60 minutes rewind
no matter how many pictures you've seen no matter how many reports you've heard it's a shock
when you get there it wasn't the nuclear disaster or the powerful earthquake that
swept the northeast coast of japan into the sea it was a tsunami a black wave darker than a nightmare
no town was hit harder this past march than atsuchi in a matter of minutes at least hundred
people out of a population of only fifteen thousand were lost otsuchi is so remote very
few people ever get there but fourteen years ago a group of americans formed a bond with the town
a bond that has only grown deeper since the tragedy the world was so mesmerized by the
nuclear accident that after a while these coastal towns were forgotten we went to otsuchi ourselves
to see what has become of a town that's on the brink of extinction
we got there just in time to witness a haunting ceremony drum beats for the dead
buddhist monks march through the remnants of this 800 year old town chanting a requiem
atsuchi reminds one of hiroshima 66 years ago nature can be as vicious as an atomic bomb
10 percent of the population was wiped out it was a fatal lesson in the fragility of civilization
the earthquake alone was so powerful it actually lowered the ground level of japan
and moved the entire island eastward by eight feet every day high tide brings a flood
even months later the survivors are still living in temporary housing but everyone understands
temporary can last a long time this is atsuchi before the tsunami and this is when atsushi
stopped 3 25 pm march 11 2011. this is my house that's your house yeah ken sasaki works for city
hall in a city which has disappeared how long have you been living here uh over 20 years and
when you came back here the first time after the tsunami was there anything of yours left here
nothing was left ken was in a meeting near the harbour when the earthquake struck
thirty minutes later he heard an ominous noise coming from the ocean
oh it must be tsunami i have to run to uh up here and then i come back that was so
it must have looked like hell yeah it must be the hell
nine of his relatives were killed by the tsunami ants cousins ken son as he's known had to live
out of his car for three weeks it was terrible so schooled and then you know there was no gas
no whiskey no beers ken son is as unique a character as you'll find in japan
a music lover and guitar player he learned english listening to the beatles
the ocean has taken things away from kensan before when he was two kensan's father died off of
tucci's coast in a fishing accident when he was a boy ken son would gaze out to sea looking for his
father he always wondered what was on the other side of that ocean when he grew up he took out an
atlas and traced his finger across the pacific it landed on the town of fort bragg california
across the ocean so there are a city of food rags a straight line yeah had you ever heard a forklift
no no no no i only heard about the san francisco california like that and then i tried to find out
what kind of city is for the rack what did you find out it is uh the world's largest
salmon barbecue the world's largest salmon barbecue right right that's quite a distinction
and then so as you see our town has a big summer history two salmon towns yeah
oh it is nice kenton wanted to get to know this fort bragg california so in 1997
he sent a fax to fort bragg city hall inviting the mayor to otucci for a marine convention
much to his surprise the mayor said okay it was the beginning of a beautiful friendship
the two salmon talents started an exchange program for ten years people shuttled back
and forth across the pacific during their last visit to atsuchi the folks from fort bragg held
their going away party inside a tourist boat just five months before all parties stopped
after the tsunami did you get messages from fort bragg so many people sent me many many emails that
makes me cry you know made you cry yeah i feel so happy to get any message from for my friends
one of those friends was sharon davis at our invitation she came back to her tsuchi and thought
she knew what awaited her i've seen the pictures in the videos but this is infinitely worse
she was particularly concerned about ken son the man who had
first brought otsuchi and fort bragg together
i know you lost all your guitars and the tsunami no way it's for you oh really yes
last year sharon hosted two otucci students
zadako and nana at her home in california as part of the exchange program
it survived the tsunami heard sharon was in town heard she was coming to their school
that was like the sun coming out from behind the clouds it was beautiful
girls are okay they are they're okay they're strong girls and for what they've been
through it really amazes me sharon brought a thousand letters from kids back in fort bragg
very frightening but some of the reunions were tough so tough that when a tucci school
superintendent spotted sharon he tried hard to smile but couldn't pull it off
sharon expressed her sorrow in japanese as she gave atsuchi's vice mayor a gift oh thank you
a picture of his former boss the mayor atucci's mayor didn't survive the tsunami
he stayed in his second floor office at city hall orchestrating the evacuation and he told
his staff to evacuate to the roof he stayed on the second floor and was killed by the
tsunami along with about 20 of his other staff the people who made it up to the roof were saved
yes can't think of a better word heroism he died a hero the story will continue after this
atsuchi like every village along the coast had a sea wall but the sea can always throw
up a higher wave a suchi's wall fared no better than a sand castle built by
children on a beach the tsunami was so furious it picked up boats from the sea and dropped them
on roofs and this one picture of this one boat has come to stand for the entire japanese tragedy
that has become the boat hasn't it it's the iconic image from this event and the last time you were
here you were laughing and dancing on that boat we were it was the boat that had hosted fort bragg's
farewell party five months earlier it won't be seeing the sea again it's being turned into trash
occasionally you spot old people wandering through the wasteland
looking for something they'll never find but bodies were still being found while we were there
three months after the tsunami officially the death toll in otsuchi is put at 1500.
think that's accurate i really don't and i think that it has a lot to do with the way
the japanese specify whether or not a person is missing and until somebody reports them missing
they're not statistically missing so in this case if an entire family was
lost there's no one left to report someone missing it's not only people memories are missing
family history is washed up in the rubble every saturday photographs found in the wreckage
are displayed at the high school the new sister a haircut happiness is recovering once passed
clearing all the debris will take years sometimes it's lifted
by what look like prehistoric creatures sometimes it's lifted by hand these people
belong to the fishermen's union they're cleaning up the beach by the sea wall just let them down
this isn't an exercise bike it's a gas station keep pedaling keep pumping the signs say
never give up the japanese never have in the past but this one is a bit much they're getting
a little help from their friends though well we're sending the money the people of fort bragg
population seven thousand have raised a hundred and eighty thousand dollars for atucci there was
no paper no cards left in town so they wrote their thank you note on all they had left
a tarp looking at the people of otsuchi you'd never know what they'd been through in japan
exhibiting one's trauma is not considered polite
sitting here looking at all this desolation knowing that you lost everything you had right
did you keep on smiling how do you do that i cannot cry you know i don't want to cry so we
need a smile we need uh laughing around here we head out before we left ken son wanted to
show us something sprouting in the dust that was once his home look at this a new hydrangea plant
this is a kind of a hope it's a life you don't know when your house will be rebuilt but when it
is yeah you're going to replant the hydrangea yeah i hope so we are living there's new life here yes