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In the morning on March 12, 2011, a day after the Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami wreaked havoc, a police officer in protective gear was telling people from his patrol car, “Please evacuate immediately.”
At that time, the officer never referred to the crisis at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant.
Veterinarian Seido Watanabe of Tomioka, Fukushima Prefecture, had spent the previous night with his wife and daughters in their car as the huge tsunami flowed in a river upward and reached the area in front of their house, which is situated on a hill.
At night on March 11, the government issued a declaration that said an emergency situation had occurred in a nuclear power plant. However, news of the declaration did not reach Watanabe.
“Despite that the huge tsunami has receded, why do we have to evacuate now?” he wondered.
Thinking that he would soon be allowed to return to his home, he planned to evacuate without bringing even a change of underwear with him.
Then, his second daughter, Reina, a third-year junior high school student, said, “Let’s bring Ponyo with us.” She wanted to take the family's pregnant pet dog with them. The dog was expected to give birth to her first puppies the next day through a Caesarean operation.
But Watanabe told her immediately, “We will not bring the dog with us.”
At that time, his animal hospital near their home had 17 dogs and cats. He was not able to put all of them in his car. As a veterinarian, it was impossible to bring only his pet dogs with him, while leaving all the other dogs and cats in the hospital.
“You are stupid, stupid. You should die,” Reina told him crying. Then, she refused to speak to her father.
The family evacuated to Kawauchi village, where he learned for the first time that an accident had occurred at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant. After that, the family continued to move around to various evacuation locations. His hopes of being able to return home soon were shattered.
When Watanabe temporarily returned to his house on March 19 with a firm resolve, five of the dogs and cats in his hospital had already died. They had apparently been unable to survive a week due to old age or poor health.
One of the five was a Labrador retriever, from which he had removed its spleen the previous month. As the postoperative condition of the dog was good, it was difficult for him to convey news of its death to its owner.
However, he called owners of all of the five dogs and cats and told them about the death of their pets. One of the owners came to his animal hospital immediately after he left there, but failed to see his pet.
None of the five owners criticized Watanabe directly. However, one of them asked him, “Wasn't it possible to come back for the dogs and cats a little sooner?”
He apologized to the owner with his eyes full of tears.
The owners of the dogs and cats that have survived have evacuated to municipalities throughout the country. Only Watanabe could continue to care for their pets. He relocated them in several trips, and is now keeping them in a borrowed shed in Miharu, also in Fukushima Prefecture, where his wife’s parents' house is located.
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