The city of Ishinomaki was ordered to pay 1.44 billion yen (US$13 million) to the children’s parents

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

A city in Japan is to appeal a court order to pay 1.44 billion yen (US$13 million) to the parents of 23 children who died in a tsunami that struck the country’s north-east coast seven years ago.



The deaths of 74 pupils and 10 teachers at Okawa elementary school is one of the most harrowing episodes of the March 2011 triple disaster, in which almost 19,000 people died.

Teachers kept the school’s 108 pupils in the playground for about 45 minutes before escorting them to higher ground near a riverbank rather then up a nearby hill. Minutes later, rising waters swept most of the children to their deaths. Only 34 pupils and three members of staff survived.

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At the end of last month, a high court upheld a 2016 ruling ordering the city of Ishinomaki, which operated the school, to pay damages to the 29 parents involved in the legal action.

The court said the school and the prefectural authorities had not made proper evacuation plans, adding that the children’s deaths could have been prevented.



“The school should have been able to forecast before the occurrence of the quake that a tsunami would reach the school,” Japanese media quoted the judge, Hiroshi Ogawa, as saying. “The school had an obligation to clarify evacuation areas and evacuation routes in its risk management manual but it failed to do so.”

This week, local councillors in Ishinomaki voted to appeal to the supreme court. The prefectural government is also expected to appeal.

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Ishinomaki’s mayor, Hiroshi Kameyama, said city officials could not have predicted the scale of the disaster, which struck after a magnitude-9 earthquake triggered a huge tsunami along the north-east coast.

Holding teachers and education officials responsible for the children’s deaths was “unreasonable,” he added.

The decision to appeal was greeted with anger by the victims’ parents. “The lives of our children are not pawns,” Hiroyuki Konno, whose 12-year-old son Daisuke, died in the disaster, was quoted as saying by the Asahi Shimbun.



Kazutaka Sato, whose son, Yuki, was among the victims, accused the city’s government of “talking about the tragedy like it’s someone else’s business”.