Here’s the article.
That’s a doozy. I hope no one was killed. Anyone who posts here live in Hokkaido?
Quickly posting before I go to a meeting here.
Tokyo came through fine, but enough shaking to wake me up.
8!!! With an aftershock of magnitude 7!!! The worst quake in recent times in the US was in Alsaka in '64. I think that was estimated at 8.4. San Fran in 1904 was guesstimated towards 9…
Still, nothing has approached 8 since then…(since 1904) I suspect that article is a very preliminary report, and MUCH more tragedy will be reported. 
Still… if it’s northern Japan… it might not be quite so devastating. Less population there.
Ok, I’m back.
From the news reports I’ve been watching all morning, the toll so far is about 150 injuries, only 2 serious, no deaths, one refinery fire and one train derailment. Even though the area that got hit hardest is relatively uncrowded, this is still pretty fortunate, IMO.
Ok, tomorrow’s Saturday, the Mrs. and I are finally going to put together an emergency kit.
scr4, are you and your relatives all okay?
Hokkaido Brit here, still shaky!
We live in the north, so about five or six hours drive from the nearest bit of land to the epicentre, which was under the sea, but we were shaken out of bed by the tremor.
We live on the 4th floor of an old apartment building, so it was creaking and cracking all through the tremor which lasted a long time. It was long enough for me to get both boys out of bed and into the entrance way with the door propped open in case the walls sagged, then go back to see what husband was up to. He had switched the TV on and was hurrying into his uniform (he is in the self defence forces here.) Three minutes later he had gone, as had all the other men in the block, hurrying to camp to wait for orders in case of rescue efforts being needed. (They were not, but have not been stood down yet, grrr!)
Three year old said grumpily, “Put me down!” so I did, and he promptly went back to sleep! Six year old was sheet white, eyes as big as saucers and trembling uncontrollably (it happened at 4.50am, so he was deeply asleep when it woke him.) When I held him, I could feel his heart thumping so hard it was moving his body. There was no chance of us sleeping so I pulled the futons out into the living room and put the TV on. (No power outages for us, but the traffic lights all went out for two hours! No matter in our tiny town so early in the morning.)
No damage to our belongings, we have a policy of no furniture over two or three feet high in the bedrooms, no ornaments or insecurely hung pictures, no glass cabinets, and all our high stuff bolted to the walls. (We are not allowed to make holes in the walls under the conditions of our lease, so I do it anyway!!) It all paid off, as things like videos slid to the edge of shelves and teetered but did not fall, and all the dangerous stuff stayed put.
Minor things - I had a t-shirt and no pants on at the time, same as older boy, so I was worried about if we had to make a run for it. I MUST learn to wear clothes to bed. (Still, it was a miracle that I even had a t-shirt on…) Hub could not find his contacts but my glasses were to hand.
I cannot contact a friend who lives right in the worst area, which worries me, but I have seen that there have been no deaths, so must assume she and her family are OK.
Thanks for your concern, it COULD have been a lot worse than it was, but it was still scary. I am a Brit, and not used to the earth moving!!
Thanks for your concern, we Tokyo residents are fine. Hokkaido is 500+ miles north of Tokyo. It didn’t even wake me up. I see the lone Hokkaido doper (that I know of) has already checked in. There are no reported fatalities.
Even though it was a magnitude 8, the epicenter was 50 miles off the coast. Some places reported 4-ft tsunami but it looks like everyone got the warning in time.
Thanks, scr4. I just wanted to make sure that my favorite Japanese doper and his kin were all doing well.
Hokkaido Brit, thank you for letting us know that even those of you near the epicenter came out all right. Best wishes!
Zenster, thanks for your good wishes.
Young Brit was very upset this morning but by this evening it has become The Big Adventure Of The Year. They were told today at school that if there was another quake, they were to get out through the windows (safer than running down a long corridor to the entrance hall - their classroom is on the ground floor!). That thrilled him skinny and he was a bit disappointed that he didn’t get the chance to do it!
It is a wake up call to ALL of us in ALL areas of the world which have quakes, to get ready with the emergency kits and escape plans. We were woefully unprepared and if it had been really bad, we would be in trouble tonight.
The first person I thought of was Hokkaido Brit - glad to see you’re still with us and able to post. Saw the pictures on the news this morning - thank goodness for pre-emptive Japanese architecture. Though Kobe was a warning that it needs to be better…
I’m in tokyo and although apparently people here were able to feel shaking, I didnt even notice it, or hear about it, until now.
Earthquakes scare me. We had one here last weekend that wasn’t strong at all, but to me I am always positive we’re going to die every time there’s even a minor one. I think this comes from growing up in NY, which doesn’t get earthquakes (although we did have one small one when I was a kid). My husband also grew up in earthquake-free places, but he has no fear of earthquakes under 8. We don’t have emergency kits. But we’re supposed to.
I am glad that all the Japanese dopers who have checked in so far are doing OK.
acrossthesea I know exactly how you feel about earthquakes - in my country the earth stays put. Even the slightest tremor makes me feel sick. I knew someone who was buried in the Kobe quake for over 24 hours before being rescued. Ultra horrible, can’t even bring myself to think about that…
On a slightly more frivolous note, could someone tell me why I am ALWAYS naked, or nearly so, when an earthquake strikes?? I have been in three big ones now and I was under-dressed on all three occasions.
NZ had a 7.2 only a few weeks back, our strongest in something like 80 yrs. http://neic.usgs.gov/neis/bulletin/neic_xtat.html
When trying to find the date I found this http://www.geonet.org.nz/recent_quakes.html which scarily told me there were 2 earthquakes here today (ok so not big ones) Is the ring of fire about to start playing up big time?
Seems odd that NZ and Japan would have big ones so together. Calafornia watch out.
OH and sorry I got distracted…glad all you Japanese dopers are ok 
Astronomer Predicts Major Earthquake. A few days late and not quite as destructive as predicted, but pretty close. Surely it’s a coincidence, but pretty strange nonetheless.
I actually read about the prediction a week or so ago (although it was not the same source) so this has not been fabricated after the fact.
I thought about that too, but this observatory is 500 miles away from today’s earthquake and I don’t think their method works over such long distances. Apparently a coincidence. Though there was a magnitude 5.5 earthquake in Tokyo last week which is pretty close to the prediction.
By the way, it looks like there may have been fatalities after all. Two people who went fishing in the morning are reported missing, possibly swept off by the tsunami. Injury count has gone up to 420. Still, not too bad for a magnitude 8.1 earthquake.
Oh my.
I was woken up rudely in the Northridge quake in '94. Scary scary stuff.
Stay safe, everybody!
The 1964 earthquake was magnitude 9.2. We also had a 7.9 earthquake last winter on the Denali fault. For a list of the biggest US quakes, go to neic.usgs.gov/neis/eqlists/10maps_usa.html
I work in the State Emergency Coordination Center for Alaska and we were quite busy getting tsunami warning and watch information out to the coastal communities.
Which are what Dave? Are there any preliminary indications a wave will impact any of the coastal communities in the Pacific?
All warnings and watches for Alaska were cancelled yesterday afternoon. I do not have any information for other Pacific areas, but the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center should have info on those areas. Their address is http://www.prh.noaa.gov/pr/ptwc/
I have not seen any data for tsunami activity outside of Japan. Most of the waves there were in the 3 foot range.
We get our information from the West Coast & Alaska Tsunami Warning Center. Another good site for information about this event or other earthquakes is the USGS earthquake site at http://earthquake.usgs.gov/
For an interesting map of current worldwide earthquakes, check out the seismic monitor at http://www.iris.edu/seismon/ which is provided by the Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology.