Today is the third anniversary of the devastating earthquake and tsunami which hit Japan on March 11, 2011. At least 15,884 were killed, 6,148 were injured, and 2,633 were missing. 127,290 buildings were destroyed, 272,788 were half collapsed, and 747,989 were damaged. 4.4 million households lost power, and 1.5 million had no water. The economic cost was estimated to be around $300 billion.
At 14:46 JST (5:56 UTC), a 9.0 magnitude earthquake occurred 45 miles off the east coast of Japan, at a depth of 19 miles.
About 70 minutes later, a massive tsunami hit the Sendai area, traveling up to 6 miles inland:
The Tsunami was estimated to have reached a maximum height of 40.5 meters at Miyako.
The seismic moment from the earthquake was equivalent to 9,321 gigatons of TNT, or about 600 million times the energy released from the Hiroshima bomb. Peak ground acceleration was calculated to be 2.99 g, or 29.33 m/s2. Japan moved 7.9 feet closer to North America. 250 miles of Japan's coast dropped by 2 feet. The seabed between the earthquake epicenter and the Japan Trench moved 50 meters east-southeast and rose by 7 meters. The Earth's axis of rotation was estimated to have been moved between 4 and 10 inches, and the length of a day was shortened by 1.8 microseconds.
This video gives a good idea of what it was like to be in the path of the tsunami:
No comments:
Post a Comment