Gender problems as seenfrom the oral history of the bereaved families ofthe deceased Tsunami in Otsuchi Town,
during the Great East Japan Earthquake
One example of Kirikiri after the Great East Japan Earthquake
Tohoku University PhD student
MIWAKO KITAMURA

SummerlyØ In Otsuchi-cho, Iwate Prefecture, we interviewed the families andfriends of the people who died under the leadership of the disasterstricken area, and found out how the dead people lived and how they
died on the day of the earthquake.
Ø We would like to talk about the “proof of living” in Otsuchi, Iwate
Prefecture, which is being analyzed in this research, through a genderlens.

The purpose of this study
Ø collect community records to prevent future disasters
Ø analyse the disaster situation of the victims
Ø find out what happened at the time of the earthquake and use
the information for future disaster prevention

Damage fromThe Great East Japan Earthquake in Japan
Human casualties include 14,508 dead and 11,452 missing people. Since many
areas are still left uninvestigated, the number is expected to increase.
The number of completely collapsed and washed-out houses amounts to76,000, and the number of those with half and partial damage is over 244,000.
Following the earthquake, 345 fires occurred in 12 prefectures, including cases
where the tsunami triggered the fire.

White Paper on Disaster Management 2018

DISASTER DIGITAL ARCHIVES HAS CREATED
JAPANESE GOVERNMENT DECISION• Principle One:• For us, the surviving, there is no other starting point for the path

to recovery than to remember and honour the many lives that havebeen lost. Accordingly, we shall record the disaster for eternity,
including through the creation of memorial forests and monuments,
and we shall have the disaster scientifically analysed by a broad
range of scholars to draw lessons that will be shared with theworld and passed down to posterity.

Two disaster archive approaches
Main stream structure

Bottom-up structureØ Huge budgetØ Low budget

Ø government ‒focusedØ Human-focusedØ Requires construction and infrastructure Ø SustainableØ Includes museums

Ø Includes testimonies

Correlation between the amount of content in the disasterarchives and the amount of damage

First step to analysing the digital disaster archive(main stream structure)Ø To do a quantitative analysis, we looked at the correlation
between the amount of damage in each region due to the 2011
earthquake and the amount of archived content in the databaseØ To do a quantitative analysis, we examined the correlation
between the magnitude of damage in each region and theamount of archived content in the database for each region.

ResultØ Summarizing the results obtained from these data, there was acertain degree of correlation between the number of human andbuilding damage and disaster archive data.
Ø However, Rikuzentakata City and Otsuchi Town have fewer records
than Miyako Town and Yamada Town, but the mortality rate and thepercentage of missing persons were higher in these towns.

Problems of digital disaster archives in the prefecturesØ As a result, even in the case of severe damage, sufficient data
were not recorded due to the low budget
Ø The shortage of personnel in these economically difficult areas.

Regional circumstancesØ After the earthquake, many actions were taken in many of theaffected areas to learn lessons from the tsunami damage.
Ø There are municipalities that have constructed large-scalemuseums with funds from the national government and disasterstricken areas that allocate a large budget to the digital archives.
Ø The town of Otsuchi, which was heavily damaged by the Great
East Japan Earthquake, released its own archive to launched its
own investigation into the damage.

Otsuchi

MachikataDemographic pyramid of Otsuchi
malefemale
050

100

150

200

100
90
80
70
60
50
4030
20
100200150100500(Japanese Statistics Bureau)
Figure 2: Demographic Pyramid of Otsuchi (2010)

Population of Otsuchi
20,00018,301
17,48018,000

16,516
15,276

16,00014,00011,75912,00010,000
8,000
1995

2000

2005

2010

2015
Japanese Statistics Bureau

Monthly income of Otuchi people¥(JPY)
700,000

Average monthly income of one household
in Japan 2010

600,000

Average value of thewhole of Japan

520,692

300,000

Otsuchi

451,430

200,000

Tokyo metropolitan
area

627,326

500,000
400,000

100,000
0

Average value of thewhole of Japan

OtsuchiTokyo metropolitanarea2010 Household survey .Japanese statistic dataOccupation percentage of Otuchi people

JapanOtsuchi

MANUFACTURING

AGRICULTURE, FORESTRYAND FISHERYPROCESSAGRICULTURE

WORKERS 14%, FORESTRYMANUFACTUR
ING PROCESSAND FISHERYWORKERS 4%2010 Household survey
WORKERS 8%

WORKERS 24%

CLERICALCONSTRUCTIOWORKERS 18%

N AND MINING
WORKERS 5%
PROFESSIONASERVICE

L AND

WORKERS 11%

ENGINEERING

SALES

WORKERS 15%

WORKERS 13%

CONSTRUCTION AND MINING

CLERICAL

WORKERS 8%

WORKERS 13%
SALES

PROFESSIONA
L AND

WORKERS 11%

SERVICE
WORKERS 12%ENGINEERING
WORKERS 8%2010 Population Census of JapanFatality
The human costs of the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake in Otsuchi
Population:15,276（As of October, 2010）

Fatality
Missing::

802484In total:

1,286 （8.4％）
source :Otsuchi City government officeKozuchi1933 inundation line

1960 inundation line

2011 inundation line
Machikata1896 inundation line

City HallOtsuchi
Bay1896
1933
1960
2011

Outline of the Kirikiri area
Kirikiri has a population of about 12,000 people and is located on the coast ofIwate Prefecture.

The main industries are fishing and fish processing.

it was in an economically harsh situation even before the earthquake becauseof the harsh climate and the lack of habitable plains.

The “living proof” wasorganised by a monk from
KirikiriØ In Kirikiri, Buddhist
monk Takahashi went to the disasterarea, chanted the buddha s teaching andnames (practice), walked in memory of
those who died in the tsunami, andoffered victims who were not relatives.
Ø Takahashi proposed making a “proof oflife” for Otsuchi as a lesson for future
generations and as a method ofmourning all who died in the disaster.

The significant aspects of the “living proof”
Ø There are many records of survivors, but there are few records of those who died.

Ø In Otsuchi, which suffered a lot of damage, many of the victims lost their loved
ones and all of their property, and it was considered taboo to talk about thedeaths of the victims immediately after the earthquake.
Ø Records were collected in Otsuchi with the support of 945 survivors tocommemorate the 1284 people who died in the Great East Japan Earthquake..
Ø The “living proof” describes the lives of each victim up until their death in theGreat East Japan Earthquake.
Ø The booklet was written using a careful interview survey
government offices and local people

conducted by theOutline of the FATLITY in the KIRIKIRI district based on the“Living proof” at the time of the Great East JapanEarthquake
The number of people by age
1513121110865532210000〜910〜19

2122

1000
20〜29

30〜39

40〜49
male

50〜59
female

60〜69

70〜79

80〜8990〜99

The number of people in KIRIKIRI by area from“living proof”
Area
40

3530
1920
1023

13

12

64610
4

3

70
Kirikiri 1cho-me

Kirikiri 2cho-me
male

Kirikiri 3cho-me
famaletotal

Kirikiri 4cho-meThe result of text mining Word cloud network

Word Score

2D mapCo-occurrente
network

該当率の男⼥差

期待値
⼥性

期待値
男性

χ2 検定
p値

19.7%

17.7

10.3

0.20

15.6%

4.4

2.6

0.04

3.8%

11.7%

5.1

2.9

0.16

48.9%

38.5%

10.4%

20.3

11.7

0.53

11.1%

3.8%

7.3%

3.8

2.2

0.31

2

11.1%

7.7%

3.4%

4.4

2.6

0.66

52

11.1%

7.7%

3.4%

4.4

2.6

0.66

2

1

4.4%

3.8%

0.6%

1.9

1.1

0.91

震災関連死

53

11.1%

11.5%

-0.4%

5.1

2.9

0.96

避難を躊躇

53

11.1%

11.5%

-0.4%

5.1

2.9

0.96

⾞で避難

8

5

17.8%

19.2%

-1.5%

8.2

4.8

0.89

避難意識あった

6

4

13.3%

15.4%

-2.1%

6.3

3.7

0.82

避難を誘われた

6

4

13.3%

15.4%

-2.1%

6.3

3.7

0.82

直ぐに避難をしなかった

12

8

26.7%

30.8%

-4.1%

12.7

7.3

0.75

⽚付け

5

4

11.1%

15.4%

-4.3%

5.7

3.3

0.63

⾃宅ごと流される

10

8

22.2%

30.8%

-8.5%

11.4

6.6

0.49

該当率
（⼥性）

該当率
（男性）

⼥性

男性

親族に⾝体弱者

21

7

46.7%

26.9%

迎えに⾏った・待っていた

7

0

15.6%

0.0%

夫が不在

7

1

15.6%

発災時⾃宅にいた

22

10

⾒に・確認に⾏った

5

1

お茶っこ

5

⾃宅が避難所になった病院や施設にいた

⾃宅から出たり⼊ったり

3

4

6.7%

15.4%

-8.7%

4.4

2.6

0.26

⾃宅が安全だと思っていた

13

10

28.9%

38.5%

-9.6%

14.6

8.4

0.49

地震後電話

3

6

6.7%

23.1%

-16.4%

5.7

3.3

0.06

Gender issue findings from “Living Proof”
Gender issues related to the tsunami victims include home careand caring for relatives.
Hesitation

1

OrderedHouse hold10

Pick up relatives

6Care

5

Hesitation

2

Ordered

2

Others1

House hold1

2
1
Others431Care2
1

3
Pick up relatives

The youngest victims of Kirikiri
Ø The youngest victim in the Otuchi area was only 9 months old.
Ø The next was 4 years old, and the next after that was 28 years old.
Ø Three generations were evacuating together: A grandmother,mother, daughter and son were in the same vehicle.
Ø The wife of a family plays an important role in caring for otherfamilies. In particular, young women are at the bottom of thehierarchy.

What happened during the disaster?
Ø Immediately after the earthquake, the 28-year-old woman drove toa nursery school in Kirikiri and picked up her children.
Ø She was responsible for helping her family, and she continued to drive
to pick up her (her husband )grandmother .
Ø She was involved in a traffic jam because of the complex evacuationroutes (many people tried to escape the tsunami by evacuating by car).
Ø Her car was destroyed by the tsunami in front of many families just afew minutes away from a safe haven on a hill.

Reason why the evacuation were delayed” HER HUSBAND” THERE WAS A” SHE WAS” SHE WENT TOTOLD HER TOFAMILY IN NEEDDISABLED

THE NURSERYWAIT AT HOME”

OF CAREPERSON, AND HERSCHOOL TO PICKWHEELCHAIR WAS

UP HER CHILD”

IN THE
WAREHOUSE”

What we should learn from the stories
Build back betterØ Why the evacuations happened
Ø How to safely evacuate people with strong social vulnerabilitiesØ Learn about existing vulnerabilities and better execute disastermitigation by using traditional community records for disasterpreventionØ The tsunami killed many people, but the sea of Kirisiri is very beautiful.
It is an area where people have lived in the fishery for a long time andlived together with the sea.
Ø Everyone in the area knew that there were many tsunamis in the pastand should have understood the need for evacuation.
Ø We noticed that many people were hesitant to evacuate.
Ø The clear record of the fatalities of the disaster at the time of theearthquake is a record that can only be told by the victim's family orsomeone who has a close relationship.
Ø The purpose of my research is to analyze the details of each of theserecords to clarify the social background of those who hesitated toevacuate and lead to the next disaster prevention.

Direction of future STUDYØ We established a relationship of trust with Otsuchi, and theOtsuchi City Hall provided me with a detailed list of addresses ofthe deceased for use in my research.
Ø Going forward, with mapping work, we plan to visualise how far
the tsunami came with the cooperation of the IRIDeS Tsunami
Research Institute.
Ø We will also share the research results with the world so that thetragedy that occurred in Kirikiri will not be repeated.

Thank you