The Makuhari Messe convention center in Chiba, Japan, site...
The Makuhari Messe convention center in Chiba, Japan, site of the annual CEATEC Japan show, was not damaged in the March 11 quake, CEATEC Producer Takashi Nakanishi told us by email Friday. Nakanishi said he couldn’t comment “at the moment”…
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on what impact the disaster might have on this year’s CEATEC, which is scheduled to open Oct. 4 for a five-day run. Our check of the Makuhari Messe online calendar found that all events scheduled at the facility through the end of March have been canceled. But rolling blackouts, not damage to the facility, caused the cancellations, organizers of the various events said. The New Otani Makuhari hotel next to the convention center also escaped damage in the quake and no hotel quests or employees were injured, spokeswoman Yuka Kido said. Like the Chiba Marines baseball stadium that sits on Tokyo Bay, Makuhari Messe, situated only 1,000 feet inland from the stadium, was built on landfill in the late 1980s. ESPN baseball analyst Bobby Valentine, who managed the Marines from 2004 to 2009, was quoted in newspaper reports as saying that since the stadium was built on landfill, the land underneath “now seems to be compromised” and that the stadium was in danger of “sinking into the bay.” Valentine is setting up a relief fund for victims of the quake and tsunami, the reports said.