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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 11, 2011 6:21:24 GMT
Home > Breaking News > Asia > Story Mar 11, 2011 7.9 magnitude quake strikes Japan TOKYO - A 7.9-MAGNITUDE earthquake has struck off Japan's north-eastern coast, shaking buildings in Tokyo for several minutes and sending people out into the streets. Japan's meteorological agency warns that a tsunami as high as 6m could strike the coast near Miyagi prefecture, closest to the epicentre. The agency says the quake struck at 2.46pm (1.46pm Singapore time) on Friday at a depth of 10km, about 125km off the eastern coast. Several quakes had hit the same region in recent days, including a 7.3 magnitude one on Wednesday. -- AP ================================================ Real-time reports here. |
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 11, 2011 6:29:45 GMT
It's been upgraded to an 8.8 magnitude.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Mar 11, 2011 14:13:16 GMT
I have watched the footage on the news this afternoon....those poor people. There is nothing that could prepare one for that sort of disaster. How do the countries on fault lines make preparation usually? I've heard of buildings having modifications to make them more stable...but how do the population cope with the possibility of an earthquake.
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Mar 11, 2011 14:15:05 GMT
....And how will the Tsunami effect the low lying islands in the pacific?
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Post by cheerypeabrain on Mar 11, 2011 14:18:10 GMT
....And how will the Tsunami effect the low lying islands in the pacific? found this... www.weather.gov/ptwc/ |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 11, 2011 14:33:39 GMT
It's been expected for so long, but will it finally wake up California from its irrepressible insouciance? So many things have been built in the wrong places with improper materials, seismic building codes be damned.
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Post by lola on Mar 11, 2011 16:43:32 GMT
It would take some superhuman architecture to withstand a lot of that. Amazing photos. Thanks for the links.
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 11, 2011 17:15:53 GMT
I don't see any photos - ? - The chart with the tsunami warnings is terrifying, though. The link in the OP is still working. Here is another one with updates (under 'issues in depth', right side of page), although perhaps not permanently: www.reuters.com/It's absolutely terrifying to read accounts of a such a monster earthquake immediately followed by the devastating waves. Fumobici ~~ are you okay? Portland must be filling up with people leaving the coast areas. |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 11, 2011 18:09:05 GMT
Paris might be a city of 2 million French people, but it is also a city with a Japanese population of 25,000, so there was quite a bit of emotion. About half of the shops and restaurants in the Japanese area did not even open today. The first general consensus about such a crisis is about telephones. Most land lines continue to work in a disaster while the mobile network goes down for an indefinite period of time or is totally saturated. People with old parents with land lines were able to obtain reassurance that they were okay, but it was pretty much impossible to get information from people who only have a cell phone.
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Post by lagatta on Mar 11, 2011 18:47:41 GMT
Could that be why we have relatively little news from such a developed country?
It is dreadful. As kerouac says, with poorer observation of seismic codes (even in wealthy places such as California and central Italy) the toll would be far worse.
In Italy, I remember a lot of "abusive" construction of tower blocks on cliffs.
I hate to think what the final toll will be, despite generally good building practices.
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Post by lola on Mar 11, 2011 20:47:33 GMT
Bixa, my mother called me early today concerned about her three grandchildren living in coastal WA and OR. She wanted to be sure I was up and worrying.
According to Seattle Times website, if any wave gets that far it would be ~3 ft at most and bad news mostly for marinas, people in boats and on beach. Fumo should be all right if in Portland.
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Post by mich64 on Mar 11, 2011 21:56:45 GMT
Many people here have given up their land lines in their homes with the popularity of cell phones, why pay two bills. However, where I live is one of those zones where the service is not reliable so we have always kept our land line and have or cell for the car. When we had a severe storm 5 years ago, we were happy we kept our landline as for a couple of hours there was alot of confusion. Watching the coverage this morning, I had to turn the channel, I could see people inside the cars being swept away, I am not a strong enough person to watch the suffering of these innocent people. So very very sad.  Mich |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 12, 2011 6:12:22 GMT
Here's a pretty good compendium of the most dramatic footage from Russia Today.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 12, 2011 12:01:19 GMT
I spoke with my dear friend in Kauai last evening. She had just left us from a Mardi Gras holiday here to return back home. She said that she and her family who live in a low lying area were forced to evacuate from their home for most of the day yesterday. One tsunami like wave did roll in close to shore but gratefully did not cause any harm. They were allowed to return to their homes by mid- afternoon yesterday.
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 12, 2011 17:57:46 GMT
I'm with Mich on how difficult it is to look at the videos of people victimized by the quake. It's impossible not to identify with the fear and suffering. Re: Lola's comment above about construction -- here is a long article about Japan's strict building codes. (& go here, #7, for another place, another time, no codes)By now you all will have read about the radiation leaking from the quake-damaged power plant. I once read that all those Japanese Godzilla and other monster movies and their popularity were a collective consciousness response to the horrors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. To read of this potential new radioactive horror on top of the devastation wrought by the earthquake is frightening and painful indeed. What a relief to hear from your friend, Casimira. |
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Post by Don Cuevas on Mar 12, 2011 22:38:59 GMT
My in-laws, and their grown daughter and families in Am. Samoa and Hawaii reported no problems for them. I understand that some boats in Hawaii were damaged.
Same in-laws had a real close one last year. Sister in law narrowly escaped the wave.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2011 10:42:55 GMT
I'm with Mich on how difficult it is to look at the videos of people victimized by the quake. It's impossible not to identify with the fear and suffering.. For some people it's not unfortunately. Talking about the death toll of the earthquake yesterday at work, one of my colleague - incidentally a voter of the Front National - said "Those Japanese anyway they're like the Chinese, they breed like rabbits". |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2011 17:41:36 GMT
Here is an excellent and horrifying interactive link that lets you slide back and forth over the photos to see the difference: Before & after |
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Post by Deleted on Mar 13, 2011 21:45:53 GMT
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Post by onlymark on Mar 14, 2011 5:04:37 GMT
Looking at these videos it begins to strike me as to how many cars there are in Japan.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 14, 2011 5:52:34 GMT
I am struck by the fact that a lot of the cars float better than I would expect. That would cause a lot of complicated calculations about what is the best time to jump out of the car. Wait for it to be swept along for a few hundred meters? Unfortunately, as we have seen, there are so many possible death traps along the way, but could it possibly better to be in all that as a pedestrian? I hope I never have that sort of choice to make.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 16, 2011 19:52:05 GMT
I look at the Japanese tourists in Paris and I can see that they are not enjoying their holiday at all.
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 16, 2011 22:33:39 GMT
Gad, Askar -- that was a really hateful comment from your colleague.
I wonder how many Japanese tourists around the world have had their tickets cancelled and are stranded where they are.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 17, 2011 22:17:27 GMT
This cat survived the tsunami on a wall.  |
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Post by koloagirl on Mar 17, 2011 23:46:01 GMT
Aloha from Kaua'i!
Just as a side-note to this horrible disaster - we here in the Hawaiian Islands were under a "tsunami warning" (the most extreme of the warning systems) and people in low-lying areas on every island were evacuated - the tsunami sirens went off every hour until 3am (it was supposed to hit here at 3:07am) - since we live just outside the evacuation zone, we stayed home and Kaua'i got very little damage at all - just some high surf - but some of the other islands had damage to harbors, boats, and hotels along their coastal areas.
Nothing, nothing.....compared to Japan.
"Kerouac2" - that picture of the cat...just heartbreaking.....in addition to the horror of all the people who were killed and affected....the helpless creatures like cats, dogs, etc. - also breaks my heart.
Malama Pono,
Janet
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Post by gertie on Mar 19, 2011 4:52:24 GMT
I'm with Mich on how difficult it is to look at the videos of people victimized by the quake. It's impossible not to identify with the fear and suffering.. For some people it's not unfortunately. Talking about the death toll of the earthquake yesterday at work, one of my colleague - incidentally a voter of the Front National - said "Those Japanese anyway they're like the Chinese, they breed like rabbits". Actually, Japan has had a problem for some time with lack of people having kids. So much so, the population is in decline and there are a lot of worries about who will take care of the aging population. Lots of news on the continuing troubles of Japan, its all I see when I turn on the tube. Hope they get those reactors and pools under control soon. Maybe the new electric lines to the plant will do the trick. Some other animal stories: |
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Post by bjd on Mar 19, 2011 8:15:48 GMT
I saw a friend yesterday who was supposed to be going on a trip to Japan next Thursday. Cancelled, of course. She had finally had news from a friend living in central Sendai -- after several days of no water, electricity, they finally had electricity again, but still no running water. And she had to stand in line for 3 hours to get some food. She also said parts of the city were damaged, others were barely touched.
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Post by gertie on Mar 19, 2011 10:56:11 GMT
My cousin who taught English in the tsunami area for several years has been unable to reach most of her friends from her time there. The school where she taught was underwater initially and still partially flooded as of yesterday.We've decided we will probably put our plans for a trip to Japan this summer on hold. I'm not really all that freaked out by everything that is going on so much as I think they really don't need a bunch of wide-eyed tourists barely able to speak a word of Japanese underfoot probably for a while. We've talked to the trip insurance people, and they thought we'd be able to get a refund on our flight, but we haven't quite brought ourselves to filling out the form just yet. We were planning only limited travel to the north of Tokyo with most of our stay in Tokyo and points south. We will probably make a definite decision in a week or so.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 24, 2011 20:59:16 GMT
A Tale Of Two Dogs Is Testament To Japan's Humanity
A news crew from Fuji TV saw a couple of dogs this week, lying in the wreckage of Mito, Japan.
A dog with brown and white splotches seemed to hover over one with gray, black and white splotches. Both dogs looked grimy. The second dog didn't seem to move.
When the dog with brown and white splotches came toward the crew, they thought it was warning them to stay away. But it returned to the other dog, and put a paw on its head.
Then they understood: the dog was sticking by his friend, and asking for help.
Japan is a nation of pet lovers. Most families have a dog or cat, birds, a rabbit, or other pets in their apartments.
When I covered Hurricane Katrina in Mississippi, it seemed that the commonest reason people who stayed through the storm gave for refusing to evacuate was, "I couldn't leave my pet." But earthquakes strike suddenly. People can get stuck at work, school, or in panicked transit, leaving pets to fend for themselves.
Among the thousands of volunteers who have been mining the rubble of the earthquake are Japanese Earthquake Animal Rescue and Support, who look and listen for dogs and cats among the ruins.
To those who might find such relief work frivolous when so many people are hungry and homeless, Animal Rescue and Support says, ". . . helping the pets in Japan is to help people. All of us who are animal lovers can relate to what it would feel like to be reunited with a pet after a disaster."
The dog with brown and white splotches and his friend with gray, black and white splotches were rescued, and are in a veterinary clinic in the Ibaraki Prefecture.
Kenn Sakurai, the president of a dog food company, who has been among the volunteers, says on Facebook:
". . . The one which came close to the camera is in the better condition. The other . . was weak. . . But please know that those two are just the tip of the iceberg. There are more and we need help."
I noticed another, smaller story this week. An 11-month old Tibetan mastiff puppy named Hong Dong, or Big Splash, went for 1.5 million U.S. dollars in China. Tibetan mastiffs are massive, fluffy status symbols there. Hong Dong has been raised on beef, chicken, abalone, and sea cucumber. His breeder told Britain's Telegraph, "He is a perfect specimen."
The million-dollar puppy that's been fattened with abalone, or the grimy dog with brown and white splotches who stood over his friend until he found help: which do you think of as a perfect specimen?
(from NPR)
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Post by hwinpp on Mar 25, 2011 1:58:52 GMT
Last night two quakes, 6.9ers, hit Northern Shan State in Burma, slap dab in the middle of the Golden Triangle. Haven't seen any details though. Apparently the sky scrapers in Bangkok wobbled. Nothing to be felt here.
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