Mr. Hiroki Abe, 48, a worker of city hall of Ofunato at Sanriku district, looks for missing documents in one month after the earthquake and tsunami. "We saw the tsunami went over the water gate and fell like Niagara Falls on our town," he said. They ran up the mountain behind the city hall. From the mountain, they saw the water swallowed the city hall. "When the tsunami went away, it took away everything," he said. "It was horrible. I have never seen something like this."
On March 11, 2011, the earthquake of magnitude 9.0, the biggest earthquake in the history of Japan and the fourth biggest earthquake in the world after year 1900, shocked the Tohoku area of Japan. In about 30 minutes, devastating tsunami reached, affecting the coastline with a length of 500 km (310 miles). The tsunami wave height of 39 meters (128 feet) was recorded in a port town in Tohoku. The tsunami swallowed villages along the coast and washed away all houses. The earthquake and tsunami killed more than 15,800 people, and still more than 3,500 people are missing.