but we were able to pry it open and as we entered on to the road, the earthquake was happening and i was able to look around and saw the hillside behind us that blocked off part of the road i could see the large smoke stacks at the power plant swaying back and forth. i saw cracks open up in the ground and cracks in the building and glass was breaking and i could hear sirens and people shouting. eventually the earthquake stopped and at that point there had been an earthquake drill the week before at the plant. my japanese colleagues knew what to do and started taking a roll call and figure out where everybody was. we noticed that the phones were not working. we were a little concerned at that. after the roll call we decided that we needed to get to higher ground we knew a tsunami was coming and we made our way to a safer