hazards - japan earthquake

the great East Japan Earthquake: Tohoku

• 11h march 2011

• 9.0 Mw

• occured along the boundary between Pacific and North American Plates

• Epicentre 70km offshore of northeast Honshu island

• focus 30km

• lasted 6 minutes

• undersea megathrust earthquake

• number of aftershocks

Japan’s Tectonic Setting

• junction of 4 tectonic plates - the pacific, philippine, Eurasian and North American Plates

• subduction zones increasing the risk of tsunamis

• 400 earthquakes every day

• since 2000, 23 earthquakes of 7.3Mw have occured in Japan

• Japenese culture, folklore and traditions are closley linked to earthquakes and their effects.

environmental impacts

• Konshu island moved 2.4m east

• 400km stretch of coastline dropped by 0.6m

• sea bed rose by about 7m

• large tsunami triggered reached a height of 40.5m, travelled 10km inland, reached antartica breaking off 125km2 iceberg

social impacts

• 16000 deaths and 6000 people injured

• 2/3 of victims 60+

• problems disposing of dead - mass graves

• 100,000 children seperated from families

• 2000 orphaned pr lost one parent

economic impacts

• £181 billion estimated damage

• 45700 buildings destroyed

• 15 ports directly affected - 4 destroyed

• 10% of fishing ports were damaged

• disruptions to power supplies - 4.4 million households and 1000s businesses without electricity

• 11 nuclear power stations shut down - Fukushima Daiichi decommisioned

• transport infrastructure badly damaged - 23 train stations swept away

• 25 million tonnes of dbris created - costly clean up

• stock market fell

political impacts

• government invested heavily in financial sector

• increased government debt

• large movement against nuclear power - concerns over safety and regulation