Merged 8.8 quake in Sendai, Japan

[MG1962]

Does "missing train" mean that it didn't arrive at a station... or missing means it is nowhere on the track and nowhere to be seen?

When Sri Lanka was hit, it meant finding a 100 ton engine 50 yards from the tracks, and never finding any sign of the cars

 

[One Skunk Todd]

Does "missing train" mean that it didn't arrive at a station... or missing means it is nowhere on the track and nowhere to be seen?

I got the impression that the tracks run along the coast in places. So missing as in washed off the tracks and swept inland or out to sea.

 

[DGM]

You did read that article right????

What does this mean???

Yes, I have read (and continue to). What does "rising radiation readings" mean ? Well besides the obvious that they are higher the before, it means nothing with-out some sort of scale.

I'm not saying they're out of the woods. What I'm saying is, they are very good at dealing with disasters.

 

[Supermac]

I cannot wait to hear what Pat Robertson has to say.

I find it sickingly offensive that at a time like this, the web is crawling with idiots claiming it's the fulfilment of biblical prophecy, the position of the moon, HAARP and every other brand of stupidity you can think of. They seem to wallow in the suffering of others to try and justify their particular warped view of reality.

 

[DGM]

Maybe BenBurch can chime in but, "pressure 1.5 times what's considered normal" doesn't sound that bad to me.

 

[technoextreme]

Maybe BenBurch can chime in but, "pressure 1.5 times what's considered normal" doesn't sound that bad to me.

As an engineer I have to say thats the most idiotic thing I have ever heard especially when you chided me for the same exact thing.

I'm not saying they're out of the woods. What I'm saying is, they are very good at dealing with disasters.

Actually, the BBC article said that the last time this happened it shut down reactors for years because the systems that were designed not to break broke.

 

[Belz...]

I find it sickingly offensive that at a time like this, the web is crawling with idiots claiming it's the fulfilment of biblical prophecy, the position of the moon, HAARP and every other brand of stupidity you can think of.

To be fair, EVERYTHING is related to those things, if you listen to them.

They seem to wallow in the suffering of others to try and justify their particular warped view of reality.

I don't think it's just an appearance.

 

[AdMan]

From the BBC:

1908: A magnitude 6.6 quake has now struck in central Japan, AP news agency reports, causing Tokyo buildings to sway. It is not clear if this is connected to the earlier quake and aftershocks. More on this as we get it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12307698?OCID=twwnabbc

 

[Alferd_Packer]

Well the Ronnie Reagan is on the way - Should be a few boys and girls on her that know stuff about this atomic stuff

I rather think that the Japanese know enough about it already.

My biggest concern would be if a radiation leak were to occur, would that spawn a whole new generation of giant monsters to stomp on Tokyo?







ETA: yeah, I know, it is not a subject for jokes, but sometimes you just got to let them out.

 

[r-j]

You can see a train get hit by a tsunami in one of the videos. it's like some sort of horror movie CGI, with out the close ups and the big name stars.

 

[shadron]

This link shows the predicted energies:

I hope the Americans are proud of the USGS

http://wcatwc.arh.noaa.gov/2011/03/11/lhvpd9/energylhvpd9-05.jpg

Oh, yeah, proud all right, and computers are great things. But that isn't energy, it's wave height; you can see it gets higher close into land. The energy in the wave is proportional (to some power, no doubt) of the height of the wave and the depth of the ocean at that point. Energy gets expended over rough bottom terrain - notice how the Aleutian chain, while actually occupying only perhaps a fifth of their stretch across the ocean, quells the waves behind it.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Foreshock, my brain struggles for words more often these days.

OMFSM, 7 pages since I posted last night!

Maybe this has been posted, but there were dozens of foreshocks. All these preceded the 8.9 quake in ~24 hour time period:

MAP 4.9 2011/03/10 22:44:25 38.844 143.006 34.2 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.7 2011/03/10 21:49:46 38.590 143.086 26.0 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.2 2011/03/10 16:54:45 38.053 143.253 4.7 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.1 2011/03/10 11:21:08 38.611 143.049 17.6 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.2 2011/03/10 09:02:21 38.652 143.146 21.9 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.8 2011/03/10 08:59:19 38.547 143.295 19.8 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.7 2011/03/10 08:08:20 38.630 143.304 17.2 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.8 2011/03/10 07:33:04 38.954 142.458 20.0 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.6 2011/03/10 04:14:00 38.406 143.427 31.0 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.0 2011/03/10 01:20:23 38.408 143.033 25.1 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.8 2011/03/09 23:57:41 38.308 143.275 20.0 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.4 2011/03/09 23:37:00 38.438 143.185 32.8 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 6.1 2011/03/09 21:22:18 38.385 142.642 23.0 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.9 2011/03/09 21:00:57 38.267 142.580 22.5 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 6.0 2011/03/09 18:44:35 38.502 143.199 23.0 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 6.1 2011/03/09 18:16:14 38.378 142.506 22.0 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.8 2011/03/09 14:24:05 38.589 143.226 10.0 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.7 2011/03/09 12:03:17 38.358 143.119 13.1 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.1 2011/03/09 11:27:51 38.529 143.040 28.2 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.7 2011/03/09 10:13:39 38.721 143.090 27.2 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.8 2011/03/09 08:55:38 38.667 143.055 15.6 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.3 2011/03/09 08:02:36 38.606 143.103 15.4 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.1 2011/03/09 07:56:27 38.849 142.929 10.7 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.0 2011/03/09 07:13:48 38.246 143.108 9.9 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.1 2011/03/09 06:25:12 38.299 143.067 10.8 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.9 2011/03/09 06:12:13 38.681 143.022 10.0 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.7 2011/03/09 05:27:06 37.830 145.135 10.0 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.3 2011/03/09 04:45:54 38.543 142.740 27.0 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.7 2011/03/09 04:37:03 38.666 142.991 25.5 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.2 2011/03/09 04:32:10 38.727 143.001 32.1 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 4.8 2011/03/09 04:15:39 38.857 142.658 12.6 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.2 2011/03/09 04:05:53 38.870 142.420 10.9 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.0 2011/03/09 03:19:00 38.795 142.962 19.9 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.2 2011/03/09 03:08:35 38.339 143.097 24.4 OFF THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 5.6 2011/03/09 02:57:16 38.402 142.825 17.5 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
MAP 7.2 2011/03/09 02:45:20 38.424 142.836 32.0 NEAR THE EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN

The last one on the list appears to have been the first foreshock.

 

[dudalb]

The problem is that you can have a lot of small tremors and still have no major quake. Earthquake prediction is still a long way from being reliable.

 

[slingblade]

Just read the whole thread; I've nothing informational to add, just hoping all our friends are safe, and not-praying for the lowest possible death toll. This is horrible...

Puppycow, glad you're safe. Stay so, please.

I just woke up, had a late night sculpting, and knew this had happened. But reports were still sketchy when I went to bed, and now I'm wondering if the West Coast waves have hit yet? I read where Hawaii has been affected, but it doesn't seem too severe. Someone said an 8 or 9 foot wave was expected somewhere along the Cali coast? That sounds pretty bad...


ETA, reading MSNBC now about the US waves.

 

[volcano]

From the BBC:



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12307698?OCID=twwnabbc

Those quakes just appeared on the USGS page (http://earthquake.usgs.gov/earthquakes/recenteqsww/Maps/region/Asia_eqs.php), listed as a 6.1 and a 6.2

The depth looks strange on the 6.2, though-- only 1km? It's been reviewed by a seismologist (according to USGS) but I imagine that depth will be revised.

ETA: The 6.1 looks like an aftershock; the 6.2 looks like the new quake location that AdMan noted.

 

[BenBurch]

The pressure vessel will vent into the containment. Containment pressure rises as a result. Containment is designed to hold pressure. When you can, you let it hold the pressure long enough for the radionuclide gasses to decay, when you can not, you release pressure up the stack.

 

[MG1962]

I rather think that the Japanese know enough about it already.

My biggest concern would be if a radiation leak were to occur, would that spawn a whole new generation of giant monsters to stomp on Tokyo?


ETA: yeah, I know, it is not a subject for jokes, but sometimes you just got to let them out.

To be fair it is about the only thing that hasn't happened to these poor people today

 

[DGM]

As an engineer I have to say thats the most idiotic thing I have ever heard especially when you chided me for the same exact thing.

So "as an engineer" you can tell me the difference between "normal" and test or design maximums?

Exactly how bad is "1.5 times normal"?


BTW I "chided" you?

 

[shadron]

In 1700 when the Cascadia megathrust fault ruptured here, Japan had a huge tsunami from it. The current fault rupture on that side of the Pacific is only causing small swells on this side. I can understand the direction is focused away from the NW coast, but I'm wondering if the Cascadia force was funneled in a different way, or the quake was just a lot bigger?

It depends on whether the quake was caused at a fault, or by slippage where the land side plate overrides the ocean side. If at a fault, did it strike (move one side up , the other down) or slip (slide sideways)? A strike fault, or a plate slip (sorry for the terminology), have great potential for displacing cubic miles of water, causing deep ocean tsunamis. A slip fault, or either fault type on land, no so much, though it's not unknown for a fault on land to displace square miles of nearby underwater surface by a few feet, causing again a massive, though usually less large, displacement in the ocean.

 

[volcano]

In 1700 when the Cascadia megathrust fault ruptured here, Japan had a huge tsunami from it. The current fault rupture on that side of the Pacific is only causing small swells on this side. I can understand the direction is focused away from the NW coast, but I'm wondering if the Cascadia force was funneled in a different way, or the quake was just a lot bigger?

It depends a lot of the exact motion-- up/down versus side to side, and peak acceleration (and obviously the direction of the peak acceleration).

Tsunami height here in Oregon today is also somewhat reduced by the fact that we're at low tide-- it's a minor effect, for sure, but still plays a slight role.