The strongest recorded earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 8.8 to hit Japan rocked the northeastern coast on 11 march, triggering a series of tsunami, including a 11-meter wall of water that submerged residential areas and farms with muddy streams and washed away scores of people, vehicles and boats in fields and ports in northeastern Japan. The earthquake was the biggest recorded in Japan since 1923.
Pathetic Condition
More than 1,000 people were dead, 530 were missing and 722 were injured, according to the National Police Agency. But one police official in Sendai's Wakabayashi Ward reported that between 200 and 300 people had apparently drowned.
Deaths were reported in nine prefectures, including Iwate, Fukushima and Miyagi, according to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency and prefectural police departments. The meteorological agency put the epicenter of the quake 130 kilometers off the eastern coast of Miyagi Prefecture, which is part of the Tohoku region. Shocks of lower 6 were reported in parts of Chiba, Saitama and Gunma prefectures. The quake registered upper 5 in many parts of Tokyo.
It was the first time since October 2004 that an intensity of 7 has been recorded in Japan. The 10-meter tsunami was observed at Sendai port in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, at around 1555 after the quake with a magnitude of 8.8 rocked the region.
A tsunami expert at the government-affiliated Port and Airport Research Institute described the tsunami following the 1446 quake ''one of the highest and widest in terms of areas of devastation in the nation's history.'' Shigeo Takahashi, senior researcher at the institute, said, ''It's a tsunami of a once-in-a-century scale.'' TV footage showed quake-triggered tsunami causing the Natori River in Sendai to swell in spots near its mouth and a wide, muddy stream from the river rapidly moving to submerge a number of houses and buildings in residential areas and fields nearby, leveling everything in its path and hitting boats, containers, vehicles and a massive amount of lumber near the river.
After the tsunami was subdued, around 200 to 300 bodies were washed ashore in Sendai's Wakabayashi Ward. Officials of the ward facing the Pacific Ocean said almost all of the approximately 1,200 households within a district where a tsunami alert was issued were affected by a tsunami.
Major Casualties
At least two Japan Coast Guard patrol boats of the 2nd Coast Guard Regional Headquarters in Shiogama in the prefecture have also been washed away following a tsunami, while a fishing boat with nine crew members was struck by a tidal wave, leaving four of them, all of which are Indonesian nationals. Other footage showed more than 20 cars and containers being washed into the sea when a tsunami hit Kamaishi port.
The National Police Agency said the area of tsunami devastation in Iwate Prefecture, also in northeastern Japan, has spread to include Kamaishi, Miyako and Iwaizumi, while quite a number of people have died or are missing following a tsunami in the coastal town of Yamada in the prefecture, where many houses were washed away.
According to the Miyagi prefectural government, 50 teachers and workers at Kesennuma Koyo Prefectural Senior High School are stranded in a school building which was flooded to its fourth floor after a tsunami hit the area.
The government also said 50 percent of the city of Higashimatsushima in the prefecture has been submerged and many residents have been left on the roofs of their homes while many buildings are on fire in the city.
The Ibaraki prefectural police said three people were carried away by tsunami while watching the ocean from their home in the eastern prefecture, while the Miyagi police said a ship carrying 100 people was washed away by tsunami.
Meanwhile, the Fire and Disaster Management Agency said about 300 buildings were washed away by tsunami in Ofunato, Iwate Prefecture.
The Sendai Airport authority in Miyagi Prefecture said the airport's runways were submerged by tidal waves. The Air Self-Defense Force's Matsushima Air Base in Miyagi was inundated with seawater, damaging 18 F-2 fighters and a number of other aircraft possibly permanently.
The Japan Meteorological Agency warned of huge tsunami in the Pacific coastal region from Hokkaido in northern Japan to Tokushima Prefecture in western Japan, following the quake, which measured the highest level of 7 on the Japanese seismic intensity scale. It also advised residents in Pacific coastal areas to move to higher ground and stay away from the sea.
A 7.3-meter tsunami was also observed in Soma port in Fukushima Prefecture and elsewhere, a 4.1-meter tsunami was observed in Kamaishi port in Iwate Prefecture.
Warning and Precaution
The city government of Soma said it has confirmed that tsunami have surged to around 4 to 5 kilometers inland from the coast. The Tokyo metropolitan government said it has shut 19 of its floodgates to prepare for possible tsunami.
Meanwhile, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center in Hawaii said a tsunami warning was in effect for more than 50 countries and regions on the Pacific coast including Russia, Taiwan, New Zealand, Chile, Marcus Island and the Northern Marianas, while weather agencies in the Philippines, Indonesia, Australia, Papua New Guinea, Mexico, Panama and Peru also issued similar warnings.
Tsunami from the quake reached countries and regions in the Pacific basin including the state of Hawaii, three islets in the Kuril Islands, including four Russian-held islands claimed by Japan, and the Philippines.
No comments:
Post a Comment