Shinichi Niitsuma enthusiastically shows visitors the attractions of the small town of Namie: its tsunami-hit coastline, abandoned houses and hills overlooking the radiation-infested reactors of the disabled Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant.
Five years after the nuclear disaster emptied much of Japan’s northeastern coast, tourism is giving locals of the abandoned town a chance to exorcise the horrors of the past.
Like the Nazi concentration camps in Poland or Ground Zero in New York, the areas devastated by the Fukushima Dai-ichi disaster have now become hotspots for “dark tourism” and draw annually more than 2,000 visitors keen to see the aftermath of the worst nuclear accident in a quarter century.
Photo: AFP
“There is no place like Fukushima — except maybe Chernobyl — to see how terrible a nuclear accident is,” Niitsuma said, referring to the 1986 accident in Ukraine.
“I want visitors to see this ghost town, which is not just a mere legacy, but clear and present despair,” he added, as he drove visitors down the main street of Namie, which lies just 8km from the stricken nuclear plant.
On March 11, 2011, a magnitude 9 undersea earthquake off Japan’s northeastern coast sparked a massive tsunami that swept ashore leaving 19,000 people dead or missing.
Namie’s residents were evacuated after the tsunami sent the nuclear plant into meltdown and none has yet been allowed to move back over radiation concerns.
Niitsuma, 70, is one of 10 local volunteer guides organizing tours to sights in Namie and other Fukushima communities, including tightly regulated restricted areas. The volunteers take visitors through the shells of buildings left untouched as extremely high levels of radiation hamper demolition work, and use monitoring dosimeters to carefully avoid radiation “hotspots.”
A tsunami-hit elementary school is another stop on the morbid tour. Clocks on the classroom walls are stopped at 3:38pm, the exact moment killer waves swept ashore.
In the gymnasium, a banner for the 2011 graduation still hangs over a stage and the crippled nuclear plant is visible through the shattered windows.
Former high school teacher Akiko Onuki, 61, survived the tsunami that claimed the lives of six of her students and one colleague, and is now one of the volunteer guides.
“We must ensure there are no more Fukushimas,” Onuki said of her reasons for wanting to show tourists her former home.
Chika Kanezawa, a tour participant, said she was “shocked” by conditions she saw.
“TV and newspapers report reconstruction is making progress and life is returning to normal,” said the 42-year-old from Saitama, north of Tokyo. “But in reality, nothing has changed here.”
Dairy farmer Masami Yoshizawa still keeps about 300 cows in Namie. They live off the radiation-contaminated grass in defiance of a government order to have them slaughtered.
As Yoshizawa showed the herd to the gathered tourists, he said he keeps the cattle alive in protest against plant operator Tokyo Electric Power Co and the government.
“I want to tell people all over the world, ‘What happened to me may happen to you tomorrow,’” Yoshizawa said.
The disaster forced all of Japan’s dozens of reactors offline for about two years in the face of public worries over safety and fears of radiation exposure, but the government has pushed to restart reactors, saying the nation needs nuclear power.
English teacher Tom Bridges, who lives in Saitama, said he was able to share victims’ anger and frustration through the tour.
“It’s not a happy trip, but it’s a necessary trip,” he said.
Some local residents still suffering from the grief of losing loved ones and with no hope of returning home, say they have mixed feelings at seeing sightseers tramping through their former hometown.
However, Philip Stone, executive director of the Institute for Dark Tourism Research at Britain’s University of Central Lancashire, said recently that such tangible reminders of disasters serve as “warnings from history.”
SEEKING CHANGE: A hospital worker said she did not vote in previous elections, but ‘now I can see that maybe my vote can change the system and the country’ Voting closed yesterday across the Solomon Islands in the south Pacific nation’s first general election since the government switched diplomatic allegiance from Taiwan to Beijing and struck a secret security pact that has raised fears of the Chinese navy gaining a foothold in the region. The Solomon Islands’ closer relationship with China and a troubled domestic economy weighed on voters’ minds as they cast their ballots. As many as 420,000 registered voters had their say across 50 national seats. For the first time, the national vote also coincided with elections for eight of the 10 local governments. Esther Maeluma cast her vote in the
Nearly half of China’s major cities are suffering “moderate to severe” levels of subsidence, putting millions of people at risk of flooding, especially as sea levels rise, according to a study of nationwide satellite data released yesterday. The authors of the paper, published by the journal Science, found that 45 percent of China’s urban land was sinking faster than 3mm per year, with 16 percent at more than 10mm per year, driven not only by declining water tables, but also the sheer weight of the built environment. With China’s urban population already in excess of 900 million people, “even a small portion
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
HYPOCRISY? The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs yesterday asked whether Biden was talking about China or the US when he used the word ‘xenophobic’ US President Joe Biden on Wednesday called for a hike in steel tariffs on China, accusing Beijing of cheating as he spoke at a campaign event in Pennsylvania. Biden accused China of xenophobia, too, in a speech to union members in Pittsburgh. “They’re not competing, they’re cheating. They’re cheating and we’ve seen the damage here in America,” Biden said. Chinese steel companies “don’t need to worry about making a profit because the Chinese government is subsidizing them so heavily,” he said. Biden said he had called for the US Trade Representative to triple the tariff rates for Chinese steel and aluminum if Beijing was