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8.9 earthquake hits Japan

earthquake.usgs.gov

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Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#131

Post by varjag »

zeugma wrote: post #100
veidr wrote: post #56

An interesting thing I noticed was that all cell phones were completely useless for a pretty long time following the quake. That's normal, but one difference this time, compared with several years ago, is that most people I know no longer have a landline phone at home. People were queuing up for like 20 minutes to use the one old green plastic coin-op pay phone accross the street. At first, I didn't think to use a ph…

Isn't that strange ? I mean cable should be more easily broken than airwaves, no ? Is it because the landlines in Japan are designed to resist and the cell phone tower got power disruption ?

Landline phones (pre-ISDN) can get their power from the network, thus mitigating one failure vector.

Also, it is much cheaper to provide enough cable than radio transceivers. Thus mobile networks nearly always run close to full capacity... ever had "network busy" on your phone when dialing in a downtown? So they are easily overwhelmed in emergencies. With landline, in contrast, you always have the line, so it is mostly a matter of installing big enough BX station.

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#132

Post by bhrgunatha »

koski wrote: post #107

The Tsunamis caused by this that might hit Taiwan etc. can be huge (5 to 10 meters). Or then just 10 cm high. How ever it's moving now 800km an hour. The destruction is terrible ( http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xhj2ge_violent-seisme-d-une... ) I cannot explain in written how sorry I feel for the people living in the area.

The tsunami has already arrived in Taiwan - very little effect - I heard a report of 10-20 cm swelling - much less than it could have been - probably due to local geology. Philippine and Indonesian islands are probably more at risk especially low lying islands.

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#133

Post by koski »

Japan has declared a state of emergency because of the failure of the cooling system at one nuclear plant, according to the Associated Press. Officials say there has been no leak of radiation.

Let's hope this does not get any worse than it is right now.

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#134

Post by wisty »

harisenbon wrote: post #7

It was crazy scary, and I was all the way down in Nagoya. There doesn't seem to be too much damage in Miyagi (where the earthquake was) but some fires broke out apparently. Luckily, it seemed to be a long, hard earthquake rather than a short hard earthquake, which means that buildings are able to withstand the shaking better. The shaking went on for about 3 minutes here, and there were some after shocks that lasted f…

It's probably also deep. Deep earthquakes do less damage. But still, 8.9, that's almost 100 times bigger than a 7.

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#135

Post by wisty »

yena wrote: post #50
bradly wrote: post #40

Interesting to view of all 5+ quakes the past 3 days http://cl.ly/3G0f0t0d1C2Z381s3O31 . Loads of activity in the area. Is that kind of activity common, or could that have been an indicator that there was a chance of a major quake?

It's not normal at all. Something was building up

I think it's the other way round. An 8.9 takes a long time to build up. When it's almost ready to pop, then a smaller earthquake can set it off.

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#137

Post by erikpukinskis »

Sandman wrote: post #31
suyash wrote: post #26

Is this post appropriate for HN?

No, it is not. From the HN guidelines: Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's probably off-topic. And unlike cosmok, I do mind it, because this type of news is slowly turning HN into something it shouldn't be. There's a reason for this particu…

I agree it's important that we maintain a culture of curation here, but some events are big enough that they eclipse cultural mores.

With respect to the kind of exceptions we make every day, I agree with you. But once or twice a year, a lot of people die, and everyone kind of stops what they're doing and pays their respects, wherever they happen to be, whether you're in line at the bank, or on the floor of the senate.

We all happen to be on HN 24 hours a day, so this is where we all stop and take notice.

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#138

Post by dhimes »

jarin wrote: post #6

I just talked to my parents in Hawaii, there's a tsunami warning for 3 am HST. I reminded my dad to sandbag the doors of his restaurant in Waikiki (Vit's Hawaiian Steakhouse) before he closes for the night. It's just outside of the "tsunami zone" in Waikiki, so I know my dad will probably be working until the police make him evacuate. He did that on the last tsunami warning, and Vit's was pretty much the only restaur…

In case anybody else is wondering, they are at GMT - 10; 3 am is 8 am EST (US)

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#139

Post by samic »

Although I feel terribly sorry I think this shouldn't be here because it's not related to what this site is about! BUT I think we can have Hacker related news about this earthquake! for example isn't it nice that news channels are now talking about what WILL happen in next hours around the world?! Or have you seen Google's first page and the alert about tsunami?! So THERE ARE very interesting hacker-like news about quake out there

Re: 8.9 earthquake hits Japan

#140

Post by koski »

bhrgunatha wrote: post #132
koski wrote: post #107

The Tsunamis caused by this that might hit Taiwan etc. can be huge (5 to 10 meters). Or then just 10 cm high. How ever it's moving now 800km an hour. The destruction is terrible ( http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xhj2ge_violent-seisme-d-une... ) I cannot explain in written how sorry I feel for the people living in the area.

The tsunami has already arrived in Taiwan - very little effect - I heard a report of 10-20 cm swelling - much less than it could have been - probably due to local geology. Philippine and Indonesian islands are probably more at risk especially low lying islands.

Auckland-based geologist Chris Buckley says the tsunami wave is on its way towards New Zealand at 500 or 600 miles an hour.

I think soon it's hitting Hawaii. Let's hope it'll end as well as in Taiwan.

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