Photos Credit: Tohoku University
The 9th APRU Multi-Hazards Summer School was held from July 29 to August 2 at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan, under the theme “Cross-border Collaborations as a Tool for Addressing Disaster Risks”. This year, the program provided 33 participants from 13 organizations across nine economies in the Asia-Pacific region with a deep understanding of the ongoing challenges in managing the recovery from the nuclear disaster caused by the 2011 megathrust earthquake and tsunami.
Since 2013, the Multi-Hazards Summer School has been organized by the International Research Institute of Disaster Science (IRIDeS) at Tohoku University as a key activity under the Multi-Hazards Program of APRU. IRIDeS was established in 2012, one year after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami. IRIDeS aims to conduct a wide range of interdisciplinary research and help build a society that is resilient against natural disasters.
“At this summer school, I hope you will learn more about disaster risk reduction and how it can address various global issues,” said Professor Toshiya Ueki, Tohoku University’s Executive Vice President for General Affairs, International Affairs, and Academic Resources. “And I hope that you will have inspiring discussions with the participants who have joined us from overseas.”
This year, the participants took a day trip to Futaba Town in Fukushima Prefecture for the first time, closely observing the aftermath and recovery of the Great East Japan Earthquake, which triggered powerful tsunami waves that caused a disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in March 2011. Their first stop was the Great East Japan Earthquake and Nuclear Disaster Memorial Museum, which opened to the public in 2020.
They also visited the Interim Storage Facility, which stores soil and waste generated through the decontamination of radioactive contaminants from the affected area. The participants toured the outdoor facility with protective gears on and measured the radiation in the air, which was within the safe level at the time.
“Witnessing firsthand the interim nuclear soil storage facility was an eye-opening experience, providing me with a deeper understanding of the ongoing challenges in managing nuclear disaster aftermaths,” said Anjali Haridas, a participating graduate student from Kyoto University.
“The stories of resilience and recovery, coupled with the technical insights shared by the experts, left a lasting impact on me, reinforcing the importance of learning from past events to build a safer future.”
The 9th APRU Multi-Hazards Summer School was organized in a combined form of lectures, group work and field trips. Participants were divided into small groups, each tasked to develop a disaster risk reduction (DRR) strategy and plan for a real city based on the interdisciplinary collaborations between the group members. The group work was aimed to bring together opinions and expertise from different regions, cultures, and academic disciplines.
The APRU Multi-Hazards Program was founded over a decade ago to harness the collective capabilities of APRU universities for cutting-edge research on the shared threat of natural disasters faced by the Pacific Rim, which is one of the most disaster-prone regions in the world.
