Most plains in Osaka Prefecture could be submerged by tsunami if an earthquake as strong as the magnitude-9.0 March 11 temblor hits the western Japan region.

unwarranted assumption, baseless gossip...

really stupid

Would love to see how he came to this conclusion.

One look at a map of Japan makes his claim seem quite ridiculous.

surely SMAP will save us from a tsunami.

I think we need to ask this guy 4 things.

So? Yeah? And? What?

Those of you who have posted so far should take a trip to Sendai and see the flooded rice fields for yourselves. It is human arrogance, if not outright stupidity to dismiss what this quote is telling us.

The reality is that any low level area adjacent to the sea is in danger. Not only Osaka, but the low areas around Tokyo Bay. With the right earthquake, these areas could be devastated.

You know if you were in the flat areas of Sendai, even with notice, it was impossible for many people to escape. Sendai was mostly farm area, but imagine a busy port area, industrial zone or housing area.

I have stood in the middle of Minamisanriku this past weekend and can say this without doubt, if you are really foolish enough to dismiss this information, then you invite disaster. We have to learn from this and do more to provision ways to save people should this happen again.

One more note. Tsunami can also back flood river areas. Take a visit to Minamisanriku and look at the 4-6 kilometer areas that are washed out upstream in the river valleys.

And look at the map of Osaka again. There are port areas there with reclaimed land. Lots of uninformed posts on this thread. That kind of inability to take good advice could cost lives.

What is this "assumption" business? It's a model - and if the model shows this could happen with a similar disaster as up north then it should be used for contingency planning and disaster prevention?

How is this remotely controversial? Isn't this the same sort of thinking that people criticize the government and TEPCO for NOT doing in Fukushima? This man's job is to make this sort of analysis.

And look at the map of Osaka again. There are port areas there with reclaimed land. Lots of uninformed posts on this thread.

Where are the enormous waves going to come from? The waves that hit Sendai rolled in off the Pacific and slammed straight into the coast. Osaka is protected on all sides from the open ocean. Waves would have to squeeze in between Okinoshima and Awaji, then veer right, slam into said reclaimed land while maintaining enough ferocity to to do damage.

Kochi and Wakayama, thats a different situation.

DentShop. No one is saying it will be exactly like Tohoku. That does not dismiss the fact that you could have substantial flooding.

Subsistance: Much of the Bay region of Osaka is reclaimed land. The surrounding area are flat plains. With a drop of 1-2 meters due to subsided land, this could result in flooding on its own.

If you visit areas hit by the Tsunami, you will quickly learn that the power of water can be amplified by having narrowed channels in the path. Again there is the the risk that waves could be focused as they come into the region resulting in powerful rises in water level that would result in flooding and destruction.

What is your deal anyway? If the experts believe this is an issue, then why not take precautions? Do you simply suggest that we ignore this potential just because you can`t see how it could be a problem? Obviously very smart people, including those in a company I know who declined new business space based upon similar concerns, believe this to be an issue and are taking is seriously.

Contrarian thinking is not what people need to take safety into consideration. What they need are leaders and people willing to err on the side of caution. You should visit Tohoku and you will very quickly learn that a a measure of caution may not even be enough and the arrogance of humans to control and predict nature, too often results in the loss of lives.

Got to agree with tkoind2.

Look at what happened to areas of Chiba, Odaiba, etc on 3/11, some are still down and will take still a time to fully recover.

Where are the enormous waves going to come from? The waves that hit Sendai rolled in off the Pacific and slammed straight into the coast. Osaka is protected on all sides from the open ocean.

Go look at the areas of biggest damage from tsunami in the past. For example, the boxing day tsunami absolutely devastated the Western coast of Sri Lanka. Wave motion is very complex; the areas directly in line from from the source of a tsunami are not necessarily the places receiving the most damage.

Take a look at the wave motion from the boxing day tsunami:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2004_Indonesia_Tsunami_Complete.gif

There's so much constructive and destructive interference going on there.