Thursday, August 13, 2009

4 Earthquakes in 5 days

JP map - earthquake

This map, from the Japanese Meteorological Agency, show the latest of the 3 earthquakes we had in Tokyo in the last couple of days. This one, the lightest of the four, was not so bad – in fact it was the lightest – but it is a bit unnerving to experience so many of these in such a short time.

It has been two years since I started living in Japan and I think in those two years, I have experienced my share of earthquakes. After all, Tokyo, and Japan in general, is pretty unstable and an earthquake every couple of months is pretty normal. However, this, this is something else.

They say the Kanto region, which includes Tokyo, has a huge earthquake every 90 years or so. This held true the last two times but this time it is overdue by a few years. I am hoping these four earthquakes in quick succession is not a precursor to the big one. If it is, the estimate for the number of casualties is not less than 90,000…

Update: We just had a fifth earthquake about half an hour ago… Sigh…

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