Archive for April, 2011

Muslim Group Serves Curry to Japanese Earthquake Survivors

Here’s a great story about members of an Islamic center in Aichi prefecture who delivered aid to survivors of the March 11th earthquake and tsunami.

The group of 17 volunteers drove up to Iwate in two 4-ton trucks, bringing 500 kilograms of rice, 300 kilograms of meet, and a large amount of vegetables and spices. When they arrived at a shelter for evacuees, they prepared and served nearly 3,000 plates of curry:

“Aren’t you cold? Are you feeling well?” the curry “chefs” said to the evacuees while serving the meals.

For the evacuees spending days in the freezing cold amid a food shortage, the hot meals with plenty of meat were heartwarming.

The members, who also stayed overnight at the community center along with the evacuees, made a total of 1,800 meals. The following day they served 900 dishes at a nearby high school.

“My heart aches to see the situation surrounding the quake victims,” said Ahmad Mushtaq, 40, from Pakistan.

“It’s natural to help anybody in need regardless of their ethnicity or religion. I want them to eat delicious food and get warm physically and also in their hearts.”

Here’s some additional information, from an article that appeared on AllVoices:

A group of Pakistanis as far as from Kasugai-shi, near Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, drove to Oozuchi cho, Iwate Pref. , one of the most devastated town, with cooking utensils and cooking ingredients on the car(s). From 20th, they are serving for the town people with their warm hearted curry and naan bread for 2,000 evacuees. A 9-old-boy from the town is now helping with those guys, who are all community members gathering at a mosque in Kasugai city, Aichi. Muhammad Shafkatmunier (spelling?) 33, says, ‘when we are in a time of trouble, we help each other. That’s the spirit of Islam.’

For breakfast, they are serving hot and sweet milk tea. Evacuees are especially happy for the FIRST hot drinks at the camp. A lady, who lost her son, happened to pass by the temporal kitchen, holding her grandson’s hand. When sipping the milk tea from a Pakistani, she said ‘Oishii, Oishii (good good)’ and bowed deeply, with a small smile on her cheek.

Although that second quote refers to them as Pakistanis, it was actually a multi-national group that included people from Bangladesh, Pakistan, Burma, and Sri Lanka.

These volunteers received a lot of positive attention from the Japanese media – most notably in a TV news program that aired yesterday on the TBS channel. I wasn’t able to get a recording of the program, but I have found reports about their aid work in the Asahi Shimbun, Chunichi Shimbun, and Gifu Shimbun. (If anyone finds a video about it, please let me know!)

Update: News47.jp has a video report about this or a similar aid project. [hat tip to Julián Ortega Martínez]

Update 2: Den4 has found TV reports from FTV and TBS:

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Dog Rescued After 3 Weeks at Sea

The Japanese coast guard rescued a dog that was found on debris floating off the shore of the tsunami-wrecked city of Kesennuma. Judging from the dog’s situation, it is very possible that it had been trapped at sea since the March 11th tsunami:

The Japanese coast guard on Friday rescued a dog floating in the debris off the coast of Kesennuma, northern Japan. It’s unclear if the canine, which was scrambling on the roof of a house that had been washed away, had been at sea for the entire three weeks since the devastating earthquake and tsunami.

The rescue did not come easy. After coast guard rescuers descended from a helicopter onto the house, the dog retreated under the roof and disappeared. The rescuers were unable to lure the dog out but according to NTV, the canine was eventually pulled to safety by a coast guard boat that relieved the helicopter, which was running low on fuel.

Update: The dog has been reunited with her owner!

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Japanese Media Coverage of American Military Relief Efforts (Operation Tomodachi)

The Japanese media has not been ignoring the relief work that thousands of American military personnel have been performing since the March 11th earthquake and tsunami. I’ve seen reports about it on every major Japanese TV network.

Here is a summary of the most positive TV report I’ve seen so far. It features FTV journalist Yuko Ando reporting directly from the scene of the action:

At Misawa Air Base, she sees boxes of food and supplies that will be sent to disaster victims. There is also a large crate that contains radiation detection equipment. Americans who are preparing the supplies and performing maintenance on aircraft say they are very happy to be participating in the relief operation.

Ando visits the USS Tortuga via helicopter. Upon arrival, she is checked for radiation – they find no significant levels of it. The Tortuga is a dock landing ship, assisting in the delivery of American and Japanese military vehicles and supplies to the disaster zone.

Her next stop is the USS Essex, an amphibious assault ship. Its helicopters and landing craft are constantly making relief trips. Its landing craft have helped transport Japanese workers and their maintenance trucks to Kesennuma Oshima Island, where they are helping to restore electricity.

About 8 and a half minutes into the clip, we can see Americans delivering supplies to people in Miyagi prefecture. They’ve also brought toys for children. The kids seem really happy.

Back in the news studio, Ando stresses the enormous scale of the American military effort. Over 18,000 personnel, 19 ships, and 140 aircraft! Her experience has left her very impressed.

There have been a lot of reports about medical facilities in the disaster zone being overwhelmed. Having seen the hospital facilities on the Essex, she thinks it would be a good idea to utilize them. The Americans told her that they are ready to offer such assistance, should the Japanese government request it. Her general impression is that the Americans have the means to provide additional help and are eager to do so.

Ando says that she believes the generous American aid is not being given only because Japan and the United States have a treaty of alliance. Co-anchor Taro Kimura agrees, but he sees Operation Tomodachi as the biggest-ever joint operation by the American and Japanese armed forces. Its success is a major step towards improving U.S.-Japan relations.

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Yogurt Shortages in Japan

Most of the post-earthquake panic buying has come to an end in Japan, so shelves at supermarkets in the Kanto region are returning to normal. However, there are some products that remain rare. One of them is yogurt.

Here is a short report explaining why there is a shortage of yogurt (from ATV news):

They visit a factory in Kanagawa prefecture, which halted all production of yogurt. The main cause of the halt is the unreliability of electricity.

The factory is still producing milk, but yogurt takes longer to make and requires an uninterrupted supply of electricity. If any stage of the production or refrigeration process is interrupted by a blackout, it would ruin the whole batch of yogurt for the day. Because of this, the company has decided that yogurt production cannot take place when there is a possibility of a blackout. Up until a day or two ago, TEPCO had only given a few hours or a day’s notice before announcing cancellations of blackouts.

The report also mentions shortages of natto. One large factory in Ibaraki prefecture was damaged in the earthquake and had top stop production. Some repairs have been made, and they are now producing natto at 80% of their normal rate.

Now that blackouts have been put on hold, production can probably resume. However, because demand for remains high, shortages will probably continue.

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“Blue Flashing Light Seen Over Japan’s Nuclear Plant”

America’s Fox News Channel runs an alarming report with the headline “BLUE FLASHING LIGHT SEEN OVER JAPAN’S NUCLEAR PLANT”:

The news anchor says that the flash of light could be bad news for workers who are trying to prevent a nuclear meltdown.

In fact, nobody has seen any flashing lights. It is speculation on what may or may not be happening:

A partial meltdown of fuel in the No. 1 reactor building may be causing the isolated reactions, Denis Flory, nuclear safety director for the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency, told a news conference in Vienna.

Nuclear experts call these reactions “localized criticality.” They consist of a burst of heat, radiation and sometimes an “ethereal blue flash,” according to the U.S. Energy Department’s Los Alamos National Laboratory website. Twenty-one workers worldwide have been killed by “criticality accidents” since 1945, the site says.

An expert says there is a chance of such a reaction. Sometimes, that kind of reaction will include a blue flash of light inside the reactor. So, following Fox logic….OH MY GOD – BLUE FLASHES OF LIGHT OVER NUCLEAR PLANT!!!

They go to reporter Dominic Di-Natale, on the scene….in Osaka. Tokyo is presumably a radioactive wasteland, so Di-Natale is bravely filing his reports from the other side of Japan. While reporting the fact that TEPCO is suffering from a shortage of radiation measuring equipment, he smugly shows off his own radiation detectors:

They also brag about Di-Natale’s exclusive report about how every worker at Fukushima “expects to die” from radiation. The report is based on an interview with the anonymous worried mother of one worker:

Speaking tearfully through an interpreter by phone, the mother of a 32-year-old worker said: “My son and his colleagues have discussed it at length and they have committed themselves to die if necessary to save the nation.

“He told me they have accepted they will all probably die from radiation sickness in the short term or cancer in the long-term.”

The woman spoke to Fox News on the condition of anonymity because, she said, plant workers had been asked by management not to communicate with the media or share details with family members in order to minimize public panic.

Luckily, the Japanese media has not run wild with fear-inducing stories about deadly blue lights flashing over Fukushima. Most of the public panic will be limited to American viewers of Fox News.

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Spraying Resin to Prevent the Spread of Radioactivity

Japanese authorities are apparently going to spray resin on debris at the Fukushima Nuclear Plant:

It is believed spraying resin would minimize the spread of radioactive substances, which would allow repair work at the plant to proceed more smoothly, the sources said. Efforts to restore the reactors’ cooling functions have seesawed repeatedly, with the detection Wednesday of radioactive iodine-131 at levels 3,355 times the legal limit in seawater near the plant being the latest wrench in the works.

Spraying resin on debris inside the plant could begin as early as Thursday, the government sources said. The operation would last for about two weeks, they said.

The plan involves using a remote-controlled robot to spray resin over about 80,000 square meters inside the 120,000-square-meter facility. The areas to be sprayed were contaminated by radiation from debris scattered by several hydrogen gas explosions in the days after the March 11 earthquake.

Synthetic resin would likely be used, possibly Kurita Water Industries Ltd.’s Kuricoat C-720 Green. The product is usually used to prevent dust and sand from being blown off reclaimed and developed land. Coating the debris with resin is expected to prevent the radioactive materials from spreading into the air.

The government had considered spraying resin from a helicopter, but about 3,000 flights would be necessary because only a limited amount could be sprayed each time. Since this method could also put helicopter crews in danger, the government rejected this option.

FTV demonstrates what it is like to spray a 7.5% resin solution on dirt:

A couple hours after spraying, it has partially hardened the surface of the dirt. It takes about a day for the resin to dry and fully harden.

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