TSUKUBA, Ibaraki Prefecture--Once home to more than 6,000 people, the northeastern coastal town of Futaba today remains completely evacuated following the nuclear accident triggered by the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.
TSUKUBA, Ibaraki Prefecture--Once home to more than 6,000 people, the northeastern coastal town of Futaba today remains completely evacuated following the nuclear accident triggered by the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake.
The tragedy and tribulations that have befallen Futaba and its residents can now be revisited on a special website dedicated to the town (
Online since April, the website was set up by a team led by University of Tsukuba professor Tetsuya Shirai. Shirai received the go-ahead for the project from the Futaba board of education to collect, examine and conserve thousands of items related to the disaster to share memories of the calamity with a wider audience.
Photos of the items that appear on the website include goodbye messages from students that were left on a blackboard in a classroom at Futaba Junior High School, and strings of origami cranes sent from across Japan and abroad to an evacuation shelter for town residents in the former Kisai Senior High School in Kazo, Saitama Prefecture.
"When I saw the website, it reminded me of the tragedy of the nuclear accident and the hardships that followed," Atsushi Hangai, head of the town's board of education said at a news conference at the university. "I think it will spur people to learn and think about the accident."
There are no prospects for lifting the evacuation order in Futaba. Ninety-six percent of the town remains uninhabitable due to dangerously high levels of radiation.