Japan’s Urban Search and Rescue (Usar) team left Christchurch today to help in the earthquake and tsunami disaster in Japan. They have been working long hours for the last two and a half weeks and are tired. They planned to leave tomorrow but when they heard of the disaster in their own country, they left today instead. There are 70 people in their team and three dogs. The Japanese team thanked New Zealand for looking after them so well and New Zealand thanked the Japanese team for the work they did.

Usar teams around the world which were helping in Christchurch are now going to Japan to help. They are all tired but this is the job they are trained to do. New Zealand is sending a team of 48 Usar which is one third of all NZ Usar people. We still need some help in Christchurch.

Most of the difficult work in Christchurch is finished. Usar finished searching the two buildings where most people were buried. They found 95 bodies in the CTV building and 15 in the PG building. The Japanese Usar team worked at the CTV building most of the time. A number of Japanese students were attending an English language school in that building. Many of them died when the building collapsed.

Questions

What technical skills do Usar people need to have? What kind of personal skills do they need?