NYK provides free transport for Moai statue
On May 25, a ceremony was held to officially present a specially created moai statue to the city of Minami-Sanriku in Miyagi prefecture. The ceremony was attended by guests involved in producing and donating the statue, and NYK corporate officer Yoshiyuki Yoshida. NYK had transported the statue from Chile for free as part the company’s support of areas affected by the Great East Japan Earthquake, said in the company's press release.
Minami-Sanriku was devastated by the deadly tsunami that struck northeastern Japan in March 2011, in addition to a tsunami that resulted from the 1960 Great Chilean Earthquake, the most powerful earthquake ever recorded. As a symbol of friendship and recovery, a moai statue crafted from Chilean mainland stone was delivered in 1990 and placed in a city park in Minami-Sanriku. Upon visiting the city after the 2011 tsunami and hearing that the statue had been destroyed, Chilean president Sebastian Pinera promised to donate a new statue, one produced from stone quarried on Easter Island, where these statues originated.
In November 2011, the completed moai — standing about 3 meters tall and weighing around 2 tons — was loaded onto the NYK containership NYK Aquarius at the port of Valparaiso with the support of the people of Chile. After arriving in Japan, this symbol of friendship was displayed in Tokyo and Osaka, and then transported to Minami-Sanriku.
