Toyota says quake-hit plants escape major structural damage

[DainBramaged]

Toyota Motor Corp. has released the first damage report for its northern Japanese factories in the region hammered by Friday's massive earthquake, saying some equipment and fixtures will need repairs but that the plants sustained no major structural harm.

For days after the quake, Toyota had trouble contacting it plants in the northern Japan quake zone, making it difficult to assess their status. Two Toyota body-making subsidiaries have assembly plants in the region, while the parent company operates two parts factories there.

One of two convoys of Toyota-dispatched relief trucks reached the area on Sunday, while another arrived Monday, the company said. The convoy – comprised of six water tankers, two fuel tankers and nine cargo trucks – delivered supplies to the factories' communities.

Among the emergency goods: water, food, blankets and portable toilets.

"We don't have any reports of injuries. There were no deaths, and everybody's safe," spokesman Paul Nolasco said of the company's employees in the disaster area



Read more: http://www.autonews.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110315/OEM01/110319947/1292#ixzz1GgHqZ8pW

[ensho]

1. a friend told me CNN had pics of thousands of cars that were ready for

shipment at the port where washed into a huge bungle. he said it was an incredible sight.

[GKirk]

2. What's a bungle? n/t

[ensho]

3. give it a guess, I know you can do it

nt

[tridim]

4. Not sure, but I do know it often occurs in "the jungle"