Japanese retailer Aeon said that it allowed some workers in its Kumamoto shopping mall to re-enter the earthquake-hit facility just before a fatal explosion occurred on July 28.
Workers evacuated Aeon Mall Kumamoto in the town of Kashima, Kumamoto Prefecture, after a massive earthquake hit the southwestern prefecture that day.
But some of them asked to return to their shops to collect personal items such as car keys and mobile phones and to secure the cash registers. Aeon permitted temporary re-entry, the company said.
The explosion killed seven workers who went back into the building.
Aeon explained that many workers at the facility commuted by car and that some would have been unable to return home without their keys.
But the company¡¯s quake disaster response rules do not stipulate how to address the need to collect personal belongings or respond to situations in which workers become unable to return home.
Aeon will revise the rules to allow shopping facility workers to carry their valuables on them during work to eliminate the need to re-enter facilities after evacuation.
The Kumamoto quake, which registered a seismic intensity of up to 7, the highest level on the Japanese scale, occurred around 4:30 p.m. July 28.
According to Aeon, the office of Aeon Mall Kumamoto at 5:21 p.m. announced the cancellation of the day¡¯s business operations and instructions to return home to workers of shops in the facility through its safety confirmation system.
Aeon made no official announcement on the day that its evacuation instructions had been lifted or that workers were allowed to re-enter the facility.
The explosion occurred around 5:50 p.m. Aeon does not know who were allowed to re-enter or how the situation was at the scene, so the company will look into details through an accident investigation committee of outside experts.
¡°We take it seriously that people on the scene were left to make judgments because of the lack of rules, manuals and training and operation systems to deal with situations after evacuation,¡± an Aeon official said.
?
With your current subscription plan you can comment on stories. However, before writing your first comment, please create a display name in the Profile section of your subscriber account page.