Cool Water Blog

Tomorrow morning (March 24th), Karen and I are flying to Misawa Air Base in northern Japan. At the base we will connect with the chaplain’s office to see what relief efforts are being done through the base and to discuss possible areas of cooperation. Calvary Baptist Church has offered to host us overnight and then the next day we will go to Iwate Prefecture as Christian Relief, Assistance, Support and Hope (http://crashjapan.com/) volunteers. We will be helping to establish CRASH bases for volunteers coming to Iwate Prefecture after us, as well as helping the people in the towns along the coast however we can.

The situation in Iwate Prefecture is terrible; however, it is quite safe since it is far from the area where the nuclear power plant has leaked radiation. In addition to the M 9.0 earthquake damage, it was hit very hard by the tsunami, which was more than 30 feet high in some areas, particularly where the shape of the coastline concentrated the wave into a narrow inlet or the mouth of a river. Thousands of people lost their lives in the tsunami and thousands more are missing. You have probably seen the news photos of boats on top of houses or bridges, and huge piles of rubble where hundreds of homes and businesses were crushed by the Tsunami. . Many of these photos are from Iwate Prefecture. It will be years before there is any sense of normal life in the worst hit areas.