Federal officials say a fishing boat that washed ashore in Northern California is the first debris to reach the state that's been confirmed as having come from the Japanese tsunami.
The 20-foot vessel belongs to the marine sciences program at Takata High School in the town of Rikuzentakata in the Iwate prefecture, the Del Norte Triplicate reports.
The boat washed ashore in Crescent City on April 7.
Wanted: The boat, now parked at the Sheriff's Office impound lot, has been cleaned of its barnacles after it was washed up in California
The National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration confirmed the boat's origin on Thursday with help from the Japanese Consulate in San Francisco, according to the Triplicate.
NOAA spokeswoman Keeley Belva says the skiff is the first confirmed debris from the 2011 tsunami in California.
In total, 27 items from among more than 1,600 reports of debris have been firmly traced back to the tsunami.
Japan has asked for the boat back.
Officials from the Japanese city of Rikuzentakata said it is in a 'giddy state of shock' and would love to get the boat back now it has been found in northern California.
Long trip: The fishing boat traveled from Rikuzentakata, Japan, to Crescent City, California
School boat: The 20-foot vessel belongs to the marine sciences program at Takata High School, pictured (post-tsunami) in the town of Rikuzentakata in the Iwate prefecture
The 20ft boat was been discovered in the town of Crescent City, midway between the cities of San Francisco and Portland.
The boat had traveled a distance of some 5,500 miles.
The Japanese found out where the boat was after officials in the U.S. posted a picture on Crescent City’s Facebook page.
Just hours later, a teacher from a school in Japan, said the boat was theirs.
Humboldt State University geologist Lori Dengler says she posted the photos recently after a university librarian translated the name of the high school from the boat.
The earthquake and tsunami which struck Japan in 2011 was the most powerful in the country’s history, and killed more than 16,000 people.
When the deadly tsunami struck Japan in March 2011, about five million tons of debris was dragged into the Pacific Ocean, according to Japanese government estimates.
In March 2011, the tsunami flooded over the breakwater protecting the coastal city of Miyako at Heigawa estuary
A catamaran sightseeing boat that was thrown by the tsunami onto a two story building, at Otsuchi town
Most of the flotsam and jetsam later sunk to the bottom, but about 1.5 tons of debris continued floating across the ocean.
Some of tsunami remnants found their way to American shores, including two docks that made landfall in Washington and Oregon. But the only living organisms that were discovered on the docks included plant life and invertebrate like limpets and barnacles.
Last June, a 70ft dock landed on a beach north of Newport. It was determined to be one of four docks that broke loose from the Port of Misawa on Honshu, Japan, the station KOIN reported.
In December 2012, a second Japanese dock drifted ashore on the Olympic Peninsula in northwestern Washington.
Prior to the discovery of the fish on the skiff, scientists believed that no species could survive a long journey across the ocean, and that only large objects, like docks, could support life.
A boat that washed ashore in Washington state on March 22, 2013