Hokkaidō is the northernmost of the four main islands of Japan. It is very roughly triangular in shape, facing north on the Sea of Okhotsk, southeast on the Pacific Ocean, and west on the Sea of Japan. It is separated from Honshū to the south by the Tsugaru Strait and from Russian Sakhalin to the north by the La Pérouse or Sōya Strait. The entire island forms a single prefecture, which is easily the largest prefecture of Japan. This page covers lighthouses of northeastern Hokkaidō, including the subprefectures of Nemuro, Kushiro, and Tokachi. The easternmost land in Japan, this coast faces east on the Pacific Ocean. In the north, the narrow and twisting Nemuro Strait separates Hokkaidō from the Kuril Islands. (The southernmost Kurils, including Etorofu, Kunashiri, Shikotan, and the Khabomai Islands, are occupied by Russia but claimed by Japan.) In Japanese, the word for a lighthouse is tōdai or toudai (灯台). The words saki and misaki are for capes and headlands, shima (also spelled sima or jima) is an island, wan is a bay, and kō is a harbor. Lighthouses in Japan are operated and maintained by the Japanese Coast Guard's Maritime Safety Agency. Lighthouses in Nemuro Subprefecture are the responsibility of the Nemuro Coast Guard office, and those in Kushiro and Tokachi Subprefectures are maintained by the Kushiro office. ARLHS numbers are from the ARLHS World List of Lights. JCG numbers are the Japanese Coast Guard's light list numbers. Admiralty numbers are from volume M of the Admiralty List of Lights & Fog Signals. U.S. NGA List numbers are from Publication 112.
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Nemuro Subprefecture Lighthouses
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![]() Kunbetsu Light, Shibetsu, February 2004 Japanese Coast Guard Nemuro Office photo |
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![]() Nosappu Misaki (Nemuro) Light, Nemuro Japanese Coast Guard Nemuro Office photo |
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![]() Ochiishi Misaki Light, Nemuro, 1990s Japanese Coast Guard photo (no longer online) |
Kushiro Subprefecture Lighthouses
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![]() Tōbutsu Misaki Light, Hamanaka, September 2009 Panoramio photo copyright ni.na; permission requested |
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Tokachi Subprefecture Lighthouses
Information available on lost lighthouses: Notable faux lighthouses:
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Adjoining pages: North: Northern Hokkaidō | East: Kuril Islands | South: Southeastern Hokkaidō
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Posted June 8, 2006. Checked and revised December 12, 2018. Lighthouses: 44. Site copyright 2018 Russ Rowlett and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.