A strong earthquake hit off the coast of eastern Japan on Saturday, injuring dozens of people and triggering widespread power outages, but there appeared to be no major damage and no tsunami warning was issued.
The earthquake had a 7.3 magnitude and its epicentre was off the coast of Fukushima prefecture at a depth of 60 km (36 miles), the Japan Meteorological Agency said. It shook buildings for some time after it hit, shortly after 11:00 p.m. (1400 GMT).
Houses and offices in the capital Tokyo, hundreds of kilometres away, also swayed and shook. No tsunami warning had been issued, the meteorological agency said...
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According to the U.S. Tsunami Warning System, there is no threat of a tsunami from today's magnitude 7.2 earthquake in the Pacific 89 km southeast of Sendai, Fukushima Prefecture, Japan.
We hope that they
are right as earthquakes of this size can trigger tsunamis. According to
the Japan Meteorological Agency JMA, no tsunami should be expected
either, only slight changes in sea level.
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Magnitude Mw 7.1
Region NEAR EAST COAST OF HONSHU, JAPAN
Date time 2021-02-13 14:07:52.1 UTC
Location 37.74 N ; 141.64 E
Depth 60 km
Distances:
81 km SSE of Ishinomaki, Japan / pop: 117,000 / local time: 23:07:52.1 2021-02-13
63 km NE of Namie, Japan / pop: 21,800 / local time: 23:07:52.1 2021-02-13
Tokyo Electric Power Co. said there were no irregularities at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant, which experienced meltdowns following a massive quake and tsunami 10 years ago.
ReplyDeleteThere were no immediate reports of irregularities from other nuclear plants in the area, such as Onagawa or Fukushima Dai-ni, government spokesperson Katsunobu Kato told reporters.
The Japan Meteorological Agency said the quake had a magnitude of 7.3, raising it from a preliminary magnitude of 7.1.
Tokyo Electric Power Co. said that some 860,000 homes were without power as a result of the quake, but electricity was gradually being restored, according to Kato.
Kato said there was no danger of a tsunami from the quake. He said that some trains in northeastern Japan had stopped running, and that other damage was still being checked.
A strong earthquake struck off the coast of Fukushima, Japan, on Saturday, just weeks before the 10-year anniversary of the deadly 2011 tsunami.
ReplyDeleteThe 7.3-magnitude quake was felt strongly in Tokyo, but a tsunami warning has not been issued.
There are reports of about 50 people injured, officials say, and almost one million homes are without power.
The quake struck near the epicentre of a 2011 earthquake which triggered a tsunami and killed over 18,000 people.
That tsunami caused a nuclear accident at the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant - the world's most severe nuclear accident since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986.
The number of people who were injured as a result of the 7.3-magnitude earthquake that struck Japan on Saturday has reached 124, the Japanese public television said on Sunday.
ReplyDeleteEarlier reports said 103 people were injured. The majority of casualties were reported in the prefectures of Miyagi and Fukushima on the eastern coast of Japan’s largest island of Honshu, which bore the brunt of the disaster. Most of the victims were diagnosed with bruises and blunt traumas sustained during falls.
Meanwhile, Tokyo Electric Power (TEPCO), a Japanese electric utility holding company operating in the quake-hit area, said that as a result of the earthquake, a small amount of water spilled from pools storing spent nuclear fuel at Units 5 and 6 of the Fukushima-1 nuclear power plant.
The amount of water was insignificant and caused no serious changes in background radiation levels at the plant. It posed no threat to safety of Japan’s nuclear facilities. Earlier, Japanese Chief Cabinet Secretary Katsunobu Kato said the country’s nuclear facilities had sustained no damage in the disaster.