A gigantic magnitude-8.1 earthquake in Japan today triggered warnings of a tsunami and a call for limited evacuation, although the waves that hit land only measured tens of centimeters at their highest. A six-foot wave hit the coasts of California later on, forcing limited evacuations and causing mild damage.
The quake struck at 20:14 local time in the Kuril Islands, which stretch northeast from Hokkaido to the Kamchatka peninsula. Earthquakes are extremely common in Japan, but a quake of this size is rare. As this story went to press, there were no reports of major damage from the quake itself.
The Japan Meteorological Agency issued an alert at 20:29 calling for people to evacuate the seashore immediately on the Sea of Okhotsk coast and the eastern part of the Pacific coast of Hokkaido — an area that is not densely populated. Waves were at that point forecast to be potentially “up to 2 meters” high.
At roughly the same time the Pacific tsunami warning center similarly issued an alert noting a quake of magnitude 7.7 and warning of the possibility of a tsunami, although at that time no data were available to confirm whether or not a wave had formed, they said. This was updated 45 minutes later when Pacific scientists upgraded the magnitude to 8.1.
November 16th, 2006 | Environment | No comments
Drinking a cup of polyphenol-enriched oolong tea with a high fat meal may increase the amount of cholesterol excreted by the body by half, say researchers from Japan and Taiwan. You can read the whole paper