Fromthenorth,

The 2016 Kumamoto Earthquakes

fromthesouthRescue from a Buckling Apartment
Naoki Yoshimoto, Fire Commander and Acting Manager of the Fire
Suppression Division (Second), Central Fire Station, Kumamoto
City Fire Services Bureau

1

Occurrence of the main shock

At 01:25 on April 16, I was struck by themain shock, more violent than theforeshock, accompanied by groaningand scraping noises at the Central Fire
Station where I was working. I tried to get
my body under a desk to protect myself,
but I could do nothing but roll around on
the floor being tossed about by theshaking.
After that, I checked the office using a
flashlight as there was no electricity, andsaw that everything that was unfixed had
fallen over or overturned. However, thevehicles and shutters were all OK, and to
top it off, none of the members wereinjured, which came as a great relief.
Teamswerethendispatchedsequentially with rescue instructions
given in quick succession.

2Activity outline○ From perception to the way we weredispatched
At 02:02, I was dispatched as a teamleader of the commanding team from theCentral Fire Station, at the reinforcement
request of the Shimazaki pump
sub-team from the Western Fire Station,
which had already been dispatchedalone to rescue people from a bucklingapartment.
On our way, as we saw the damaged
roads and buildings on the edge ofcollapse illuminated by our headlights inthe darkness, I was horrified for a

moment by the return of the undeniabledamage situation after the foreshock on
April 14, but gathered myself and hurried
to the scene imaging what conditions I
would find there.
○ Conditions on arrival at the scene
We arrived at the scene and contacted
the Shimazaki pump sub-team who hadarrived first. According to informationfrom the sub-team leader, the building
was seven-stories and fireproof, fuel had
leaked from some vehicles caused by
the buckling of the parking area on thefirst floor, the building had numerous
cracks in its structure as well as gas
leakage, and the number of people inneed of rescue was unclear althoughfour people had been seen from outside
waving from a seventh floor balcony.
In order to confirm the details at thescene, the first arriving sub-team leader
and the other team leaders, myselfincluded, entered the building. In
addition, by order of the commanding
team leader, two pump sub-teams whocame later with special mission set
security zones, set up a command
headquarters, deployed watch nozzles,
and treated the fuel leaks from thevehicles in the parking area.
○ Indoor entry
There were just two paths of entry: theindoor stairs on the west side and theoutdoor stairs on the north side. The
outdoor stairs were unusable due to thebuckling, so we entered the building
through the indoor stairs.

Fromthenorth, fromthesouthPrefectural Road 303
Yomogi Kumamoto Line

When we entered the building from thewest entrance, the inside smelledstrongly of gas. We saw numerous smalland large cracks on the walls, ceilings
andfloors
Second Kyomachidai
illuminatedbytheHeights
lights.
Thebuilding
wasgreatly inclined tothe east side.
Diagram viewing thebuilding from above

Joint command with the Fukuoka PrefecturalTeam

Room number
Rescuee name

TwoTwoThree

TwoOneOne

OneOneApartment association office

Restaurant

GarageNumber of rescuees and room numbers

Strong aftershocks continued, so weimmediately began searching eachdwelling unit and rescued those who had
failed to escape in the building which
was facing the risk of collapse.

Entry to the buckling apartment○ Rescue through the rooftop deck
The smell of gas became stronger as we
went up the indoor stairs to the people inneed of rescue on the seventh floor. The
front doors of the dwelling units, being
deformed and swollen outwards, were
not humanly possible to open. We
arrived on the seventh floor and tried toopen the front door, the only entrance tothe room with the people in need ofrescue, but it was impossible to open
using just the rescue equipment (acrowbar) we had on hand. We had toconsider the possibility of a gas
explosion caused by a spark if we broke
down the door.
Therefore, we decided to enter theseventh floor from the roof and evacuate
the people to the roof. We headed to theroof, but the door leading to the roof waslocked and the smell of gas wasconcentrated at the top of the staircase.
Therefore, we broke the glass part of thedoor carefully and reached a handthrough to the knob on the roof side to
unlock and open the door, and reach theroof.
We checked the roof and saw that it wasundulating like the humps of a camel andinclined downward to the east side,which revealed severe damage to thebuilding. We called out to the people inneed of rescue on the seventh floor for a
response, and could confirm that the fourpeople were not injured. On the radio we
asked the commanding team leader for
reinforcements of two members and asingle ladder to be delivered to the roof.
Afterthearrivalof
thetworeinforcements and the single ladder, weset the ladder down against the seventh
floor and one member climbed down theladder. The four members including theFromteam leaders guided the people in needof rescue up to the roof. We assessedevacuation to the ground through theindoor stairs with the gas leak as
dangerous, and decided to use theoutdoor stairs on the north side of theroof. We reached the outdoor stairs andchecked the gate, which was locked witha padlock. We broke the padlock with thecrowbar to open the gate, and hurrieddownstairs. Since the first-floor part ofthe outdoor stairs was unusable due tothe buckling, we evacuated the people
we were rescuing using a preset twin
ladder set up against the second-floor
part of the outdoor stairs to the adjoining
land.
After completion of the rescue, we broke
into teams to search the other dwelling
units and check for people who had
failed to escape. As a result, we foundeight more people who were in need ofthenorth, from

thesouthrescue. We broke windows, etc. andevacuated those people to the ground.
In addition, we cooperated with theFukuoka Prefectural Emergency Fire
Response Teams, who arrived during
our operation, under joint commandsearching the crushed vehicles in theparking area on the first floor and all
dwelling units. As a result, one new
person in need of rescue was found, andthe Fukuoka Prefectural Team rescuedthat person. We then cooperated inclosing the gas supply valves andcompleted the procedure at 03:58.
The total number of rescuees was 13:
Kumamoto City Fire Services Bureau
rescued 12 and the Fukuoka PrefecturalTeam rescued one. In this case, we
could complete our activities withoutinjury.