The Fukushima towns frozen in time: nature has thrived since the nuclear disaster but what happens if humans return?

"Inside, there are still textbooks lying on the desks, pencil cases are strewn across the floor; empty bento boxes that were never taken home. Along the corridor, shoes line the route the children took when they fled, some still in their indoor plimsolls, as their town was rocked by a magnitude-9 earthquake on the afternoon of 11 March 2011 which went on to cause the world's worst nuclear disaster since Chornobyl."

"The building is frozen in time, but outside, the once-pristine playground is a tangle of weeds and susuki wild grass, the top of a slide just visible in the background. Rusting bicycles nestle in the undergrowth, yards away from a monitor informing us that atmospheric radiation on this sunny afternoon in December, while posing no danger to our health during our short visit, is still too high to allow former residents to return home."

"Among the 330 children who ran from their school that afternoon was Yuna, Kimura's seven-year-old daughter. She reached her home, less than two miles from the sea, just before the tsunami arrived, killing more than 20,000 people along Japan's north-east coast. Yuna died along with her mother and grandmother, leaving behind Kimura, a former pig farmer who had been at work that day, and his eldest daughter and father."

An abandoned primary school in Fukushima remains frozen since the 11 March 2011 magnitude-9 earthquake and subsequent nuclear disaster. Textbooks, pencil cases and empty bento boxes lie scattered on desks and floors while shoes line the corridor where children fled. The playground is overgrown with weeds and susuki grass; playground equipment and bicycles have been overtaken by vegetation after 15 years. Atmospheric radiation levels outside remain high enough to prevent former residents' return despite short-visit safety. Among the fleeing children was seven-year-old Yuna, who reached home just before the tsunami but died along with her mother and grandmother, leaving family survivors.

Read at www.theguardian.com