Today is the sixth anniversary of the Japanese earthquake (March 11, 2011). This is a “movie” of the epicenters and intensities of the 4,453 earthquakes that day, including the 9 magnitude earthquake.
Watch it with the sticky dots turned off (display box in upper right-hand corner of map). Then select it and watch it again so the epicenters remain visible.
Hint: Don’t blink beginning at about 2:00 in the sequence and hold that gaze until about 16:00 or you’ll miss it. Then watch the “fireworks” begin the media never really reported.
The Tōhoku earthquake was the most powerful earthquake ever recorded to hit Japan and the fourth most powerful recorded earthquake ever in the world. It moved Honshu (the main island of Japan) 8 ft to the east, and it shifted the Earth on its axis by estimates of 4-10 inches.
I am working tonight as I was six years ago. I remember the reports coming in live, though I could only find one Japanese feed in English. I don’t recall much mention of so many ongoing quakes, just video of waves rolling ashore.
Actually there have been 4,453 earthquakes in total, from 11 Mar 2016 to today. There were not 4,453 earthquakes on just 11 Mar 2016. You see the days and JST times scroll along. It begins @0120 JST on 11 Mar. 75-80 quakes hit on that day – still a lot of quakes!
Yes, I remember that day very well. I was walking down the street in Ichigaya, Tokyo and the large plate glass windows of Starbucks looked like some invisible giant was beating them like a drum.
To be fair to the media, there was something a little more pressing going on.
The aftershocks were disturbing and several woke us up in the middle of the night.
The big quake hit mid afternoon JST on 11 March. But the first reactor to meltdown didn’t fail until 12 March.
I know all eyes were on the Daiichi plant early, but IIRC (and Quite possibly I don’t) I thought the early discussion was that they thought they would be able to move in additional emergency generation capacity to power the necessary cooling pumps? Though the diesel generators failed, backup batteries kept pumps running for about a day.
In my tiny little role halfway around the world I chose to send out an emergency alert to our government officials and emergency services here in the Cayman Islands. That probably woke a few people out of bed. Though we have zero nuclear facilities the local press did start asking a few harder questions about earthquake and tsunami preparedness in the aftermath.
I don’t know what was being reported outside of Japan, but there was coverage on the plants from at least the next morning.
The day of the quake was all about the tsunami and the quake as well as all of the people who had been stranded and couldn’t return home. Not that anyone in Tokyo could watch it without power. . .
ground movement: the viewer is walking through a city park, watching as small and not-so-small fissures in the ground open and close rhythmically as if breathing, some of them pushing ground water to the surface.
Those fissures are cool. That’s out in Makuhari, close to Tokyo Disneyland and on the other side of Tokyo Bay, closer to the epicenter. I feel cheated!
This is approximately where I was at. I hope it shows up in street view. The building straight ahead is the Ichigaya train and subway station. The building on the left with the red sign has a bank on the first floor. I was just there.
Being on the sidewalk by tall buildings like that is dangerous. Falling glass from even 15 story buildings is going to ruin your day. I quickly went out into the street, where all of the cars had stopped. This is the Starbucks and the people were trying to huddle under those small tables. Bags of coffee beans and broken mugs were all over the floor. Along with hundreds others, I took refuge in a small park to the right.
Thinking back, other things which were getting reported on where the massive fires in the refinery as well as human interest stories about children stuck in day care overnight because both parents had been stuck in Tokyo and unable to get home because the mass transit system was shut down.
Then there was the videos of the tsunami of course. I probably saw them later than most people in the States because we didn’t get power for a day. We didn’t have gas either; the gas meters have automatic shutdowns which are activated by quakes.
I mentioned this before, but my 2 1/2 year old daughter loved the quake. They did earthquake drills monthly at her daycare and when they did it this time, the floor shook! It was so fun! “Daddy, can we do this again tomorrow?” she asked.
