# Information and Communications in the Aftermath of the Great East Japan Earthquake

At 2:46 PM on March 11, 2011, an earthquake of magnitude 9.0 struck with an epicenter off the Sanriku coast of northeastern Honshu. With a seismic intensity of 7 in Kurihara City, Miyagi Prefecture, and 6 upper in Miyagi, Fukushima, Ibaraki, and Tochigi prefectures, it strongly jolted a wide area and triggered an enormous tsunami that struck the Pacific coast, causing severe damage especially in the Tohoku and Kanto Pacific coast regions $ ^{1} $ .

The government of Japan established a Government Headquarters in Response to the Great East Japan Earthquake at 3:14 PM, and based on the nation's policy on emergency response to disasters, began collecting information, tracking the scale of damage, dispatching rescue missions, assisting survivors, taking emergency measures such as fighting fires, working to restore basic services to the affected areas, securing the necessary personnel and supplies, and providing clear information to residents of the affected areas.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications (MIC) established an MIC Response Headquarters at 2:46 PM the same day, and an MIC Emergency Disaster Response Headquarters at 4:00 PM, tracking the extent of damage, taking emergency disaster response measures, and working to restore services.

The information and communications infrastructure, which is essential to the lives of Japanese citizens, underwent tremendous damage in the earthquake and tsunami. The telecommunications infrastructure suffered from interrupted lines and electrical blackouts rendering ICT equipment unusable, primarily in the Tohoku and Kanto regions. In addition, the Great East Japan Earthquake's devastation of the ICT (information and communications technology) industry caused a ripple effect across the entire economy $ ^{2} $ .

In the aftermath of the earthquake, private enterprises and others worked to restore infrastructure as quickly as possible, and various measures were taken including allowing use of public telephones free of charge and installation of extra public phones. Information was broadcast, and social media and other new online media allowed people to determine the status of victims and survivors and provide relief to survivors, highlighting the role of new technologies in post-disaster situations. On the other hand, rumors and false information spread via the Internet, and there was a clear disparity in ability to obtain information between Internet users and non-users, making it clear that ICT poses an array of challenges as well.

While the challenges involved with disaster response are constantly evolving, this white paper will examine the role played by ICT in the aftermath of the disaster on the basis of the situation as it stood in May 2011.

## Section 1

## Status of Telecommunications

### 1. Telecommunications damage

## (1) Damage to the telecommunications network

In the earthquake and tsunami of March 11, equipment inside telecommunications buildings was damaged, submerged in water, or washed away; underground cables and pipes were severed or damaged; electrical poles fell, suspended cables were damaged, and mobile phone base stations collapsed or were swept away. In addition, there was an extended disruption of commercial power supply, storage batteries dried up, and service was suspended.

Telecommunications carriers took steps to restore service as quickly as possible, including dispatching several dozen mobile power supply vehicles and 40 or more vehicle-mounted mobile phone base stations to the affected areas, as well as releasing restoration area maps and publicizing areas where telecommunications damage had occurred.

Network infrastructure also suffered severe damage. Damage to telecommunications equipment along the coast included loss of numerous electrical poles and cables in the tsunami, as well as a great amount of equipment inside telecommunications facilities being damaged. Damage to trunk lines and master stations positioned along the coast meant that landline communications were disrupted and inland switching centers temporarily went out of service as well.

## (2) Network congestion

The earthquake caused confusion in the transit network and concentration of communications traffic, resulting in relatively prolonged congestion of landline phones over a wide area.

Voice calls on mobile phones saw a surge in traffic, up to 50 or 60 times the normal volume in the case of NTT DoCoMo traffic, causing carriers to impose restrictions of up to 90% (NTT DoCoMo), 95% (KDDI) and 70% (Softbank). On the other hand, text messages (packets) faced much milder congestion, with only a 30% restriction im-