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00:06Friday, March 11, 2011 started as a very ordinary day.
00:17There was this big,
00:30deep bass rumbling.
00:37We had no idea what was going on.
00:52And then we were just watching this wave, thinking, oh my goodness,
00:58this is really bad.
00:59Oh my goodness, this is really bad.
01:19At the Fukushima第一 nuclear power plant, one of the workers was handling radio active waste, and all the lights go
01:28out.
01:37And suddenly we were at the center of the world's biggest story.
01:51Oh my goodness.
01:54Oh my goodness.
02:14So yeah, I managed to find my portfolio 25th of January, 2011.
02:23So about two months before it happened.
02:28I was nine years old.
02:30I was born in Japan.
02:31So even though my mom and dad are French and English, I would say sort of in my heart,
02:36because I lived there for 13 years, I was born there, I grew up there, I would say at heart
02:40I'm Japanese.
02:46I was the Tokyo bureau chief for the Financial Times newspaper.
02:51I'd been working there for a few years, having been a correspondent in China and Taiwan, in the region as
02:59well.
03:01Japan has a very distinct and very interesting society and a very rich culture.
03:08So it's a great place to live and work.
03:17Around 300 kilometers north of Tokyo lies the coastal city of Ishinomaki.
03:27Richard Halberstadt taught English at the university.
03:31I was born in Reading in the UK, but I've lived in Japan for over 30 years now.
03:38Here in Ishinomaki City.
03:43Ishinomaki is the very typical small city.
03:49Its main industry is fisheries.
03:51And the reason I came to like it is not so much because of the place,
03:55but because of the people who were really warm and welcoming.
04:07Ryoko Endo was a nursing assistant.
04:10I was born in Tokyo in Nakano.
04:15I met my wife in Tokyo and I met my wife in Tokyo.
04:21I married 10 years ago,
04:24and I moved to my wife to my wife's house.
04:31I was very close to the sea from the sea,
04:33and there was a family of my wife's house.
04:40My wife and my wife,
04:45and my wife,
04:45and my children.
04:47I lived together with my friends.
05:00March 11th is spring vacation for the university,
05:04so we weren't teaching or anything like that.
05:07But for some reason, I don't know why,
05:09when I woke up,
05:10I didn't really have much to do at the university,
05:12but thought I'd go in anyway.
05:15I was working in the hospital,
05:18and I was going to work in the hospital.
05:20and I was probably coming in before I起こった,
05:27and I had to go to school,
05:29and I was going to work in the hospital.
05:30the children were getting the most power to my mother and mother.
05:34I found out to school,
05:35and I was going to go to school.
05:43us it was just like any other Friday my brother he was three years old I think so then he
05:52was
05:52still going to nursery I was getting ready for primary school and my mom would cycle me
06:00I loved school a lot we had karaoke Friday which was a thing we had in the afternoons
06:06I was really looking forward to it was really fun
06:16it had actually been a fairly quiet period for news in Japan and one of my colleagues was wondering
06:22when things would heat up again and we'd start getting articles in decent places in the paper
06:29we had no idea what was going to happen next
06:37along the coast 40 kilometers west of Ishinomaki is the sprawling city of Sendai
06:45where you Muroga was preparing for an afternoon delivering medical supplies
06:53we had a very close house in the morning at home and in the morning
07:02we used to stop living in the morning and we had a very close job
07:03it was at home so we were taking some coffee
07:05we had a really close to the kitchen
07:06we were going to start with a lunch
07:12we had to go to the kitchen
07:15so we had to go to the kitchen
07:19we were walking back to the kitchen
07:21It was a high-quality system, and it was a high-quality system to set up a video camera for
07:28a house.
07:36When I entered the signal at the first time, the car was going to hit the car.
07:58I was sitting at my desk in our office building on the 21st floor in the Hibiya business district and
08:08suddenly I felt the rattling and the beginning of the sway.
08:26It started to tremble, it started to shake, all the way from nursing we would do drills, we would practice
08:36going underneath the tables, going to frames, like door frames,
08:41as a way to protect. Teacher just said, alright everyone, there's no desks, no tables in that room, so just
08:48huddle together in the middle of the room and we'll just wait for it to pass.
09:08When the shaking started, then it was just so bad that I had to just clutch hold of my desk
09:16to just stay standing.
09:27All the books were flying off my shelves, which was pretty terrifying.
09:38And when it goes by and it's still continuing to shake and then the trembling gets worse and worse and
09:44stronger.
09:47I had a fan that was above my head and a screw came loose and so it was just flinging
09:52and this one screw that was left.
09:55And I was thinking for myself, I hope that doesn't fall on me.
10:06It was very quickly apparent that this was a powerful earthquake and it was growing in power.
10:24The magnitude 9 earthquake was the strongest ever recorded in Japan.
10:30Local government officer Teruo Okono was working near Ishinomaki.
10:36I was working in the city of St. Kami-chami.
10:40I started working on the city of St. Kami-chami.
10:52The destination of St. Kami-chami.
10:55I saw a full-time fire and it turned out ofmi.
10:55There was a lot of noise, and the computer was on top of it, and it was on top of
11:03it.
11:05It was a little bit of an accident.
11:08I think it was probably 3 minutes later on.
11:15I thought that I was thinking about it.
11:25when I think when everything just got worse it started to drag on for a while
11:31and the shaking became much worse and then we could see our teachers
11:35expressions that that's when I think we knew something was wrong
11:53we didn't realize how bad this was and how bad it was going to be of course I worried about
12:01my mom
12:02and my dad and but I remember my main worry at the time was my brother and because he was
12:08at nursery
12:10and just you don't know it how your family is you don't know if they're safe if they've been injured
12:19I mean the power of the earthquake was extraordinary and we in Tokyo felt it as something extraordinary
12:31but if you were along the coast much closer to the epicenter it was for many people
12:38absolutely terrifying and right on that coast sat one of the world's largest nuclear power stations
12:48Fukushima Daiichi decontamination worker Yukio Shirahige was in a building at the edge of the site
12:58oh my god
13:00em
13:01you know
13:02you know
13:04you know
13:11you know
13:13That's what I think it's important to me.
13:15That's when the earthquake happened.
13:19The earthquake happened.
13:27The earthquake happened.
13:32There was a earthquake.
13:35There was a earthquake.
13:37There was a earthquake.
13:41But the area is getting worse, and we can't even stand on the ground.
13:54When the earthquake hit, safety systems automatically shut down the three active reactors.
14:01So, very crudely, the earthquake caused damage to the plant, but nothing that alone would have caused a crisis.
14:15For example, one part is that it destroyed a pylon and broke the connection that the plant had to the
14:23national grid.
14:24And it's one of the features of nuclear power plants of the type used at Fukushima Daiichi,
14:33that they need electricity to keep the reactors and the spent fuel that's kept in cooling ponds cool.
14:44After the chain reaction has stopped, it needs to be cooled down for a long time.
14:52Even though there was no power coming in from outside, there were emergency generators starting to kick in
15:00and providing electricity to pump in the coolants of the reactor.
15:09With diesel generators keeping the fuel cool, plant operators hoped the worst was over.
15:18But the six minute long quake left the whole country on edge.
15:25When the shaking eventually stopped, I think the teachers were trying to figure out what to do.
15:34I'd asked my teachers if I could be let go and they said, yep, that's fine.
15:38So, I got my bicycle and I started to cycle to my mum's office to try and find her.
15:46As I'm trying to get up this hill, I just remember feeling this panic of,
15:52it doesn't matter if something falls on me, it falls on me, I've got to get to my mum's office.
15:59I wasn't sitting on my bicycle, I was standing trying to get there as quickly as possible.
16:06Trying to dodge through people who are coming out into the streets as well
16:10and just feeling this feeling of panic and I need to get to my mum, I need to get to
16:15my mum.
16:23300km north, in coastal Sendai city, Yuma-roga was still on the road.
16:31There is a pretty heavy wind in the route of the wind.
16:37But when I was as a river to the river,
16:40it was also a river that didn't do not have to.
16:42And what I've experienced was,
16:49and I've missed the river that they had on the road.
16:50I used to have a river that was a river that was a river.
16:51At that time, the road was a river that there was a river that is up to me,
16:54so a river's river that could get down,
16:54but the river was around.
17:03The storm has still been in the middle of the day.
17:08The storm has been in the middle of the day.
17:15The storm has been in the middle of the day.
17:20It has been a lot of concern with the storm.
17:34We didn't have any news, we had no idea what was going on, and I didn't really have a chance
17:43to be worried about anyone, because everything was just happening all at the same time, and
17:49it was all so surreal that we were kind of just more occupied with coping for ourselves.
17:56Riyoko Endo was on the fifth floor of the hospital.
18:00It was a big hit, and there were a lot of things, and the patients were scared, so we were
18:09scared.
18:30My mom's office is on the fourth floor of the office building.
18:36But the lifts aren't working, so I was running up the stairs, and I remember just bursting
18:42into her office.
18:45It was such a relief to see her.
18:48I just ran straight into her arms, and I think I just cried.
18:54We cycled home together, and I remember seeing my brother, and that feeling of, thank goodness
19:02he's all right.
19:08The earthquake's epicentre was traced to the ocean floor, around 80 kilometres east of
19:14Ishinomaki.
19:17So the immediate aftermath of the earthquake for us was realising that we were actually not
19:26at the centre of it, and as soon as the Japanese television was reporting, as they did quite
19:36quickly, that the epicentre was off the coast, then it became possible that a damaging tsunami
19:45could be on the way.
19:50We were all gathered together, first in the university canteen, and then when the tsunami
19:58warning was issued, then that meant we should get to higher ground.
20:09So we all moved to a big classroom on the third floor.
20:16There was so much happening that it wasn't really, my head couldn't cope with everything
20:21that was going on, really.
20:45As a journalist, I don't want bad things to happen.
20:52I like reporting good news, but it was always in the back of my mind that it might be on
20:59my watch that a very large disaster might happen.
21:06One of the first things we did was to switch on the television and see what on earth was
21:11going on, because for all we knew in that moment was that we had an earthquake.
21:16But what we didn't realise was that it was so big that then it had caused a tsunami.
21:28And that's when I remember just seeing the wave making its way to that northern coast, thinking,
21:38oh my goodness, this is, this is really bad.
21:42let's see.
21:46Let's see.
21:48Let's see.
21:54Let's see.
21:57Let's see.
22:05Let's see, I've been waiting for a lot of time.
22:15The first time I saw the tsunami, it was the first time that the tsunami came from back to the
22:20back.
22:26I saw it in the mirror, and I saw it in the camera.
22:33Then, the tsunami came from before.
22:55The tsunami came from the face of the stormed рек in the middle of the storm, but I thought I
23:03couldn't get it.
23:03The tsunami came from before, and I thought it would have been possible, but not in a few seconds,
23:09After that, the car was moving slowly.
23:15The car was moving from the front of the car,
23:18and the car was moving from the front of the car.
23:21I felt the fear of dying,
23:56The tsunami struck a long swathe of Japan's east coast.
24:02Swamping harbours, rivers and low-lying areas.
24:44I was still thinking we might be reporting mainly on deaths from falling buildings.
24:52But from the reports that were coming through from Japanese media,
24:59it was clear that the tsunami was likely to be the real killer here.
25:10Near Ishinomaki, Teruo Kono was sheltering in his office a few hundred meters from the coast.
25:20The tsunami struck a lot.
25:30The tsunami struck a lot.
25:33So I couldn't be able to see the situation outside.
25:41The sound of a strange sound came from outside,
25:45and I saw that the tsunami came from a small river,
25:48and I saw that the tsunami came from the first time.
26:09車両が座席から流れ出すもの。
26:21役所自体がきしみ音がすごくて、屋根のパネルは折れる、割れる、傾向音が切れる。
26:46建物が異常な振動をし始まって、そうしているうちに、実は我々は逃げようと思った瞬間に、その真正面の実はドアのところから水が2回襲ってきた。
27:15大きな黒い波が我々に迫ってきた時に、自分が役所から投げ出されて、津波の中に巻き込まれるというところは、今でも駒送りに自分がどのような体勢で入っていったかというのは、今でも記憶しています。
27:33私の車は重量バランスがちょうど50対50で良かったので。
27:47ちょっと船のように浮いていたので、しばらくは私の車に関しては、中に浸水はほぼほぼなかったですね。
28:06車の中で、車という鉄の箱の中で守られていた方がいいのか、それとも上に乗った方がいいのかと、頭の中でぐるぐるぐるぐるぐると考えが錯綜しているというか、迷っていましたね。
28:22車があの後、どんどん流されていって、バックして流されているような状態で、建物の中、倉庫の中に突入して、
28:46窓から、開けた窓から水がもうドバッと入ってきましたので、これは車の中での待機は無理だと思って、窓の枠を掴んで、後方に流されてしまって、
29:13単身で窓から、こう、脱出するような形で、水の中に出ました。あっけないなと思って、人生って。こんなに突然、朝あんなに穏やかだったのに、急に水に流されて、こんなところで、海水飲んで、窒息して流されて、死ぬんだなと思って。
29:38あっ、もうダメだと思った時に、水飲みながら、手が水面に出る感覚があったんですよね。それで、あっ、もうちょっとだけ頑張ろうと思って、もうひとかきだけして、なんとか顔を水面に出すことができたんですよ。飲んだ水も吐き出して、とりあえずなんか、しばらく5分、10分ぐらいとか、ずっと息ハーハーしながら、
30:03その場で、こう、なんだろう、四つん這いになって、うずくまってたような感じですね。上に行かなくて、全然ダメだよ。これ、死因が出るね。あたった。津波に揉まれてる間は、もう真っ黒の中なんで、もう何もわからない。あの、洗濯機の中で自分がこう、回されてるような。
30:32ただ、そこから、手の指も足も体も何一つ動くことができなかったです。あの、本当に苦しかったです。で、このまま、たぶん自分は死んでしまうんだろうなということで、実は、本当に家族に対して、ごめんねっていう言葉をそのとき話しています。で、その家族の顔を思い浮かべていて、ごめんねって言った瞬間、
30:52なんか、こう、自分の指が動くし、体も動くってなって、そこから、あと、自分の体を必死にもがきあがいて、こう、水面まで出てきたっていう形。最終的には、あの、屋根の一部のようなものが流れてきて、
31:11それにちょっと捕まって、まあ、津波の流れのままに、手下っていう形ですかね。で、そうしたら、そこから、頑張れっていう声が聞こえてきたんです。
31:30で、その声で、自分が、あの、目を覚ましたっていうか、意識を取り戻して、で、あ、あの、私の元同僚っていうか、保育所の先生の鈴木先生の家だなっていうのは分かって、
31:50で、鈴木先生が、頑張れ、頑張れっていう言葉に合わせて、その屋根が、鈴木先生の家にだんだん近づいていくんです。で、あの、本当に鈴木先生の励ましの言葉で、自分も、あの、本当に頑張れたんですけど、
32:03その頑張れ、頑張れって言うて、本当に奇跡的に鈴木先生の家の玄関のところに、私の乗っていた屋根が、ごちんと接続したんです。
32:20鈴木先生の家の玄関の中で、鈴木先生の家の玄関の中で、鈴木先生の家の玄関の中で、
32:27鈴木先生の家を、
32:29of people who had lost loved ones
32:36very likely because those loved ones
32:38had been trying to look after each other
32:41or trying to find them rather than just fleeing.
32:45And that's a kind of very human dilemma.
32:54There were people who were having to stand by
32:58very close to their neighbors,
33:02sometimes their loved ones being washed out to sea
33:04without anything they could do to save them.
33:13Ryoko Endo hadn't heard from her husband
33:15or her three children since before the earthquake.
33:41Ryoko Endo
34:00While Ryoko waited for news, further south, Fukushima Daiichi was also directly in the path of the tsunami.
34:09Yukio Shirahige was sheltering on the land side of the site.
34:20Ryoko Endo
34:23There was a video of the tsunami that came out of the tsunami that came out of the tsunami.
34:32Ryoko Endo
35:01Fukushima Daiichi was
35:03protected by a five-and-a-half meter high tsunami defense wall you know tsunami is not just like a
35:12wave it is it is like a rise of the sea level with a very strong force so tsunami came
35:21over the defense shield flowed into the power plant pushed away all the cars and the other installations
35:33around the reactor and then it hit the reactor buildings
35:42no one knew if the plant could survive a direct hit
35:51meanwhile the extent of the damage to coastal communities was dawning on residents like social worker Mizuei Kano
36:02I was working in the city of Okuma原発から4キロぐらいの所で働いていました大変なことになってるんだということを実感した頃に
36:16集会所が津波で持っていかれたという情報が入りました
36:35すべての電話線が電池が倒れてしまいましたので電話ができなくなる恥ずかしいことにすぐそばにある原発のことについて大丈夫かって思っていませんでした
36:40100km north residents of coastal cities
36:43like Sendai and Ishinomaki
36:45were facing a freezing night
36:47without power
36:50the whole central area of the city
36:53had been flooded
36:54and that meant I couldn't get back into the central area
36:57either to where I live
36:59or to anywhere else I wanted to go
37:01so I ended up just sleeping at the university with many of the other staff
37:09Yu Muroga took refuge in a warehouse above his wrecked van
37:35震度5前後ぐらいの揺れがずっともう1日中揺れてましたので12人が集まって一夜を過ごしましたでもそれでもやっぱり寒かった流された物とか家とか車とかそういうのとかの話をずっとしてましたね
38:02窓の方に自分いたんですけども外は赤く赤く燃えてましたねあと叫び声ですね皆さんの助けてくれっていう声だったりとかライト持ってる人がこうなんだろうヘリに向かってライトで照らして助けてくれみたいな感じだったんですけども
38:11I hated sleeping and going to sleep because at least if I were awake, then I could quickly
38:21move or find my parents or get to safety.
38:26And so when aftershocks would happen in the middle of the night, I'd have to run down
38:30the corridor to find my parents, but I always had this sense of anxiety and it started to
38:40get worse and worse.
38:42And even through all of that, I've always wanted to protect my brother.
38:48I think even though I've overcome all the events, thinking about him is still the thing
38:58that gets me the most upset, I think.
39:15Teruo Okono woke up in the house where the tsunami had dropped him.
39:19Teruo Okono woke up in the morning, but...
39:26I feel that during the night of the life of the headache, I was still in the middle of the
39:33mind.
39:33I feel like I'm feeling the most upset that I was in the middle of the morning.
39:47出ました。
39:59何一つ音がしなかったって自分の中ではそう思ってるんですが、間違いなくいろいろな小鳥のさえずりとか多分あったと思うんですけど、
40:08私の耳に聞こえてくるのはもう無音の世界。もう荒れ果てた風景。
40:11There were a lot of people who were looking for their family.
40:20When the tsunami came up, they would get away from their family.
40:24So, it's a matter of time.
40:33When I was in the morning, I had a little bit of water from the top.
40:42I went to the bottom of the top of the water and I went to the bottom of the water.
40:52It was a hole in a hole, and I was separated from the road.
40:56I didn't know where the road was.
40:57Then, everyone said,
41:01I'm going to go home.
41:10Financial Times Bureau Chief Muir Dicki headed for the disaster zone.
41:17we have a responsibility as a journalist to
41:21report the big stories as best we can and i felt that we needed to go to the area
41:27it was very challenging to get there but that was proud to be on the ground to see what's
41:32really happening to people here behind me is a sign put there to show visitors and residents
41:39of this area that beyond that point is at risk of tsunami flooding but the waters this time
41:47came far far further the earthquake had caused relatively little damage to property but it was
42:03relative normality compared to the sudden shock as you came down off the hills
42:09towards the coast you could see a line drawn across the land and on one side of it where
42:17the tsunami had hit just absolute devastation it looked to me and to many other people who
42:25saw it as as if we had walked into the kind of scene that you see in old newsreel of
42:34the
42:35hiroshima or nagasaki after nuclear bomb that kind of leveling of whole towns
42:43the evidence is everywhere of the incredible power of the tsunami
42:47buildings have been mashed and mangled beyond repair trucks picked up carried distances and
42:52then dropped on piles of debris those who didn't flee in time had little chance
43:02those who could fled the devastation including mizu a who was heading for her family farmhouse in the hills
43:11they had all to be in the city of sicaken up to be a little bit
43:13the most important thing that took place is at the intersection of the
43:26land from there and the wind was running along the hill
43:36the city was running until after the storm came down
43:37and it was all the wind coming down
43:38because of the storm came down
43:38and the storm came down
43:38there in the air
43:39there was a lot of rain
43:44Finally, Mizue reached the safety of her farmhouse, but the nightmare was far from over.
44:10My colleague and I were driving into southern Fukushima Prefecture.
44:17We weren't actually in communication with the outside world.
44:22And we went through an area which did have mobile signal,
44:29and I saw my BlackBerry light up with multiple messages from editors in Hong Kong saying,
44:38call, call, call. So I rang and I heard the line which felt like something out of a movie.
44:47They said, there's been an explosion at the nuclear plant. Turn the car around and drive south.
45:04It was sort of a Chernobyl moment.
45:07My view was that, oh, this is not the worst case yet.
45:13There was a lot of fear in Japan. People were scared. The Prime Minister was scared.
45:24There was a lot of fear in Japan.
45:25I've never seen any gas masks.
45:29There was a lot of fear in Japan.
45:31There was a lot of fear in Japan.
45:37If this were to be a really significant release of radio activity, would you have to evacuate Tokyo?
45:44The news on the radio was talking about the Fukushima reactor, but we were so busy trying to look after
45:50ourselves.
45:52He was just crying and shouting, and I couldn't do anything for him.
45:58I was going to school. I didn't see the children's face.
46:03I was going to walk through the school.
46:05I didn't see the children's face.
46:06I was going to walk through the school.
46:08I didn't see the problems it was the same.
46:08I didn't see the things that wanted to be.
46:12The information for any of the issues raised can be found online at
46:16channel4.com slash support.
46:18And you've more from Fukushima, days that shocked the wild half-ten tomorrow night.
46:22Super Surgeons is next tonight.
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