Tsunami survivors face monstrous cleanup task

[AsahinaKimi]

By TIM SULLIVAN
The Associated Press

HIGASHIMATSUSHIMA, Miyagi Pref. — Where do you even start?

Do you start by carting away the Chokai Maru, the 45-meter ship that was lifted over a pier and slammed into a house in this port town? Do you start with the thousands of destroyed cars scattered like discarded toys in the city of Sendai? With the broken windows and the doorless refrigerators and the endless remnants of so many lives that clutter the canals?

In the first days after a tsunami slammed into the Tohoku region coast on March 11, killing well over 10,000 people, it seemed callous to worry about the cleanup. The filth paled beside the tragedy. Now, nearly two weeks later, hundreds of communities are finally turning to the monumental task ahead.

The legacy of Hurricane Katrina, which devastated the U.S. Gulf of Mexico coastline in 2005, gives an idea of both the immensity of the job and the environmental hazards Japan could face for years to come.

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20110326a5.html

[polly7]

1. I can't even imagine how overwhelmed and sad they must feel seeing

the magnitude of the destruction.


Wishing them strength and hope.