Victims' families exhausted, official reports
| • | Waddle ponders next move in inquiry |
| • | Greeneville tech admits 'bit' of laziness |
| • | Mori to visit site of fatal collision this morning |
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| • | A Tribute to the Missing |
By Susan Roth
Advertiser Staff Writer
As the court of inquiry enters what could be its final day today, the eight family members from Japan are exhausted by the length of the trial, and several are sick, said Mizue Maeda, the lieutenant governor of Ehime prefecture who met with the families yesterday.
Associated Press
Though they have had simultaneous translation of the testimony via earphones, they have struggled to fully understand the alphabet soup of technical military terms and the circuitous lines of questioning at the trial.
From left, victims' family members Mitsunori Nomoto, father of student Katsuya, 17; Mika Makizawa, wife of teacher Hiroshi; and Naoko Nakata, wife of teacher Jun, 33, leave the building after attending the Navyâs court of inquiry at Pearl Harbor.
Kazuo Nakata, father of teacher Jun Nakata, who was lost at sea in the collision, and who has become the families' spokesman, brushed off Japanese media yesterday after testimony abruptly ended in the afternoon.
Nakata, who has been using binoculars to study the charts of data at the front of the courtroom and taking copious notes every day, said the day's events moved too quickly, and he had not yet grasped what was happening as testimony wrapped up.
Since the trial began, Nakata has demanded that the submarine's skipper, Cmdr. Scott Waddle, take the witness stand to openly explain the accident, but that remains uncertain as the trial nears its ends.
Maeda will join Japanese Prime Minister Yoshiro Mori this morning to view the site off Diamond Head where the Ehime Maru sank after it was rammed Feb. 9 by the USS Greeneville, killing nine of the 35 people aboard.
At lunch yesterday, Maeda met with the families to tell them she made the trip to Hawai'i to accompany Mori, the beleaguered leader who is on his way back to Japan after meeting with President Bush in Washington.
Arriving toward the end of the 11-day court of inquiry, Maeda acknowledged that she could not say much about the proceedings but surmised that the investigation would soon be completed.
"I hope the court will figure out why the accident occurred," Maeda told Japanese journalists.
