Japan tsunami and earthquake - Live coverage

1.02pm: My colleague Jo Adetunji has spoken to the Guardian's Asia environment correspondent Jonathan Watts who is in North East Japan. He said that in the city of Sendai there are huge queues for water, food and fuel.

12.51pm: One piece of clarification. Although the Japanese authorities have updated the size of the quake to magnitude 9.0, the US Geological Survey is still referring to it as magnitude 8.9.

12.35pm: Here's a summary of events today so far:

• The original earthquake to hit Japan has been upgraded to a magnitude of 9.0

• The struggle to control a nuclear crisis at two power stations continues. Officials said there is a risk of a second explosion at the Fukushima power station but Yukio Edano, chief cabinet secretary, said the facility could withstand the impact. Technicians are battling to cool a third reactor after a blast at reactor one on Saturday. Technicians are pumping sea water into the reactor in a bid to prevent a nuclear meltdown. The size of the evacuation zone around Fukushima is now 20km.

• The Japanese prime minister has called the disaster the worst crisis since WWII. There are also reports that up to 10,000 are feared dead in the Miyagi prefecture alone and up to 190 people exposed to radiation after cooling system fails at a second nuclear plant.

• More than 250 aftershocks have rocked Japan since the original earthquake on Friday. The US Geological Survey said 30 of these were in excess of magnitude 6. Japan's meteorological agency said there was a 70% chance of a magnitude 7 aftershock striking in the next three days.

• The huge rescue effort now includes 100,000 Japanese soliders, around 40% of its armed forces. International rescue teams are heading towards the region including a UK team. Tokyo's vice-mayor said 44,000 meals of crackers, 643,000 of instant rice and 57,000 units of condensed milk are on their way to the disaster area, along with 384,000 blankets and 9000 portable toilets.

• Stories of rescues and tragedies are beginning to emerge, including from Hiromitsu Shinkawa, a 60-year-old man rescued after being swept out to sea with only his roof as a makeshift raft. Our correspondent Jonathan Watts in Miyagi prefecture interviewed Harumi Watanabe who said she was unable to rescue her elderly parents from their house before the wave hit.

• The UK Foreign Office has set up contact numbers for assistance for British nationals and has advised against all non-essential travel to Japan. It has also issued information about the status of Japanese airports.

 

 12.07pm: A gallery of remarkable images from the Guardian's Dan Chung who is in tsunami-ravaged Shiontona.

11.54am: Associated Press has this report from Banda Aceh in Indonesia of the reactions of survivors of the 2004 tsunami watching the pictures of the devastation in Japan:

    Tears streamed down Maisara Mucharam's face as she watched aerial shots of the tsunami pummeling Japan's coast and remembered the day, six years ago, when her youngest daughter was ripped out of her arms by the heavy salty sea.

    Survivors of the 2004 tsunami that started off Indonesia sat glued to their TV sets, stroking each other's hands, as images of last Friday's disaster in northern Japan flashed repeatedly across the screen.

    "I heard someone screaming and ran to see what was going on," said Mucharam, who also lost her husband and two other daughters.

    "I tried, but couldn't stop watching," the 38-year-old said, her voice trembling. "It was exactly the same, except they have this horrible footage, events unfolding right before your eyes."

environmentguardian.co.uk team: Jonathan Watts

11.41pm: The full piece from our Asia environment correspondent Jonathan Watts who is in Shintona, Miyagi prefecture talking to survivors and relief workers is live. Here's some of it:

    The nearby bay is filled with cars, concrete and half-sunken homes that have floated away from their foundations. A railway line has been ripped from the ground and twisted vertically like a garden fence. Cars and motorbikes lie broken and so roughly re-parked by the tsunami that some balance precariously on their bonnets. Emergency and media helicopters buzz overhead and the bereaved sob by the side of the road. The air is rich with the rotting smell of disaster and death.

    Self-defence force personnel and rescue workers search for bodies amid the the mud. Their work is sporadically interrupted by earthquake alerts and tsunami warnings, but they do not have to look far.

    When found the dead are wrapped in blue tarpaulins and laid on military stretchers. In Shintona their numbers rose as quickly as the dozen or so rescue workers were able to find and carry them.

    "We have found 50 bodies today and there'll be more," said an officer in the self defence forces as his team took a quick lunchbreak. "We're putting more efforts into rescue elsewhere as there is very little chance of anyone surviving here."

11.33am: Japanese prime minister Naoto Kan has urged Cabinet members to ensure "maximum efforts" are made to save as many people as possible, Kyodo news agency has reported.

He has also met the heads of the Tokyo Electric Power Company, which runs the Fukushima nuclear plant, and Toshiba, which supplied some of the equipment used in the facility, to discuss the crisis.

Electricity providers have warned that consumers could face a week or more of rolling electricity black-outs from tomorrow, due to the shortages caused by shutting down power plants. "There is a high possibility that service areas of Tokyo Electric and Tohoku Electric will face an abnormal situation in which a great deal of supply shortage will occur,'' the industry minister Banri Kaieda told reporters. His ministry has urged large firms to restrict their use of air conditioning, neon lighting and hot water to help conserve the supply.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano has said the government will use its contingency funds of some 200bn yen ($2.44bn) to pay for the relief effort. But Kyodo says the president of the opposition Liberal Democratic Party has said it will meet the government to discuss a possible temporary tax increase to fund relief work.

11.13am: Associated Press is reporting that Japan's prime minister has called the disaster the worst crisis since World War II when two nuclear bombs were dropped of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He has urged country to unite.

10.59am: The UK Foreign Office is advising against all non-essential travel to Tokyo and the North East of Japan. It has set up contact numbers for assistance:

    British nationals in Japan who require assistance should contact the Foreign Office helpline in London: +44 20 7008 0000 (from Japan) or 020 7008 0000 (in the UK). You can also e-mail the Foreign Office on japan.earthquake@fco.gov.uk or skype (text not call) on "fcojapan".

It has issued the following information about the status of Japanese airports:

    Sendai - Closed
    Sado - Closed
    Iwate-Hanamaki - Closed
    Misawa - Closed
    NRT/Tokyo Narita - Open, although flights to and from the airport are experiencing some disruptions. There are some train and bus services to the airport but traffic is heavy and serious disruptions in travelling to Narita continue. 1700 people are currently at Narita airport; airport authorities are distributing sleeping bags and food.
    HND/Tokyo Haneda - Open, though flights are subject to cancellation.
    UKB/Kobe Airport - Open
    KIX/Osaka - Open
    KIJ/Niigata - Open
    Amori - Partially open
    Akita - Partially open
    Misawa - Partially open
    Yamagata - Partially open
    Shonai - Partially open
    Odate Noshino - Partially open
    Fuksushima - Partially open

10.40am: The Tokyo Electric Power Company which operates the Fukushima Daiichi and Fukushima Daini nuclear power stations has confirmed that a crane operator has been killed at the Daini plant. The operator was trapped in the crane operating console of the exhaust stack and was transferred to the ground at 5:13pm on Saturday and confirmed the death at 5:17pm.

In an update early on Sunday morning, the International Atomic Energy Agency said that four workers had been injured by the explosion at Unit 1 reactor of the Daiichi plant. In addition, one worker was exposed to higher-than-normal radiation levels that fall below the IAEA guidance for emergency situations. And at Fukushima Daini, four have been injured.

10.06am: This map from the US Geological Survey shows the aftershocks that have hit the region since Friday. There have been over 250 aftershocks, with 30 of those in excess of magnitude 6.

9.47am: Justin McCurry in Tokyo reports that Japan's meteorological agency on Sunday upgraded last Friday's earthquake from magnitude 8.8 to 9.0, although it is still referring to this estimate as an "interim value". It occurred 130km off the Pacific coast of Tokoku region at a depth of 24km. It is advising people to be vigilant for further tsunamis, landslides and further building collapses.

It is also warning that there is a 70% chance of a magnitude-7 aftershock striking the country in the next three days.There will be a 50% risk over the three subsequent days.

9.39am: Japan's Daily Yomiuri has this powerful eyewitness piece on the "hellish sight" of Kesennumma in Miyagi prefecture, hit by quake, tsunami and fires:

    Black smoke belched from fires that continued to spread even after daybreak in this city on the Sanriku Coast with a population of 75,700.

    All but the platform of Minami-Kesennuma Station on the JR Kesennuma Line was swept away by tsunami as if it had never existed.

    Also hit by tsunami, the city's central community center near the station was flooded to the second-floor ceiling, forcing people evacuated there to stay overnight on the third floor, community center officials said.

    Many wrecked cars and trucks lay amidst heaps of rubble, while broken houses were swept down the Okawa river along the JR line. The water continued to ebb and flow with waves from the sea.

9.36am: In a a small indication of the massive relief effort now underway, Tokyo vice-mayor @inosenaoki says 44,000 meals of crackers, 643,000 of instant rice and 57,000 units of condensed milk are on their way to the disaster area, along with 384,000 blankets and 9000 portable toilets.

9.19am:
Our correspondent Jonathan Watts is in Shiontona, Miyagi prefecture. He has been speaking to survivors of the tsunami. One woman, Harumi Watanabe said she rushed home from work to save her elderly parents but was unable to get them out of the house quickly enough. "There wasn't time to save them. They were old and too weak to walk so I couldn't get them in the car in time," she said.

When the wave hit the house, her mother and father were ripped from her grasp and dragged under-water. "I stood on the furniture, but the water came up to my neck. There was only a narrow band of air below the ceiling. I thought I would die," said Watanabe.

Early indications are that older people will make up a high proportion of the dead because they were unable to act on the tsunami warnings in time. "There are many old people here. We have evacuation drills, but people could not get to the meeting place in time. The tsunami was beyond our expectations. We must reflect on our shortcomings," said Jiro Saito, head of the local disaster countermeasures committee.

Watts reports that further round the coast in Minami Shirazu, close to 10,000 people are reportedly missing after the town was engulfed by the tsunami. The full story will be online shortly.

8.50am: Agence France Presse has more details of the extraordinary story of the 60-year-old man rescued after being swept 15km out to sea by the tsunami:

    A Maritime Self-Defence Force destroyer rescued 60-year-old Hiromitsu Shinkawa after discovering him floating on a piece of roof in waters off Fukushima Prefecture, two days after the disaster struck.

    The man, from the city of Minamisoma which has been virtually obliterated, was swept out along with his house after the massive tsunami tore into Japan's northeast following a 8.9-magnitude earthquake on Friday.

    He is conscious and in "good condition" after his rescue which took place around 12:40 pm (0340 GMT), ministry officials said, adding that he was transported to hospital by helicopter.

    "I ran away after learning that the tsunami was coming," Shinkawa told rescuers according to Jiji Press.

    "But I turned back to pick up something at home, when I was washed away. I was rescued while I was hanging to the roof from my house."

8.40am: These remarkable interactive graphics from ABC in Australia and the New York Times use before-and-after pictures of the disaster zone to demonstrate the extent of the devastation.

Another New York times interactive allows you to zoom in on a scene of devastation in Sendai, northern Japan. This interactive map help convey the scale of the disaster.

8.31am: One very welcome piece of good news: astonishingly, a 63-year-old man was rescued after his home was swept 15km out to sea by the tsunami, Japanese media are reporting. Rescuers in a helicopter spotted him waving from the rooftop near Futabacho, Fukushima prefecture.

8.19am: Good morning, we're continuing our live coverage as Japan tackles the aftermath of Friday's devastating 8.9 magnitude earthquake and the ensuing tsunami. Tokyo has doubled the number of rescuers to 100,000 and is still struggling to control the crisis at two nuclear power stations.

The developments today:
• Up to 10,000 people may have died in Miyagi prefecture, a police official there has told broadcaster NHK. Miyagi was the area worst-hit by the double disaster. The previous estimate of the death toll was around 1,800, although police had said they were unable to make contact with 9,500 people in the devastated town of Minamisanriku.

• Japan is still struggling to control the crisis at two nuclear power plants damaged in Friday's huge earthquake and tsunami. The emergency cooling system has failed at another reactor.

• As many as 190 people may have been exposed to radiation. Potentially unsafe levels have been detected in 22 people.

• Aftershocks also continue to hit the region, with two tremors of 6.2 magnitude earlier today.

• Millions remain without power and drinking water and reports from the disaster zone suggest many survivors are struggling to find food.

• International rescue teams are arriving in Japan.



source : http://www.guardian.co.uk/ 

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