unfolding
disaster. We have reached the stopping point. You can hear in the background diggers are now trying to clear the debris from the road up ahead, bits of wood, car tyres, bits of twisted metal. The main town is straight ahead of us and that is where, we are told, many thousands of people are still unaccounted for.
Large swathes of Japan are without power and the government is beginning a programme of rolling electricity
blackout
s. Huge numbers of survivors are gathered in emergency shelters, some with no heat. More than a million households are without fresh water. About 30% of Japan’s electricity comes from nuclear power.
In a
remarkable
tale of survival, the Japanese defence ministry said a 60-year-old man had been rescued
clinging to
the roof of his house. It had been carried out to sea by Friday’s tsunami. Mark Lobel has more.
For two days Hiromitsu Shinkawa drifted 15 kilometres off Japan’s northeastern coast, clinging to his floating rooftop. It was all that was left of his house in Fukushima prefecture after the tsunami had ripped it from its foundations and swept away his wife. As he clung on in the sea, he waved a red cloth in an attempt to attract the attention of passing helicopters and boats. The crew on board a Japanese military ship spotted him and sent a small vessel his way. As he was taken to hospital by helicopter, he was reported to be in good health.