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Iwate Tsunami Memorial Museum

tsunami3.11RikuzentakataMiracle Pinememorial museum

Iwate · Rikuzentakata

39.0071°N, 141.6261°E

The Sanriku coast has been hit by major tsunami repeatedly — 1896, 1933, 1960, 2011 — and this museum, opened in September 2019, is the prefecture's attempt to hold all of that in one place rather than treating 2011 as an isolated event. Its stated theme is protecting life and living with the sea and the land.

The exhibits run to 1,155 square metres and include damaged objects, film shot during the disaster and photographs, arranged so that the mechanism of the wave, the failures of the defences and the recovery are each legible. It stands in the Takatamatsubara Tsunami Reconstruction Memorial Park, where the Miracle Pine — the single tree left of a forest of seventy thousand — is preserved a short walk away. Admission is free.

Essential Information

Opening Hours

9:00 AM – 5:00 PM | Last entry 4:30 PM

Closed: Closed 29 December – 3 January | Occasional additional closures

Entrance Fee

Free

Best Season

Year-round

Visit Duration

2 hours

Getting There

Access Information

Kesen-cho Doteage 180, Rikuzentakata, inside the Takatamatsubara Tsunami Reconstruction Memorial Park. About 30 minutes from JR Kesennuma Station on the Ofunato Line BRT to Kiseki-no-Ippon-Matsu Station, or by car. Open 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM, last entry 4:30 PM. Closed 29 December – 3 January, with occasional additional closures. Admission is free. Exhibits cover 1,155 sq m and include damaged objects, disaster footage and photographs. The Miracle Pine stands a short walk away in the same park.

Insider Guide

Premium

**Free admission.** The prefecture built it as a public record rather than an attraction, and there is no charge. **Walk out to the Miracle Pine.** One tree survived from a forest of about seventy thousand and is preserved in the same park. Seeing the museum and then the tree is the intended sequence. **It covers more than 2011.** 1896, 1933 and 1960 are all here. The repetition is the point the museum is making about this coast. **Storyteller sessions run separately.** Local guide organisations in Rikuzentakata run tours led by people who lived through it; they are booked through the tourism association, not the museum. **The BRT gets you here.** The Ofunato Line runs as a bus rapid transit route since the railway was not rebuilt, and the stop is named for the pine.

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