As I’m sure many of you have heard by now northern Japan was hit Friday afternoon by an 8.9-magnitude earthquake, the seventh largest on record. The earthquake was followed by a tsunami - with reports of the waves being between 6-10 meters high - that’s practically washed away the Miyagi Prefecture and, last I checked, kept going inland. Multiple fires have broken out in Tokyo, an oil refinery is on fire, and a nuclear plant is having a problem cooling down one of its reactors.
Meanwhile Hawaii, Russia, Alaskan islands, and basically every landmass touching the Pacific (Taiwan, Indonesia, New Zealand, Mexico, Peru, Chile, British Columbia, Washington, Oregon, California, etc) have all been issued warnings. Last I checked at 2/3 of the way from Japan to Hawaii waves have been measured at five feet (it could be five meters but I hope to hell it’s feet) and waves have been known to grow the closer they get to land. Hawaiian residents have been evacuated to higher ground.
Been tracking this since the news of the earthquake first broke out on my twitter feed and have been spreading information everywhere I can. The photos and footage I’ve seen are incredible and heartbreaking. Luckily there is a lot less loss life than one would expect from an earthquake so devastating, since Japan’s infrastructure had been created to deal with natural disasters of this manner.
All my thoughts going to the Japanese people and everyone standing in the tsunami’s way.
Looked awful on the news today. Thoughts are with all those affected. My cousin is studying in Brisbane and my best friend is on holiday in Singapore so hoping they won’t be too badly affected. Just shows how powerful and devastating nature can be.
I have heard from my friends out that way (one out in Niigata, who says it was only a 4 on a 7 point scale–so, 3.5 to 4.4–out there), thankfully everyone’s doing okay. From the pictures I have seen it seems like most of the buildings have withstood the quake (the tsunami is another matter), and I am hopeful that we will not see the same scale of devastation that we saw in Chile and Haiti.
Just woke up from an impromptu nap and, um, everything’s suddenly worse.
approx. 300 people are dead at last count at least 137 people reported dead and this is before the 200-300 bodies they found at Sendai in the Miyagi Prefecture; at least 88,000 531 people are missing/unaccounted for (they keep adjusting the numbers but I’m pretty sure more than 531 people are missing/unaccounted for)
authorities are still having trouble with the nuclear power plant in Fukushimathings are reportedly under control; the US flew out emergency coolant to help cool down the reactors; things are reportedly NOT under control - “Tokyo Electric Power Co: Pressure inside No.1 reactor at Fukushima-Daiichi nuke plant is rising, with risk of radiation leak - Reuters” (this has the potential to turn into Three Mile Island)
a bullet train has gone missing
a cruise ship with 80-100 people have gone missing
a dam in the Fukushima prefecture broke, washing away more homes
no major damage as the tsunami waves finally hit the US West Coast; waves reported to be as high as 7 ft in Hawaii’s Maui and two submarines broke from their moorings in Guam but have been towed back
Sorry for the constant edits but information is moving/changing very quickly here.
It’s definitely awful. I’m living in Japan just south of Tokyo so it was quite scary during the tsunami warnings. I happened to be in Korea on vacation during the inital earthquake and I was only just able to get back to my hometown.
But it looks like the nuclear plants might be not as bad as first thought. The power supply problem is a big concern here right now though. My prefecture is having rolling blackouts to send up north to affected areas.