On the 15th anniversary of the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in Japan, Germany public broadcasters have been caught misrepresenting the almost 20,000 people who died in the catastrophe as victims of the Fukushima “nuclear catastrophe”.
That is despite the fact that that just one death was caused by the incident at the Fukushima Daiichi power plant, according to Japanese officials.
On March 11, 2026, Bayrischer Rundfunk – a subsidiary of German state broadcaster ARD – wrote in its news section: “Japan commemorates the victims of the nuclear catastrophe of Fukushima. Throughout the country people lay down flowers and wreaths for the circa 20,000 dead.”
The misrepresentation had nuclear experts up in arms. Anna Vero Wendland, a pro-nuclear German science writer, accused the public broadcaster of disseminating “disinformation or fearmongering”.
It is not the first time that Germany’s public broadcasters have conflated tsunami casualties as supposed radiation deaths.
In 2023, ARD’s main news show Tagesschau wrote on its website: “The Fukushima nuclear power station, situated by the sea, was struck by a tsunami nearly 15 metres high shortly after a major earthquake on 11 March 2011.
“The plant’s cooling system failed, leading to a meltdown in three of the six reactors. It was the worst nuclear disaster since the Chernobyl catastrophe of 1986, claiming the lives of around 18,500 people.”
Similarly, in 2017 ARD subsidiary MDR wrote of the catastrophe: “Today, Japan remembers the Fukushima nuclear catastrophe in March 2011. Back then, 18,500 people died.”
The 9.0 magnitude earthquake on March 11, 2011, caused a powerful tsunami which hit the east coast of Japan. The monster wave destroyed more than 120,000 buildings – and damaged almost 1 million more , killing almost 20,000 people.
The floodwaters also caused a blackout at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, situated right on the coast around 200km north of Tokyo. That halted critical cooling systems, causing meltdowns in three of the plant’s six nuclear reactors.
While radioactive material was released, causing the temporary evacuation of more than 150,000 residents, only one person’s death was officially attributed to the nuclear incident: The death of a worker of cancer in 2018.
The tendency of German media to misrepresent the tsunami victims as casualties of a nuclear disaster may well have a political component.
The Fukushima meltdown motivated then-German chancellor Angela Merkel to implement Germany’s nuclear phaseout.
The country shut down its last nuclear plants in 2023. As a consequence, Germans pay some of Europe’s highest prices for electricity while electricity generation relies mainly on pollutant fossil power plants such as coal and gas-fired facilities.
Nuclear safety expert Rainer Moormann surmised in January 2025: “Without the lies after Fukushima of tens of thousands of dead and the panic caused thusly, many German nuclear power plants would still be running.”
Contrary to Germany, Japan has brought its own nuclear power stations back online in the years since the tsunami. As of March 2026, 15 nuclear reactors have so-far passed the new stricter safety standards and are again delivering power.
