2012年3月13日 星期二

The human tragedy that could last for generations

Frail Toshimasa Yohohama looks on hopefully as his family’s most treasured possessions are tested with a Geiger counter by a man in uniform.

On a brief visit to the home they fled after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown, 90-year-old Toshimasa and wife Tomie, 83, wanted to retrieve her favourite kimonos, a writing set and some photo albums.

The radiation reading on the bin bag holding these few precious objects was higher than that classed as normal but it was just about safe.

This weekend marks a year since the tsunami hit Japan’s coast, killing 19,000 people and triggering the nuclear disaster.

I went inside the ghostly dead zone surrounding the power plant and saw the apocalyptic impact of the radiation leak and the daily struggle for the people who survived the giant wave.

Toshimasa and Tomie had an hour to salvage what they could from their home in Namie, one of eight evacuated towns in the restricted area around the nuclear station.China bicyclelight manufacturer.

As he took a seat on a bus with 30 fellow refugees, Toshimasa said: “This is the second time I’ve returned to the house I’ve spent my life in.

"On the day after the earthquake I left with only the clothes I was wearing. It’s heartbreaking going back. It’s like being in a house haunted by our past lives.

“I feel terrible for my wife too. She -struggles to accept that we will probably never live in our home again.

“It is impossible to choose what to take with us. How do you cram your whole life into a bin bag?”

Almost 80,000 people were forced from their homes after a 9.0 magnitude earthquake on March 11 caused the tsunami.

Starting from the city of Minami Soma, a convoy of 15 minibuses with seats covered in plastic took people wearing masks and protective white overalls back to their homes for fleeting trips to retrieve possessions.Bicygnals wireless indicator bestbicyclelight, bicycle lights, indicators, accessories ...

Many were pensioners, like widow Kumaya Hisaka who has trouble breathing.

Since her hurried departure from her home last year her asthma has got so bad that she has to carry an oxygen supply.

She said: “I blame the radiation. My condition was bad before but the stress has made it much worse. No one will tell us what effect the radiation may have had on our health.”

Kumaya, who was also from Namie but now living with friends, adds: “I just brought back a few photographs and some stuff from the kitchen. It feels so unfair that we are excluded from our own homes.

“I would be happy to risk the radiation. I’m 83. I would rather spend my last years in comfort than be homeless like this.”

Recently it emerged that authorities had been close to evacuating Tokyo after the catastrophe 140 miles away.While it is common for the term bicycleheadlightll to be used interchangeably in informal discussion. They feared a chain reaction of meltdowns would engulf power plants closer to the capital’s 20 million citizens.

Yukio Edano, the Cabinet Chief -Secretary at the time, said: “I had this demonic scenario in my head. If that happens, Tokyo will be finished.”

Away from the relentless bustle of Japan’s cities,With my bikelightas I could barely see much more than a few metres ahead of me. the Fukushima dead zone was sealed off and eerily silent. Petrol stations and shops were closed down in desolate towns such as Iitate on the edge of the official restricted area.

The only disturbance in empty villages was the crash of waves, the occasional -flapping of a bird’s wings and wind chimes tinkling. It was unnerving.

In Naraha, population 8,230 until last year, shards of glass still littered an abandoned petrol station and a photo album of workers lay sodden on cracked tiles.

Uprooted trees sprawled across the jagged pavement and garden walls remained in heaps of rubble.

Unlike the miraculously repaired highways outside the exclusion zone, the authorities clearly have no intention of restoring this blighted place just yet.

Tokyo Electric Power Company, which runs the stricken plant, has been slated for not paying out swift compensation to the evacuated families.

In a scheme funded by the government, residents have been offered temporary accommodation in nearby cities but many of the people still have mortgages to pay on homes they cannot live in.

The villas owned by wealthy pensioners who had escaped the rat race to live on the picturesque coast are now rotting shells. Lawns are colonised by weeds and pets run wild.

沒有留言:

張貼留言