Merged 8.8 quake in Sendai, Japan

[Skeptic Ginger]

Some sources say the Santa Monica tsunami in 1930 was only 9 feet and I can't find any images or news stories.

But I found this: Tsunami Hazards Associated with the Catalina Fault in Southern California

Several earthquake scenarios with moment magnitudes ranging between 7.0 and 7.6 are used as initial conditions for tsunami simulations, which predict runup of up to 4 m. Normalizing runup with the maximum uplift identifies areas susceptible to tsunami focusing and amplification. Several harbors and ports in southern California lie in areas where models predict tsunami amplification.

 

[BeAChooser]

Reply to this nonsense is unworthy of my time.

LOL! So what the USGS says is nonsense? So the historical record on the largest quake in recorded history is nonsense? I see …

Well that was easy. You only need go back to 1930 when a measly 5.2 quake caused an 18 foot tsunami to hit Santa Monica.

LOL! The source you quote states that "In California, a magnitude 5.2 earthquake in 1930 off of Redondo Beach is thought to have caused a landslide that generated a six-meter (about 20 ft.) wave." Let's see if we can find any corroboration of that claim.

NOAA's West Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center website (http://wcatwc.arh.noaa.gov/web_tsus/19300831/runups.htm ) states the amplitude of the 1930 tsunami was 3 meters in Santa Monica and Venice. In Redondo beach they apparently aren't even sure. And there is a big difference between 3 meters and 6 meters in the topography of Redondo and Santa Monica in terms of the damage that would be done.

Here's another source (the Santa Monica Daily Press) that says the 1930 tsunami was only 3 meters high:

http://www.smdp.com/pdf/122904.pdf

The tsunami that hit the Santa Monica Bay on Aug. 31, 1930 was triggered by a 5.2-magnitude earthquake. It produced waves measuring nearly 10 feet high

Now you'd think Santa Monica's papers would get this right.

By the way, know what the elevation of Santa Monica is? Once you get away from the beach, it quickly climbs above 10 feet … or even 20 feet, at least in the northern part of the city. In fact, city hall is between 60 and 80 feet above sea level.

Now Venice Beach would be in more difficulty because it has a big marina and the region around that marina is relatively low. But most of it is still above 10 feet too. Here, the red line in this (http://www.conservation.ca.gov/cgs/...Tsunami_Inundation_Venice_Quad_LosAngeles.pdf ) is the area CEMA worries about. As you can see, Santa Monica is certainly not the problem.

And what are you proposing we do about this grave threat? The fault is so close that there would only be a few minutes between quake and arrival of a wave. It's not enough time to do much, so are you proposing we build a tall wall any place we have a fault in the ocean right next to a city? How exactly is that going to work to protect the Marina Del Rey harbor? Are you envisioning locks to get in and out?

And by the way, what's the frequency of quakes on this fault? Do we even know? Perhaps it's many hundreds of years in which case worrying about this is rather silly.

 

[gumboot]

Did you miss all the stories of people risking their lives to help their neighbors?

I'm not talking about the people directly involved in the disaster. I'm talking about the "audience" watching from the sidelines.

How about the massive increase in donations to the Red Cross?

I'd bet all of those Red Cross donations that they drop off like a stone the moment the story's off the front page. Look at Haiti. Government leaders were clambering over each other pledging millions in humanitarian aid. Over a year later most of it still hasn't actually been paid. If you make the pledge while the topics headlining the news people think you're great. Once the story's forgotten by the media no one cares if you actually paid or not.

And generally these disasters don't see much of an increase in donations, rather it's a redistribution. Donations that would otherwise be given to local charities are instead given to overseas causes, and the local charities suffer as a result.

You are focusing on the wrong people.

I'm not focusing on anyone.

 

[alfaniner]

This morning they found a man alive after 9 days.

Because he was out of the area during the first 8, and safe.

 

[Puppycow]

Because he was out of the area during the first 8, and safe.

No. But I was wrong about the number of days. It was 8, not 9.

Japan earthquake survivor pulled out alive EIGHT days later

 

[Puppycow]

Progress seen in nuclear battle

 

[Bluespaceoddity]

Progress seen in nuclear battle

Really encouraging news. The fire trucks they were using today -with the "raised arms"- appear to be even more accurate in delivering large amounts of water into the fuel pools than the vehicles seen in the photo that goes with the article.

 

[jayh]

That's kind of my point. Whatever current disaster is most attention-grabbing is viewed as the worst calamity ever. But the moment the cameras turn away, no matter how bad the situation might still be, no one cares any more.

Define "no one cares". As a species that evolved in small groups of 100 or so individuals there are only so much tragedy that practicality and emotional stability can manage.

The truth is, no matter how bad the tragedy, if there is little we personally can do about it, it is essential to get on with our lives. People deeply psychologically involved in a tragedy are not usually much help. Often the most useful thing people outside the area can do is send money and supplies.

Meanwhile in much more dire situations like Haiti, where the ongoing crisis has no impact on us directly and hasn't really evolved to offer new stories for the media, the media are silent, perhaps giving brief coverage on anniversaries when some aid agency releases a report detailing how bad everything still is.

Haiti and NO/Katrina were recipients two of the largest amounts of donation ever, much more than Japan. I hardly think that is 'ignoring' the issue.

 

[Puppycow]

Because he was out of the area during the first 8, and safe.

Oh, maybe you are right. The story I heard didn't say that. But this one does.

 

[9/11-investigator]

New video: Japanese coast guard does tsunami in open sea:

http://www.spiegel.de/panorama/0,1518,751984,00.html

 

[angrysoba]

If I was abroad, and suddenly I was living in a place with power shortages and petrol shortages and food shortages and some panic buying, and I wasn't essential to the recovery effort, I think I'd want to get home too. Even if just to remove one more hungry mouth from the food chain.

But if something like that happened to my home, no, of course I'd stay unless it was completely impossible to stay. So I think a lot of it may simply be psychological. Most of us have somewhere that is "ours", and we'll go there or stay there preferentially in times of crisis.

Rolfe.

Yeah, I know what you mean Rolfe.

Just to clarify this:

Japan IS my home and I don't consider my role here as some "useless eater".

A case in point, today I went to a school to teach where the guy in the next room from me had buggered off back to Canada. I really liked the guy but thought that with him living in Osaka, like me, he was over-reacting. Some other teachers at the school were saying that given he had children no one had any right to judge him on his decision to leave.

My take on that was that it was bollocks. Osaka is in no serious danger from nuclear fallout and we - even as teachers - do have a responsibility to our students. Fleeing the country in such a precipitous manner is really rather shameful given that he doesn't expect things to be bad enough for Japanese families to escape.

I'm sorry, but if people like me have lived here and benefitted from the overwhelmingly hospitable welcome that most Japanese have for foreigners who live here it really looks like betrayal to me when they fly out at the first sign of danger.

That's just my humble opinion.

 

[Puppycow]

Even the criminals are helping out

Organized crime. Police aren't the only ones on patrol since the earthquake hit. Members of the Yakuza, Japan's organized crime syndicate, have also been enforcing order. All three major crime groups—the Yamaguchi-gumi, the Sumiyoshi-kai, and the Inagawa-kai—have "compiled squads to patrol the streets of their turf and keep an eye out to make sure looting and robbery doesn't occur," writes Jake Adelstein, author of Tokyo Vice: An American Reporter on the Police Beat in Japan, in an e-mail message. "The Sumiyoshi-kai claims to have shipped over 40 tons of [humanitarian aid] supplies nationwide and I believe that's a conservative estimate." One group has even opened its Tokyo offices to displaced Japanese and foreigners who were stranded after the first tremors disabled public transportation. "As one Sumiyoshi-kai boss put it to me over the phone," says Adelstein, " 'In times of crisis, there are not Yakuza and civilians or foreigners. There are only human beings and we should help each other.' " Even during times of peace, the Yakuza enforce order, says Adelstein. They make their money off extortion, prostitution, and drug trafficking. But they consider theft grounds for expulsion.

 

[William Parcher]

Dashcam video of a car being engulfed by the tsunami. About as close as you can get.

 

[Belz...]

I'm sorry, but if people like me have lived here and benefitted from the overwhelmingly hospitable welcome that most Japanese have for foreigners who live here it really looks like betrayal to me when they fly out at the first sign of danger.

It's reassuring to hear you say that. I had heard that the Japanese were, on average, slightly isolationist and wary of Gaijin.

 

[angrysoba]

It's reassuring to hear you say that. I had heard that the Japanese were, on average, slightly isolationist and wary of Gaijin.

They may be both and at the same time very hospitable. Some of those who I know are leaving are those that neither the Japanese nor the Gaijin will miss very much.

 

[Father Dagon]

Once the krauts shut down their reactors and buy their first gigawatt hour from france, Arevas billing office should have their accountants do a march through the Brandenburg Gate.

I wonder if the germans would get the hint?

Regarding the protests and shut-downs in Germany, one must take this into consideration:

It might sound like a bad joke, but germans are in general thorough. You can seldom get a simple explanation of what you need to know, but you'll get a small lecture. In the 80s or 90s free condoms was to be handed out. But some official had to stamp them with the stamp of approval, punching holes trough every condom, rendering them useless.

And the worst thing you can be in Germany is a nazi. Therefore the most "progressive" persons proves ther non-naziness by doing the exact opposite of what the nazis did in every imaginable and non-imaginable way. And since they had a nuclear program, then it's anti-nazi to be against nuclear power. And that explains why they can't make simple transfers of nuclear waste from A to B in Germany without raising a small civil war.

The irony lost on the "progressives" is that they only manage to transform themselves to an inversion of Otto Skorzeny, save the dedication and uncompromising personal style.

 

[MattusMaximus]

Even the criminals are helping out

Wow, that was a pretty cool article. Thanks for sharing

 

[Rolfe]

In the 80s or 90s free condoms was to be handed out. But some official had to stamp them with the stamp of approval, punching holes trough every condom, rendering them useless.

I have a great deal of difficulty believing this. Does Snopes have anything to say about it?

Rolfe.

 

[Father Dagon]

Wow, that was a pretty cool article. Thanks for sharing

Sadly, that's what the organized crime always are doing as they're not only plain criminals, but challening the state. There's similar stories from earthquake and landslide disasters in Italy. Because "mafioso" did in an original sense not exclusively refer to criminals. A mafioso could be a man that stood by his word and helped his peers. A man of honor. And in the southern parts of Italy, there's usually a chalkboard or something similar by the counter. Because when you buy a cup of coffe, you have the option of buying a cup for someone who can't afford it. A "pay foward" they note on the chalkboard.

 

[jimbob]

In the 80s or 90s free condoms was to be handed out. But some official had to stamp them with the stamp of approval, punching holes trough every condom, rendering them useless.

I have a great deal of difficulty believing this. Does Snopes have anything to say about it?

Rolfe.

Was that supposed to be a true story, and not just metaphor?