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Bitter lessons of Japan's 2011 tsunami put to use with latest quake

9 Comments
By Elaine Lies

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9 Comments
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If people want to live in Japan, they have to live with frequent earthquakes. At almost every place in Japan, they have histories of earthuake and tsunami disasters. Some even connect Japan's repeated invasions of the continent in the past with earthquakes. They wanted to find a place where they can live without disasters of earthquakes and tsunami.

-4 ( +3 / -7 )

Hopefully this was a wake up call to all the nuclear power plant advocates that just because there was a massive disaster a few years ago doesn't mean there won't be another one tomorrow, and all plants should be decommissioned -- not given extensions after the "maximum" operation time has been reached. It's not if, but when, and the next one we might not be so lucky. Hell, we saw the power go out with the cooling systems at the number three reactor with this quake, so even Fukushima is still far, FAR from "under control" and safe. Take care, people. I don't think we've seen the last quake for the next little while.

4 ( +8 / -4 )

There is a system of buoys way out to sea over the earthquake nest measuring rise and fall in ocean surface. Some of those figures must have helped trigger the tsunami warnings.

Glad to see this turned out to be a practice run, and a successful one. Even so, the 1.4 meters recorded in the port of Sendai is 4.6 feet, which is quite a powerful wave.

6 ( +6 / -0 )

What I don't understand is why the frequent revision of the magnitude of earthquakes If earthquakes cannot be measured accurately then how can occurrence of earthquakes be predicted. The depth of the present earthquake was initially stated as 10km and then revised to 25Km

-2 ( +1 / -3 )

The occurrence of earthquakes canNOT be predicted, aside from some warning from the initial motion waves - hence the quake warning system, which detects some of the first wave frequencies. But aside from that, no, quakes can't be predicted no matter what the Japanese government might hope.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

One thing that bothered me about the pre 3/11 tsunami warnings was that no matter how small they were TV stations would constantly flash news alerts and warnings as it they were life threatening.

Seeing 3, 5, 10 cm tsunami warnings with flashing red lights, TVs beeping and newscasters popping up on TV screens made many people numb to them after awhile, I believe.

You'd often see live or recorded footage of boats in harbors rising about a couple of centimeters. After seeing that for almost 20 years, I stopped paying much attention to them.

I understand even small tsunamis can dangerous but the extreme danger of 10, 20, 30 meter tsunamis, should have warnings that are different and more noticeable than the ones for smaller tsunamis.

-1 ( +1 / -2 )

@drlucifer, Initial magnitude estimates are usually processed quickly based off of automatic systems. These are only estimates, typically based on just a few reporting locations. Later the event is reviewed by a seismologist taking data from a wider range of locations. Having the additional data allows for better accuracy, but takes time to gather.

Measuring the size of earthquakes is not directly related to predicting future ones.

2 ( +2 / -0 )

Fukushima has seen its share of environmental weather patterns that result in a earthquake with subsequent tsunami. The bitter lesson I fear has not been learned by the Government of Japan at all. We still have people living in shelters from the 3/11 earthquake tsunami event.... We still have 3 exposed nuclear melted reactors, 3 nuclear meltdowns are not contained.... where is the lesson learned when there is radiation still being emitted from Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant and it is spreading along the coastline and into the inland.... Where is the lesson learned when there is trash bags filled with radioactive debris in parks, along river banks and the coastline.... Where is the lesson learned when there are women in Fukushima who can not carry a pregnancy to term due to nuclear radiation abnormality upon the fetus....

3 ( +3 / -0 )

It's really good to hear and see that the 2011 disaster at least had some benefit in making a reoccurrence of the massive loss of life much less likely as people are taking lessons to heart and evacuation warnings are updated. Lest we forget

0 ( +1 / -1 )

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