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    Swept Away: The Story of the 2011 Japanese Tsunami
    Swept Away: The Story of the 2011 Japanese Tsunami
    Swept Away: The Story of the 2011 Japanese Tsunami
    Ebook98 pages52 minutes

    Swept Away: The Story of the 2011 Japanese Tsunami

    By Rebecca Rissman

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    About this ebook

    In an immersive, exciting narrative nonfiction format, this powerful book follows a selection of people who experienced the 2011 Japan Tsunami.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherCapstone Young Readers
    Release dateJan 1, 2017
    ISBN9781515736370
    Author

    Rebecca Rissman

    Rebecca Rissman is an award-winning children's author. She has written more than 200 books about science, history, art, and culture. Her writing has been praised by School Library Journal, Booklist, Creative Child Magazine, and Learning Magazine. She lives in Chicago, Illinois, with her husband and two daughters.

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      Book preview

      Swept Away - Rebecca Rissman

      TABLE OF CONTENTS

      Cover

      Title Page

      Foreword

      1: AN EARTHQUAKE STRIKES

      2: A WALL OF WATER

      3: THE TSUNAMI ROLLS IN

      4: A SEA OF DESTRUCTION

      5: FINDING SOLUTIONS

      6: MELTDOWN

      7: A CRISIS UNFOLDS

      8: STRUGGLING TO SURVIVE

      9: PLEADING FOR HELP

      10: AFTERMATH

      11: PICKING UP THE PIECES

      Epilogue

      Timeline

      Glossary

      Critical Thinking Using the Common Core

      Internet Sites

      Further Reading

      Selected Bibliography

      Index

      About the Author

      Copyright

      Back Cover

      FOREWORD

      nurenu saki no kasa

      (It is best to have your umbrella before the rain falls)

      —Japanese Proverb

      Masao Yoshida

      Fukushima Dai-Ichi Nuclear Power Plant, March 2008

      Masao Yoshida grumbled as he sat down in the conference room. The square-jawed plant manager ran the sprawling seaside Fukushima

      Dai-Ichi nuclear plant. The plant was located on the northeastern coast of the main island of Japan, Honshu. The workers at Fukushima Dai-Ichi and 53 other nuclear plants worked hard to provide 30 percent of Japan’s power. Yoshida had lots of work to do and didn’t appreciate being hastily called into a meeting in the middle of the day. He joined a group of serious, quiet men in their 50s and 60s around a conference table and waited for the meeting to begin. Some wore tailored business suits. Others wore the company’s crisp blue jumpsuits.

      Yoshida soon learned the reason for the meeting: an internal group of scientists had released a new report in which they argued that Fukushima Dai-Ichi needed better protection against enormous ocean waves called tsunamis. A giant earthquake, they warned, could trigger a tsunami that could overwhelm the plant.

      This news was irritating, but not altogether surprising. The plant had already been rebuilt once to boost its tsunami protection. A thick concrete seawall blocked the plant from the ocean’s tall waves. When Fukushima Dai-Ichi was built, this wall stood about 10 feet tall. In 2002, scientists warned that it was too short. Fukushima leadership heeded the warning and rebuilt it to stand nearly 19 feet tall. But now, Yoshida saw, this new report was advising that the wall needed to be rebuilt again, to a staggering height of almost 50 feet!

      It wasn’t that Yoshida was unafraid of tsunamis. Far from it. He and the other managers present that day understood that tsunamis were a constant threat. As they drove into work, some had even passed tsunami markers.

      Now, as Yoshida and his colleagues took in the report’s details, they began to discuss the new information.

      Is this pressing? one asked.

      How promptly should we take this up? asked another.

      The conversation continued like this for a short time, until the group eventually agreed to review the matter further at a later date.

      Yoshida sighed as he stood up to leave the meeting. He wasn’t worried. It certainly didn’t seem likely to him that a 50-foot tsunami would happen anytime soon.

      Fukushima Dai-Ichi, 2007

      1

      AN EARTHQUAKE STRIKES

      Employees at Fukushima Dai-Ichi oversee the process of loading fuel into nuclear reactor 3.

      Atsufumi Yoshizawa

      Fukushima Dai-Ichi, March 11, 2011, 2:46 p.m.

      Atsufumi Yoshizawa walked quickly down a long, gleaming corridor. It was almost the end of his shift. Nearly every corner of the sprawling Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear plant was clean and orderly, just as he liked it. Yoshizawa mentally reviewed everything he still needed to finish. He had spent the day supervising a routine shutdown of nuclear reactors 5 and 6, and he wanted to be sure everything was in order before he drove home.

      Yoshizawa was an important figure at Fukushima Dai-Ichi. He was quiet and shy, but his 30 years at the plant had given him the

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