Japan Earthquake 2011

Information on Earthquake

If you are going to Japan, we strongly encourage you to contact the Canadian Embassy and or Canadian Consulate General in Japan to provide them with your latest contact information.

Japanese earthquake and tsunami : cause, effects reactors - could it happen here? [ pdf document ]

Important message regarding UVic students in Japan [ click ]

Travel Advisory
[ Assistance for Canadians in Japan ]
[ Travel Report for Japan ]

The link for a [ new Japan quake map ] .
This is similar to the “time lapse” map we had of Christchurch (the developer is from the U. of Canterbury in Christchurch). It’s interesting that there are a few smaller quakes before the big one hits. We are now at the one week mark, and there have been well over 500 aftershocks – many of them quite sizeable. It gives you an idea of difficult it is to respond while the ground continues to shake.

Really helps to show the level of devastation! [ Before and After Digital Images ] - run your mouse over the pictures.

Professor Katsuhiko Endo’s reflections

While the media outside Japan has been praising Japanese in their reaction to this disaster, it seems that it does not apply to the way in which the government handles the nuclear crisis in Fukushima prefecture, which happens to be my homet...own. The situation shows no sign of improvement yet and the lack of the appropriate decision and action by the Japanese government is much of media focus.

Actually, my mother is in Fukushima right now. She lives in the place called Aizu, 95 km west of the nuclear plants. Aizu is now the evacuation center. I’ve been frequently contacting her and the other friends there in order to get as much information as I can. Also, the special message board was open on the internet for the information exchange among the locals and, through it, I have been hearing the voices of the people who actually saw and experienced the disaster on the coastal side. I would like to share it with you here in Canada, mixing it with the latest news from Japanese media.
Following is the latest news from the English edition of the Asahi Shinbun, a leading national newspaper in Japan:

The crisis at the No. 1 Fukushima nuclear power plant was quickly running out of control Tuesday, after two explosions, a fire and dangerous levels of radiation compounded the problems at four of its six reactors.

This summarizes the current situation of not just the No. 1 but three more. Nevertheless, the high level of radiation around the area has been preventing almost any effort to put it under control. The Japanese edition of Asahi just said that the fire needed to be extinguished as quickly as possible in order to cool down the reactors; but the dangerous level of radiation prevents the workers from going in there and actually doing so. According to Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS), the current crisis level is 6, the se! cond hig hest.

The lack and inappropriateness of the disclosure of the information by the government as well as Tokyo Denryoku, Tokyo Electric Power Company, have been criticized by many, including the ones who have been actually involved in the development of nuclear power in Japan. According to Nikkei Shinbun, Japan’s leading economic newspaper, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) finally requested from the government “faster supply of the more detailed information” about the crisis yesterday. They criticized the Japanese government by saying, “they are ‘even’ behind radio and TV.” Some also claim that, while the government may be limiting the circulation of information in order to avoid the panic, it has been causing increasing speculation and false rumours (largely through internet) and, ironically, amplifying fear and anxiety among the people.

Last time I saw the news about it yesterday, the number of people who were exposed to the dangerous level of radiation had already exceeded 20. The health examinations for the evacuees has been going on in many places in my neighbourhood in Aizu; the school gyms, town halls, the hospitals, university, etc., etc., But, all of them will be packed soon. Including the ones who lost their homes by the earthquake and Tsunami in Miyagi and Iwate Prefectures, the total number of evacuees has already exceeded 400,000 and it will certainly increase more. Two days ago, 26,000 people were still on the tops of office buildings, waiting for fire fighters and the Self Defense Army to come to their rescue. Heavy snow started hitting the Tohoku area yesterday and it has been making the already devastating situation even severe, especially for the elderly who occupy the large portion of population in Tohoku like many other agricultural regions in the developed countries.

The word that you see most often in media and internet is “ライフ・ライン (lifeline).” This is the key word right now from the kids in the! element ary school to their grandpas and grandmas. That should tell you how tight the sully of subsistence is already, and it will certainly get tighter as time goes by. Especially, the lack of the supply of gasoline seems most serious. The government needed to ask the people to stop the speculative stocking of food and supplies. Along with the potential effect of radiation on the body, the information about gas stations occupies much of space on the local message board on internet I mentioned above.

In this first report, I have nothing optimistic to write about. The actual situation is way worse than what the foreign (and even domestic) media has been reporting, and it is absolutely nonsense to talk about the prospect of “quicker recovery” with the same, old Orientalist rhetoric as the mainstream media in North America has been putting up. Praising or accusing the uniqueness of the “Japanese race” and its “mystic power” does not help the situation at all: it simply makes the capable people here and there incapable of seeing the situation straight, and prevents them from taking action to help the situation.

I am not saying that the people in Japan do not have any special talent. I guess that the kind of “Japanese culture” in question here can be called “組織力 (organizational power)” or “チームワーク (teamwork).” Actually, I have been quite impressed by what I’ve been witnessing on the local message board on the internet. People are exchanging information, sending warnings, providing scientific analyses of the situation, etc., etc. Also, by using social media, they are organizing volunteer groups for the evacuees without any orders from the local government.

I’ve been impressed by my locals but about a month ago, during that 18 “days,” I was also impressed by the youth and women in Tahiar Square in Cairo for exactly the same reason. Reducing the “secret” of this positive pheno! menon to “Japanese uniqueness” would certainly prevent these young leaders all over the world, both men and women, from cooperating with each other beyond the boundaries of race, ethnicity, gender, and sexuality while such cooperation is absolutely necessary for Japan to survive the biggest crisis in its long history.
The organizational power or, teamwork, is already there. All Japanese (including myself), as well as the people outside who want to help, are adding one more “talent” to this already “tuned-up” power. It is the power to overcome cultural/racial particularism and to become able to cooperate with others in the different cultures.

I am going to wrap up this first report by quoting the words from Dr. Timothy Iles, a professor in Pacific and Asian Studies who specializes in Japanese culture. I believe that those words summarize what this “new power” is all about:

…fundamentally this is a situation involving diverse communities composed of individuals with a vast collection of specific abilities and limitations--and, like communities everywhere in times of crisis, the very heterogeneous aspect of the people involved will be the biggest strength and hindrance to the process of surviving this event.