Aid providers and local government officials struggled Wednesday as temperatures plunged in the disaster zone in the northern Honshu region.
Aid providers and local government officials struggled Wednesday as temperatures plunged in the disaster zone in the northern Honshu region.
Throughout wide areas of the Tohoku region heavy snow forced evacuees inside evacuation centers. Many had fled their homes with little more than the clothes on their backs after the March 11 magnitude-9.0 earthquake and tsunami.
Evacuees in many shelters were crammed into cold, uncomfortably tight quarters, raising fears of flu outbreaks.
A few centimeters of snow covered the Ogatsu forest park in Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, on Wednesday. The park's administrative building and cottages are home to about 270 evacuees. A group of people warmed themselves by a fire at an outdoor barbecue area. The evacuees had rigged temporary walls from spare wood and blue tarps.
"Some children have caught colds," said Toshiya Otsuki, a 52-year-old construction worker. "Since blankets went to the old people and children first, many young men stayed by the fire all night," one person said.
On Friday, when the earthquake and tsunami struck the Tohoku region, many people evacuated to higher ground behind their homes and spent the night in the snow. At least eight elderly people are believed to have died that night from exposure.
At municipal Daiichi Junior High School in Rikuzentakata, Iwate Prefecture, about 20 residents huddled around a large drum where a bonfire was burning.
Here, at least, fuel was not a problem.
"We have all the lumber we need," said one evacuee who had been at the shelter since the first day of the disaster. He said that the fires were kept burning around the clock. With the school surrounded by homes flattened by the quake, wood was plentiful.
Officials at an evacuation center in Shirakawa, central Fukushima Prefecture, which took in evacuees from the coastal areas hit by tsunami and explosions at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant, were less lucky.
About 70 evacuees huddled in blankets in a junior high school gymnasium, as outside temperatures fell to 3.6 degrees below zero at 10 p.m. Wednesday.
The school has only four kerosene heaters, but to keep the heaters running through the night, and create a little warmth in the vast space, officials said they needed about 100 liters of kerosene.
With supplies of fuel dwindling, officials considered moving the evacuees to smaller rooms inside the school instead of the cavernous gym whose tall ceiling made heating impractical.
However, some said the cramped quarters would deprive evacuees of privacy and cause even greater stress.
Meanwhile, medical officials said the poor heating conditions at the centers and the closed spaces could create breeding grounds for influenza outbreaks.
At one evacuation facility in Shichigahama, Miyagi Prefecture, two evacuees were isolated and being treated for flu symptoms after medical personnel administered influenza tests.
"Influenza can be contracted any time of the year, but people whose immune systems are compromised through exposure to the harsh conditions in evacuation centers are especially susceptible," a doctor said.
Officials started distributing flu masks at the center.
Medical workers representing AMDA, an international emergency relief NPO, visited many shelters, including facilities for the aged. Miwa Ishioka, a nurse working for the NGO called for the prevention of flu and other infectious diseases. Ishioka, 30, advised that evacuees properly cover their mouths when coughing or sneezing, using their sleeves if they don't have masks.
Hiroyasu Anzai, a 69-year-old evacuee who arrived at the Shichigahama evacuation center from the town of Tomioka in the same prefecture with 10 family members and relatives, said he tried to keep warm by placing cardboard underneath the blankets and wearing four sweaters and wrapping himself in a blanket.
A cold wind blows in whenver people pass in and out of the main door to Sakari Elementary School in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture, now home to several hundred evacuees.
Sekiko Sasaki, 58, who stayed in the lobby near the entrance, said, "I cannot take a bath. I feel weaker as my body becomes cold from the inside. I want to eat something hot." Sasaki added that she was worried about her 80-year-old mother, who was lying in a futon next to her.
At the school, officials placed panels in the hallway to keep the wind from blowing into the lobby.
In addition, officials have put up signs instructing people to keep the doors closed whenever possible and to be considerate of the other evacuees at the school.
"We hope to put our brains together to make life as comfortable as possible for the evacuees," Shoko Suzuki, vice principal of the school, said.