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Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

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Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#131
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> A bunch of 7.X earthquakes in the ocean are not going to be hugely destructive. New Zealand’s 5th most deadly disaster was Christchurch’s 6.2 which killed 185 people. It was a shallow aftershock from a larger, less destructive quake. The damage was huge. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2011_Christchurch_earthquake

The key phrase in the parent is “in the ocean”

Yeah, I didn’t miss that.

It’s a bit academic for a country like New Zealand where the sea is usually pretty close by.

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I heard that smaller (relative) earthquakes actually lower the prob of larger ones, so maybe it is a good thing? A bunch of 7.X earthquakes in the ocean are not going to be hugely destructive.

Almost all energy released in earthquakes is released in the biggest ones. No realistic number of smaller quakes is ever going to add up to even the single biggest earthquake ever recorded.

To dissipate the energy of a M9 (which happens about once per decade) you'd need about 32,000 quakes of M6 (still big enough to collapse buildings).

Energy scales as 10^(1.5 × ΔM)

ΔM = 9.0 − 6.0 = 3.0

10^(1.5 × 3) = 10^4.5 ≈ 31,600

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#133
post #119
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good luck, the Sapporo Chitose airport is closed for inspection of both runways. BTW, you are safer in hotel than outside. No need to stay in lobby, go to bed, just protect your head. I experienced much bigger one in Sapporo in 2018.

When I moved to SF, someone told me that the three most important things you can do for earthquake safety are: - make sure nothing can fall on you when you're in bed (no mounted artwork above the headboard; no lamps etc on side tables that are high enough to fall on you) - make sure you have footwear in your bedroom, so you can be mobile if there's broken glass everywhere - store extra drinking water somewhere (I use…

Keep in mind that this is a major metropolitan area in a state that has a history of earthquakes. You can expect state level response (and federal as well) within the same day. Their main priority will be water, and elements exposure.

Guidance varies. California list here https://earthquake.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/8/2025/02...

You should have water, food, medical supplies, and cash.

btw you might find this interesting https://www.amusingplanet.com/2021/01/san-franciscos-hidden-...

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#134
I’m in Niseko (Hokkaido) and had just driven 2.5h through a snowstorm to my hotel, opened door, and put down bags and phone. Weird alarm from my phone (new phone; forgot to disable, which I usually do because where I live abuses the system for a bunch of stupid alerts for chronic issues), looked at it, realized in Japan it is probably real, so I stood in a doorway. Pretty decent sized storm.

If a tsunami affects me on a mountain something would be seriously wrong, so I’m not going to worry.

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#135
post #80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the reference

The Wikipedia redirect is apparently dead ( https://en.wikipedia.org/?title=Shadow_clone&redirect=no ) and the main page for Naruto doesn't show anything about shadow clones. Care to explain the reference? Do people dress up like a character from the TV show and help out people or what's going on?

The reference is that the anime character "Naruto"[0] wears the same colors and roughly the same uniform as a Japanese recovery worker[1].

During disaster work, you see swarms of recovery workers and the joke/reference being made is that this looks like Naruto doing a "shadow clone" technique.

[0] https://i.redd.it/psseu93j62la1.jpg [1] https://sendai-resilience.jp/media/images/efforts/case31_ima...

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#136
post #134

I’m in Niseko (Hokkaido) and had just driven 2.5h through a snowstorm to my hotel, opened door, and put down bags and phone. Weird alarm from my phone (new phone; forgot to disable, which I usually do because where I live abuses the system for a bunch of stupid alerts for chronic issues), looked at it, realized in Japan it is probably real, so I stood in a doorway. Pretty decent sized storm. If a tsunami affects me o…

Do those alerts work for foreigners on data-only SIMs?

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are certainly reading something into my question that isn't there. I'm genuinely ignorant. I thought you were saying that predictions of a strong aftershock following an M8.8 were dumb, but the same thing following an M7.6 were smart. Is that not the case? Again, sorry if this seemed antagonistic or something, I really am just unsure of what you were saying.

A manga book published in 1999 randomly predicted a disaster in March 2011, which seemed to come true with Fukushima. The manga was re-published in 2021 predicting a M8.8 in July 2025, but nothing happened. This is the dumb prophecy part, it was not based on seismology studies, just a shot in the dark to try to seem prophetic again. Countless works of fiction are published every year which predict some future disaste…

Great response and very informative - no clue how I totally missed the references and stories about this manga. That’s pretty cool - I’ll have to look it up!

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#138
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't know about hypocenter before too but it's neat how you can sometimes deduce the meaning of a word from its parts (because "hypo" means "under"/"below" in Greek, like in hypodermic, hypoglycaemia, etc).

Basically every language works that way? You can say underquake in English if you like, doesn't have to be Greek. In fact, it might make sense to pick a widely understood language rather than one with ~13 million speakers

"Hypocenter", like "epicenter", is English, not Greek. These words, like many words in English today, are made of Greek components, which is why kids are taught in grade school English class about Latin and Greek roots.

No, not every language works this way, because not every language uses Latin and Greek root-words like this.

Re: Strong earthquake hits northern Japan, tsunami warning issued

#139

I live in Misawa ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misawa,_Aomori ) and work in Rokkasho ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rokkasho ), which is the area where the earthquake hit the strongest. It was quite violent, apparently the strongest earthquake ever recorded in the region. My house suffered no damage other than a few things falling off the cabinets, and I could sleep soundly afterwards, but lets see today at work.

Update: the tsunami warning has been lifted, in the end there was no major damage.
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