The lessons from two major disasters that struck the nation during the Heisei era must be passed to the next generation.
Thursday marked 24 years since the Great Hanshin Earthquake, which is inscribed in the annals of Japanese disasters along with the Great East Japan Earthquake. The experience of losing 6,434 lives in the Hanshin quake became the foundation for measures to deal with disasters that remain in place today.
The initial response to the Great Hanshin Earthquake has been widely criticized. It took about six hours after the quake hit for the Prime Minister's Office to finally get an accurate picture of the extent of the damage. The Hyogo prefectural government, which was overwhelmed as it responded to the disaster, turned down offers of assistance from other local governments, and it took at least four hours for the governor to request the Self-Defense Forces be dispatched to help.
Soul-searching on these shortcomings resulted in the establishment of the crisis management center at the Prime Minister's Office, and mutual support between cities, wards, towns and villages also took root. The disaster can be said to have become an opportunity to press the central and local governments to prepare disaster management systems.
After the Great East Japan Earthquake, the request to dispatch SDF personnel came six minutes after the temblor.
Accurate information is necessary so SDF personnel can swiftly rush to a disaster-hit area and save many lives. Cooperation with local governments and police forces must be deepened during ordinary times.
The disaster also made people aware of the importance of self-help, in which people protect themselves, and mutual assistance, in which local residents help each other in addition to public assistance provided by central and local governments.
Residents stepping up
Some regions have started "pre-disaster recovery planning," in which local residents participate in considering in advance how a community will be developed after it gets hit by a disaster. This approach is aimed at enabling the swift reconstruction of disaster-hit areas, and the central government developed guidelines to promote such planning in July 2018.
In the town of Minami, Tokushima Prefecture, residents living near Yuki bay spearheaded the compilation of a reconstruction plan. In preparation for a tsunami expected to strike the area following a huge earthquake in the Nankai Trough, the plan included arrangements to move residential housing to higher ground.
Drawing a blueprint for reconstruction in advance also will lead to building communities better able to withstand a disaster. Efforts at pre-disaster recovery planning should be undertaken in even more places.
A string of disasters battered Japan last year. Torrential rain that hit western Japan underlined again the difficulties involved in urging residents to evacuate.
The Central Disaster Management Council divided the actions residents should take into five stages and compiled a report specifying at what times evacuations should be conducted. Despite many warnings and advisories issued by the Japan Meteorological Agency and local governments, many people found it difficult to understand the urgency of the situation and were confused when deciding whether to evacuate.
It is vital that the meaning of information that will be transmitted during a disaster is made clear to residents on a regular basis.
A Yomiuri Shimbun opinion poll asked what changes during the Heisei era had the biggest impact on society, in which respondents could give multiple answers. The most common answer, given by 82 percent of respondents, was "major disasters, including the Great East Japan Earthquake and the Great Hanshin Earthquake." This indicates the heightened public awareness of disasters.
The nation should take advantage of this situation, constantly review disaster countermeasures and prepare for future threats.
(From The Yomiuri Shimbun, Jan. 17, 2019)
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