DOD: Troops' Family Members Arrive From Japan

About 200 military family members who left Yakota, Japan, arrived March 19 at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in Washington state, according to an article by American Forces Press Service.

They left Japan voluntarily, "aboard a government-chartered airplane," Army Lt. Col. Wayne Shanks, an Army North spokesman said in a phone interview March 19, the article states.

According to the article: "Shanks stressed that the family members were not forced to flee. Rather, he said, those who decided to leave Japan likely did so as a precaution.

"The 9.0 magnitude earthquake that struck northern Japan on March 11 and the tsunami that followed devastated the country, including destruction to viable infrastructure, such as nuclear power plants."

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