Massive 8.9-magnitude quake hits Japan - Eastern coastline inundated by multiple tsunamis
Fri, 11 Mar 2011 01:32 UTC
CNN's Ivan Cabrera reports as a powerful earthquake triggers tsunami waves off the coast of Japan.
An 8.9-magnitude earthquake hit northern Japan on Friday, triggering tsunamis and sending a massive body of water filled with debris that included boats and houses inching toward highways.
The epicenter was 373 kilometers (231 miles) away from the capital, Tokyo, the United States Geological Survey said. But residents there felt the tremors.
The quake rattled buildings and toppled cars off bridges and into waters underneath. Waves of debris flowed like lava across farmland, pushing boats, houses and trailers toward highways.
In Tokyo, crowds gathered in the streets and tried to reach relatives via cell phone.
Scenes inside office buildings showed papers strewn all over the floor and people clinging onto seats and desks.
Such a large earthquake at such a shallow depth creates a lot of energy, said Shenza Chen of the U.S. Geological Survey.
It caused a power outage in about 4 million homes in Tokyo and surrounding areas.
A tsunami in the Pacific was moving closer to other shorelines in other countries, said CNN meteorologist Ivan Cabrera.
It triggered tsunami warnings for various countries, including Japan and Russia, the National Weather Service said.
"Earthquakes of this size are known to generate tsunamis potentially dangerous to coasts outside the source region," it said.
"Based on all available data a tsunami may have been generated by this earthquake that could be destructive on coastal areas even far from the epicenter."
The quake was the latest in a series in the region this week.
Early Thursday, an earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.3 struck off the coast of Honshu.
A day earlier, a 7.2-magnitude earthquake struck off of Honshu, the country's meteorological agency said.
The largest recorded quake took place in Chile on May 22, 1960, with a magnitude of 9.5, the USGS said.
Comment: Japanese state TV footage of the tsunami washing way inland:
Japanese Earthquake / Tsunami TV Coverage March 11, 2011
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Hugh Mann · 2011-03-11T03:19:18Z
And so it begins. My God this was a big one! May our hearts and prayers go out to those touched by this tragic event.
mugatea · 2011-03-11T03:43:12Z
hope it's not as bad as it looks.
TroubleMaker · 2011-03-11T04:35:36Z
March Mega Quake Warning...
March Mega Quake Warning Issued For United States (March 9, 2011)
A new report released today in the Kremlin prepared for Prime Minister Putin by the Institute of Physics of the Earth, in Moscow, is warning that the America's are in danger of suffering a mega-quake of catastrophic proportions during the next fortnight (14 days) with a specific emphasis being placed on the United States, Mexico, Central America and South American west coast regions along with the New Madrid Fault Zone region.
This report further warns that catastrophic earthquakes in Asia and the sub-continent are, also, "more than likely to occur" with the 7.3 magnitude quake in Japan today being "one of at least 4 of this intensity" to
occur during this same time period.
Raising the concerns of a mega-quake occurring, this report says, are the increasing subtle electromagnetic signals that are being detected in the Earth's upper atmosphere over many regions of the World, with the most intense being over the US Western coastal and Midwest regions.
Important to note are that Russian and British scientists are at the forefront of predicting earthquakes based on these subtle electromagnetic signals and have joined in an effort to put satellites in space to detect more of them.
More ominously in this report are Russian scientists confirming the independent analysis of New Zealand mathematician and long-range weather forecaster, Ken Ring [photo 2nd left], who predicted the deadly Christchurch quake and this week issued another warning of a quake to hit on or about March 20th.
BIG EARTHQUAKE TO COME...
BIG EARTHQUAKE TO COME! Get Away From the Fault Zones!!! (March 9, 2011)