Taxi Drivers in Japan Report 'Ghost Passengers' in Tsunami Ravaged Area

It has been nearly five years since the Tohoku earthquake in Japan on March 11th 2011 a magnitude 9 earthquake triggered a massive tsunami which killed nearly 16,000 people.

Tidalwaves reached reached over a hundred and thirty feet high and went as far as six miles inland. In the Aftermath survivors desperately searched for their loved ones. among the wreakage. Today over 2500 people are still listed as missing.​

Of course such a tragedy is often very difficult for survivors to cope with, but a study recently conducted by 22 year old Yuka Kudo a senior at Tohoku Gakuin University suggests that it's not only delivering who are struggling to make sense of the tragedy.

The Asahi Shimbun newspaper reports stats UConn interviewed more than 100 taxi drivers in Ishinomaki for her graduation thesis. She asked drivers if they had any unusual experiences after the March 2011 disaster. Some drivers became irritated while others simply pretended as though they didn't hear her. However seven out of 100 drivers actually answered the question.

Yuka Kudo the University senior majoring in sociology included the encounters in her graduation thesis, in which the seven taxi drivers reported carrying "ghost passengers" following the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.

One driver in his 50's told a story about a woman that got into his cab near Issue no Machi Station several months after the disaster. He said the woman was wearing a Colts which he found odd because it was summertime and was asked to drive her to Minami Hayama district. Sadly the cab driver told her there was nothing there since the tsunami devasted the entire area. She the said in a shaking voice have I died?

Another driver who was in his 40's related how a man in his 20's got into his cab and pointed toward the front when the driver repeatedly asked him for his destination. The young man replied "Hiyoriyama" mountain. When the taxi arrived there, however, the man had vanished.

The seven drivers' accounts cannot be easily dismissed as simple illusions. That is because if a passenger climbed in their taxi, the driver started the meter, which is recorded. If the passengers were indeed "ghosts," they were still counted as riders. As a result, the drivers were forced to pay their fares. Some of the seven drivers jotted down their experiences in their logs. One showed his driver’s report, which noted that there was a fare that went unpaid.​

As the "ghosts" the drivers encountered were all youthful, it is believed they could be the spirits of victims of the 2011 disaster.​

“Young people feel strongly chagrined (at their deaths) when they cannot meet people they love. As they want to convey their bitterness, they may have chosen taxis, which are like private rooms, as a medium to do so,” Kudo said. What impressed Kudo was that the drivers did not have any fear toward their ghost passengers, but held them in reverence. They regarded the encounters as important experiences to be cherished.

The taxi drivers were feeling the daily sorrow of residents in Ishinomaki where many people were killed by the tsunami. One said that he lost a family member in the disaster. Another said, “It is not strange to see a ghost (here). If I encounter a ghost again, I will accept it as my passenger.”​

Kudo came from Akita Prefecture, which was not struck by the tsunami. Before interviewing taxi drivers, she had only thought of the victims as “thousands of people” who had died in the disaster. “(Through the interviews,) I learned that the death of each victim carries importance,” she said. “I want to convey that (to other people).”​