What happened on 11th March

Mr Tanaka tried to recapture what Mr. Konno had experienced on 11^th March based on his story and his photos.

At 2:27 pm on 11^th March, Mr. Konno was at his uncle’s house next to the river when the shocks of the enormous earthquake were felt and the vibrations lasted for a long time. The disaster prevention radio communications didn’t work due to the power outage because of the earthquake.

After the violent shocks, Mr. Konno had an intuition that a “Tsunami might come!”. He put his uncle on the wheel chair and brought him to an evacuation place about one kilometer away from his home. It was located on the north side of a small hill where is situated the Suwa Shinto Shrine on its summit. Mr. Konno’s home was on the east side of the stone steps which approached the front of the shrine, and he had always kept it in mind that this would be a good place to seek sanctuary if ever a tsunami came.

He then went down to the town where another of his uncles lived, but found his uncle had already evacuated to another shelter. Then he went back to his home, where he heard that a tsunami of 6m in height was approaching. He grabbed his wallet, some bottle of water; glanced at his computer but had second thoughts: “If the tsunami is only 6m high then it shouldn’t reach here”, and with that he left the computer.

Mr Konno’s house was located 1.5 kilometers inland from Hirota Bay and 200m away from the river embankments. Nobody thought that the tsunami would reach this area; so many people didn’t evacuate and stayed at home after the earthquake but were tragically killed by Tsunami. 

Mr Konno moved his car at the foot of the hill and started to climb the gentle path on the southern side of the hill. Thinking that there would still be some time until tsunami came, he went down to check the situation, but at that moment, he saw the water overflowing the river embankments. One aged woman caught his eye, who was coming toward him slowly carrying a blanket. The water was approaching just behind her. He ran up to her, took her blanket and hurried her up the stone steps to the shrine. The water of the enormous wave was now bearing down behind them very quickly. The people who had already evacuated to the hill were shouting at them, “ Hurry, hurry! The water is there!!”.

The water washed away his car, coming up the hill swallowing the stairs. Mr Konno and the old lady though, finally reached the shrine at the top of the hill. From there they had a bird’s-eye view of the scene of devastation below them. All the houses and buildings were already under the swirling waters, and it looked like the city was sunk under the raging ocean. Eventually, as the water started to ebb away, they saw that the wooden houses had been washed away offshore, and they saw some people on the roofs of those floating houses. “Hang in there!!! Hold on!!!” Everybody on the hill could only shout to the people and pray. 

When evening came, the water gradually started to subside. All the buildings had disappeared. Mr Konno’s house, two storehouses in front of it, terraced houses… everything was gone. Later, they heard some explosions from the junior high school which stood on their right side, and a fire broke out. We came to learn later that gasoline from the cars in the school’s car park had caught fire; and the cars had gone up in flames, one after the other.

(c) Fumiaki Konno

 In the evening, Mr Konno went down to a spring at the back of the hill with some young fellows to secure drinking water. The cultivated fields on its slope had become all muddy. On the way, a man asked them for help. He told them that there must be an aged woman who has difficulty walking, and the wife of her son trapped in the collapsed wooden house in front of them. Mr Konno climbed up to the roof and went inside the house from there with his companions. They found the two ladies inside the house and pulled them out, but they were already dead. The man said the young wife must have tried to save her mother in law and couldn't escape.

Even as night fell, the explosions still continued. The fire spread to the school’s gymnasium, and the glare of the large fire was seen against the dark, licking its way through the mud-covered ruins of the stricken town. The sky though was incredibly clear and filled with the stars, but soon snow began to scatter across the disaster area.

(c) Fumiaki Konno

 The survivors made a fire which they kept alive all night from the firewood they had collected from the hill. They also dismantled some of the old wooden facilities of the shrine to warm themselves. About 80 people were there, including old people and young mothers holding their babies. Everybody was sitting around the fire and passed a sleepless night. The fire of the school gymnasium bathed the vast muddy town in an odd yellow light.

(c) Fumiaki Konno

The day dawned. The fire of the school gymnasium which was burning the whole night had finally gone out. A new vista, which nobody had ever seen before, was spreading out below them. Around about 8:00 am, they began to move together to walk along the mountain heading for the other evacuation shelters. 

(c) Fumiaki Konno

Written by Machi Tanaka (translated by Eriko Kamimura & Richard Byford)