Case File: Ishinomaki Ghosts
Location: Ishinomaki, Japan
Date: 2011 to present
Description: Ishinomaki is a city located in the Tohoku Province, which is located in the Miyagi Prefecture in Japan. It is a port city that is surrounded by mountains, rivers and the Pacific Ocean.
Case
History: On March 11, 2011, a 9.0 magnitude earthquake struck Japan. The earthquake triggered several powerful 120-foot-high tsunami waves which struck several cities throughout Japan. It especially devastated the coast of the Tohoku region of Northeastern Japan. The earthquake and tsunami caused over $360 billion in damage. Nearly 20,000 lives were lost. It was the deadliest tsunami to ever hit Japan. It was also Japan’s greatest single loss of life since the atomic bombing of Nagasaki in 1945. In the months that followed, hundreds of strange encounters were reported.
Ishinomaki, in the Tohoku Province, was one of the hardest hit cities. Ishinomaki is surrounded by mountains, rivers, and the ocean. The Kitakami River is considered the “mother” of the town. It created the port of Ishinomaki. According to Teruo Konno, a city employee, its citizens receive wealth from the rivers and the sea. Resident Kansho Aizawa is a spiritual medium. Her relatives work with the ocean. They make nori, a seaweed product. She says that the ocean has always meant prosperity to the people of Ishinomaki. They all loved the ocean, until the tsunami hit.
On that day, the earthquake struck Japan, causing severe damage. People in the area of Ishinomaki had experienced a number of large earthquakes before, such as: one in 1896 that was a Magnitude 8.5; one in 1933 that was a Magnitude 8.4; and one in 1978 that was a magnitude 7.4. The one that struck in 2011 was a Magnitude 9.0, one of the largest ever recorded and the largest to ever hit Japan.
When the earthquake struck, Teruo knew that a tsunami would soon come. Using their emergency radios, he and his coworkers told residents to flee as quickly as they could. They gave evacuation instructions. They did everything they were trained to do. However, they were unable to expect the size of the tsunami that followed. As it approached the coast, it gained force and grew larger.
Teruo says that his office ceiling caved in and all the lights started to break. He says that the moment he felt he was in serious danger, the impact of the tsunami hit him. It was so forceful that it pushed him outside. He could not tell what was up or down. He thought he was going to die. He saw the faces of his wife and children. He tried his best to swim up for air. Eventually, he reached the surface. As he was being carried away, he wondered where he was going to end up. After struggling to stay afloat for two hours and suffering from severe hypothermia, he was rescued by a friend.
Reverend Taio Kaneta is a Buddhist monk and the reverend at the Tsudai temple in Kurihara, which is thirty miles from the coast. He remembers that after the earthquake and tsunami hit, it started to snow. It snowed a lot. The snow fell on the injured and drenched survivors. He felt completely defeated. He did not understand why nature was being so cruel and merciless to people who were already suffering.
The tsunami reached a maximum height of 131 feet. 15,854 people were confirmed dead. 2,533 are still missing. The next morning, Teruo learned that fifty-four of his coworkers had died. He felt like he was in hell. He says that he never wants to experience that again.
Survivor Kazuya Sasaki found his eldest daughter’s body in a bamboo forest. He noticed that some of the bamboo were bent; when he went over to look, he found her draped over one of them. He says that she looked like she was sleeping. “She looked beautiful. There wasn’t a single cut on her face.” His wife’s body was found about a three-minute drive away.
About a week after the tsunami, Kazuya and some others were cleaning up debris. He was looking for his youngest daughter. Someone shouted, “I’ve found a baby!” Her face was swollen and covered with mud. He cleaned her face and recognized that it was his youngest daughter.
In Japan, people are normally cremated. Due to a lack of fuel and electricity from the nuclear power plant failure, the crematoriums were not functioning. As a result, people could not have funerals. They were forced to bury the dead in the ground. Later on, once the crematoriums were working again, the bodies were exhumed and cremated. Teruo recalls that bodies were carried in one after another nonstop. He says that it was devastating to see them all pass by. Kazuya says that it took him weeks to give his family a proper burial.
Reverend Kaneta says he performed funeral services for over 200 people that month. The first dead bodies he saw were two fifth-grade girls. He was not able to read a mantra because he could not stop shaking. He is a 26th generation reverend and grew up in his temple. He went to college and later trained as a monk. He says that everything he learned could not have prepared him for what happened after the tsunami. He did not know what to say to the survivors.
In June 2011, three months after the tsunami, journalist Shuji Okuno arrived in Ishinomaki. Almost immediately, he started hearing rumors of "ghosts of the dead." Some people reported waking up in the middle of the night to unusual noises or sensations. Some reported seeing spirits wandering through the streets and on beaches, unsure if they were dead or alive. Others claimed to see "curious eyes" peering out from puddles in the road. Some even saw lines of ghostly figures waiting outside the rubble of a supermarket, as if they were waiting to go inside. By October, there were dozens of reported sightings. He started documenting people who had supernatural experiences. He later wrote the book, Stay Near Me, based on these stories.
One day, a man named Endo reached out to Shuji. He said that he had experienced something supernatural. On the day of the tsunami, he visited a shelter to see if his mother was there. He was told to wait there for her. While he waited, he saw an older woman looking out the window and wearing his mother’s clothes. As he looked closer, he realized it was his mother. He took out his camera to take a photo of her, so that his family would know she was safe.
After taking the photo, Endo looked at his “mother” again, and realized that her face had changed into someone he had never seen before. He later found out that the microbus his mother was riding in was washed away by the tsunami around the same time he took the photo at the shelter.
Until August 2013, Shuji continued searching for stories of people’s experiences with ghosts. The people he visited would say how desperate they were to see the spirits of their loved ones. They said they were still looking for some kind of message from them. For example, a woman who lives in Ishinomaki lost her three-year-old son to the tsunami. Since then, she has suffered from depression and panic attacks. Inside her home was her deceased son’s toy train.
One night, as the woman and her family sat down to eat, she talked to her son’s toy, saying “let’s eat together.” A few moments later, the toy started lighting up and making sounds. It had a manual switch inside of an electric one, so there would be no way for it to turn itself on without any force. Before that night, the woman looked forward to dying. She had a daughter who survived, and she would tell her, “Even though you might suffer when I die, at least I’ll be happy in heaven.” But the toy reminded her that her son was watching her at all times. It helped give her purpose again.
Dr. Kiyoshi Kanebishi, senior professor of sociology at Tohoku Gakuin University, says that unlike Americans, the families of victims in Japan do not seek out grief counseling. They know that they would feel much more at peace with a counselor, but they are afraid it would make them forget the deceased. Reverend Kaneta thinks that it is because of Japanese spirituality and the way they perceive life and death. They do not separate the dead from the living.
Shoji is a sliding door made of very thin paper. Reverend Kaneta says that to Japanese people, death is like shoji. Once you open the sliding door, you go through to the other side, and the living can still see you through it. He says that survivors tend to move on at their own pace. He wants them to move on with their lives, but for them, “three steps forward can lead to three steps back.”
Reverend Kaneta says that many Japanese people have lost loved ones and have not had the chance to say goodbye. They do not think it is fair. He says that the deceased feel the same way. Many Japanese people believe that because the tsunami took people before they were ready to die, their restless spirits still wander the Earth.
Shuji heard a story told by a person in a group of people who had supernatural experiences. One clear night, a woman was preparing a meal when she heard a knock at the door. A person was standing outside, soaking wet, even though it was a dry night; they asked for dry clothes. The woman went and got clothes for them. The visitor thanked her and then left. Soon after, the woman heard another knock at the door. This time, there were three people standing outside, all soaking wet. She did not open the door for them.
British reporter Richard Lloyd Parry, who has lived in Japan for decades, also explored the widespread phenomena of "tsunami spirits" in his book, Ghosts of the Tsunami. People reported to him that their neighbors - who had died in the tsunami - would come to their houses and sit down in puddles of water. He heard from several people about the ghost of an old woman who haunts a refugee home in nearby Onagawa. She would regularly sit down for a cup of tea there. The chair's cushion would be soaked with seawater every time her visits were over. In Tagajo, a fire station received repeated calls until the firefighters drove to the deceased caller's destroyed home and prayed for him. After that, the calls stopped.
Parry also heard about two psychics who seemed to have differing opinions on what was happening to the spirits of the seventy-four students who died during the tsunami at Okawa Elementary School. One psychic, who had been recruited by one of the students' parents, claimed to have seen the spirits of the dead crawling on the ground near the school. Some of them appeared to be stuck in invisible water and thrashing as if they were drowning in mid-air. Another psychic, Sumi, disagreed; she said that the spirits of the students were at peace.
Kansho barely survived the tsunami. She says that there used to be houses all over an area that is now empty due to the tsunami. She says it was like a small community. There is no trace of it anymore. She is very sad about what happened. Sadly, many places are still trying to rebuild. She says that after the tsunami, the spirits wanted to return home. But since the city had changed so much, they did not know how to find their home. Many of them did not know how to contact their families. She says that lost souls do not have a place to go, so they ask people on the streets for help.
Kansho says that some people can see ghosts, while others cannot. She says that she has been spiritual and “a bit odd” since she was a child. She used to think that everyone could see the dead when she was talking with them, but they could not. People frequently ask her what ghosts look like. She says that they usually appear as a slightly transparent reflection through a glass window. However, since the tsunami, she has seen some "gruesome" apparitions: headless ghosts, ones missing hands or legs, and ones cut completely in half. She says that she sees them as they were when they died.
One night a few weeks after the tsunami, Kansho was stopped by a group of young men who were killed by it. They did not seem to know that they were deceased. But she knew, based on their appearance, that they were no longer living in this world. She says that she could have simply ignored them, but she felt sorry for them, so she stopped. She asked them what happened. One of them said he wanted to go home, but he was lost. She told them the truth because she did not want them to suffer anymore. She said, “All of you have passed away.”
Since the tsunami, many survivors have contacted Kansho, asking for her help. Some wanted to know where their loved one's bodies were located. Others wanted to know exactly how their loved ones died. Still others wanted to know if their loved ones were happy in the afterlife. Some even asked her to transmit messages to them. Today, she works with survivors to help them cope with the tragedy and connect them with the departed.
One survivor Kansho helped was Shinichi Yamada, a father of two. Their home was destroyed in the tsunami, but Shinichi was able to salvage two Buddhist statues from the wreckage. When he brought the statues to their temporary house, strange things began to happen. His two children suddenly got sick and inexplicable chill seemed to follow them as they moved about the house. Shinichi says that on a few occasions while he was lying in bed, he felt something walk across him and step on his chest.
Worried, Shinichi turned to Kansho for help. She told him build a shrine for the statues and pray for them. After that, the family's problems went away. Shinichi believes that the spirits are still in their home; however, he believes that, due to his actions, they are now at peace.
Dr. Kanebishi says that his specialty is the sociology of disaster. Every year, during his seminars, he asks his students to come up with a different topic to research for their senior thesis. One student, Yuka Kudo, suggested the story of the ghosts in Ishinomaki. She collected accounts from seventy-one survivors, many with compelling ghost stories and hauntings of their own. The ones Dr. Kanebishi found most believable came from taxi drivers because there were physical records connected to their sightings.
In August 2011, a man, around twenty years old and wearing a thick coat, got into a taxi. The driver felt there was something strange about the passenger. He especially thought it was strange that the passenger was wearing a thick coat in the middle of summer. By the time they arrived at the destination, the sun had already set. When he looked back, the passenger was gone.
There were several taxi drivers who had similar experiences. In Summer 2011, a driver spotted a woman hailing him down in a particularly hard-hit area. She was wearing a heavy winter coat, despite it being the middle of summer. She was also completely drenched, despite the fact that it had not rained in days. She climbed into his taxi and asked to be taken to the largely abandoned Minamihama district. He told her that that area was almost empty, and asked, "Are you sure?" After a few moments, she said, in a shivering voice, "Have I died?" When he turned around to look at her, he discovered that she had vanished.
Another driver said that he picked up a confused-looking man in his twenties who kept pointing forward when asked where he needed to go. Finally, he said, “Hiyoriyama,” a mountain park near the city. The driver drove up the mountain; after arriving at the park, he turned around to be paid. There was no one there.
In all of these cases, the meters would continue to log their travels, which gives evidence of these ghostly phenomena. Someone needed to pay for these rides because the meters kept running. It turns out that the drivers were the ones paying for their “ghost passengers.” Some of these passengers appeared to be "drenched in water." Many taxi drivers had experienced the loss of their families to the tsunami as well. So they said they would welcome the ghosts with open arms if they needed a ride again.
The disaster was very traumatic for the people of the Tohoku region. Dr. Kanebishi thinks that the presence of ghosts is a way for people to cope with their PTSD and survivor's guilt as a community. He believes that is what is being manifested there. He also suspects that the ghosts are imaginings of people coming to terms with the deaths of their loved ones. However, he also notes that after the Great Hanshin Earthquake, and after the devastation of the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, where many lives were also lost at once, data shows that ghost sightings were never publicly reported. So why do people experience these ghostly phenomena after this particular earthquake in the Tohoku region?
In the northern region of Japan, Tohoku had the slowest development compared to the rest of the country. There are still areas that are very rural. Shuji presumes that is why the area still holds onto certain spiritual traditions.
Dr. Kanebishi says that the souls of the dead are invited by a spiritual shaman using a “kuchiyose” ritual, where the shamans act as vessels to tell their stories. This tradition has been customary to the Tohoku region. He says that death is not the end of the journey. That is why the idea that death travels between two worlds is not uncommon.
Reverend Kaneta believes it lies somewhere even deeper. He says that the relationship between the living and the dead is something that has existed from long ago. It remains in some fundamental part of us and became “shaken loose” by the earthquake and tsunami. He says, “perhaps you can say it’s part of the DNA of religious sentiment, but it all spewed out.” Those feelings are especially strong in the Tohoku region.
Dr. Kanebishi says that he does not really believe in ghosts, and is not the type of person who would see them. However, he says that in everyday life, there are certain things that one cannot “file away in a box.” He says, “although we cannot all process it now, we all carry data that is somehow important. In which case, regardless of how undefined they may be, we can leave them undefined.” He believes that things like ghost encounters can remain ambiguous in people’s lives.
Reverend Kaneta says that scientists “complain” about people’s ghost stories. They tend to focus on evidence and logic, and usually brush these stories off as superstition. Some psychologists say that the stories are because of people’s trauma. He says that that is their interpretation based on what they have observed from “outside of this chaos.” He says that their interpretation does not mean anything to him or the survivors. He wonders, “Why can’t we embrace them as they are and help find their own answers?”
Reverend Kaneta has felt a calling to help the victims. He has performed many spiritual cleansings and exorcisms since the tsunami. In one case, he helped a man named "Takashi Ono" who had become possessed. Takashi lived miles from the coastline. Ten days after the tsunami, he went to the disaster zone to see the destruction in person. After the visit, he returned home and had dinner with his family. After dinner, he began to feel lonely and started calling several of his friends.
Shortly after the phone calls, Takashi began acting very strangely. He jumped down onto all fours and began licking the tatami mats and futon. He then snarled at his family, saying: "You must die. You must die. Everyone must die. Everything must die and be lost." After that, he ran outside into a field next to his house. He rolled over and over in the mud, as if he was being thrown around by waves, shouting: "There, over there! They’re all over there — look!" Then, he stood up and walked further into the field, saying, "I'm coming to you. I'm coming over to that side." His wife had to wrestle him back into the house.
Throughout the night, Takashi writhed and bellowed in his bed, until around 5am, when he cried out, "There's something on top of me!" He then collapsed and fell asleep. He woke up that morning having no recollection of what happened. The next evening, as darkness fell, he saw people walking past his house, covered in mud. They looked familiar to him, but the images appeared to "flicker" like they were in a film. The next day, he was lethargic and inert. That night, he staggered while he walked, he glared at his family, and he waved a knife around, saying, "Drop dead! Everyone else is dead, so die!"
After three days of strange behavior, Takashi's family convinced him to go to Reverend Kaneta. Reverend Kaneta could tell just by looking at him that something was wrong; he believed that multiple spirits were possessing him. Takashi, meanwhile, felt hatred towards Reverend Kaneta; part of him resisted, while the other part was relieved that he was getting help. Reverend Kaneta performed an exorcism on him, reciting Buddhist sutras and sprinkling him with holy water. After it, he abruptly returned to his senses. He felt that the spirits in him (both animal and human) were gone. He has not felt them since. Reverend Kaneta suggested that Takashi's "flippant attitude" and lack of respect towards the disaster had attracted an angry spirit who had yet to find peace.
Another case involved a twenty-five-year-old nurse from Sendai, "Ami." One night, Reverend Kaneta's wife, Yuko, answered the door. She told him that there was a young woman, Ami, that seemed ill. When he met with her, she said, “I feel many people inside me and I can’t stop them. Please help me, Reverend Kaneta.” He says that during his long years at the temple as a priest, people like her have visited him before. But he never met someone who suffered as much as she did.
That night, Ami said to Reverend Kaneta, “Many spirits are entering my body and I can’t stop them.” At the time, she did not really understand what was going on with her. All she could feel was pain. She says that it was so painful, she wanted someone to kill her. She felt the spirit of a girl crying inside her. And the spirit of a man was holding the girl’s leg and would not let go.
As soon as Reverend Kaneta grabbed Ami’s feet, the male spirit said, “Who are you?” He responded, “Me? I’m the reverend of this temple.” The man replied, “What is the reverend doing here?” Ami saw the man yelling and screaming. She says it was terrifying. Reverend Kaneta says that the prayer takes a long time. By burning incense in front of Buddha, she was released from the possession.
Reverend Kaneta says that possessed people he had seen in the past were incomparable to Ami. Her personality would change whenever she was possessed. He asked her if she lived near the disaster zone. He asked if she experienced the tsunami. He also asked if anyone close to her died from it. She said no to everything. She, herself, had nothing to do with the tsunami.
Ami says that even before the tsunami, ghosts would bother her. It was a year after it when its ghosts started invading her life. Reverend Kaneta told her that she could visit anytime. And she really came at “any time.” It often started around 7pm and lasted until 2 or 3am. Through her, he was able to listen to the solemn voices of the spirits who lost their lives in the tsunami.
Ami says that after what happened to her at Reverend Kaneta’s, more and more victims of the tsunami started to enter her body. One of them was a girl who had to let go of her brother’s hand. The girl heard her brother saying, “Sis, I can’t run anymore.” But she would not respond to him because they had to keep running from the water. Ami could see, hear, smell, and feel everything, even the touch of the brother’s hand. The girl was so scared, and Ami was too. She saw her brother being washed away.
Reverend Kaneta spoke to the little girl. She reached out to him, so he held her hand. But then, she said, “No!” and she let go of him. She said, “Mom! Mom! I want mom!” Ami felt helpless. She said, “Why isn’t anyone helping her?” The girl wanted to apologize to her mom for letting go of her brother. The girl kept saying, “Mom, I’m sorry.” She was looking everywhere for her mom.
Yuko was near Ami at the time, so she chose to act as the girl’s mother and held her hand. Yuko remembers that she had a really strong grip. Yuko said to the girl, “Mom is right here. I will never let go. You are always here with me.” Then, she said, “Let’s walk towards the light.” And Ami started to follow her. She told the girl, “Go to the light. Everyone is there waiting for you.” Then, Ami was finally able to let go of her hand.
During another session, a male spirit communicated with Reverend Kaneta through Ami. When Reverend Kaneta asked who the man was, he said, “I’m at the bottom of the ocean.” Then, he asked, “Reverend, am I alive or dead?” Reverend Kaneta told him that there had been an earthquake, that he had been hit by a tsunami, and that he died.
Over several weeks, Reverend Kaneta expelled more than two dozen spirits from Ami's body. She asked Reverend Kaneta if she was mentally ill. He said that he did not think she was; she was just more “sensitive” than most. He told her that he was not going to treat her as mentally ill. He believes that there is a range of what humans can actually hear and see. But everyone is slightly different on that spectrum. Some can hear and see more than others.
Reverend Kaneta says that when big disasters happen, people’s ranges tend to expand, enabling them to see what is not supposed to be seen, and hear what is not supposed to be heard. He says that they “feel” rather than “think.” He claims that in everyday life, people sacrifice their need to feel without even knowing it.
Yuko says that Ami’s story is neither a movie nor a made-up story. They normally would not share this story with the world. She says that she will tell the story, but only if someone asks her about it. She says that these things just happen. Reverend Kaneta says that at the time, he felt a sense of duty to confront the events that happened during the earthquake and tsunami. That sense of duty is what gave him the motivation to help Ami.
Reverend Kaneta says that what he did with Ami does not follow traditional Buddhist teachings. Some monks asked why he did such a thing, but he says that he does not care. When he sees a woman who is suffering, he feels obligated to help her rather than worry about his religious beliefs. He does not believe any gods would get mad at him.
Since the tsunami, Reverend Kaneta has been asking himself, “What can I do as a monk?” From his interaction with Ami, he realized that what he can do is listen to people to help cure their pain. He wants people to talk about the pain that they are carrying in order to let it go. He and Yuko have opened a cafe where people can talk to them about their experiences. She is happy that they have created a warm place for people to gather. She wants to bring people joy, even if it is just for a moment.
Reverend Kaneta says that many survivors have asked him questions like, “Why did I survive? Why couldn’t I save them? Who’s dividing this line between life and death?” He says that many of them were scared of ghost sightings. They asked him what they should do. He has told them: “These ghosts aren’t scary at all. They appear in front of you because they worry about you and long for you. So there is no need to be scared. If you see ghosts again, tell them, ‘You are dead. There’s a world for you to go to. We are still living. We will remain in this destroyed city, and will make sure to revive and restore our relationship with the city. Do not worry about us.’”
On March 11, 2019, a memorial service was held for the tsunami victims in Ishinomaki. During the tsunami, many people lost albums filled with family photos. Over time, some of them were recovered.
Background: The Tohoku earthquake started at 2:46pm on March 11, 2011. It was centered forty-five miles east of Tohoku at a depth of fifteen miles below the ocean's surface. It shook the ocean floor for six minutes, triggering several powerful 128-foot tsunami waves. The waves, traveling at speeds of more than 435 miles per hour, struck several cities throughout northeastern Japan. The water traveled up to six miles inland in some places. A total of 217 square miles were flooded.
People had just minutes to flee their homes. Tragically, more than 100 evacuation sites were washed away. Millions lost access to running water or electricity, and more than 120,000 buildings were destroyed within a matter of minutes. Hospitals, schools, businesses, railways, roads, and homes were among the destroyed. Nearly 20,000 people were killed. More than 340,000 were left homeless. The tsunami also caused a cooling system failure at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant, leading to a meltdown. Much of the surrounding area is still uninhabitable.
Ishinomaki was one of the hardest hit cities; nearly half of it was inundated by the tsunami. 3,097 were confirmed killed; 2,770 are still listed as missing. 50,000 buildings were destroyed there.
Investigations: Coming up
Extra Notes:
- This case was first released on October 19, 2020 as a part of the second volume of the Netflix reboot of Unsolved Mysteries.
- It was dedicated to the people of Ishinomaki and all the victims of the tsunami.
Results: Unsolved
Links:
- Ishinomaki Ghosts on Unsolved.com
- 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami on Wikipedia
- Tsunami's Ghosts Haunt Japanese Earthquake Survivors - March 16, 2014
- Taxi drivers in tsunami disaster zone report "ghost passengers" - January 21, 2016
- Taxi drivers see "ghosts" after tsunami - February 5, 2016
- The Ghosts of the Tsunami - October 24, 2017
- Inside The Disturbing Legend Of The "Tsunami Spirits" That Have Haunted Japan Ever Since Its 2011 Disaster - October 16, 2020
- What Unsolved Mysteries Leaves Out About "Tsunami Spirits" - November 12, 2020
- Exorcist haunted by 'headless ghosts and spirits cut in half' after Japan's tsunami - November 25, 2020