Evacuation Order Fully Lifted in Ofunato After Large-Scale Wildfire Burns for Nearly 2 Weeks; Residents Begin to Return to Their Homes

The Yomiuri Shimbun

13:58 JST, March 10, 2025

The municipal government of Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture, which was devastated by a large-scale forest fire, fully lifted an evacuation order at 10 a.m. on Monday.

The city, which declared the fire to be under control at 5 p.m. on Sunday, said the fire damaged as many as 210 houses and buildings, 171 of which fully burned down. As the order was lifted, evacuated residents began to return home one after the other. Also, three junior high and elementary schools in the city reopened, making students glad to be reunited with their classmates.

The city government issued an evacuation for 4,596 people in 1,896 households. “The day we’ve long been waiting for has arrived,” Ofunato Mayor Kiyoshi Fuchigami said at a press conference on Monday morning. “As there are people who have lost their homes, we have to help those who need housing.”

The forest fire started at about 1 p.m. on Feb. 26. The burned body of a 90-year-old man was found in Sanriku town in the city. The fire burned about 2,900 hectares, becoming the largest forest fire in the country since the Heisei era (1989-2019).