FOLLOWING THE PLANT BROTHERS IN SENDAI THROUGH TWITTER
For the last 96 hours, eyes have been on the Twitter accounts of Maynard Plant and Blaise Plant, brothers who are the lead members of the Japanese band Monkey Majik.
Both Plant brothers are from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada and for Maynard Plant, he moved to Japan to become an Assistant Language Teacher (ALT) and in 2000, as a side-project, created the band with a few friends and would later incorporate his younger brother Blaise, who plays for a local ice hockey team in Sendai.
When the earthquake hit, both brothers took to Twitter. Here is a chronology of what Maynard and Blaise Plant posted right after the earthquake their situation, including the damage to photos of Blaise’s home is on Twitter:
- Blaise Plant of Monkey Majik tweeted, “My house is trashed! I’m ok! It was spooky…the biggest one yet!! Hey Everyone! It seems to have calmed down a bit.from where I am.the buildings are all busted up..massive billboards on the verge of falling. I urge everyone to keep alert…things are falling all over the place… I heard tsunami looks pretty big on TV. I currently can’t go home the ground is still shaking and shaking. So far a lot of people from the neighborhood gathered together to keep warm. Just checked out Mayn’s Studio, everything is ok, not much damage…my place is…trashed. This is my only way to talk to you all, sorry, just trying to write as fast as I can. I think these tremors are going to last all week. I know it’s a little dangerous to be in a car throughout all this, but just needed a little charge for my iPhone. We are getting non-stop tremors…a big one every 15 mins or so. It sucks cause every shake makes u wonder if it’s the big one. Still pitch black, power is not back yet…walked outside…smell of propane. Currently 2am, power still out, cold. Keeping positive, but so many people have been injured, or killed. It’s hard to sleep. Unimaginable. Just heard from Maynard…there headed over here…looks like things are slowly coming together on this side. Pray for others.”
- Maynard Plant tweeted, “Omg.. That was scary. Is everyone ok? I finally found Blaise… He’s ok… But his mansion was in terrible condition. I am now going to check my studio. Haven’t had Internet, phone, power, water, heat since my last twit on Friday. I’m back downtown to see how Blaise is doing. Using ocean water to cool down the nuclear reactor. Many people exposed at this point.”
While both brothers were tweeting their experience, their family in Ottawa were worried. Noreen Plant told the Ottawa Citizen, “It took 59 tries before they could get through to any one of us, and finally they got through to their sister and she relayed the message to all of us,” said their mother Noreen Plant. “It’s really hard when you just don’t know and you’re so far away. You just can’t do anything.”
Noreen added, “You watch the news and they say 1,000 people have died and you don’t know if your kids are part of that.”
As both brothers are OK at this time, when asked if they will leave Sendai,
Blaise Plant tweeted, “I would never leave Sendai! Love this place, people are great!”
Blaise would later add, “I won’t leave until all my Loved ones are safe and sound and ready to go…until then, I’m here.”
Both men have been instrumental in helping people in Sendai. Maynard has been creating Japanese earthquake information and nuclear power planet evacuation pages for English speakers. While Blaise has been busy helping locals in his neighborhood.
As of today, Blaise has tweeted that he is heading North. Plant tweeted, “On the road North to get a little further away from the Nuclear Reactors. There have been leaks, and the winds could change blowing it to us.”
Meanwhile, Maynard who was without Internet for hours has tweeted, “I have been able to travel by car because it has gasoline. But there is a demand for gasoline and people are on the road, looking for food and also to charge their phones. Many people are trying to push their cars on the road because they have run out of gas.”
We will continually monitor Maynard and Blaise’s status on Twitter. You can follow Maynard and Blaise as well by visiting their Twitter accounts and blog: