IASPEI - Picture Gallery

IUGG XXIV General Assembly July 2-13, 2007 Perugia, Italy
(S) - IASPEI - International Association of Seismology and Physics of the Earth's
Interior
JSS002 Poster presentation 1843
Tsunami disaster prevention Management in Iwate Prefecture, Japan
Mr. Kenichi Yoshida
Department of Prefectural Land Developm Iwate Prefecture, Japan IASPEI
Shigeki Sakai, Toshinori Ogasawara, Koshiya Shin, Tomoko Yamazaki, Nobuo
Shuto, Takashi Furukawa, Tsutomu Mikami
Since Iwate Prefecture has suffered extensive damage from tsunamis in the past, much effort has been
directed towards the maintenance of sea walls, water gates and other tsunami disaster prevention
facilities. However, as a result of i) the serious worsening of the economic situation, ii) the
development of tsunami simulation technology and the predicted occurrence of a tsunami that could
outstrip previous estimates of size, disaster prevention measures in Iwate are currently shifting from the
maintenance of disaster prevention facilities to evacuation strategies. In order that prefectural residents
are able to evacuate in the instance of a tsunami, knowledge and understanding of tsunamis and
improvement in their awareness of disaster prevention is necessary. However, there are many
prefectural residents who have limited understanding of tsunamis, while in the majority of schools in the
prefecture, there are no lessons given in disaster prevention. Futherstill, much time has elapsed since
the occurrence of past tsunami-related disasters and the consequent deterioration of prefectural
citizens' knowledge of disaster prevention, is of great concern. In this report, Miyako City (Iwate
Prefecture) is cited as a model case of how the inclusion of tsunami disaster prevention education in
children's school curriculum and the provision of disaster prevention workshops for adults, have been
used to effect improvement in regional citizens’ awareness of disaster prevention. When an initial
attempt was made to introduce tsunami disaster prevention studies in schools, one issue that became
clear was the ➀ the lack of tsunami disaster prevention educational materials ➁ limited understanding
of the subject on the part of the teachers. Given this situation, tsunami disaster prevention educational
materials have been developed in cooperation with teachers from elementary and junior high schools.
The materials consist of a DVD compilation of video images that allow viewers to experience at first
hand the terror of a real tsunami, a diagram that explains the mechanism of a tsunami in simple terms,
experiments and photographs of past sea defenses and damage from past tsunamis. To allow teachers
to select and use the educational materials they require for inclusion in a particular lesson plan, the
materials have been put together and categorized using a motif system. As from now, slightly over 90%
of schools in Miyako City will be integrating the tsunami disaster prevention educational materials into
their school curriculums. Workshops attended by regional citizens, members of regional administration
and university members have been set up to address problems and issues relating to tsunami
evacuation. Prefectural citizens living in areas that are potentially susceptible to inundation by tsunamis
have been encouraged to walk the actual path that will lead them to the evacuation area, check on
problems and issues that often arise during an evacuation, discuss policy aimed at reducing damage
and create an action program as part of their tsunami evacuation strategy. In the beginning, prefectural
citizens took a passive stance on the tsunami disaster prevention strategy but after the workshop, there
was much visible improvement in their disaster prevention awareness, culminating in maintenance of
evacuation routes, the production of maps detailing evacuation routes in the event of an emergency
(disaster prevention maps) and other such activities.
Keywords: tsunami disaster, evacuation, disaster education