Emperor, Empress Mourn Flood Victims in Wajima

Jiji Press

11:24 JST, December 19, 2024

WAJIMA, Ishikawa (Jiji Press) — The Emperor and Empress bowed to mourn flood victims in the city of Wajima, Ishikawa Prefecture, on Tuesday.

On their third trip this year to the Noto Peninsula to cheer up people afflicted by a powerful 7.6-magnitude earthquake on Jan. 1 and torrential rain in September, the Imperial couple visited the Futegawa-machi district of Wajima after arriving at Noto Airport aboard a special plane shortly before 11:30 a.m.

In the district, four people including Hanon Kiso, a 14-year-old third-year student at Wajima Junior High School, were killed when the Tsukada River flooded on Sept. 21.

Following a briefing about the disaster given by Wajima Mayor Shigeru Sakaguchi, the Emperor and Empress looked at the debris- and driftwood-scattered flooded site, and bowed silently toward where houses once stood. Kiso is believed to have been in her home at the time of the flooding.

They also visited the junior high school, which is now used as an evacuation center for 51 people, leaning down and talking to the evacuees one by one.

Among them, Kumiko Yoshioka, 70, received sympathy from the couple when she told them that her home was destroyed by the earthquake and a makeshift house she moved into later was damaged by the downpour.

“I felt nothing but gratitude to them for their warm words,” she said.

The Emperor and Empress returned to Tokyo at night after thanking a local police chief and others for their disaster response efforts and meeting with the mayors of the town of Noto and the city of Suzu.

The rain disaster has claimed 16 lives in the prefecture, including 11 in Wajima, the Ishikawa prefectural government said in a revised report the same day.