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source : Japan Times .

Japan's seismic nerve center
Those tasked with warning the nation of quakes and tsunami can never drop their guard

By EDAN CORKILL

The Earthquake Phenomena Observation System, located inside the Japan Meteorological Agency in Tokyo's central Otemachi district, is usually operated by five teams of seven who work in rotating shifts that span every minute of the year. But at 2:46 p.m. on March 11 this year, all that changed. In an atmosphere that even one of Japan's famously reserved bureaucrats — an agency staffer — admitted was "extremely intense," everyone who physically could report for duty did, and some didn't go home for the next 72 hours.



During the first three days after the Great Eastern Japan Earthquake struck, the EPOS operators in Tokyo detected and monitored what was literally a nonstop barrage of aftershocks. In that 72-hour period, they recorded more than 250 quakes of magnitude 5 or higher — that's an average of one every 17 minutes. At least 45 of those exceeded magnitude 6, and three topped magnitude 7.

To track seismic activity in and around Japan, the Meteorological Agency has established multiple networks of monitoring stations that are the most comprehensive of their kind in the world. At 2:46 p.m. on March 11, they swung into action.

... The quake was caused when the edge of the Eurasian Plate sprang back upward after centuries of being dragged down by the west-moving Pacific Plate sliding beneath it. With its epicenter some 130 km east-southeast of the Oshika Peninsula in central Miyagi Prefecture in Japan's north, as the Eurasian Plate skidded upward it sent seismic waves of energy, known as P-waves, racing through the earth's crust toward the Miyagi coast at between 6 and 14 km per second.

MORE
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/fl20110410x1.html

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Tragic echoes from the past

By EDAN CORKILL

78 YEARS AGO
Saturday, March 4, 1933 Quake havoc

The severest earthquake experienced in northern Japan in scores of years was felt in Iwate Prefecture about 2:21 this morning. The populaces of several towns along the coast, many of whom have bitter and vivid memories of 1896 (the magnitude 8.2 Meiji Sanriku earthquake), promptly left their homes, taking refuge at places of vantage. As in 1896, the tremors were followed by tidal waves, the first coming at about 3:11 a.m.

More than 130 houses were destroyed in Miyako, Iwate Prefecture, and its vicinity. Fires broke out in the town of Kamaishi, also in Iwate, and the flames were left to rage as the citizens sought refuge as far away from the town limits as possible.

The earthquake was felt distinctly in Tokyo, many citizens rushing out of their homes into the streets. The time was about 2.30 a.m. and the vibrations could be felt for more than 10 minutes.

Sunday, March 5, 1933
Death toll mounts; waves claim most

While first reports yesterday indicated that the casualties in the earthquake disaster would not be so heavy, later ones show the death list has been mounting gradually until the figure is now said to be well over 1,600. The number of injured and missing is stated to be more than 1,300.

The greatest damage was wrought by the tidal waves which, far more than the seismic tremors or subsequent fires, brought considerable loss of life and destruction to property in their train.

MORE
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/fl20110410ec.html

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Workers try to trap water from reactors
Workers start building offshore enclosures behind the Fukushima No. 1 power plant to prevent radioactive runoff produced by emergency cooling operations from further contaminating the Pacific Ocean.
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a1.html

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Companies nix higher radiation dose limit
Companies dispatching workers to the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant are refusing to enforce the government's raised limit on radiation exposure, saying it would not be accepted by their workers.
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a2.html

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Tens of millions in 'lost' cash found
Rescue workers and citizens are turning in tens of millions of yen in cash found in the rubble-strewn remains of tsunami-hit Tohoku.
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a3.html


Huge pumps heading to reactors to spray water -- maybe concrete?
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a6.html


Temporary housing units opened for Iwate survivors
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a4.html

Evacuees begin moving into Akasaka Prince
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a5.html

Ban: Nuke industry must learn from crisis
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a8.html

Deregulate disaster-hit zones: Keidanren chief
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410a9.html

EU lowers food radioactivity limits
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410b2.html

Soviet victims lacked today's info flood in '86
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/nn20110410n2.html


To 'hanami' or not hanami jishuku
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/ed20110410a1.html


Awaji Island quake museum offers shocks and survivors
TOMOKO OTAKE
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/mail/fl20110410x2.html

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