Japan earthquake 2011

Question 1

Date

Answer 1

March 11th 2011

Question 2

Location

Answer 2

Japan

Question 3

Tectonic context

Answer 3

• Destructive plate margin
• Eurasian and pacific plate meet
  slipped 10-20m , 30max by the main shock
  400-500km segment of the na dragged under the pacific plate

Question 4

Magnitude on richter scale

Answer 4

9.1

Question 5

Epicentre stats

Answer 5

epicentre was 70km to east of sendai

Question 6

Focus stats

Answer 6

Focus 18.6miles below floor of western pacific

Question 7

Factors contributing to vulnerability

Answer 7

• Friction at plate bpundaries
  Tsunami wave extremley high over 40km high
  lies on pacific ring of fire
  low lying coastal area
  Highly population dense
  Fukushima nuclear disaster
  Ederly population unable to evacuate

Question 7

Global impacts

Answer 7

• Moved the entire island of honshu
  Shifted earths axis atleast 10cm
  Made earths days shorter by 1.8microseconds
  Calved 125.59km of ice berg from antartics coast
  Caused visible waves in norwegian fjords

Question 8

Primary impacts

Answer 8

• 15,900 deaths
  6100 injured
  2500 missing
  30k displaced
  Tsunami caused nuclear accidents in fukushima nuclear plant
  Heavy damage to infrastructure - roads and railways
  People left stranded due to rapid onset
  Ground shaking - collapsed buildings and some set ablaze by broken glass and petrol pipes
  Ichiard commuter town of tokoyo, oil refiniery engulfed by flames as fuel tanks exploded
  Tsunami swept inland along n-east coast causing devestation to everything
  Flooded an area of 500km
  Cities in ruins
  Tokoyo sky scrapers shaking but damage limited due to eq structure
  Insendai badly damagd

Question 9

Secondary impacts

Answer 9

• 121k buildings destoryed
  280k half collapsed
  700k partially damaged
  235bn in total damage owing to diaster
  4.4million houses left w/o electricity
  land subsidence and high tides - felt in chile
  1/2 million homeless and for weeks 15k lived in temp shelters
  fears of nuclear diaster cause panic selling across global stock markets
  shortaged of food water and petrol medical supplies
  two weeks after eq more than 700 as causing conecern and further damage
  Fukushima nuclear plant sprad global fear - served as powet supply to cooling system, tsunami destroyed back up generators - struggled to prevent a meltdown

Question 10

Short term responses

Answer 10

• Japan metreological agenect adcanced tsunami warning 3m after an eq
  Emergecny contingency planning enacted pm set up emergecny command centre
  100k members if self force to diaster zone
  930k people contributed to disaster recovery effort
  Survivors in shelters with supplies
  Helicopters collecting stranded survivors
  100k soilders mobilised to establish order organise rescue work blankers f and warer aud frin countries usa and china
  UK sent 63 s and rescue teams
  exclusion zone around fukushima
  Govt shutdown of plant

Question 11

Long term responses

Answer 11

• 2015 report -220k still displaced and living away from their homes in tempory or permanent housing
  Japan move forward commitee focused on improving disaster response through youth input
  preparing for future hazards
  Work completed on 3/4 of improved coastal defences such as sea wall which failed to keep tsunami at bay
  2013 new tsunami warning system
  Japanese govt set up advistory body called the reconstruction design council to plan long term growth prior to 2011 30% of japans energy from power plants increased their dependence on fossil fuels
  Risk of thyroid cancer 5 years after 100k not returned to fukushima 2018 two to partiail lift
  Radioactive decay still needing to be collected
  US300BN most costly natural disaster in history

Question 12

Japan today