Photographer Phyllis B. Dooney is documenting the plight of Japan's refugees who fled the nuclear disaster in Fukushima prefecture after the March 11, 2011 earthquake and tsunami. She writes,"In Fukushima Prefecture, the third and most permanent disaster in the series followed; a nuclear meltdown occurred at Tokyo Electric’s Fukushima Daiichi plant. Radiation poured into the atmosphere and environment. First it was a suggestion, but by mid-April the government was enforcing the mandate that the residents of Tomioka and Kawauchi, who hadn’t already left because of the earthquake and/or tsunami damage, leave indefinitely. Nearly one year later an estimated 80,000 nuclear refugees are living in government-issued temporary housing or elsewhere. In the temporary housing, often just outside the evacuation zone, it is the elderly and mentally or physically disabled who comprise a large percentage of the residents." Collected here are images of those refugees made by Dooney in August of last year and in the last few days. -- Lane Turner (25 photos total)
Masayoshi Katakura stands on the steps of his temporary housing in Koriyama, Fukushima Prefecture, August 16, 2011. Masayoshi, like many others, is frightened and displaced by the earthquake and tsunami but his destitution and hopelessness are a result of the nuclear disaster. (© Phyllis B. Dooney)
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