Survivors’ food and water worries begin to mount one week on

A WEEK after their home town was annihilated in a catastrophic tsunami, the 1,000-plus survivors of the small Japanese fishing town of Otsuchi are hanging by a thread.

With no water or electricity and scant food, survivors keep each other company at one of three emergency shelters on the outskirts of what remains of the town. “You can’t wash your hands or face,” says 72-year-old Katsu Sawayama, seated in the middle of the high school gymnasium, the biggest of the shelters in a town where more than half the 17,000 residents are still missing.

While international attention has been focused on Japan’s efforts to stop damage at a quake-hit nuclear power plant from spiralling out of control, a massive salvage and rescue operation has slowly been gathering steam.