Tohoku, Japan 8

 Onagawa   March 31, 2011


 I entered Onagawa in the morning of March 31 2011.

Onagawa is a small town located just about a mile east from Ishinomaki City, the town is sandwiched between a bay and mauntains
Although Onagawa and Ishinomaki City are right next to each other, situation there are totally different.


 When I first saw the town, I was speechless..... whole town was just gone, I could not even image how the town looked like.


 There is a good size hospital on top of a hill in the center of the town, now it's a shelter for the victims, I went there first to take a look at the town from higher ground.

A view from top of the hill.

This man was working to control traffic at parking lot of the hospital. He is a local here in Onagawa. After he heard the news that tsunami is coming, he fled to here by driving his car. The hill is about 55 feet higher than sea level so he thought he is going to be ok there but he was wrong. The water came over the hill top so he had to run to second floor of the hospital.
He said he saw everything from the top.
By the time, the parking lot was packed by cars and all washed away, people were still there in some of the cars. You can see some concrete buildings in the back, he said he saw a lot of people on roof top evacuating and after the tsunami they were all gone.....

She was walking with heavy bags in middle of nowhere, well this place used be lots of houses and stores, so I asked where she is going. She said she is on her way back from her relative's house to a shelter. She's got some clothe and stuffs she needs from her relative.

They are a troop from India called NDRF. They said they are not military forces, they are specialized for rescue missions. 

The captain of NDRF.
When I was taking this photo, there were about 10 NDRF personnels working behind me on top of rubbles, one of them yelled that they found a human body underneath.  

In front of his shop, trying to clean up. He has to work in morning time because this area sank 3 feet by the earthquake, will covered by water when high tide. 

Inside of the shop. The shop used be a dealer/maintenance for farm machines. 

Salvaging car and debris from seabed. 

He said the salvage ship is from Ishinomaki. They have to clean up the seabed so that more bigger ships can come in and out to transport materials.

They evacuated to Sendai City, about 50 miles from Onagawa, came back to town 3 weeks after.
They were grieving that they can not recall how the town was like from it is now after tsunami.

A husband and a wife. Behind them was where the wife's parents' house used to be. Parents are not found yet after 3 weeks.
They come here every day to search for parents' bodies and anything remains from the house for keepsake.
Thay said chances are low to find parents' body near  here because they know bodies can travel tens of miles by water flow.
They were shedding tears while they were talking about their stories. Then when I asked for a photo, they smiled at my camera to show they are going to be alright.