Covered by White Devil

Entirely covered by heavy snow, Japan ceased working in everywhere on Friday evening and during whole Saturday. Transportation was paralyzed on the ground with various reasons. People stayed home, having few things to do such as making snowmen or watching Sochi Olympic on TV. Although one of the reasons why the big cities are vulnerable to snow is extremely dense population, no one tries to start discussion of distribution of capital functions.

The snow swept Japan from the west to the east. In Tokyo, it marked the fourth largest accumulation in history, 27cm, just the same record of last weekend. Having learned a lesson from experienced one week ago, businessmen and women went home early in the Friday evening, leaving restaurants and bars mostly empty.

That worsened troubles in ground transportation. Commuter trains were extremely clouded by passengers going home. Transportation system in Tokyo is extremely vulnerable to snow, as everyone knew. Trains delayed by trouble of the switches or too many passengers getting on and off in every station. One train crushed on another train stayed in a station in late Friday night, injuring nineteen passengers. The railroad company explained the brake system did not work well in a cold weather, while automatic train control system had no trouble.

In Haneda Air Port, 4,500 people stayed overnight in the building, waiting for airplanes that would be bringing them to their final destinations. In Narita Air Port, passengers of Japan Air Line international flights were left in the airport due to the lack of announcement of final boarding inside the building. Because of delay in arrival of airplanes, pilots and cabin attendants, the company temporarily stopped checking in, and could not inform departure time for some flights. Over one hundred passengers made a gaggle around the ground staffs, requiring proper explanation.

Some highway lines are closed by car accident. Cars made a long line on other highways, locking drivers in cars for hours. In Fukushima, ground self-defense force was mobilized for rescuing one hundred cars stuck on a road with heavy snow. Blackouts happened some places. Mobile phones stopped working due to blackout around operational stations.

If Tokyo had not had such a heavy population, trains did not have to work so hard in bad weather. However, leaders in politics, bureaucracy or business are ignoring the necessity of the discussion on it. Concentration of governmental power and wealth is making the national capital defenseless against natural, and possibly manmade, threats.