Hmmm, should we worry that the Japanese ghost ship off the coast of BC will be a hazard or should we let it find its own resting place after its miraculous, year-long voyage?
Earlier this month we marked the first anniversary of the devastating earthquake and tsunami that hit Japan on March 11, 2011. I must admit that I let the day pass without too much thought as I was busy running the daily 100 hundred yard dash that life has become in this day and age.
My radar registered a blip and a brief “oh no” with the news reports that a 6.3 magnitude quake had hit Japan earlier this week. Fortunately, there were no reports of damages or casualties and a tsunami warning was not issued.
News reports that the Toyko Electric Power Company, operator of the crippled Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear station, has requested 1 trillion yen ($12 billion) of public funds to avert collapse, brought another momentary “oh wow” before my mind reverted to the deadlines I had to meet.
I have managed to push the chilling statistics – 16,000 deaths, 21,000 injuries and 3,000 still missing – into one of those partitioned corners of our memory that we keep for things too unpleasant to dwell on. It is a psychological survival tactic that most of us have developed to stay sane in the face of such overwhelming tragedy.
But the long term effects of the Japan disaster are beginning to float – quite literally – into our consciousness again whether we want them to or not.
Five million tons of debris from the coastal areas of Japan was swept into the ocean. 70% of this debris sank quickly. But authorities estimate that 1.5 million tons have floated. Oceanographers estimate that the debris is now dispersed over an area of 2,000 miles by 1,000 miles. And because of the clockwise circulation of the Pacific Ocean’s northern waters, some of that debris is headed for North America.
At this very moment, the rusted and battered shell of a Japanese fishing boat – what has been dubbed a “ghost boat” – is drifting 150 nautical miles south of the Queen Charlotte Islands off the coast of British Columbia.
Canadian authorities, while conceding that the ghost ship is a shipping hazard, have not said what – if anything – will be done with it. The Coast Guard says it will only take action if fuel spills from the ship which is apparently unlikely.
So this fishing boat will, it seems, continue to drift aimlessly until it washes up on shore somewhere or settles on an ocean reef. And perhaps that is the way it should be.
The Japanese ghost ship exists as a living metaphor for the far-reaching effects – in time and in human terms – of the horrible tragedy that struck Japan. Many residents of the area around the nuclear power plants have still not been allowed to go home. Some never will be able to because the radiation levels are too high.
But the ghost ship can also be a metaphor for hope for the Japanese people. Somehow, against all odds, it has stayed afloat through the tsunami, through the thousands and thousands of miles it has drifted and through countless ocean gales.
So I will choose to interpret the Japanese ghost ship as a metaphor for the endurance of the human spirit – and a reminder that we, who are so fortunate, should never allow ourselves to forget those whose lives were torn apart and will never be quite the same.
~ Michael Robert Dyet is the author of “Until the Deep Water Stills – An Internet-enhanced Novel” – double winner in the Reader Views Literary Awards 2009. Visit Michael’s website at www.mdyetmetaphor.com or the novel online companion at www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog.
~ Follow Michael’s Metaphors of Life Journal aka Things That Make Me Go Hmmm regularly at this site. Categories: Shifting Winds, Sudden Light, Deep Dive, Songs of Nature, Random Acts of Metaphor. Originating at www.mdyetmetaphor.com/blog2.
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Tags: ghost ship · Japan earthquake · metaphor · Michael Robert Dyet · tsunamiNo Comments