英語訳
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A flood warning had been issued from Morioka, and the residents had all been on alert and ready for the floodwaters to arrive, so there was no element of surprise. Around three hundred houses in the vicinity of the city were inundated, and bridges along the national highway collapsed, cutting off traffic.
**Minami-Iwate District, Aza Matsushima** — There is a place by this name located a little over two ri from Morioka. A humble resident belonging to this aza had built a single home on an island in the middle of the Kitakami River and lived there. On the nineteenth, floodwaters suddenly arrived, leaving him no way to escape; he climbed onto his roof and waited for the water to recede. However, the water grew ever more violent with no sign of easily abating, and he spent the night on his rooftop. The following day, the twentieth, the water level had decreased somewhat, but as he had no boat to reach the shore, he remained on the roof awaiting rescue. Eventually the waters did recede, but all his household goods had been soaked, there was nothing to eat, no fire to warm himself, and he sat alone on the island in a daze, gazing ruefully at the water. Just then, some neighbors who had come to check on the state of the island discovered this unexpected "Shunkan." But without a boat or raft there was no way to help him directly, so they devised a plan: they tied a fire-starter (hokuchi) to the tip of an arrow, nocked it to a bow, and shot it from the riverbank toward the man's hut. With this fire-starter, the makeshift "Shunkan" obtained a source of fire and was able to endure the temporary cold.
**Nishi-Iwai District, Ichinoseki** — Whenever the Kitakami River floods, Ichinoseki is invariably caught up in the damage. This is because the terrain around Ichinoseki is a place where the river narrows, and the fierce waters coming from upstream are dammed up here, creating backflow that overflows into the surrounding area. Because of such geography, the residents, the town office, and the police all had pre-established procedures for flood response. In nearby Nakazato Village, for example, three privately-owned boats had already been hired and rescue arrangements were in place; thus when the floodwaters rose, they immediately put these boats to use for rescue operations, and the residents generally climbed onto rooftops to avoid danger. The water has now fully receded, but the flooded farmland is said to amount to nearly eight hundred se (square units of land measure).
**Nishi-Iwai District** — Ichinoseki Station premises flooded to a depth of over two jō (approximately six meters).
**Isawa District, Mizusawa** — The area around the town saw water levels rise to nearly twenty shaku (about six meters) or more, leaving the town half-submerged under raging waves. Over three hundred and twenty houses were affected, and in nearby villages, the count of flooded
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houses amounted to over three hundred.
In summary, this flood struck the entire length of the Kitakami River basin, inundating or washing away anywhere from four or five chō to as many as a hundred chō of farmland per village. While the aftermath is not as catastrophic as a tsunami, it is truly a matter of grave concern for the farming population.
**Ninohe District** — Due to flooding of the Mabuchi River, four bridges collapsed on the national highway, at Arase, Kawahara Fukin, and Shitazaki.
**North and South Kunohe Districts** — About nine-tenths of the coastal roads suffered damage; two bridges on prefectural roads at Ōno and Natsui collapsed.
**Tōhoku Hei District** — Miyako's Shinsei Bridge collapsed; Aza Fujiwara suffered damage; thirty houses were inundated in Miyako.
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**● Flood Damage in Miyagi Prefecture**
From the twentieth of July, storms caused flooding in numerous rivers. The previous night, the embankment at Hibine in Tome District along the Kitakami basin burst. Damage to other rivers was also considerable.
Along the Kitakami River basin, one section of the Kitakami embankment at Nishikori Village in Tome District, four sections of the Futamata River embankment at Yoneya Village, and two sections of the Hibine embankment in Tome District all burst. Also, one section of embankment at Hōe Village in Tome District along the Hasama River basin, and one section at Nodake Village in Toda District, among many other overflow sites, were reported. One section of the Kozuka embankment at Moto-Wakuya Village in Toda District along the Arō River basin also burst. The Abukuma River rose by one jō and five shaku, and there was widespread inundation of houses and considerable damage to farmland.
The collapse of the embankment at Aza Akōzawa in Toyosato Village, Tome District, resulted in five hundred houses being inundated. Near Nodake Village in Toda District, the Hasama River flooded, breaking embankments at several locations, destroying over ten private dwellings, and submerging all the farmland. In Shibata District, the Abukuma River flooded, and in Funaoka Village, Shimonayū, and Nakanayū, every single house and field was inundated. Near Ejiri in Igu District, the Abukuma River also overflowed, with water levels just four sun (about 12 cm) below those of the great flood of Meiji 13, which had been called the greatest flood in living memory; thus the farmland around Tōne Village suffered severe damage.
The total flood damage across the prefecture was: fourteen houses completely washed away; one thousand nine hundred and seventy houses inundated; inundated
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farmland totaling eight thousand seven hundred and thirty-six chō; eight hundred and fifty-seven households receiving relief assistance, encompassing five thousand three hundred and seventy-five persons.
In August, flooding occurred once again.
**Nishi-Kizuki District** — On the eleventh, due to a storm, a bridge was washed away at Makiyoko in Nanaorimura, Nishi-Kizuki District, and six people drowned. (Dispatched from Sendai, the twelfth.)
**Ishinomaki** — Storms have been arriving in quick succession these past days, and again rivers have flooded; the inundation of houses and damage to embankments and bridges are ever-increasing. Particularly in Ishinomaki, where seawater had already risen, flooding between last night and tonight has been considerable. Relief cooking and rescue operations are being carried out at each location. (Dispatched from Sendai, the twelfth.)
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**● Flood Damage in Fukushima Prefecture**
From the twenty-first of July, the volume of water in the Suka River increased rapidly and visibly, so Fukushima townspeople variously put their household belongings in order, fled to relatives and friends for safety, or sought lodging at temples on higher ground. As night fell, the water level continued to rise steadily, and houses throughout the low-lying area below the Jōkōji Temple in the Nishiura district, extending to the area below Hōrinji Temple at the back of Ichōme, were entirely inundated. When examined the following morning, the water gauge showed a level of over one jō and eight shaku (approximately 5.4 meters). Despite the desperate efforts of the fire brigade to save the bridges, these began to be carried away from the east end, and by around eight o'clock in the morning they had been entirely swept away. Simultaneously, five or six houses in Torite Village on the opposite bank were swept away intact, filling onlookers with grief. The areas of greatest damage in Fukushima town were the riverbanks in Nishiura and Ichōme, followed by Okitama-dōri, Suzukidō, Minamiura, and Jinnba. By around ten o'clock in the morning the rain stopped and the water level began to gradually fall.
In Motomiya Town, the Abukuma River flooded due to rainfall beginning on the twenty-first; six hundred houses in the town were inundated, but by the morning of the twenty-third the waters had fully receded.
In Aizu, a storm began around ten o'clock in the morning on July twentieth, changed abruptly into heavy rain at one o'clock in the afternoon, and continued without pause until six o'clock in the evening on the twenty-second, causing all rivers to flood. Five bridges collapsed on the Yugawa River; in Wakamatsu City, nearly one thousand houses were flooded above floor level; and farmland damage was innumerable. Along the main river (i.e., the upper reaches of the Agakawa River), all bridges spanning Kita-Aizu,
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Ōnuma, Kawanuma, and Yama districts were washed away (one suspension bridge, three pontoon bridges, eight fixed bridges), making traffic between Wakamatsu and the two districts of Ōnuma and Kawanuma impossible. The damage in both districts was therefore enormous.
A report from the twenty-second stated that the Abukuma River water gauge at Fukushima showed one jō and eight shaku, and was still rising. Known damage so far: six houses washed away in Torite Village, Shinobu District; two houses in Kuchikubo, Hamabe Village; one house in Motomiya Town, Adachi District; one drowning death in Shirakawa; the Shirakawa railway bridge destroyed; and numerous national highway, prefectural road, and other bridges washed away.
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**● Flood Damage in Aomori Prefecture**
Due to continuous rainfall from the nineteenth of July onward, the Iwaki River, Asaseishi River, Hara River, and others flooded severely throughout Aomori Prefecture, and there was hardly a district that escaped flood damage. Of these, the western face of Kita-Tsugaru District, which borders the Iwaki River, suffered the most severe damage. To describe the general state of damage in that district: the peak flood level occurred around seven o'clock in the morning on the twenty-first; the water gauge installed on the Iwaki River bank within Goshogawara Village at the center of the district showed a reading of over twenty shaku (about six meters), nearly overtopping the embankment. Over forty houses outside the embankment were entirely inundated to above floor level, with the highest reaching four shaku and the lowest not less than two shaku; boats and rafts were borrowed to rescue the flood victims. About two ri to the north of this village, the Iwaki River embankment at Aza Mogawa and Chiunai in Miyoshi Village burst for a stretch of over twenty ken, and simultaneously the Togawa River flowing through Kawayama, Tanei, and Nagahashi in the adjacent Nakagawa Village overflowed the embankments and broke through at various points. The combined flooding of these two rivers spread in a vast, unstoppable surge across fields and open country, forming a pool roughly eight ri in circumference; in the deepest parts of the paddies the water was one jō four or five shaku deep (over four meters), and looking across it appeared boundless and endless, like a great elongated lake. In Mogawa, every house was inundated; villagers took refuge on upper floors or on embankments, relying on emergency rice distributions to barely stave off starvation, while inside the houses fish leaped and frogs croaked, and excrement, mud, and well-water mixed together, emitting a foul odor that flowed throughout the interiors and exteriors of homes — a scene of utter devastation. In Numagawa Village to the south of the district, the embankments of the Togawa and Naminokawa Rivers overflowed entirely, and on top of that, four sections of embankment (measuring sixteen ken down to four ken in length) collapsed, instantly flooding more than ten private houses and over four hundred chō of rice paddies in the two large aza of Takii and Tatanokoshi within the village. The force of the flooding was truly overwhelming—