Plan B Forum

The owner has been found of a Harley-Davidson that drifted to Canada after being swept out to sea in the 2011 Japanese tsunami.

Details from the motorcycle's licence plate helped to locate Ikuo Yokoyama.



According to CBC News, Mr Yokoyama lost his home and three family members in the tsunami.

The shop that sold the motorcycle to Mr Yokoyama is now hoping to ship the Harley-Davidson back to Japan and restore it.

The motorcycle is among the first items in a wave of debris heading to the west coast of North America. Most of the debris is expected to arrive in 2013.

The Harley-Davidson motorcycle was discovered by Peter Mark on 18 April on the coast of an island in British Columbia.

Mr Mark said it was caked with "a lot of corrosion, a lot of rust", but that he could see the manufacturer's distinctive logo.


Ikuo Yokoyama told Japanese TV he had bought the bike five years ago The Canadian realised that the bike could be part of the tsunami debris after he noticed that license plate was from Miyagi prefecture, the area hardest-hit by the March 2011 disaster.

Mr Yokoyama's bike was inside a large white container he was using as a storage shed, which eventually washed away, leaving the bike partially buried in sand.

"This is unmistakably mine," Mr Yokoyama told Nippon TV when shown photos of the motorcycle. "It's miraculous."

Most of the debris is expected to arrive in 2013.

bigskygal wrote:

Garbage of another culture; kinda cool.