Disaster in Japan

Abstract

A series of major earthquakes and the tsunami devastated the seaside of East Japan, on the east side of Honshu Island, on 11 March. Unfortunately, many people lost their lives in the earthquakes and tsunami. I pray for the souls of the dead. Many people are still fighting with their difficulties. I really hope that the region recovers and reenergizes soon with today's technologies and that the robotics technologies help the recovery. As a Japanese citizen, I would also like to express my sincere thanks to the people around the world for their warm and encouraging words, generous offers, and support. The series of the earthquakes and tsunami have caused serious damages to the nuclear power plants in the Fukushima area. For these disasters, a task force, Robotics Task Force for Antidisaster (ROBOTAD), has been formed by researchers and engineers in Japan involved in robotics and related fields to exchange and discuss the issues of technology, application, and management to utilize robotics toward recovery from the great East Japan earthquake and the Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster (http://roboticstaskforce.wordpress.com/). © 2011 IEEE.