Rugby player snatches child from tsunami's grip [1]
Tuesday, March 22, 2011 - 13:28. Updated on Wednesday, September 11, 2013 - 10:06.
TWO Tongan rugby players in Northern Japan, Piei Mafile'o and Lata Lui and his daughter Sisifa, almost lost their lives while rescuing a child from the tsunami that devasted the port town of Kamaishi on March 11.
While they were running for their lives from the rapidly rising water and dodging collapsing buildings, the pair stopped to pull a child from the water.
Reporting the act of heroism, Takai Palei, the secretary of the Tongan Community in Japan, told Matangi Tonga that he had spoken to Lata the day after the tragedy.
He said that on March 11 when the devastating earthquakes struck Japan, Piei and Lata with his young son (Lata confirmed later this was actually his daughter Sisifa) were in Kaimaishi, at the port area outside the office of the Nippon Steel Company. They had an appointment to meet the management of the company at 3:00 pm to renew their working contracts, so by 2:45 pm they were already outside the office.
While they were waiting, the earthquake struck and the wall of the Nippon Steel Company office collapsed, along with nearby buildings. As they made their escape, dodging collapsing buildings, suddenly there was the tsunami siren warning. They ran for their lives toward higher ground while the tsunami was catching up with them. In the midst of the chaos Piei noticed a child was separated from his fleeing mother.
"At this stage the tsunami was already catching up with them. Piei made a dash into the water and rescued the kid, but at the same time got into difficulty trying to regaining his footing," said Takai.
"Lata realised that Piei was in trouble so they stopped to help him, but Piei told Lata to keep going, because he had his son to worry about. But Lata managed to push a piece of timber toward Piei and he was able to get onto firmer ground and they kept running to safety."
Takai said that Lata was very emotional when he was telling the story the day after the earthquake and was in tears.
Aftershocks
The place where Piei and Lata were staying was considered unsafe during the frequent aftershocks, and so they had moved in with other foreign rugby players and were staying at the Kamaishi Rugby Club House.
Kamaishi is located some 130 miles north of Sendai, the nearest town to the March 11 earthquake epicentre. Located on the coast, the city suffered severe damage from the Tsunami wave. Survivors in the area are facing shortage of food and water and freezing cold weather.
Takai said that the rugby players were uncertain whether or not the Kamaishi Rugby Club would renew their rugby contracts.
Lata reported that they had been told to wear hats and safety clothes to protect themselves from nuclear radiation, because of the ongoing problems that they had with the nuclear power stations in the Fukushima Perfecture, but unfortunately they did not have any safety clothes.
Lata said that they were trying to make contact with his wife in Tokyo to organize for someone to pick them up and bring them down to Tokyo.