KALAMAZOO, Mich. — Far from home, Noah Chukwuma tried to call his mom. Studying abroad in Japan's Shiga Prefecture, he had just experienced an earthquake.
"Things got really wobbly," said Chukwuma, who was biking with friends when tremors shook his city of Hikone on New Year's Day, three-plus hours away from the quake's epicenter on the coast.
"The city paused for a moment, but no actual damage," said the junior at Kalamazoo College. "It was just maybe a little bit jarring."
But back home in Westland, Michigan, his mom went hours without knowing the status of her son, unable to reach him by phone.
"I kept calling and texting and I was getting no response," Gail Johnson said. "It did send me into a panic. It did, it really did."
The 7.5 magnitude earthquake registered as Japan's most powerful in more than a decade, resulting in the death of at least 57 people, as of January 2.
Stuck watching the news, Johnson also messaged Chukwuma's professor in Japan. Neither he nor Kalamazoo College responded.
"The worst" went through her mind.
Around midnight, however, she received a text from her son. A while later, a phone call came.
"He said, 'Mama, I'm alright.' My heart stopped," Johnson said. "I couldn't hear anything else."
"I just screamed and said, 'Noah, is this you?' He said, 'Mom, it's me. I'm alright. I'm alright'"
This afternoon, Kalamazoo College released a statement to FOX 17:
"The safety and security of our students is our highest priority. We have 8 students studying abroad in Japan, none near Ishikawa Prefecture."
"As part of our emergency response protocols, we communicated with students to check-in when we became aware of the earthquake. We also reached out to our partners to confirm the local situation.”
While Johnson says faster communications from the college "would have been enought to deescalate my stress," she's relieved her son— as well as his classmates— are safe.
"I'm really glad that of all the countries to be in, I'm in Japan," said Chukwuma. "They have a deep love and appreciation for their fellow man."
