Japan struggles to begin reconstruction, mountains of debris still remain

Published 18 August 2011

The 11 March earthquake and tsunami that devastated Japan left 22 million tons of debris scattered across three prefectures that the government is still struggling to clear; reconstruction cannot begin until the debris is removed; the geography and land layout in the different affected prefectures has slowed the cleanup process; some towns and villages with little flat land focused on building temporary housing which left little room for temporary debris storage; furthermore 7,000 people are still missing, so cleanup crews are proceeding carefully with the debris disposal process

Source: Japan struggles to begin reconstruction, mountains of debris still remain