Nishiki Tower, Tsunami evacuation facility and museum in Taiki, Japan

Nishiki Tower is a five-storey reinforced-concrete disaster tower, 21.8 m tall, standing 4.2 m above sea level in the Nishiki district of Taiki. Its cylindrical form is meant to spread the force of tsunami waves and drifting boats, and the staircase runs on the outside so people swept away can be spotted. A meeting room on the second floor, at 8.1 m, serves as the shelter and holds up to 500 people.

Nishiki Tower was completed in July 1998, after the 1993 Hokkaido Nansei-Oki earthquake and tsunami on Okushiri Island prompted Kisei town officials to visit Okushiri in 1994. A 1995 committee found that Hinode-machi could not reach high ground within five minutes, so mayor Tomomi Taniguchi, who survived the 1944 Tonankai tsunami at age five, proposed the tower. It won the 1998 Disaster-Resilient Town-Building Award.

The tower's name comes from the Nishiki district, and its shelter doubles as a meeting hall and a small museum. Every 7 December, the anniversary of the 1944 Showa Tonankai earthquake, residents hold a drill and walk the route to the tower. Day-to-day upkeep is done by the "Ikiiki Katsudotai", a paid volunteer group of local elderly people who open the museum and shelter by 8:30 each morning and clean the observation deck and toilets once a week.

The tower is managed by the local volunteer group Ikiiki Katsudōtai, which opens the museum and shelter by 8:30 each morning and cleans the observation deck and toilets once a week. The second-floor assembly room, 8.1 meters above sea level, serves as the evacuation space and can hold up to 500 people. Emergency supplies kept there include 100 half-liter water bottles, 50 blankets, life jackets and a private generator.

The tower's cylindrical shape is designed to disperse the force of tsunami waves and collisions from drifting boats, and its staircase runs along the outside so people swept away can be spotted. It cost 138 million yen, against hundreds of billions of yen for a breakwater.