is a

town A town is a type of a human settlement, generally larger than a village but smaller than a city. The criteria for distinguishing a town vary globally, often depending on factors such as population size, economic character, administrative stat ...

Fukushima Prefecture is a Prefectures of Japan, prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. Fukushima Prefecture has a population of 1,771,100 () and has a geographic area of . Fukushima Prefecture borders Miyagi Prefecture and Yamagata Prefecture ...

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

. , the town had an actual population of 180, although the official registered population was 5,300 in 2,301 households. The total area of the town is . As of March 2011, the entire population was evacuated as a result of the

Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster The Fukushima nuclear accident was a major nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in Ōkuma, Fukushima, Japan, which began on 11 March 2011. The cause of the accident was the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami, which r ...

. However in the decade since then, 3% of the town has been open to visitors and residents, with the first residents returning on a permanent basis as of February 2022.

Geography

Futaba is on the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

coastline of central Fukushima. The

Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant The is a disabled nuclear power plant located on a site in the towns of Ōkuma, Fukushima, Ōkuma and Futaba, Fukushima, Futaba in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. The plant Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, suffered major damage from the 201 ...

, owned by the

Tokyo Electric Power Company is a Japanese electric utility holding company servicing Japan's Kantō region, Yamanashi Prefecture, and the eastern portion of Shizuoka Prefecture. This area includes Tokyo. Its headquarters are located in Uchisaiwaicho, Chiyoda, Tokyo, an ...

, is on the southern border of Futaba in the neighboring town of Ōkuma.

Surrounding municipalities

*Fukushima Prefecture **

Namie is a Towns of Japan, town located in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan. the town has a population of 1,238 in 794 households, although the official registered population was 17,114 in 6853 households. The total area of the town is . The town was ev ...

** Ōkuma

Demographics

Per Japanese census data, the population of Futaba was relatively stable until the nuclear disaster.

Climate

Futaba has a humid climate (

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification divides Earth climates into five main climate groups, with each group being divided based on patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature. The five main groups are ''A'' (tropical), ''B'' (arid), ''C'' (te ...

''Cfa''). The average annual temperature in Futaba is . The average annual rainfall is with September as the wettest month. The temperatures are highest on average in August, at around , and lowest in January, at around .

History

The area of present-day Futaba was part of Mutsu Province. The remains of

Kofun period The is an era in the history of Japan from about 300 to 538 AD (the date of the introduction of Buddhism), following the Yayoi period. The Kofun and the subsequent Asuka periods are sometimes collectively called the Yamato period. This period is ...

burial mounds have been found in the area. During the

Nara period The of the history of Japan covers the years from 710 to 794. Empress Genmei established the capital of Heijō-kyō (present-day Nara). Except for a five-year period (740–745), when the capital was briefly moved again, it remained the capita ...

, it was the center of ancient Futaba District in Iwaki Province During the

Edo period The , also known as the , is the period between 1600 or 1603 and 1868 in the history of Japan, when the country was under the rule of the Tokugawa shogunate and some 300 regional ''daimyo'', or feudal lords. Emerging from the chaos of the Sengok ...

, it was part of Sōma Domain, ruled by the

Sōma clan The was a Japanese clan, Japanese samurai clan that ruled the northern Hamadōri region of southern Mutsu Province in the Tōhoku region of northern Japan for over 700 years, from the Kamakura period through the Meiji Restoration of 1868. The S ...

until the

Meiji restoration The , referred to at the time as the , and also known as the Meiji Renovation, Revolution, Regeneration, Reform, or Renewal, was a political event that restored Imperial House of Japan, imperial rule to Japan in 1868 under Emperor Meiji. Althoug ...

. Town records indicate that over 700 residents of the region died due to a tsunami in the 1611 Sanriku earthquake. The area was the site of the Battle of Iwaki during the

Boshin War The , sometimes known as the Japanese Revolution or Japanese Civil War, was a civil war in Japan fought from 1868 to 1869 between forces of the ruling Tokugawa shogunate and a coalition seeking to seize political power in the name of the Impe ...

. On April 1, 1889, with the establishment of the modern municipalities system, the villages of Shinzan and Nagatsuka were created in Shineha District, Fukushima, which subsequently became Futaba District in April 1896. Shinzan was raised to town status on February 1, 1913. Shinzan merged with Nagatsuka on April 1, 1951 becoming the town of Shineha, which changed its name to Futaba on April 1, 1956.

2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami

Futaba was severely affected by the

, and the

2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami On 11 March 2011, at 14:46:24 Japan Standard Time, JST (05:46:24 UTC), a 9.0–9.1 Submarine earthquake, undersea megathrust earthquake occurred in the Pacific Ocean, east of the Oshika Peninsula of the Tōhoku region. It lasted approx ...

on March 11, 2011. Besides sustaining considerable damage from the earthquake and the

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from , ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and underwater explosions (including detonations, ...

(which devastated the coastal area), the entire population of the town was evacuated en masse on the morning of March 12, as it is well within the exclusion radius around the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. On March 28, 2013, the central government rezoned the town into two areas according to level of radiation: in the first, people were free to go in and out but not allowed to stay overnight; in the second, all entry was forbidden because of elevated radiation levels that were not expected to go down within five years after the accident. However, only 4 percent of the town area zone was opened to daytime return of residents, and the town remained uninhabitable. As of 2017, the Japanese government is leading a cleanup of the town, aiming for 11 percent to be livable by spring 2022. In March 2020, the town's

train station A train station, railroad station, or railway station is a railway facility where trains stop to load or unload passengers, freight, or both. It generally consists of at least one platform, one track, and a station building providing suc ...

was reopened as cleanup efforts continued, and an area of habitability of around one square mile was established around the station. Services between Futaba and the neighbouring towns of

and Naraha commenced on March 14, 2020. In 2022, resettlement of the town commenced when the first three residents to return on a permanent basis arrived. It is planned to increase Futaba's population to 2,000 over the course of five years.

Economy

The economy of Futaba was heavily dependent on

commercial fishing Commercial fishing is the activity of catching fish and other seafood for Commerce, commercial Profit (economics), profit, mostly from wild fisheries. It provides a large quantity of food to many countries around the world, but those who practice ...

and agriculture. Raising of

carnation ''Dianthus caryophyllus'' ( ), commonly known as carnation or clove pink, is a species of ''Dianthus'' native to the Mediterranean Basin, Mediterranean region. Its exact natural range is uncertain due to extensive cultivation over the last 2,00 ...

s was a major industry.

Education

Futaba has two public elementary schools and one public junior high school operated by the town government, and one public high school operated by the Fukushima Prefectural Board of Education. All schools remain closed.

Transportation

Railway

JR East The is a major passenger railway company in Japan and 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 in ...

–

Jōban Line The is a railway line in Japan operated by the East Japan Railway Company (JR East). The line officially begins at Nippori Station in Arakawa, Tokyo before the line officially ends at Iwanuma Station in Iwanuma, Miyagi. However, following ...

Highway

* - Tomioka Interchange * *

Noted residents

Kazunari Watanabe is a Japanese cyclist. Watanabe has competed in the keirin and other track events at the 2008 Summer Olympics and 2012 Summer Olympics The 2012 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXX Olympiad and also known as London 2012, w ...

, Olympic cyclist

Local attractions

* Kiyotosaku Cave Tombs, a National Historic Site with a ''kofun'' burial chamber decorated with murals * The Great East Japan Earthquake and Nuclear Disaster Memorial Museum, this museum shows how Fukushima has dealt with a complex and unprecedented disaster and its ongoing consequences, and communicates lessons for the future on the importance of disaster prevention and mitigation.

References

External links

Official Website
{{2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami Towns in Fukushima Prefecture Populated coastal places in Japan Environmental disaster ghost towns