TOKYO —
The Japanese and U.S. governments are concerned about a large amount of Pacific Ocean debris, set afloat by last year’s tsunami caused by the Great East Japan Earthquake, that is expected to reach the U.S. West Coast starting in autumn.
The trouble stems from the lack of an international agreement on who is responsible for disposing of debris released into the sea. Experts have also said harmful substances mixed with debris will likely damage the marine environment.
According to Japan’s Environment Ministry, the total amount of debris resulting from the March 11, 2011, disaster in the three stricken prefectures of Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima is estimated at 18.11 million tons. About 4.8 million tons of additional debris is further believed to have been washed out to sea.
About 70 percent of drifting debris consists of such things as cars and cargo containers. Most debris is believed to have sunk off the coast of the Tohoku region. However, the remaining 30 percent, or about 1.54 million tons, became floating debris, including collapsed houses and wood from disaster-prevention forests. These articles have been drifting in the Pacific Ocean since the disaster.
A large amount of debris is expected to wash ashore on the U.S. West Coast in October or later, according to the Environment Ministry’s calculation based on data collected from satellite images and ocean currents.
Drifting debris such as a fishing boat and motorcycle have already landed on the U.S. coast. It became a local news phenomenon when a large floating pier from Aomori Prefecture washed ashore in Oregon.
Members of nongovernmental organizations both in Japan and the United States held a meeting in Oregon early this month and started studying measures to deal with the floating debris.
Azusa Kojima, secretary general of the Japan Environmental Action Network, an environmental nongovernmental organization, said after returning to Japan, “What the U.S. side wanted most was concrete information about the debris - how much and what kind will be washed ashore and which areas or coastlines in Oregon it is projected to land on.”
To deal with drifting debris, an official at the Cabinet Office’s Secretariat of the Headquarters for Ocean Policy said: “No international rules (about drifting debris) exist and it’s become the custom that a country in which debris drifts ashore bears the costs of clearing it. However, it’s difficult to deal with the situation this time as there’s no precedent for such a large amount of drifting objects being washed ashore.”
The Oregon state government paid the demolition cost of the floating pier in Oregon, which was about $84,000.
The headquarters official said, “We can’t let the U.S. side solely dispose of debris, as we received a lot of assistance from them during Operation Tomodachi after the disaster.”
The headquarters is studying what Japan can do to resolve the issue.
World, nation, state
Japan, U.S. discuss cost of clearing tsunami waste
- World, nation, state
-
-
2 FBI agents killed during training exercise
Two FBI agents died Friday in an apparent off-shore training exercise.
The agency’s website identified the officers as Special Agent Christopher Lorek and Special Agent Stephen Shaw. They were members of the FBI’s elite Hostage Rescue Team, which is part of the Critical Incident Response Group based at Quantico, Va. -
Just one ticket is good for big Powerball jackpot
One ticket sold in Florida has won the Powerball jackpot, with a final annuity value of $590.5 million, short of the advertised estimate of $600 million.
-
Ohio newspaper editor David Miller dead at 66
Editor David C. Miller of The (Bowling Green) Sentinel-Tribune newspaper in Ohio died Saturday at a hospital in York, Pa., the paper said in a statement. He was 66.
-
Police in NE Ohio report black bear sightings
Police in a northeast Ohio community report a number of black bear sightings.
-
Tornadoes level homes in Okla., hit other states
One of several tornadoes that touched down Sunday in Oklahoma turned homes in a trailer park near Oklahoma City into splinters and rubble and sent frightened residents along a 100-mile corridor scurrying for shelter.
-
Mental illness in youth is a common struggle
Go to a busy street in your community and count the next 25 adolescents who walk, bike, skateboard, stroll or saunter past. Odds are that two of those 25 kids (8.3 percent to be exact) would own up to having experienced 14 or more days in the last month that he or she considered “mentally unhealthy,” according to a comprehensive report on the mental health of American youth issued this week.
-
Imprisoned Ohio Amish complain about schooling
Some of the Amish sentenced in beard-cutting attacks on fellow Amish in Ohio are upset with federal prison education requirements.
-
Feces contaminates 58 percent of public swimming pools
Human feces taints more than half of public swimming pools, a finding U.S. health officials are using to urge better personal hygiene as the summer months approach.
-
Record Powerball jackpot inspires office pools
In workplaces across the nation, Americans are inviting their colleagues to chip in $2 for a Powerball ticket and a shared daydream.
-
Dark, massive asteroid to fly by Earth May 31
It’s 1.7 miles long. Its surface is covered in a sticky black substance similar to the gunk at the bottom of a barbecue. If it impacted Earth it would probably result in global extinction. Good thing it is just making a flyby.
- More World, nation, state Headlines
-
2 FBI agents killed during training exercise
