breakwaters (PARI, 2011)
998 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
typhoons. However, some of them, for example the
seawall in Taro town, were meant to serve as tsunami
barriers. Taro town experienced tsunamis in 1611,
1896 (a tsunami height of 15 m, 83 % fatality, and
100 % of the houses destroyed) and 1933 (a tsunami
height of 10 m, 32 % fatality, and 63 % of the houses
destroyed). In 1934, construction of two, 10 m high
seawalls (measured from the mean seawater level)
was started; the purpose of the seawalls was to
protect the town by allowing the tsunami to flow
along both sides of the seawalls. They were com-
pleted in 1958, two years before the 1960 Chile
tsunami, and could fully protect the town from a
maximum tsunami height of 3.5 m. In the 1970s, the
town constructed another two lines of 10 m high
seawalls to accommodate the increasing population
(KAMAISHI PORT OFFICE, 2011). The total length of the
seawalls is *2.4 km, as shown in Fig. 7, left. The
designs of both of the seawalls took only the 1933
tsunami into consideration. However, the 2011 tsu-
nami flowed over the two-line seawalls, damaged
most houses, with 5 % fatality, and destroyed the
eastern part of the new seawall (Fig. 7,
right).
There are three main reasons why the seawalls
were damaged.
• The two seawalls crossed in an X shape, which
caused the tsunami to accumulate and increase in
size at the center of the seawalls.
• The foundations of the seawalls were weakened by
the river on the eastern side of the town. Soil
properties near rivers may have disrupted the
stability of foundations.
• The seawalls were not maintained properly and had
not been adequately connected to each other. The
tsunami flowed over the seawalls and became a
high-speed water jet. The strong current at high
speed caused scouring around the foundations.
Examples of damage to typical seawalls can be
found in Ishinomaki city (Fig. 8, left) and in Higashi-
Matsushima city. The tsunami height near the control
forests of both cities was 7–8 m. On the sea side, the
surfaces of the seawalls survived, but on the land side,
severe scouring occurred at the foundations. Another
example of damaged seawalls is shown in Fig. 8, right.
In Yamada town, five blocks of seawalls of total length
Figure 7
Seawalls in Taro town. Damage occurred to the eastern parts of the new seawalls (9/11/2011)
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 999
of 50 m were moved by the tsunami. The block structure
survived but failed because of poor connection with the
foundations and with neighboring blocks. Figure 9
shows typical mechanisms of damage to seawalls
including sliding because of the pressure difference,
overturning because of collision of the wavefront, and
scouring by strong currents (PARI, 2011).
3.3. Tsunami Gates
Fudai village developed along the Fudai River. It
suffered from the 1896 and 1993 tsunamis that
propagated along the river. In 1984, 15.5 m high
tsunami gates were constructed to close the river
mouth in case of tsunamis. Fudai was the location of
a successful countermeasure structure that protected
the village from the 2011 tsunami. The 17 m high
tsunami flowed over the gate but inundated only a
few hundred meters past the gate (NIKKEI NEWSPAPER,
2011), as shown in Fig. 10, left. Most of
Fudai
village, including the evacuation shelters (primary
and secondary schools), was protected, as shown in
Fig. 10, right, and no loss of human life was reported
(TOKEN, 2011). If there had not been a tsunami gate,
Figure 8
Seawalls damaged by scouring in Ishinomaki city (left, 26/4/2011) and by sliding in Yamada town (right, 31/5/2011)
Figure 9
Typical mechanisms of damage to seawalls (PARI, 2011)
1000 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
the tsunami would have damaged the center of the
village (IWATE PREFECTURE, 2011).
The residents of Minami-Sanriku town have high
tsunami awareness because of previous experience
with tsunamis. The maximum height of the tsunami
in Minami-Sanriku town was [10 m in some areas,
whereas the average height of past tsunamis was
\5 m. Seawalls and tsunami gates were constructed
at ?4.6 m MSL after the 1960 Chile tsunami
(MINAMI-SANRIKU TOWN, 2011) and residents did not
expect such a large tsunami, because the first tsunami
warning had prediced 3 m in Miyagi prefecture.
Tsunami evacuation drills are conducted every year.
However, the tsunami gates and seawalls were
overwhelmed and did not stop the 2011 tsunami,
which was higher than 15 m (Fig. 11, left). As a
result, 95 % of the town, including the disaster
prevention building, was destroyed (Fig. 11, right),
and approximately half of the population was missing
immediately after the tsunami. Approximately 1,000
people died or are missing as a result of the
tsunami.
Another important issue raised by the 2011
tsunami is that many firemen were lost in the call
of duty as they closed many tsunami gates and the
gates of seawalls. Two-hundred and fifty-four casu-
alties were reported in Iwate, Miyagi, and Fukushima
prefectures, and more than 70 of these were while
closing these gates (YOMIURI NEWSPAPER, 2011a).
Figure
10
The tsunami gate that protected Fudai village and led to no reported casualties (9/11/2011)
Figure 11
The damaged tsunami gate in Minami-Sanriku town and the town’s condition after the tsunami (25/3/2011)
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1001
According to a questionnaire given to 471 firemen in
5 cities (Miyako, Kamaishi, Kesennuma, Ishinomaki,
and Iwaki) (KAHOKU NEWSPAPER, 2011), 61 % of
firemen met at their office and went out for duty.
Among them, 23 % went to the coast to close the
gates, and 47 % went to help the evacuation. The
percentages of fireman killed by the tsunami were
22 % during gate-closing work and 31 % during
evacuation work. Thus, the Japanese government has
a plan to install a new system to control these gates
remotely.
3.4. Control Forests
An example of a great loss of control forests is in
Rikuzentakata city. The city is known for having a
2 km stretch of shoreline lined with *70,000 pine
trees (Fig. 12, left). The 2011 tsunami, which was
nearly 20 m high, swept away the entire forest; only
one 10 m high, 200-year-old tree remains (Fig. 12,
right). This surviving tree became a very important
symbol of the reconstruction for people in the city.
The forest not only could not protect the town but
also increased the impact of the tsunami because of
floating debris.
In Natori, where Sendai airport is located, a
tsunami with a height of 10–12 m, as measured from
garbage remaining on trees (SUPPASRI et al., 2012b),
overturned most of the trees (Fig. 13, left); however,
the control forest helped to protect the airport,
because the tsunami inundation depth was only 4 m.
Unlike the first two examples, almost all of the
pine trees in the control forest in Ishinomaki survived
(Fig. 13, right). The forest reduced the destructive
Figure 12
Control forest in Rikuzen-Takata city. Approximately 70,000 pine trees were completely swept away
Figure 13
Damage to a control forest in Natori city (11/5/2011), and a control forest that survived in Ishinomaki city (26/4/2011)
1002 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
power of the tsunami and trapped debris, for example
cars, from the water before it entered the city. The
trees may have been saved because the height of the
tsunami at Ishinomaki was lower (*6 m). The
seawall (which was later destroyed) may also have
helped protect the trees. YOMIURI NEWSPAPER (2011b)
reported results based on the estimates from a field
survey of tsunami-affected areas conducted by the
Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute.
Without control forests, it is predicted that a 16 m
high tsunami would have inundated 600 m in 18 min
with an average velocity of 10 m/s. However, with
the control forest, the tsunami arrival time was
delayed by 6 min, and its velocity was reduced to
2 m/s.
In general, control forests can withstand tsunamis
up to 3–5 m high, on the basis of historical Japanese
tsunami data in 43 locations, namely, 1896 Meiji-
Sanriku, 1933 Showa-Sanriku, 1946 Nankai, 1960
Chile, and 1983 Japan Sea, as shown in Fig. 14, left
and right (SHUTO, 1985). The circles indicate trees
that have survived whereas triangles and the rectan-
gles indicate trees that collapsed or were cut down,
respectively. For example, a tree with a diameter of
10 cm can withstand a tsunami inundation depth up
to 3 m but will collapse or be cut down if the
inundation depth is greater than 4 and 5 m, respec-
tively. Figure 14, right, shows the effectiveness of the
control forest in trapping debris and reducing the
wave current. The effectiveness of the control forest
was limited at an inundation depth of 3 m for a forest
width of \20 m. Historical data show that a forest
width [100 m is expected to be effective up to an
inundation depth of 5 m. The maximum 2011
tsunami heights in both Rikuzen-Takata (150 m
forest width) and Natori (500 m forest width) were
[10 m (out of the data range), and caused devastat-
ing damage. On the other hand, a 6 m tsunami
attacked the control forest in Ishinomaki (150 m
forest width); the damage that was caused is shown in
Fig. 14, left.
Figure 15 shows a good example of how control
forests and breakwaters could have helped to reduce
the damage to areas behind them in Ishinomaki city.
This figure was created by visual inspection of
satellite images, with gray indicating the area of
tsunami inundation by the 2011 tsunami, red indicat-
ing the areas where houses were washed away, and
blue indicating the areas with surviving houses (TEL,
2011). It is very clear that the number of houses
washed away in zone B (behind the control forest) is
much smaller than that in zone A (without a control
Figure 14
Tree damage as a function of inundation depth and tree diameter, and the effectiveness of control forests as a function of inundation depth and
forest width (SHUTO, 1985)
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1003
forest). GOKON and KOSHIMURA (2012) showed that
the probability of a building being washed away in
zone C (inside the breakwaters) was *40 %, whereas
in zone D (outside the breakwaters), it was almost as
high as 90 %, confirming the 50 % reduction effect,
although both areas experienced a maximum tsunami
height lower than 7 m.
4. Residential Structures
4.1. Residential Houses
The tsunami left 115,163 houses heavily dam-
aged, 162,015 houses moderately damaged and
559,321 houses partially damaged (NATIONAL POLICE
AGENCY, 2011). Most houses in residential areas are
constructed from wood. The relationship between the
tsunami hazard level and the structural damage is
described by tsunami fragility curves. Figure 16, left
shows the tsunami fragility curves that were devel-
oped, using data from the 1993 Okushiri tsunami
(most of the houses were constructed out of wood)
(KOSHIMURA et al., 2009). These curves indicate that
the probability of damage (destroyed or washed
away) is very high when the tsunami inundation
depth exceeds 2 m. The structural materials and the
number of stories are directly related to the proba-
bility of damage. For example, the probability of
damage (destroyed or washed away) from a tsunami
with an inundation depth of 4 m is 0.3, 0.7, and 0.9
for a reinforced concrete (RC) house, a mixed-type
house in Thailand (SUPPASRI et al., 2011), and a
wooden house, respectively (Fig. 16, left). For the
same tsunami, the probability of damage is 0.9 for a
one-story house and 0.5 for a house that has more
than one story (Fig. 16, right). Figure 17, top, shows
examples of three damaged houses. Although all
three houses experienced an inundation depth of 4 m,
the level of damage is different, depending on
building typology. In Fig. 17, bottom, the first
building on the left side (green rectangle) is a two-
story RC office that sustained broken windows but no
structural damage. The two-story wooden house in
the center (yellow rectangle) sustained damage to
some of its walls and columns. The one-story wooden
house on the right (red rectangle) completely col-
lapsed. However, the impact from floating debris is
complex and difficult to ascertain at this time. In fact,
the velocity of the tsunami wave current was also
important in the structural destruction, because of the
hydrodynamic force. Nevertheless, the current veloc-
ity is quite difficult to measure using only tsunami
traces found during field surveys, especially along the
Sanriku ria coast, where the tsunami wave easily
accumulated such hydrostatic and hydrodynamic
force that the tsunami height and velocity became
Figure 15
Tsunami damage reduction effect because of the control forest and breakwaters in Ishinomaki city
1004 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
larger than in the Sendai coastal plain. Comparison of
the housing damage ratio between the plain and ria
coast of Ishinomaki city shows that the damage ratio
for houses washed away at 3 m of inundation depth
was 0.1 along the plain coast but as high as 0.6 along
the ria coast (SUPPASRI et al., 2012b). This result
confirms the effect of current velocity on different
damage levels at the same inundation depth.
0.0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
0 5 10 15 20
D
am
ag
e
p
ro
b
ab
il
it
y
Inundation depth (m)
Japan_W
Thai_Mix
Thai_RC
0.0
0.2
0.4
0.6
0.8
1.0
0 5 10 15 20
D
am
ag
e
p
ro
b
ab
il
it
y
Inundation depth (m)
Thai_One story_LV2
Thai_> one story_LV2
Figure 16
Tsunami fragility curves for different types of structural material and for different numbers of stories (KOSHIMURA et al., 2009; SUPPASRI et al.,
2011)
Figure 17
Examples of different damage levels for the same tsunami inundation depth (26/4/2011)
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1005
4.2. Commercial and Public Buildings
In tsunamis it is usually recommended that people
evacuate to high-rise RC buildings or steel-reinforced
concrete (SRC) buildings if there are no mountains
nearby. The building code for earthquake-resistant
buildings was revised in 1981 and 2000 but did not
take into account tsunami load. The guideline for
tsunami evacuation buildings was established in 2005
(CABINET OFFICE, 2005). The practical instruction for
evacuation of buildings stated in the guideline is to
evacuate to higher than the third or fourth floor if the
expected tsunami inundation depth is 2 or 3 m,
respectively. However, the 2011 tsunami shows that
this guideline may not always be correct. There are
six overturned buildings in Onagawa town (Fig. 18,
left), and two each in Akamae village, Miyako city,
Otsuchi town, and Rikuzen-Takata city. None of
these were tsunami evacuation buildings, and they
were not designed to resist tsunami loads. The four-
story RC building (building B) pictured in Fig. 19,
right, was moved 70 m from its original location
before stopping at a hill (Fig. 20, left). However, a
five-story RC building (building X) survived and did
not overturn (Fig. 19, left), even though it was in the
same place.
The reasons these buildings may have overturned
are as follows (Fig. 18, right):
• First, many pile foundations were damaged by the
strong shaking and soil liquefaction that preceded
the tsunami which reduced the frictional resistance
of the pile foundations. A large lateral load
occurred during the earthquake, and liquefaction
might have caused cap failure. In other words, pile
connections failed, and the cap could not resist
overturning moments from the vertical load of the
building and lateral hydrodynamic load of the
tsunami. The building that is pictured in Fig. 20,
right had only one pile remaining.
• Second, because of the ria coast, the tsunami was
amplified by a narrow bathymetry and resulted in
runup heights of 15–20 m, as measured near the
locations of the overturned buildings. The tsunami,
which was generated by a large earthquake (large
fault width), had a long wave period, which led to a
Figure 18
Six buildings that were overturned (A–F) in Onagawa town and the mechanisms that mediated overturning
1006 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
long time of interaction of the tsunami force acting
on the buildings.
• Third, the ratios of openings (windows and doors)
to walls in the overturned buildings were small.
Therefore, pressure suddenly accumulated at the
tsunami-facing wall, which caused local scouring
at the foundations. Table 3 summarizes detailed
information on the overturned and non-overturned
RC buildings in Onagawa town, as measured
during field surveys. Most of the buildings in
Onagawa town (including buildings C and E) were
overwhelmed by the tsunami, except building X.
Figure 19
Building X (sea front), which survived (29/9/2011), and building B, which was overturned (29/3/2011)
Figure 20
Building B, which was moved 70 m from its original location (upper-left corner), and a detailed picture of a pile foundation from building B
(3/9/2011)
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1007
The overturned buildings were directed toward
land, meaning that they were overturned by the
striking wave and not the receding wave. It is very
clear that all of the overturned buildings had an
opening area equal to or less than 10 %.
• Fourth, buoyancy created an uplifting force that
raised the buildings. All of the overturned build-
ings were overwhelmed by the tsunami, resulting
in a large uplift force because of buoyancy. In
some cases, buried structures can literally be
floated out of the ground because of the increased
pore water pressures. In addition, there was
sufficient time for water to flow inside the build-
ings, because of the long period of the wave, which
increased the vertical load of the building. Accu-
mulated air between the top level of the windows
and the ceiling also generated buoyancy.
• Fifth, because of outdated structural design codes,
the buildings had poor reinforcement against
longitudinal and lateral pressure (Fig. 20, right).
Most were probably constructed during 1970–1980,
before the new building design code for earthquake-
resistant buildings in 1981.
All of these phenomena and forces generated an
overturning moment on the buildings.
4.3. Evacuation Buildings and Shelters
There were many designated evacuation buildings
and shelters that failed to protect lives because of the
unexpected tsunami height and runup. For instance, a
community gym was designated as an evacuation
shelter in the flat region of Rikuzen-Takata city.
The tsunami overwhelmed the gym, and only three
people survived out of more than 80 evacuees.
Another example in Rikuzen-Takata is a five-story
residential building (Fig. 21, left). The tsunami
reached only the fourth floor; however, the building
had no stairway that would enable people to evacuate
to the roof in the case of a larger tsunami. Another
example of an unfortunate result of the unexpected
tsunami was at Okawa primary school (Fig. 21,
right), located near the mouth of a river. The tsunami
claimed 74 out of a total of 108 children and 10 staff.
Most of the children that survived climbed the
mountain behind the school; the others went to the
bridge where they were struck by the tsunami. The
school had not conducted evacuation drills and had
no tsunami plans before the 2011 event.
Officers and staff members that were stationed at
the Otsuchi town office (Fig. 22, left) and the disaster
prevention building (Fig. 22, right) in Minami-
Sanriku also lost their lives. In Otsuchi town, the
town leader and his staff lost their lives; this loss has
caused the reconstruction process in Otsuchi town to
be slower than at other locations. A staff member in
Minami-Sanriku town lost her life while announcing
the evacuation; other staff members inside the
building also lost their lives.
In the Unosumai area of Kamaishi city there is a
famous story called ‘‘Miracles of Kamaishi’’ because
all 580 students and teachers from two schools
survived the tsunami even though their schools were
destroyed by the tsunami. Although their schools
were located outside the expected tsunami inundation
area, on the basis of historical records, the students
Table 3
Information about overturned and non-overturned RC buildings in Onagawa town
ID Story Building
height (m)
Opening
area (m
2
)
Opening
ratio (1)
Footing
area (m
2
)
Length/
width (2)
(1)/(2) Direction
of overturn
A 2 10.5 6.6 0.0524 68.4 2.11 0.024 Sea
B 4 14.0 4.3 0.0427 26.6 1.95 0.022 Land
D 2 10.5 19.72 0.0806 172.4 3.15 0.026 Land
E 2 7.0 7.71 0.1039 42.4 2.65 0.039 Land
X 5 17.3 38.64 0.1679 90.4 1.95 0.086 –
Y 4 13 121.5 0.5841 208.0 1.23 0.475 –
Z 2 8.5 19.25 0.1258 153.0 2.12 0.059 –
Most of buildings are pile foundation except for building A, which is shallow foundation. Building C is steel frame with ALC wall building
and building F is an RC building but the town removed the building before the measurements were performed. At present, only three buildings
(A, C, and E) will remain as memorial parks
1008 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
decided to leave their schools and evacuate to higher
ground, and all of them survived. However, there was
also great loss in this area because of an incomplete
evacuation drill. The evacuation drill was performed
on 3rd March (the memorial day of the Showa-
Sanriku tsunami), *1 week before the tsunami. The
town selected the two-story RC building as the
disaster prevention center (a group evacuation shelter
located outside the expected inundation area) rather
than other evacuation areas on high ground, because
the center is easily accessible by the elderly. A fatal
tragedy occurred when most of the evacuation drill
participants evacuated to the center rather than to
high ground. As a result, there were only 25
confirmed survivors from the total 200 evacuees,
with 54 found dead inside the center and the number
of estimated dead and missing [100.
Some other successful cases are reported here.
Onagawa town hospital is located *15 m above the
sea level, and the tsunami reached the first floor
(Fig. 23, left). A school in Ishinomaki city that was
located behind the control forest was inundated to the
second floor (Fig. 23, right). The tsunami reached the
first floor at the sightseeing ferry terminal in Shio-
gama city; the evacuation sign suggests evacuating to
the second or third floor (Fig. 24, left). Last, a school
in Arahama town was the only building in the area
that was located on high ground; it survived because
the tsunami reached the second floor only (Fig. 24,
right).
Figure 21
A five-story apartment building in Rikuzen-Takata city, and Okawa primary school
Figure 22
The Otsuchi town office (31/5/2011) and the disaster prevention building in Minami-Sanriku town (3/9/2011)
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1009
To summarize, in the entire Tohoku region the three
worst designated evacuation shelter locations inundated
by the tsunami (MURAI, 2011) were those for Rikuzen-
Takata: Iwate prefecture (35 out of 68 places, 51.5 %),
Onagawa (12 out of 25 places, 48 %), and Minami-
Sanriku (31 out of 78 places, 39.7 %), leading to
fatalities at the three locations as high as 11.7, 11.2, and
6.3 %, respectively (SUPPASRI et al., 2012a).
5. Tsunami Awareness and Disaster Mitigation
5.1. Tsunami Experience and Awareness
People who live along the Sanriku coast have
more experience of tsunamis than those who live on
the Sendai plain. The occurrence of two huge
tsunamis in 37 years (the 1896 Meiji tsunami and
the 1933 tsunami) taught the residents of the Sanriku
coast about the dangers of tsunamis. From the
questionnaire results (CeMI, 2011), 90 % of the
people in Kamaishi city evacuated quickly, with
60 % of them starting their evacuation \10 min
after the earthquake, whereas only 60 % of the
people in Natori city evacuated quickly, and 30 % of
them started their evacuation within 30 min of the
earthquake. However, there were many cases doc-
umented in the media of people who quickly
evacuated to a safe place but then went back to
their houses for many reasons and ultimately
became casualties.
Figure 23
Evacuation buildings in Onagawa town (29/3/2011) and Ishinomaki city (12/5/2011)
Figure 24
Evacuation buildings in Shiogama city (29/4/2011) and Arahama town (16/4/2011)
1010 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
Historical records from the Sanriku area were
used to compare the number of deaths caused and the
number of houses damaged (houses that were washed
away or sustained major or moderate damage) by the
1896, 1933 (YAMASHITA 2008a, b), and 2011 tsunamis
(IWATE PREFECTURE, 2011; MIYAGI PREFECTURE, 2011).
Fatalities as a result of the 1896 tsunami were very
high, and not comparable with those of the 1933 and
2011 tsunamis (Fig. 25, left). House damage as a
result of the 1896 and 2011 tsunamis are not very
different in the Iwate province; however, they are
very high for the 2011 tsunami in the Miyagi
prefecture because of land development in this area
(Fig. 25, right).
Despite high house damage and the largest runup
height (Fig. 26, right), fatalities as a result of the
2011 tsunami were much smaller because tsunami
experience resulted in the people recognizing the
need to evacuate, and evacuating quickly. The
tsunami evacuation effect can also be confirmed by
the number of deaths per damaged house, which is
shown in Fig. 26, left. For the 1896 tsunami, there
were more than 2.0–4.5 deaths per damaged house
whereas for the 2011 tsunami there are \0.5 deaths
per damaged house. One reason why the number of
deaths for the 1933 tsunami was still high in some
locations can be explained by using Taro town as an
example. The 1896 tsunami killed nearly 90 % of the
people in Taro town. Therefore, most of the people
who were affected by the 1933 tsunami were
newcomers who had settled in the area after the
1896 tsunami.
Figure 27 shows the relationship between the
fatality-to-damage ratio and the maximum runup
height of the three tsunamis that affected the Sanriku
area, on the basis of data from YAMASHITA (2008a, b)
for the 1896 and 1933 tsunamis, and data from IWATE
PREFECTURE (2011) and MIYAGI PREFECTURE (2011) for
the 2011 tsunami. The 2011 tsunami (MORI et al.,
2012) had runup heights in excess of 20 m in most
areas; fatalities were limited to *10 % whereas
damage was as high as 50–80 %. Figure 28 shows the
death-to-damage ratios as a function of the maximum
runup height for the 2011 Tohoku tsunami for two
0 10 20 30 40 50 60
Hirono
Kuji
Noda
Fudai
Tanohata
Iwaizumi
Miyako
Yamada
Otsuchi
Kamaishi
Ofunato
Rikuzen-Takata
Kesennuma
Minami-Sanriku
Onagawa
Ishinomaki
Death ratio (%)
1896 Meiji
1933 Showa
2011 Tohoku
0 20 40 60 80
100
Hirono
Kuji
Noda
Fudai
Tanohata
Iwaizumi
Miyako
Yamada
Otsuchi
Kamaishi
Ofunato
Rikuzen-Takata
Kesennuma
Minami-Sanriku
Onagawa
Ishinomaki
Damage ratio (%)
1896 Meiji
1933 Showa
2011 Tohoku
Figure 25
Tsunami deaths and house damage for the Sanriku coastal
communities
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1011
different types of coastline: the ria topography along
the Sanriku coast and the Sendai plain. The maximum
runup height on the Sendai plain was 10 m; however,
in some areas, fatalities and house damage were as
high as 10 and 75 %, respectively. In brief, fatalities
and house damage in the Sendai plain were similar to
those of the Sanriku ria coast, despite much lower
maximum runup heights.
0 1 2 3 4 5
Hirono
Kuji
Noda
Fudai
Tanohata
Iwaizumi
Miyako
Yamada
Otsuchi
Kamaishi
Ofunato
Rikuzen-Takata
Kesennuma
Minami-Sanriku
Onagawa
Ishinomaki
Number of deaths per damaged house
1896 Meiji
1933 Showa
2011 Tohoku
0 10 20 30 40 50
Hirono
Kuji
Noda
Fudai
Tanohata
Iwaizumi
Miyako
Yamada
Otsuchi
Kamaishi
Ofunato
Rikuzen-Takata
Kesennuma
Minami-Sanriku
Onagawa
Ishinomaki
Maximum runup height (m)
1896 Meiji
1933 Showa
2011 Tohoku
Figure 26
The number of deaths per damaged house and the maximum recorded runup heights for tsunamis that have struck Sanriku coastal
communities
0.01
0.1
1
10
100
1 10
F
a
ta
li
ty
r
a
ti
o
(
%
)
Runup height (m)
1896
Meiji
1933
Showa
2011
Tohoku
0.1
1
10
100
1 10
D
a
m
a
g
e
r
a
ti
o
(
%
)
Runup height (m)
1896 Meiji
1933 Showa
2011 Tohoku
Figure 27
Fatality-to-damage ratio as a function of the maximum runup height for coastal communities along the Sanriku
coast and the Sendai plain
1012 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
5.2. Self Evacuation
As mentioned in the section above, experience
with tsunamis in the past promoted tsunami aware-
ness in the people of the Sanriku areas. However,
there were many cases, including the 2011 event, of
people remaining in their house waiting for their
family, or taking their belongings after the earth-
quake, who were ultimately washed away by the
tsunami. Self evacuation is very important to prevent
this type of tragedy. On the basis of experience from
the tsunamis in 1896 and 1933, in which some
families lost all of their members because of the
tsunami, an idea of self evacuation called ‘‘Tsunami
tendenko’’ was proposed (YAMASHITA, 2008b). ‘‘Tsu-
nami tendenko’’ is a phrase in the dialect of the
Sanriku region that is used to encourage people to
evacuate from the tsunami alone without taking any
belongings or waiting for their family; this phrase can
be translated as ‘‘you should protect your life by
yourself’’. Therefore, it is acceptable not to blame
people who did not help others. The ‘‘Miracles of
Kamaishi’’ was a very good example of the practical
use of ‘‘Tsunami tendenko’’ because the children
started their evacuation by themselves, and all were
saved. Examples of similar stories of self evacuation
were also reported for the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami
on Surin Islands, Thailand, and Simeulue Island,
Indonesia.
5.3. Residences on High Land
The Toni-Hongo village was struck by the 1896
tsunami (with a tsunami height of 14.5 m and 224
houses destroyed) and the 1933 tsunami (with a
tsunami height of 9.3 m and 101 houses destroyed)
(MEIJI UNIVERSITY, 2011). After the 1933 tsunami, the
village was rebuilt on high land at an elevation of
20 m (MSL), as shown in Fig. 29, left. The village
survived the 1960 Chilean tsunami, which was *5 m
high. After this event, many houses were built in the
lowland areas to accommodate the increasing popu-
lation, as shown in a picture from 2009 (Fig. 29,
center) and a satellite image from 2010 (Fig. 30, left).
The 2011 tsunami destroyed the lowland houses but
not the highland houses (Figs. 29, right, 30, right).
5.4. Tsunami Memorials
Tsunami memorials, for example stone monu-
ments, can be found in many areas along the Sanriku
coast. These memorials can be found in Minami-
Sanriku town, where there are monuments for the
1896 Meiji, 1933 Showa, and 1960 Chile tsunamis.
The message on the stone monument for the 1933
Showa tsunami (Fig. 31, left) reads ‘‘to be cautious of
an abnormal receding wave’’. However, these mon-
uments, including a 2.6 m high monument for the
1960 Chile tsunami (Fig. 31, right), were destroyed
0.01
0.1
1
10
100
1 10 100
F
a
ta
li
ty
r
a
ti
o
(
%
)
Runup height (m)
2011 Ria 2011 Plain
1
10
100
1 10 100
D
a
m
a
g
e
r
a
io
(
%
)
Runup height (m)
2011 Ria 2011 Plain
Figure 28
Fatality-to-damage ratios as a function of the maximum runup height of the 2011 Tohoku tsunami for the ria topography along the Sanriku
coast and the Sendai plain
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1013
by the 2011 Tohoku tsunami. The Namiwake shrine
(Fig. 32, left) is a monument in the Sendai area that is
located *5.5 km from the sea (Fig. 32, right). The
shrine is located in a low-lying area in the Waka-
bayashi ward of Sendai city, and was originally built
in 1703. Many flood and tsunami disasters have
occurred in this area in the past. In the 1611 Keicho
event, the tsunami inundated the shrine’s original
site, and *1,700 people were killed. At one site, the
tsunami wave, which approached from the East, was
split in the north–south direction; at the time, people
believed that the tsunami was created by the god of
the sea. In 1835, the shrine was moved to that site to
protect it from the next tsunami; it was given the
name ‘‘Namiwake’’ (‘‘Nami’’ means wave and
‘‘Wake’’ means separate) and is viewed as a symbol
of tsunami prevention. In fact, deposits from the 869
Jogan tsunami were found 200–300 m from the front
of the shrine. Although the 2011 tsunami was larger
than expected, the shrine survived the 2011 Great
East Japan earthquake and tsunami (Fig. 32). Addi-
tionally, many shrines along the Pacific coast of the
Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima prefectures survived
this tsunami. They were built at locations that were
regarded as safe on the basis of historical tsunamis,
for example the 1611 Keicho tsunami, and left as a
warning message to future generations.
5.5. Tsunami Festivals
A good example of a tsunami festival in Japan is
the festival in the Wakayama prefecture that cele-
brates a real story titled ‘‘Inamura no Hi’’. The story
originated from the Nankai tsunami in 1854. Ham-
aguchi Goryo (Fig. 33, left), the leader of Hirogawa
town in Wakayama province, noticed a tsunami after
a strong shake (WAKAYAMA BROADCAST, 2009). He
knew that it would be difficult to convince people to
Figure 29
Toni-Hongo village after the 1933 Showa Sanriku tsunami, before the 2011 Tohoku tsunami, and after the 2011 Tohoku tsunami
Figure 30
Satellite images of the Toni-Hongo village in May 2010 and in April 2011
1014 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
evacuate from the tsunami. Therefore, he set fire to
his own rice straw and asked people to help him
extinguish the fire (in Japanese, ‘‘Inamura’’ means
rice straw and ‘‘Hi’’ means fire). All of the town
residents came to help him and were saved from the
huge tsunami that destroyed the village. Hamaguchi
became a hero to the village and spent his own money
to construct a seawall. This seawall helped to protect
the town from the 1944 Tonankai and 1946 Nankai
tsunamis. In memory of this story, the local people,
especially the children in the community, help to pile
on the earth embankment (Fig. 33, right) and improve
their tsunami awareness every year (MATSUSAKA,
2007). Tsunami evacuation drills and education may
also increase their skills and knowledge for the next
tsunami.
6. Conclusions, Lessons Learned
and Recommendations
• Many tsunamis have affected the Sanriku coast and
Sendai plain in the past, including the 1611 Kei-
cho, 1896 Meiji, 1933 Showa, and 1960 Chile
tsunamis. In particular, Sanriku has a ria coastline
that is capable of amplifying the height of a
Figure 31
The stone monuments for the 1933 Showa Sanriku tsunami and the 1960 Chile tsunami in Minami-Sanriku town (25/3/2011)
Figure 32
Namiwake Shrine and the inundation area of the 2011 tsunami
Vol. 170, (2013) Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami 1015
tsunami. Due to of its ria coastline, Sanriku is one
of the areas that has experienced the highest tsu-
namis in Japanese history. Most of the tsunami
countermeasures failed to stop the 2011 Tohoku
tsunami because they were not designed to resist an
event of this earthquake magnitude. Recent tech-
nology has made it possible to build massive
structures that could fully protect against 500–1,000-
year return-period tsunamis; however, these struc-
tures are impractical when budget and time are
considered. Nevertheless, the scale of damage and
loss can be reduced by enacting proper structural
design and land-use management policies.
• From the perspective of structural damage, break-
waters and seawalls should have stronger
foundations, and there should be more secure
connections between neighboring blocks. New
designs for stronger and more stable coastal
structures should be developed. Tsunami gates
and gates in seawalls should be remotely con-
trolled. However, these structures may reduce the
tsunami awareness of residents by leading them to
believe that the structure fully protects them rather
than simply reducing damage; an example of this
thinking occurred in Taro town. The scenery
should also be considered after the construction
of high seawalls; Matsushima town, for example,
has one of the best views in the Tohoku area.
• Control forests are not only unable to stop or
reduce huge tsunamis such as the 2011 event but
may also cause more damage when the trees
become floating debris, as observed in Ofunato and
Rikuzen-Takata. Because they can only withstand
tsunamis with heights up to 5 m, control forests
should be planted as a second barrier behind
seawalls or at elevations that are higher than the
level of the seawalls. Another option is to plant the
control forest more deeply in the ground so that
their roots can be more connected with the land and
increase their strength.
• Wooden structures are good for earthquakes,
because of their light weight, but poor at resisting
the hydrodynamic force of a tsunami. For areas
where the tsunami inundation depth is expected to
be low and residential areas are constructed, the
first floor of houses should be built as RC
structures. The tsunami current velocity is also an
important factor in the tsunami force and damage
to port facilities including fishing boats. Recent
technology, for example video camera analysis,
can aid estimation of the velocity. The locations of
gasoline and other fuel tanks should be reconsid-
ered; they should be put in safer places where they
will not cause fires during a tsunami, as in
Kesennuma city.
• The design codes for evacuation buildings should
be revised after the examples in Onagawa and
some other areas; openings should be considered,
and pile foundations should be strengthened. The
elevations of railways and roads should be raised
so that they can serve as secondary or tertiary
tsunami barriers.
Figure 33
Statue of Hamaguchi Goryo and the activity during the tsunami festival
1016 A. Suppasri et al. Pure Appl. Geophys.
• Evacuation shelters in plains (e.g., the community
gym in Rikuzen-Takata city), low-rise buildings
(e.g., the disaster prevention building in Minami-
Sanriku town), and primary schools near the sea or
river mouths (e.g., Okawa School in Ishinomaki
city) are all examples of failed evacuation shelters.
The design and location of tsunami evacuation
buildings should be reconsidered. Escape hills can
be constructed in plain areas using debris from this
tsunami. Evacuation signs should include informa-
tion not only about tsunami height but also about
the height above sea level of each evacuation
shelter, evacuation building, and escape hill.
• Although the tsunami was higher along the Sanriku
coast, experience and awareness encouraged people
to evacuate rapidly. On the other hand, people in the
Sendai plain area had less tsunami experience and
were slow to evacuate, but the tsunami was lower.
These factors may explain why fatalities in the two
areas were similar. It is important to remind people in
the Sanriku area not to go back once they have
evacuated to a safe place. A greater number of high
ground areas and evacuation buildings are necessary
for the Sendai plain area, and awareness should be
encouraged after the 2011 event. Although many
structural tsunami defenses can be constructed,
evacuation is still the most important and effective
method for saving human lives.
• Land use policies for future development should be
used to avoid relocation to tsunami-prone areas.
Moving to the highland is good for tsunami disaster
reduction, but it is also important to evaluate other
hazards in sloped areas, for example landslides and
floods. Many examples of tsunami warning mes-
sages from people in the past are shown on
memorial stones, shrines, and temples, especially
along the Sanriku coast; these provide information
on tsunami heights, arrival times, and inundation
limits. These tsunami memorials are important for
building awareness and remembering past events,
and remain ready for possible future events.
Predictions of future population growth are also
necessary for designing countermeasures for the
100–1,000-year return-period tsunamis.
• It is important to develop both hard countermea-
sures, for example breakwaters, seawalls, and
tsunami gates, in conjunction with proper land
use and soft countermeasures, for example evacu-
ation plans and tsunami awareness education;
tsunami education can take the form of memorial
parks or hazard maps. These measures prepare
towns well for the next tsunami.
Acknowledgments
We express our deep appreciation to the Tokio Marine
and Nichido Fire Insurance Co., Ltd, through the
International Research Institute of Disaster Science
(IRIDeS) at Tohoku University, the Willis Research
Network under the pan Asian/Oceanian tsunami risk
modeling and mapping project, and the Ministry of
Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology
(MEXT) project for their financial support. Professor
Yalciner acknowledges the Turkish Chamber of Civil
Engineers and the TUBITAK 108Y227 Project for their
support. We would like to express special thanks to the
anonymous reviewers and editor for their comments on
improving the quality of the paper.
Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use,
distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original
author(s) and the source are credited.
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- Lessons Learned from the 2011 Great East Japan Tsunami: Performance of Tsunami Countermeasures, Coastal Buildings, and Tsunami Evacuation in Japan
Abstract
Introduction
Historical Tsunamis that have Affected the Sanriku Coast and Sendai Plain Areas
Tsunami Countermeasures
Tsunami Breakwaters
Seawalls
Tsunami Gates
Control Forests
Residential Structures
Residential Houses
Commercial and Public Buildings
Evacuation Buildings and Shelters
Tsunami Awareness and Disaster Mitigation
Tsunami Experience and Awareness
Self Evacuation
Residences on High Land
Tsunami Memorials
Tsunami Festivals
Conclusions, Lessons Learned and Recommendations
Acknowledgments
References
© The Author(s) 2011. This article is published with open access at Springerlink.com www.ijdrs.org www.springer.com/13753
Int. J. Disaster Risk Sci. 2011, 2 (1): 34–42
doi:10.1007/s13753-011-0004-9
ARTICLE
* Corresponding author. E-mail: yetao@bnu.edu.cn
The 2011 Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster:
Overview and Comments
Okada Norio1, Tao Ye2,*, Yoshio Kajitani1, Peijun Shi2, and Hirokazu Tatano1
1Disaster Prevention Research Institute, Kyoto University, Kyoto 611-011, Japan
2State Key Laboratory of Earth Surface Processes and Resource Ecology, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China
Abstract This article briefly reviews the causes and impacts
of the massive eastern Japan earthquake and tsunami of
11 March 2011, and comments on the response measures
taken by Japan to cope with this devastating disaster. Mass
losses occurred mostly because the intensity of the quake
and the induced tsunami exceeded local coping capacity.
Particularly, the nuclear power plant crisis triggered by the
tsunami significantly increased the short- and long-term
impacts of the disaster. While the coping capacity Japanese
society built after the 1995 Hanshin-Awaji great earthquake
tremendously mitigated the damages, there is room for
improvement despite Japan’s great efforts in this disaster.
Investigating the tsunami preparedness of the coastal nuclear
power plants is an issue of paramount importance. In response
to future large-scale disasters, there is an urgent need for a
highly collaborative framework based on which all available
resources could be mobilized; a mutual assistance and rescue
system against catastrophes among regions and countries
on the basis of international humanitarian aid; and further
in-depth research on the multi-hazard and disaster-chain
phenomenon in large-scale disasters and corresponding
governance approaches.
Keywords 2011 Eastern Japan Earthquake, earthquake-
tsunami disaster chain, Fukushima nuclear crisis, impact and
response
1 Introduction
On 11 March 2011, a magnitude 9.0 earthquake occurred in
the international waters of the western Pacific and induced a
huge tsunami. These natural disasters hit the northeastern part
of Japan and caused heavy casualties, enormous property
losses, and a severe nuclear crisis with regional and global
long-term impact. On April 1, the Japanese government
officially named the disaster “The 2011 Tōhoku Earthquake
and Tsunami” (東日本大震災, Higashi Nihon Daishinsai,
literally “Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster”).
2 Characteristics of the 2011 Japan
Earthquake and Tsunami
The main earthquake disaster hit Japan at 14:46 Tokyo time
on 11 March 2011. The epicenter was estimated at 38.322°N
and 142.369°E (Figure 1), merely 77 km (47.9 miles) off
the eastern coast of Japan’s Honshu island, 129 km from
Sendai, 177 km from Fukushima, and 373 km from Tokyo.
The hypocenter was at an underwater depth of 32 km
(19.9 miles).
According to the Japan Meteorological Agency (2011), the
magnitude estimate of this quake was initially 7.9, then
revised to 8.4, 8.8, 8.9, back to 8.8, and finally set at 9.0. The
data released by the United States Geological Survey was 8.8,
but revised to 8.9 the same day. On March 14, it was finally
set at 9.0. This 9.0 magnitude earthquake is the third highest
ever recorded in the world, after the 9.5 magnitude quake that
hit Chile in1960 and the 9.2 magnitude quake that hit Alaska
in 1964.
Figure 1. Epicenter of the 2011 Great Earthquake in Japan
Tokai and the hypocentral regions classified by the Earth-
quake Survey Committee, Japan
Source: Earthquake Survey Committee, Japan 2011.
Norio et al. The 2011 Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster 35
A number of foreshocks and aftershocks occurred before
and after the main quake. Several thousand quakes were
recorded by April 11. Relatively severe foreshocks and
aftershocks included a magnitude 7.2 foreshock on March 9,
and magnitude 7.0, 7.4, and 7.2 aftershocks at 15:06 Japan
Standard Time (JST), 15:15 JST, and 15:26 JST on March 11.
On April 7 and 11, magnitude 7.4 (revised to 7.1) and 7.1
aftershocks occurred.
The main quake triggered a massive, destructive tsunami
(Figure 2). It reached the eastern coast of Honshu, Japan
within a couple of minutes after the quake, and spilled into the
interior to a maximum distance of 10 km. It was estimated
that the tsunami wave was up to 38 m high (Kyodo News
2011), while field observation suggested that the record was
24 m, according to the figure released by the Port and Airport
Research Institute (2011) on March 23. Based on the analysis
of the Japan Meteorological Research Institute (JMRI 2011),
the wave source zone of the tsunami covered about 550 km
from north to south and about 200 km from east to west,
setting a record for the most extensive wave source zone
around the Japan Sea.
The tsunami caused by the quake affected almost the whole
Pacific coast, and over 20 countries on both sides of the
Pacific issued tsunami warnings, including Japan, Russia, the
Philippines, Indonesia, Australia, New Zealand, Papua New
Guinea, Fiji, Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, Costa Rica,
Nicaragua, Honduras, Panama, Columbia, Ecuador, Peru,
Chile, and the United States.
The quake released surface energy of 1.9 ± 0.5 × 1017J
(USGS Earthquake Hazards Program 2011a), two times that
of the Indonesia tsunami in 2004. The total energy released,
including shaking and the tsunami, amounted to 3.9 × 1022J
(USGS Earthquake Hazards Program 2011b), slightly lower
than that of the Indonesia tsunami, equivalent to 9.32 × 1012 t
of TNT or about 600 million times that of the Hiroshima atom
bomb.
Analysis of the USGS (USGS Earthquake Hazards
Program 2011b) showed that this earthquake was triggered
as the Pacific Plate slipped beneath Japan, while moving
towards the Eurasian Plate to the west. Before this disaster,
the Pacific Plate moved a few centimeters west away from the
North American Plate every year, which led to this large
earthquake as plate movement released energy.
The March 11 earthquake was induced by at least four dif-
ferent hypocenters slipping in a short period (see Figure 1).
Based on the aftershock records, these hypocenters
include not only Sanriku-Oki and Miyagiken-Oki, the two
hypocenters considered most likely to have slipped, but also
Fukushimaken-Oki and Ibaragiken-Oki. Such large-scale,
interrelated earthquakes had not been envisioned by many
earthquake experts.
3 Impacts of the 2011 Eastern Japan
Great Earthquake Disaster
3.1 Geophysical Impact
The violent shock resulting from the seismic intensity moved
the Honshu island of Japan about 3.6 m to the east, shifted the
earth’s axis by 25 cm, and accelerated the planet’s rotation
by 1.8 microseconds (Chai 2011; CBS News 2011). A total
of 400 km of Japan’s east coast has subsided about 0.6 m
because of the quake (Chang 2011). Ojika-hantou of
Miyagi-ken, located northwest of the epicenter, has moved
about 5.3 m southeast towards the epicenter, with a simulta-
neous subsidence of about 1.2 m. The World Meteorological
Organization has warned the Japanese government of poten-
tially more severe flood risk in the northeastern part of Japan
in the future (Xinhuanet 2011).
Figure 2. Tsunami caused by the 2011 Eastern Japan Great Earthquake
Source: NOAA 2011.
36 Int. J. Disaster Risk Sci. Vol. 2, No. 1, 2011
3.2 Humanitarian Impact
The influence exerted by the seismic event itself was not so
striking. Only one prefecture was impacted with a seismic
intensity of VII, and eight prefectures were impacted with a
seismic intensity greater than VI (Figure 3). But the losses
incurred by the earthquake and tsunami together were
extremely severe. According to statistical data from the Japan
National Police Agency (Table 1), by April 13, there were in
total 13,392 people dead nationwide and 15,133 missing.
More than 335,000 refugees in northeast Japan are lacking in
food, water, shelters, medical care, and even the necessary
means to conduct funerals for the deceased.i
3.3 Impact on Buildings
Up to April 3, there were 190,000 buildings damaged, among
which 45,700 were totally destroyed. The damaged buildings
in Miyagi, Iwate, and Fukushima were 29,500, 12,500,
and 2400, respectively (NHK World 2011). By April 13, the
number was further verified by the Japan Police Agency
and increased (Table 1). About 250 million tons of rubble and
debris were produced in Japan because of the earthquake and
tsunami disaster.
3.4 Impact on Key Infrastructures
Several nuclear power plants and thermal power plants were
heavily damaged in this disaster and details will be elaborated
later in this article. The power supply of the Tokyo Electric
Power Company (TEPCO) was reduced by 21 GW, causing
outages for 4.4 million families in eastern Japan (Japan
Times 2011; The Nikkei 2011). From March 14 to March 29,
TEPCO implemented rolling blackouts in most areas of
Tokyo. Meanwhile, with the support of Tokyo residents’
power-saving activities and temporary supply from steel
manufacturers’ power plants, rolling blackouts are expected
to be avoided throughout this summer (Japan Ministry of
Economy, Trade and Industry 2011).
The quake severely affected Japan’s transportation system.
After the quake, all ports in Japan were closed for a short
time, and the 15 ports impacted by the disaster were not
fully reopened until March 29 (Nihon Keizai Shimbun 2011).
Because of the quake, the northeastern part of the Tokaido
Shinkansen high-speed rail line was shut down and not
reopened to the public until March 24 (The Guardian 2011).
Sixty-two of the 70 railway lines run by the East Japan
Railway were affected to various degrees, and 23 railway
stations and seven lines were completely destroyed (Nihon
Keizai Shimbun 2011). The Sendai airport incurred massive
losses because it was attacked by the flood caused by the
tsunami one hour after the quake. Both Tokyo’s Narita and
Haneda airports were closed for about 24 hours (The Aviation
Herald 2011).
3.5 Economic Impact
It is estimated that 23,600 hectares of farmland were ruined
and 3–4 percent of the rice production in Japan was affected
in this great earthquake and tsunami disaster (Martin 2011).
Many large-scale manufacturers of automobiles (for example,
Toyota, Nissan, and Honda), steel (for example, Nippon
Steel), and chemicals (for example, Mitsubishi Kagagu) were
off production (Mainichi Daily News 2011), causing a
decline in global automobile production.
The Japan earthquake led to significant fluctuations in the
global financial markets. On the day of the earthquake, March
11, the Nikkei Stock Average dropped 5 percent (Reuters
2011), and it dropped another 1000 points (10.6 percent)
on March 15, when the seriousness of the nuclear accident
became clear (CNBC 2011). Subject to the earthquake,
Germany’s DAX index and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index
also decreased in varying degrees. But the main American
stocks experienced a slight increase of 0.5 to 0.7 percent. The
world’s largest reinsurers, Munich Re and Swiss Re were
speculated to suffer total reinsurance losses of 10 billion U.S.
dollars (Kucera 2011) even after the losses absorbed by
primary insurers and grants from the Japanese government.
The earthquake brought about the rapid appreciation of the
Japanese yen, and the yen against the U.S. dollar at one point
reached 76.25 yen to 1 U.S. dollar, the highest point since
World War II (BBC 2011). Appreciation of the yen is harmful
to the Japanese economy, which is heavily dependent on
exports.
The Industrial Production Index dramatically decreased by
15.5 percent compared to the index in February (Table 2). Not
Figure 3. Estimated seismic intensity from observation
stations right after 14:46 on 11 March 2011
Source: Japan Meteorological Agency 2011.
Seismic Epicenter
Norio et al. The 2011 Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster 37
Table 2. March 2011 Japan Industrial Production Index (100 in year 2005)
Item
Seasonally Adjusted Index Original Index
Index Changes from February (%) Index Changes from February (%)
Production† 82.7 -15.5 88.7 -13.1
Shipping‡ 85.0 -14.6 95.0 -12.1
Source: Japan Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry 2011 (Confirmed version reported on May 19).
†: Weighted average of the amount of major items (521 items) produced by the industrial sector. Weight of each item is determined by the added value for each
item with respect to the reference year (2005).
‡: Production items shipped from factories, a measurement for actual transaction of goods.
Table 1. Damage from the 2011 Eastern Japan Great Earthquake and Tsunami (as of April 13)
People impacted Buildings damaged Damaged
places on
roads
Bridges
damaged Prefecture
Death
toll
Missing Injured
Full
damage
Half
damage
Washed
away
Totally
burnt
Half
burnt
Hokkaido 1 3
Northeast Aomori 3 1 61 272 970 6 2
Iwate 3867 4101 154 18,742 1024 30 4
Miyagi 8190 8025 3055 36,772 3452 1006 23
Akita 12 9
Yamagata 2 29 37 80 21
Fukushima 1272 3003 240 2417 959
Tokyo 7 77 3 6 3 16 1
Kanto Ibaraki 23 1 691 711 3453 307 41
Tochigi 4 135 146 1142 257
Gunma 1 35 1 7
Saitama 42 5 1 1 160
Chiba 18 2 223 706 1636 3 3 321
Kanagava 4 128
Niigata 3
Yamanashi 2
Shizuoka 4
Central Gifu 1
Mie 1
Shikoku Tokushima
Kochi 1
Total 13,392 15,133 4896 59,806 12,728 6 7 4 2137 69
Source: Japan National Police Agency 2011 (excerpt from original table).
only the damaged area, but also the non-damaged areas were
suffering from scarcity of materials, and final demand
decreases. Because many industries in the upper streams
of the supply chains were located in Tohoku, the northeast
region of Honshu, and the northeast areas of the Kanto region
around greater Tokyo, their damages caused widely spreading
economic impacts, which were unforeseen by many crisis
managers.
According to an early evaluation by analysts, the earth-
quake disaster caused direct economic losses of about 171–
183 billion USD, while the significant cost for recovery might
reach 122 billion USD (Pagano 2011). On June 24, the Prime
Minister’s office crisis management center announced a rough
estimation of over 16 trillion yen for property damages alone
(Cabinet Office, Government of Japan 2011). This estimation
is based on the damage ratio of buildings of the 1995
Hanshin-Awaji earthquake. In the best case scenario (16
trillion yen), the total property damages are 14 trillion yen in
three prefectures in the Tohoku region alone. This amounts to
about 20 percent of the total economic value of property in
these three areas.
4 The Nuclear Power Plant Crisis
The earthquake and tsunami created a serious nuclear crisis.
Affected by the quake, the 11 nuclear power plants in north-
east Japan, including the first and second nuclear power plants
in Fukushima, and the nuclear power plants in Onagawa,
Genshiryoku, and Hatsudensho, automatically stopped oper-
ating their nuclear reactors. However, the cooling system of
the first nuclear power plant in Fukushima also stopped work-
ing because of the impact of the tsunami, causing the reactor
temperature to rise. Although the Japanese government and
38 Int. J. Disaster Risk Sci. Vol. 2, No. 1, 2011
the operator Tokyo Electric Power Company adopted a series
of measures, the nuclear accident gradually became a level 7
nuclear event, which is a major accident and the highest level
on the International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale
(INES), equivalent to the Chernobyl disaster in April 1986.
The radiation in the vicinity of the reactor rose steeply,
becoming a deadly threat to the local residents, as well as
polluting vegetables, milk, and water. TEPCO also released
tens of thousands of tons of low radiation nuclear pollution
water into the Pacific, resulting in grave concern and criticism
from neighboring countries.
The way that the nuclear incidents were triggered is plant-
specific. However, the most catastrophic consequences have
arisen from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, where three
units were exposed to level 7 accidents and one unit was
exposed to a level 3 incident. The critical issue in the crisis
became the cooling systems failures.
The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant mainly uses
reactors to boil water, lets the steam drive steam engines, and
returns the cooled water to the reactors to cool them down. In
the system, water immerses the fuel rods and cycles in the
system with radioactive isotopes. Under normal conditions
this is not a problem because the process occurs in a closed
cycle. None of the water, steam, and radioactive isotopes can
escape from the closed vessel.
The earthquake and subsequent tsunami broke the closed
cycle and delivered a deadly strike against the cooling system
(Figure 4). The cooling system was designed to be supported
with four different power supplies. The offsite power supply
from the power grid and the internal power supply from the
reactor were down because of the earthquake. The on-site fuel
generator started working once the other two power sources
failed, but was damaged by the tsunami wave. Emergency
back-up batteries appeared to be affected by the tsunami as
well, but could at most have lasted for eight hours even if they
had been spared from damage. As a result, the cooling system
stopped working and this triggered the set of extremely
severe consequences.
Due to the nature of the nuclear fuel used in the plant, the
core temperature of the reactors dropped only very slowly
after the cooling system was down because there was still
slow decay even after the reactors had gone off-line. The high
temperature turned most of the internal coolant water into
steam, which in turn exposed the fuel rods to air. Without the
provision of a cooling alternative, the high temperature would
have melted down the nuclear fuel rods. Fuel would escape
away from control rods, intensify decay, melt through the
reactor floor, and consequently induce a massive release of
radioactive isotopes, a worst case scenario.
In order to avoid the most catastrophic consequences,
operators of the plant tried to inject coolant water from
external sources (first seawater, later freshwater). The injecte d
external coolant water, however, was then turned into steam
and further increased the vessel pressure, which hampered
water injection. As a result, operators had to bleed-off pres-
sure, which resulted in hydrogen explosions and the release
of radioactive isotopes from the vessel. Radioactive isotopes
released from Fukushima were later detected in North
America and other regions in the world. Coolant water that
did not escape the vessel in the form of steam accumulated in
the bottom of the reactors in highly radioactive form. These
waters either leaked or were released by the operator into
the Pacific Ocean. Widespread radioactive pollution was
created. Worse yet, though countermeasures were adopted,
the fuel rods in units 1, 2, and 3 of the plant were reported to
have experienced major damage and possibly fully melted
(TEPCO 2011a, 2011b; CNN 2011). The long-term impact of
the nuclear crisis to Japan, the Asia-Pacific region, and the
entire world is still not fully revealed.
Figure 4. Illustrative chart of the 2011 Fukushima nuclear crisis
Norio et al. The 2011 Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster 39
5 National and International Response
5.1 Response of Japan
After the earthquake, a countermeasure office was immedi-
ately set up in the Prime Minister’s office crisis management
center. The Japanese government established a special head-
quarters for emergent disasters headed by Prime Minister
Naoto Kan. At the press conference on April 13, the Prime
Minister declared that it was the most serious disaster in
Japan after World War II. The other main response head-
quarters, also lead by the Prime Minister, was set up for the
nuclear crisis. These two headquarters became the main
decision-making bodies on crisis management.
The Japanese government also established a government
emergency response headquarters headed by Foreign
Minister Matsumoto. He said that Tokyo welcomes foreign
countries to provide any assistance to Japan, and Japanese
government would check foreigners in Japan and confirm
security situation of the embassies in Tokyo.
The Japanese government also established a countermea-
sure headquarters against disasters headed by the Defense
Minister, Toshimi Kitazawa. On April 13, the Japanese Prime
Minister Naoto Kan asked the Ministry of Defense to send out
100,000 self-defense officers to participate in rescue work.
The total number of troops mobilized, including those provid-
ing logistics, was 180,000, the largest number dispatched by
the Japan Self-Defense Forces since World War II.
On April 14, the Bank of Japan (the Central Bank) held
a monetary policy meeting, discussing the new monetary
easing policy to be implemented after the Eastern Japan Great
Earthquake Disaster. On March 14, 15, 17, and 22, the Bank
of Japan successively injected capital of up to 4 trillion yen in
cash into the market (Wearden 2011).
5.2 International Involvement
After the quake, Japan specifically requested quake rescue
teams from Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, the United
Kingdom, and the United States (Nebehay 2011). It also
requested satellite images of available types of the quake and
tsunami regions according to the International Charter on
Space and Major Disasters.
By March 30, 134 countries and regions and 39 interna-
tional organizations had expressed their willingness to
provide aid to Japan (Figure 5). Twenty-three countries
and regions sent out rescue teams and experts on nuclear
accidents. The statistical data released by the Narita branch
of Tokyo Customs on March 29 showed that, in total, 190
batches and 1300 tons of relief goods from 29 countries and
regions arrived at Narita Airport between March 12 and 25.
Of these 190 batches, 60 were from China, 40 from the
United States, 30 from Thailand, and 20 from Korea. The
major types of goods included food, blankets, mineral water,
radiation protection suits, and emergency lamps. By April 3
the Japanese Red Cross had received over one billion USD in
donations in response to the disaster, and dispatched more
than 200 emergency relief teams to the disaster zone.
The earthquake-tsunami induced nuclear crisis has been
of grave concern. Many countries started to evacuate their
citizens from the northern part of Japan right after the disaster.
UN agencies were widely involved in the nuclear issue,
including the World Health Organization (WHO), the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the World
Meteorological Organization (WMO), the International
Maritime Organization (IMO), the International Civil Avia-
tion Organization (ICAO), the World Tourism Organization
(UNWTO), and the International Labor Organization (ILO).
The WHO together with the Food and Agriculture Organiza-
tion (FAO) conducts inspections and provides information
on (sea)food safety after the nuclear accident. The IAEA
Briefing on the Fukushima Nuclear Accident is updated on a
daily basis since the quake (IAEA 2011). Tourists and other
visitors to Japan are advised by the IMO, ICAO, UNWTO,
and Japanese government agencies on travel and transport
from and to Japan by air or sea.
Figure 5. Countries and regions expressed willingness to provide aid to Japan after the 2011 Earthquake disaster
Source: Wikipedia 2011.
40 Int. J. Disaster Risk Sci. Vol. 2, No. 1, 2011
6 Comments and Discussion
6.1 Prepared for the Expected
After the Great Hanshin Earthquake in 1995, the Japanese
government and society profoundly reflected on the precau-
tions that needed to be taken against earthquake disasters.
Many new measures became the solid foundation for Japan to
cope with this most recent earthquake-tsunami catastrophe to
some degree.
For example, Japan attaches great importance to scientific
research and technological development on disaster preven-
tion and mitigation. The Japan Meteorological Agency oper-
ates the world’s first earthquake early warning system, which
can warn the Japanese people ahead of a quake. It also can
detect seismic waves near the epicenter, and send out early
warnings through national television and radio networks,
even through mobile phones. On the day of the main quake,
alarm was sounded around 80 seconds before the beginning
of shaking in Tokyo area.
In Japan there are various ways for the public to get access
to disaster information—by mass media and cell phone
services, for example. The Japanese media have developed a
rapid and systematic reporting system for disaster situations,
and will promptly disclose all kinds of useful information
whenever a natural disaster occurs. Japan also invests heavily
in public disaster education, making one of the highest disas-
ter risk aware populations in the world. With the help of
disaster preparedness training carried out in communities,
the Japanese people have developed the skills and habits of
self-relief.
The Self-Defense Troops are granted much power by the
government in response to disasters. This is a significant gain
from the experience of the Hanshin-Awaji earthquake. In
response to the Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster,
the Self-Defense Troops played an indispensible role in orga-
nizing emergency response actions and accomplished many
in-field missions. All of these preparations constituted a solid
foundation for the Japanese to raise evacuation rates during
the tsunami disaster and reduce the loss of lives.
Japan is also implementing one of the most stringent con-
struction standards in the world, with intensively reinforced
residential buildings, bridges, and other infrastructures. It is
worth noting that Japan is a leader in earthquake proofing
nuclear plants, although a severe nuclear crisis was induced
by the earthquake-triggered tsunami. All nuclear reactors
automatically stopped operating after the quake. The building
damages and the nuclear plant crisis were induced by the
tsunami rather than the quake per se.
6.2 Prepared Beyond the Expected: Where to Go from
Here
The 2011 earthquake-tsunami was so severe that it went
far beyond the expectation and coping capacity of Japanese
society. The quake was of high magnitude and the energy
released was huge. The tsunami triggered by the earthquake
critically overwhelmed the coping capacity of the stricken
areas. Preparedness is based on expectation and prediction,
which had not taken into account the extreme situation that
actually unfolded. From that standpoint Japan is not prepared
enough.
First, the disaster impact easily overwhelmed local coping
capacity. Although local evacuation centers and public build-
ings were available for the local people, there were cases in
which many old people died because they were not able to
evacuate quickly. In the field survey conducted by the
authors, some concrete buildings stood after the tsunami
disaster, which potentially could have become emergent
evacuation shelters if they had been reinforced/upgraded.
Although disaster evacuation drills were held regularly
in many local communities, they were not helpful to all
segments of the population because the evacuation centers
were not easily accessible for many old people and it was dif-
ficult for them to be really involved in these drills. Emergency
evacuation plans and drills require further improvement.
Second, Japan is not prepared for a truly “mega” disaster.
Experiences in other countries have shown that a large-scale
disaster cannot be coped with solely by local capacities and
aid from outside of the stricken region is indispensible. In
this earthquake disaster, the damaged/affected areas were
so extensive that clusters of local governments for cities and
prefectures were paralyzed. Not only the public sectors, but
also many private sectors were unable to provide adequate
services during this disaster due to damaged infrastructures.
These services include providing energy, food and water, and
medical treatment. A typical example of these difficulties is
the power frequency difference between East Japan and West
Japan. In Kansai area the frequency of electricity is 60 Hz,
while in Kanton area it is 50 Hz. Though there are two
stations able to covert frequency, the capacity is limited to
1 GW, far below the drop due to power plant failure.
Third, Japan’s response system is not as efficient as it
could be. A valuable lesson drawn from the Chinese experi-
ence in dealing with the Wenchuan Earthquake in 2008 (Shi
et al. 2009) is the significance of centralized power in coping
with large-scale disasters. In this earthquake-tsunami disaster,
the Japanese government appeared not as powerful as had
been expected in resolving many issues, particularly with
respect to the nuclear crisis. Coordination between the
government (emergency response headquarters), the Tokyo
Electric Power Company, and the nuclear and industrial
safety agency were not sufficiently organized. Information
was not simultaneously shared right after the disaster, which
delayed efficient decision making.
Finally, Japan, as well as probably all nuclear countries in
the world, is not truly prepared for nuclear crises. Although
there were two types of back-up power supply available in the
Fukushima nuclear power plant, they simply failed because
they were as vulnerable as the major power supply systems.
“Backup” did not make sense in this case. Obviously, a major
tsunami was not in the plan of the designer and operator of the
Norio et al. The 2011 Eastern Japan Great Earthquake Disaster 41
plant. This is a serious mistake because these plants are
located exactly in the coastal and earthquake-prone region of
the country.
6.3 Prepared for Unexpected Large-Scale Disasters
Several issues regarding the governance of large-scale
disaster risk arise from the experience of the Eastern Japan
Great Earthquake Disaster.
(1) The severity and unexpectedness of large-scale disas-
ters require a global, synergic, and efficient response system.
The response needs to mobilize all available resources, from
public and private sectors, affected and unaffected areas,
domestic and abroad. The response needs to highly coordi-
nate all disaster response entities so that the synergic effect is
achieved. The response must be founded on rational strategies
with orderly and efficient arrangements based on the
emergency plans. In this sense, centralized power in the face
of large-scale disasters is indispensible.
(2) The regionalized and globalized impacts of large-scale
disasters call for a new international platform to cope jointly.
The recent experiences of catastrophes worldwide imply that
the impact of a catastrophe is no longer confined to the
affected areas but spreads around the world in the context of
globalization. The mismanagement of the affected countries
will bring about serious consequences for the surrounding
countries or even the whole world.
The radioactive contamination caused by the nuclear
accident following the earthquake and tsunami is affecting
the rest of the world through atmospheric circulation. The
polluted water released by the Tokyo Electric Power
Company is likely to affect the entire Pacific Ocean in the
coming decades. In the long term, impacts of radiation should
be carefully monitored and assessed based on data derived
from previous nuclear accidents and state-of-the-art medical
knowledge. International frameworks are required to do so.
The Japanese economic instability caused by the quake
affects the yen and Japan’s domestic economy, which draws
attention from the G7 (Group of Seven) that is already plan-
ning to intervene against the yen when necessary. Moreover,
the existing international framework of humanitarian aid
cannot meet the demand of coping with large-scale disasters.
A mutual assistance system that incorporates a higher degree
of international involvement in coping with large-scale
disasters should be established.
(3) The complexity of the catastrophic impact urges us to
conduct further studies on multi-hazard and disaster-chain
issues. Due to the super-energy released in the catastrophe,
many regional physical-geographical factors are likely to
cross critical thresholds of balance and create secondary
hazards, which will transmit and enlarge the disaster in the
form of disaster chains to an extent beyond regional endur-
ance. In the 2008 Wenchuan Earthquake in China, for exam-
ple, the quake generated a huge amount of loose soil and
rocks, inducing landslides and debris flow. In the Eastern
Japan Great Earthquake Disaster, what mattered most was not
the quake but the tsunami as well as the nuclear crisis that it
triggered. The chained-triggering phenomenon is similar to
other catastrophes in recent years. It is also a critical reason
that large-scale disasters generally claimed huge losses.
Therefore, it is necessary to study the formation mechanism
of disaster chains and issue region-specific precautions
against potential disaster chains.
(4) Key infrastructures require more robust systems
planning and design. Here key infrastructures refer to those
that can largely facilitate disaster relief efforts, for example,
life-line projects and transportation hubs, or those that create
serious threats, such as nuclear power plants and major water
dams. Failure of a key infrastructure would lead to the failure
of an entire system. In most cases problems only need to
occur in one or several small but critical components. The
power supply for the cooling system is only a subsystem of
the Fukushima power plant, but its failure collapsed the entire
system and was fatal. Event tree analysis, network analysis,
and systems engineering will be necessary for understanding
this issue.
Note
i NHK, March 17, 04:01 am. Evacuees by prefecture: Miyagi- 205,418,
Fukushima- 64,040, Iwate- 44,433, Yamagata- 2217, Aomori- 371,
Akita- 40, Ibaraki- 12,347, Chiba- 1010, Tochigi- 1696, Gunma- 63,
Saitama- 107, Niigata- 3200, Nagano- 1579.
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