Tears, survivor's guilt and desperate pleas for help in hard-hit Wajima

Rescuers racing against time to bring relief aid amid limited road access, power outage

- Walter Sim Japan Correspondent

WAJIMA, Ishikawa - Mr Kazuhiro Saka's mind went a complete blank as he witnessed images of the devastation wrought by a New Year's Day earthquake in his home town Wajima, unable to concentrate on quality time with his family in Tokyo.

While he works as a consumer consultant and lives with his wife and three children in the Japanese capital, he was born and raised in Wajima's Kuroshima neighbourhood.

Kuroshima is designated a historically important cultural district for its distinctive wooden buildings and black tiled roofs that date, architecturally, to the Edo era.

Many of these were levelled by the magnitude-7.6 tremor that struck at 4.10pm on Japan's most important festive holiday. Its strength, at the maximum of seven on Japan's shindo earthquake intensity scale, caught even seismologists by surprise.

Experts have said that the Noto Peninsula quake, which struck in an area of geographical remoteness, was triggered by faults that had been dormant for 4,000 years until recently, with the big one preceded by "swarm activity" of small quakes since the end of 2020.

Since Jan 1, at least 1,200 aftershocks have been registered. Wajima shifted 2m south-west because of crustal deformations, with an uplift of as much as 4m in parts of the city.

Mr Saka, shocked by the extent of damage and harbouring a sense of survivor's guilt, knew immediately he wanted to return home as a volunteer. The 44-year-old broke down in tears when asked by The Sunday Times what the city meant to him.

"I'm really sorry," he said in apology for losing his composure.

Several of his childhood friends had died. "It's really painful. This is a very special place to me, with really deep community ties and special connections," he said.

His grief is palpable as the death toll continues to mount across Ishikawa prefecture.