Bridge to Disaster-Hit Northeastern Japan Island Opens

Kesennuma, Miyagi Pref., April 8 (Jiji Press)--A bridge connecting Kesennuma, Miyagi Prefecture, and an island belonging to the northeastern Japan city facing the Pacific Ocean went into service on Sunday. Residents of the island, called Oshima, were isolated for around three weeks after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami, as a port there for ferry services was damaged by the disaster. The Miyagi prefectural government spent some 6 billion yen on the construction of the 356-meter-long bridge. On Sunday, Oshima residents and others crossed the bridge in a ceremony to mark its opening. Yuichi Hatakeyama, a 71-year-old resident, noted that his wife was scheduled to enter a hospital in Sendai, the capital of Miyagi, on March 11, 2011, when the disaster occurred. Due to the ferry service disruption, however, it took more than three weeks before she was hospitalized, according to Hatakeyama. Hatakeyama said that he had been "extremely worried" that her symptoms could worsen. "I'm now full of emotion to see the much-awaited completion of the bridge," A tourism-related facility is slated to open on the island next year. "I want many people to visit the scenic island," Kesennuma Mayor Shigeru Sugawara said. In Oshima, 33 people lost their lives in the March 2011 disaster. The island's population stood at 2,447 as of the end of February this year. END