Fire and Flood

Driving towards one of the worst hit schools in the whole of Miyagi Prefecture we entered an area where the look of the damage and the color of the debris suddenly changed. From the grey blue of the tsunami mud to the ocher tones of burned and rusted metal. In this part of town, about 10 minutes after the earthquake had set fire to a few parked cars, the tsunami hit and carried a wave of cars belonging to several different shops and factories towards, over and through a residential area, spreading the fire as the tsunami moved towards the last buildings of the area, the Kadowaki Elementary school were evacuations of the 300 students where just taking place. As you can see, cars and buildings that survived the tsunami were heavily damaged in the subsequent fires.


This was once the location of a Yakult center.





The road we were traveling had only just been opened a day before, and many soldiers remained in the area to clean roads and search for bodies.



Road towards Kadowaki Elementary School, just cleared of debris.



This bonsai tree didn’t make it.


A few newly constructed residential houses somehow survived the earthquake, the tsunami and the fire. Nothing remains of the interior though. The tsunami easily reached the roof tops.