Raw Japan

from Ben Gruber:

My experience covering Japan’s earthquake and tsunami.

People have been asking me about my recent coverage of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, wondering what sticks out in my memory. After some reflection, one part of my experience keeps rising to the top - the mountain tunnels.

The Reuters multimedia team was based in the north-east town of Tono, a small mountain town situated above the coastline. Tono had an eerie feeling to it, almost all of the shops and restaurants were closed. But you wouldn't know the town had been rocked by a massive earthquake. There were no physical signs.

Every morning we would wake up early and pile into cars for the drive down to the coast.

To get from Tono to the coastal areas you need to drive through several massive tunnels, some stretching as long as 5kms. These tunnels would normally be well lit and ventilated but that wasn't the case any longer. They were pitch black inside and even with the windows shut tight; you couldn't help but get extremely nauseous from petrol fumes.

In my mind the tunnels were like gateways. When you enter, you leave behind Japan's picturesque mountain country and drive through a void that seems to never end. When you finally see the light on the other side you are greeted by a scene that can only be described as an apocalyptic nightmare. No matter how many times I made this trip, the scene that awaited me on the other end of the tunnels never ceased to amaze me in the worst way possible.

You have all seen the images. Whole towns washed away and massive ships amid debris where those towns should have been. Thousands of survivors piled into shelters still very much in shock. You ask these kind people how they are coping. What will they do? Nine times out of ten, the answer was "I don't really know".

“Sorry” excuse for tsunami

Japanese weather forecasters might have been expected to be cheery after a tsunami that hit the country’s coast on Sunday proved smaller than feared.

Instead, the agency apologised for “crying wolf” when it urged some 1.5 million people to evacuate ahead of a possible major tsunami.

Experts defended the agency’s decision to warn that waves of 3 metres (9 ft 10 in) or more might strike Japan’s Pacific coast after a huge earthquake hit Chile, but acknowledged the risk of making residents blase about the danger next time.

“In the end, (the warning) was a bit excessive. I would like to apologise for the fact that the warning lasted so long,” Jiji news agency quoted Japan Meteorological Agencyofficial Yasuo Sekita as telling a news conference after all warnings and advisories had been lifted, some 25 hours after the first alert.

Tsunami warnings are common in Japan, one of the world’s most earthquake-prone countries, but Sunday’s alert was the first for a major tsunami in 17 years and only the fourth since 1952.

The alert came after the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center (PTWC) had issued a Pacific-wide warning that included Hawaii and stretched across the ocean from South America to the Pacific Rim.

Another Sunday night on the Pacific Ring of Fire

Sunday night’s strong but uneventful 6.9 magnitude earthquake reminded all in greater Tokyo that these are indeed volatile times, tectonically speaking.

It was also a reminder of the advantages of Japan’s intense preparation for if – or when — the “Big One” does indeed come. As usual, train lines immediately stopped service while media reports of the quake and its Japanese scale rating of “4″ flashed within moments of the long temblor. Email and twitter-ing would have reached that magnitude when the Richter scale numbers were broadcast overseas.

Japan, which sits on the Pacific “Ring of Fire” and logs 20 percent of the world’s earthquakes of magnitude 6 or greater, is by no means blase about such activity, as major disasters have claimed thousands of lives and resulted in hundreds of billions of dollars in damage over the last 15 years.

There is a bit of a surfers’ mentality about the less destructive rumblings, though, which come with a frequency ripe for comparison, anecdote or even deception. For example, when I try to sleep in the car as my family shops (known as the Tokyo taxi driver position), they often return and shake the car from behind, simulating tectonic rumblings.

I’ve fallen for this one too many times to recount, so after they went into a supermarket on Sunday evening and the rolling began, I laughed. Then I shouted out the window that they could stop, and actually opened the car door peeved as it continued. But no family.

Instead, they were standing in front of the melon display inside, experiencing the same shaking as me while a store speaker blared the specifics of the seismic event, and where a human phalange of staff quickly emerged, ostensibly ready to throw themselves in front of any rolling — and expensive — melons.

Thankfully, the tremors ceased, the store and all Japan remained standing, and the melon ended on a different kind of moving plate, to the satisfaction of all.