The government will create small special response units in fiscal 2014 to carry out rapid response reconnaissance in disaster-hit areas. The units will fall under the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry and be used to better cope with major disasters, The Yomiuri Shimbun has learned.
The joint mobile units are to be created in light of bitter lessons learned following the Great East Japan Earthquake of 2011, when it took time to dispatch fire-fighters to some disaster-hit areas, because authorities were unable to fully comprehend conditions, due to the inability to get information on severed roadways and other problems. |
