News Analysis: Japan's disaster preparedness underfire following flood-linked blunders

Rescue operations continued Saturday as more than 100 people still remain stranded in Joso City of Ibaraki Prefecture, following torrential downpours dumped in the wake of Typhoon Etau.

It caused a river to burst its banks wreaking Armageddon-like havoc on the city, with tens of thousands of residents across the country also advised to evacuate their homes and flee to emergency shelters.

But while thousands of rescue workers, including the Self- Defense Forces and special fire and helicopter units deployed from Tokyo to assist with the efforts in the city of 65,000 which lies 50 km north of Tokyo, battled the floods and performed daring aerial rescues and plucked numerous trapped peopled from inside flooded homes and buildings, bringing the number of potential unaccounted victims down from 22 on Friday to 15, serious questions are being asked of the nation's preparedness for such expected disasters.

Japan's geographical location and the fact that it is an island nation makes it prone to tropical cyclones and typhoons, and such is the regularity of typhoons lashing Japan's shores and carving sweeping torrential paths, often from south to north.

However, in the most recent case this week from east to north and then west, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) in twine with other national weather agencies monitoring the annual Pacific typhoon formations in the western Pacific Ocean, have access to some of the most sophisticated satellite technology in the world, meaning predicting and charting the probability of a typhoon's course is an exact science.

Hence, and in light of the fact of severe flooding in southern parts of the country earlier this year, which seemingly also took local officials by surprise, despite typhoon season here running almost like clockwork from May to October every year, coupled with the memories of the horrific devastation caused by the monster earthquake-triggered tsunami in 2011, the massive torrents of water alone washing away thousands of homes and, indeed, lives, as well as causing the worst commercial nuclear disaster the world has ever seen, due to inadequate levees and tsunami walls, local citizens and experts are suggesting more than a degree of government ineptitude in preparing for a dealing with the latest floods.

"Firstly, it would seem that the local government in Joso, Ibaraki Prefecture, did not issue an evacuation order for the most at-risk residents living near the banks of the Kinugawa River which were breached along a long stretch of the river, causing the rapid flooding of the surrounding areas, and those that did receive information about evacuating were only given an advisory to do so," Japan affairs commentator, Philip McNeil told Xinhua.

"The weather agency and hence the government knew the typhoon was on its way and posed a significant threat to low-lying areas on the eastern and northeastern seaboard as early as Tuesday and history absolutely guarantees that if emergency preventative measures are not taken then extensive flooding is almost certain. So why the evacuation order wasn't issued earlier and, more importantly, enforced and facilitated by the local municipality is beyond me. This is gross ineptitude and the government bears a great deal of responsibility for the tragedy resulting from its bungled handling of the disaster," said McNeil.

He continued to explain that as the typhoon struck and downpours reached unprecedented levels, flood control at the Kinugawa River was compromised from the get-go due to four upstream dams rapidly reaching capacity and the levees which were soon breached were overdue for repair work and reinforcement, which he said was utterly shocking being that typhoon season is soon coming to an end.

"Not reinforcing the levees in time for typhoon season, could very well have cost lives. This river has flooded countless times over the years, so is very much on the government's radar as a potential disaster hotspot when a typhoon hits, yet they did nothing. The infirm levees remained and the evacuation order was not given. This is beyond my comprehension. Even the river's name Kinugawa translates to "river of an angry demon" in Japanese. It's unbelievable," McNeil said.

And with the government under scrutiny now for its blatant lack of disaster preparedness, despite all the assurances given to the nation and the international community following the triple disasters in 2011, further instances of negligence have come to light as Tokyo Electric Power Co. (TEPCO), operator of the stricken Daiichi nuclear power plant in Fukushima Prefecture, admitted that hundreds of tons of radioactive water had, once again, leaked from the tsunami-raved facility.

In the weeks, months and years following the plant's multiple meltdowns, the utility has grappled with rainwater causing storage tanks to overflow and mix with groundwater, with the radioactive cocktail then flowing freely into the Pacific Ocean and again, with TEPCO receiving advanced warning of an impending typhoon thanks to Japan's advanced meteorological satellite imagery, it failed monumentally to prevent more toxic leaks, which, as with ongoing leaks over the past four years, could have an untold affect on marine life, the local fishing industry and hence put the health and well being of humans in jeopardy.

Hajime Yamamoto, who works for a notable Japanese construction firm and is posted in Ishinomaki City in Miyagi Prefecture, a coastal town almost completely obliterated by the devastating tsunami four years ago, with the prefecture also seeing one of its major rivers burst its banks on Friday, explained to Xinhua about TEPCO's latest howler.

"TEPCO installed a drainage system and closed off a wall that protects against flooding and assured the public that its efforts would absolutely safeguard against the inbound typhoon and potential flooding at its plant," Yamato told Xinhua on the telephone.

Indeed, the utility said in an official statement released Tuesday, "For heavy rains, TEPCO has standard procedures to install rainwater guttering on the upper part of the water storage tanks and also to construct dikes around groups of tanks, which is applied to all of the recently added storage tanks. The drainage systems on the premises are most active during heavy rains to keep the site from flooding," the statement read.

"TEPCO began closing the seaside impermeable wall at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Station today following the successful implementation of the subdrain and groundwater drain systems," the statement continued.

"For the first operation, one of the nine steel pipe sheet- piles were struck by a vibratory hammer to within 1.5m of the planned depth. The wall will play a crucial role in preventing the groundwater containing radioactive materials from reaching the port area and ensure ocean water quality," it read.

"But once again, despite more than four years of experience in such matters, TEPCO's substandard efforts have led to radioactive materials being released into the sea, and added to that more than 80,100-liter black plastic bags holding toxic waste following the cleanup in areas around the Daiichi Plant were washed away by flood waters from areas around the plant, with less than half of them having been retrieved," Yamamoto said, adding that in his opinion the government and its local municipalities, as well as TEPCO, had once again colossally failed to take the necessary precautions to protect its own citizens from standard and expected natural disasters. Endi