Shizugawa Station platform after Tsunami

was a

JR East The is a major passenger railway company in Japan and is the largest of the seven Japan Railways Group companies. The company name is officially abbreviated as JR-EAST or JR East in English, and as in Japanese. The company's headquarters are ...

railway station located in

Minamisanriku is a town in Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. , it had an estimated population of 12,516, and a population density of 77 persons per km² in 4504 households. The total area of the town is . It is a resort town on a coastline of wooded islands and moun ...

Miyagi Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. Miyagi Prefecture has a population of 2,305,596 (1 June 2019) and has a geographic area of . Miyagi Prefecture borders Iwate Prefecture to the north, Akita Prefecture to the nort ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. The station was destroyed by the

2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami The occurred at 14:46 JST (05:46 UTC) on 11 March. The magnitude 9.0–9.1 (M) undersea megathrust earthquake had an epicenter in the Pacific Ocean, east of the Oshika Peninsula of the Tōhoku region, and lasted approximately six minutes ...

. Services have now been replaced by a provisional

bus rapid transit Bus rapid transit (BRT), also called a busway or transitway, is a bus-based public transport system designed to have much more capacity, reliability and other quality features than a conventional bus system. Typically, a BRT system includes ...

line.

Lines

Shizugawa Station was served by the Kesennuma Line, and was located 33.7 rail kilometers from the terminus of the line at Maeyachi Station.

Station layout

Shizugawa Station had a single

side platform A side platform (also known as a marginal platform or a single-face platform) is a platform positioned to the side of one or more railway tracks or guideways at a railway station, tram stop, or transitway. A station having dual side platforms ...

and a single

island platform An island platform (also center platform, centre platform) is a station layout arrangement where a single platform is positioned between two tracks within a railway station, tram stop or transitway interchange. Island platforms are popular on ...

serving two tracks, and connected to the station building by a level crossing.

History

Shizugawa Station opened on 11 December 1977. The station was absorbed into the JR East network upon the

privatization Privatization (also privatisation in British English) can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation when ...

of the Japan National Railways (JNR) on April 1, 1987. Operations were discontinued after the station was completely destroyed by the

and an iconic video on the internet recorded from the Shizugawa High School shows the station being flattened as well as the tracks and other nearby buildings before being pouring down to a flat area towards a neighborhood. Today rail services have now been replaced by a

line.

Surrounding area

* Japan National Route 45 *former Shizugawa Town Hall *Sode Beach Ocean Swimming Area

References

External links

JR East Station information
* video of a train trip from

Utatsu Station was a JR East railway station located in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. The blue-roofed station platform remained standing after the 2011 tsunami, however the adjacent railway bridge and track (southwest of the station) collapsed. Ser ...

to Shizugawa Station in 2009, passing

Shizuhama Station was a JR East railway station located in Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. The blue-roofed station platform remained standing after the 2011 tsunami, however the adjacent railway bridge and track (southwest of the station) collapsed. Ser ...

at around 03:45 minutes without stopping. Satellite photos (e.g., in Google Maps) showed that much of the landscape visible in the video was severely affected by the

2011 tsunami Eleven or 11 may refer to: *11 (number), the natural number following 10 and preceding 12 * one of the years 11 BC, AD 11, 1911, 2011, or any year ending in 11 Literature * ''Eleven'' (novel), a 2006 novel by British author David Llewellyn *'' ...

and most of the railway bridges the train travels across were partly or completely destroyed. The destination Shizugawa Station was completely obliterated. * video of a train trip from Shizugawa Station to

Rikuzen-Yokoyama Station is a JR East railway station located in the city of Tome, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. The station was undamaged by the 2011 tsunami; however services have now been replaced by a provisional bus rapid transit line. Lines Rikuzen-Yokoyama Station ...

in 2009, passing

Rikuzen-Togura Station was a East Japan Railway Company, JR East railway station located in Minamisanriku, Miyagi, Minamisanriku, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan. The station was destroyed by the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, 2011 tsunami and surrounding railway track ...

at around 03:48 minutes without stopping. Satellite photos (e.g., in Google Maps) showed that some sections of the railway were completely washed away by the

, particularly near the departure point of Shizugawa Station and the vicinity of Rikuzen-Togura Station, while other sections remained intact. * video shot from a train (facing east) in 2009, stopping at Shizugawa Station and then proceeding to

on the Kesennuma Line. Satellite photos (e.g., in Google Maps) and aftermath videos show that virtually every building visible (except the very largest white buildings in the background) in the first three minutes, and in the final minute, were washed away in the 2011 tsunami, as well as the train track and infrastructure and both stations; buildings and track in the middle part were undamaged. * Shizugawa Station after the tsunami {{coord, 38.678147, 141.442944, format=dms, display=title, type:railwaystation_region:JP_scale:10000 Railway stations in Miyagi Prefecture Kesennuma Line Railway stations in Japan opened in 1977 Railway stations closed in 2011