Japan hit by 8.9 earthquake. Tsunami warning across all of the Pacific

#2
MASSIVE earthquake in Japan. Trying to get a hold of family. So far no luck. 8.9 on the richter scale.
This deserves it's own thread. I've been keeping up with this for the past couple hours. I hope they are ok Tetsujin. This is a horrible event, it's making me feel ill.
 
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#4
http://www.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/03/11/japan.quake/index.html?hpt=T1&iref=BN1

tsunami travel time

Be safe everyone who is in the warning areas

http://wcatwc.arh.noaa.gov/2011/03/1...alhvpd9-01.txt


The following list gives estimated times of arrival for
locations along the North American Pacific coast from a
tsunami generated at the given source location. The
list is ordered by arrival time starting with the earliest.
Since tsunami speed is directly related to
water depth, tsunami ETAs can be computed independent of
tsunami amplitude. THE LISTING OF A TSUNAMI ARRIVAL TIME
BELOW DOES NOT INDICATE A WAVE IS IMMINENT. The listed arrival
time is the initial wave arrival. Tsunamis can be dangerous
for many hours after arrival, and the initial wave is not
necessarily the largest.

Source:
Lat: 38.0N
Lng: 142.9E
Mag: 7.9
O-time: 0546UTC
Date: MAR 11

Estimated times of initial tsunami arrival:

DART 21415 2348 AKST MAR 10 0848 UTC MAR 11
Shemya, Alaska 0020 AKST MAR 11 0920 UTC MAR 11
Attu, Alaska 0020 AKST MAR 11 0920 UTC MAR 11
DART 21414 0020 AKST MAR 11 0920 UTC MAR 11
Amchitka Pass, Alaska (125 miles W of Adak) 0034 AKST MAR 11 0934 UTC MAR 11
Amchitka, Alaska 0037 AKST MAR 11 0937 UTC MAR 11
DART 46413 0059 AKST MAR 11 0959 UTC MAR 11
Atka, Alaska 0116 AKST MAR 11 1016 UTC MAR 11
Adak, Alaska 0118 AKST MAR 11 1018 UTC MAR 11
DART 46408 0119 AKST MAR 11 1019 UTC MAR 11
DART 46402 0145 AKST MAR 11 1045 UTC MAR 11
Nikolski, Alaska 0159 AKST MAR 11 1059 UTC MAR 11
DART 46403 0219 AKST MAR 11 1119 UTC MAR 11
Akutan, Alaska 0224 AKST MAR 11 1124 UTC MAR 11
Dutch Harbor, Alaska 0228 AKST MAR 11 1128 UTC MAR 11
Unimak Pass, Alaska (80 miles NE of Dutch Harbo 0236 AKST MAR 11 1136 UTC MAR 11
St. Paul, Alaska 0239 AKST MAR 11 1139 UTC MAR 11
DART 46409 0300 AKST MAR 11 1200 UTC MAR 11
King Cove, Alaska 0303 AKST MAR 11 1203 UTC MAR 11
Sand Point, Alaska 0304 AKST MAR 11 1204 UTC MAR 11
Perryville, Alaska 0326 AKST MAR 11 1226 UTC MAR 11
DART 46410 0326 AKST MAR 11 1226 UTC MAR 11
Cold Bay, Alaska 0337 AKST MAR 11 1237 UTC MAR 11
Chignik Bay, Alaska 0357 AKST MAR 11 1257 UTC MAR 11
Kodiak, Alaska 0358 AKST MAR 11 1258 UTC MAR 11
Cape Suckling, Alaska (75 miles SE of Cordova) 0359 AKST MAR 11 1259 UTC MAR 11
Old Harbor, Alaska 0400 AKST MAR 11 1300 UTC MAR 11
Hinchinbrook Entrance, Alaska (90 miles E of Se 0409 AKST MAR 11 1309 UTC MAR 11
Seward, Alaska 0423 AKST MAR 11 1323 UTC MAR 11
Alitak, Alaska 0425 AKST MAR 11 1325 UTC MAR 11
Elfin Cove, Alaska 0425 AKST MAR 11 1325 UTC MAR 11
Kennedy Entrance, Alaska (40 miles SW of Homer) 0428 AKST MAR 11 1328 UTC MAR 11
Saint Matthew Island, Alaska 0433 AKST MAR 11 1333 UTC MAR 11
Cape Fairweather, Alaska (80 miles SE of Yakuta 0433 AKST MAR 11 1333 UTC MAR 11
Yakutat, Alaska 0433 AKST MAR 11 1333 UTC MAR 11
Sitka, Alaska 0433 AKST MAR 11 1333 UTC MAR 11
Salisbury Sound, Alaska (25 miles NW of Sitka) 0434 AKST MAR 11 1334 UTC MAR 11
Port Alexander, Alaska 0434 AKST MAR 11 1334 UTC MAR 11
the Alaska/British Columbia border 0538 PST MAR 11 1338 UTC MAR 11
Valdez, Alaska 0443 AKST MAR 11 1343 UTC MAR 11
Langara Island, British Columbia 0543 PST MAR 11 1343 UTC MAR 11
Cordova, Alaska 0452 AKST MAR 11 1352 UTC MAR 11
Cape Decision, Alaska (85 miles SE of Sitka) 0455 AKST MAR 11 1355 UTC MAR 11
DART 46419 0608 PST MAR 11 1408 UTC MAR 11
Homer, Alaska 0516 AKST MAR 11 1416 UTC MAR 11
DART 46404 0625 PST MAR 11 1425 UTC MAR 11
the north tip of Vancouver Island, British Colu 0626 PST MAR 11 1426 UTC MAR 11
DART 46407 0632 PST MAR 11 1432 UTC MAR 11
Craig, Alaska 0534 AKST MAR 11 1434 UTC MAR 11
Ketchikan, Alaska 0540 AKST MAR 11 1440 UTC MAR 11
Juneau, Alaska 0543 AKST MAR 11 1443 UTC MAR 11
DART 46411 0656 PST MAR 11 1456 UTC MAR 11
Tofino, British Columbia 0706 PST MAR 11 1506 UTC MAR 11
Gambell, Alaska 0606 AKST MAR 11 1506 UTC MAR 11
Prince Rupert, British Columbia 0711 PST MAR 11 1511 UTC MAR 11
the Washington-British Columbia border 0712 PST MAR 11 1512 UTC MAR 11
Neah Bay, Washington 0718 PST MAR 11 1518 UTC MAR 11
Clatsop Spit, Oregon 0719 PST MAR 11 1519 UTC MAR 11
La Push, Washington 0719 PST MAR 11 1519 UTC MAR 11
Cape Blanco, Oregon 0719 PST MAR 11 1519 UTC MAR 11
the Oregon-Washington border 0720 PST MAR 11 1520 UTC MAR 11
Point Grenville, Washington 0721 PST MAR 11 1521 UTC MAR 11
Port Moller, Alaska 0622 AKST MAR 11 1522 UTC MAR 11
Charleston, Oregon 0723 PST MAR 11 1523 UTC MAR 11
Douglas/Lane County Line, Oregon (10 miles SW o 0724 PST MAR 11 1524 UTC MAR 11
Cape Mendocino, California 0724 PST MAR 11 1524 UTC MAR 11
Cascade Head, Oregon (70 miles SW of Portland) 0724 PST MAR 11 1524 UTC MAR 11
Tillamook Bay, Oregon 0726 PST MAR 11 1526 UTC MAR 11
Horse Mountain, California (50 miles SW of Eure 0727 PST MAR 11 1527 UTC MAR 11
Fort Bragg, California 0728 PST MAR 11 1528 UTC MAR 11
Humboldt Bay, California 0729 PST MAR 11 1529 UTC MAR 11
Crescent City, California 0730 PST MAR 11 1530 UTC MAR 11
Seaside, Oregon 0731 PST MAR 11 1531 UTC MAR 11
the Oregon-California border 0731 PST MAR 11 1531 UTC MAR 11
Westport, Washington 0732 PST MAR 11 1532 UTC MAR 11
Point Arena, California 0733 PST MAR 11 1533 UTC MAR 11
Newport, Oregon 0733 PST MAR 11 1533 UTC MAR 11
Gualala Point, California (80 miles NW of San F 0735 PST MAR 11 1535 UTC MAR 11
Point Reyes, California 0746 PST MAR 11 1546 UTC MAR 11
Davenport, California (10 miles NW of Santa Cru 0747 PST MAR 11 1547 UTC MAR 11
Point Sur, California 0749 PST MAR 11 1549 UTC MAR 11
Astoria, Oregon 0751 PST MAR 11 1551 UTC MAR 11
Monterey, California 0752 PST MAR 11 1552 UTC MAR 11
Port Angeles, Washington 0755 PST MAR 11 1555 UTC MAR 11
Ragged Point, California (45 miles NW of San Lu 0758 PST MAR 11 1558 UTC MAR 11
DART 46412 0759 PST MAR 11 1559 UTC MAR 11
Point Concepcion, California 0805 PST MAR 11 1605 UTC MAR 11
Port San Luis, California 0811 PST MAR 11 1611 UTC MAR 11
Bella Bella, British Columbia 0812 PST MAR 11 1612 UTC MAR 11
San Francisco, California 0816 PST MAR 11 1616 UTC MAR 11
Cape Newenham, Alaska 0723 AKST MAR 11 1623 UTC MAR 11
Santa Barbara, California 0824 PST MAR 11 1624 UTC MAR 11
Rincon Point, California (15 miles SE of Santa 0835 PST MAR 11 1635 UTC MAR 11
San Pedro, California 0839 PST MAR 11 1639 UTC MAR 11
Santa Monica, California 0839 PST MAR 11 1639 UTC MAR 11
Newport Beach, California 0845 PST MAR 11 1645 UTC MAR 11
La Jolla, California 0848 PST MAR 11 1648 UTC MAR 11
Seattle, Washington 0851 PST MAR 11 1651 UTC MAR 11
Alamitos Bay, California (20 miles SE of L.A.) 0854 PST MAR 11 1654 UTC MAR 11
the California-Mexico border 0854 PST MAR 11 1654 UTC MAR 11
Hooper Bay, Alaska 0854 AKST MAR 11 1754 UTC MAR 11
Little Diomede Island, Alaska 0904 AKST MAR 11 1804 UTC MAR 11
Dillingham, Alaska 0946 AKST MAR 11 1846 UTC MAR 11
Nome, Alaska 1059 AKST MAR 11 1959 UTC MAR 11
Unalakleet, Alaska 1430 AKST MAR 11 2330 UTC MAR 11
 
#5
My thoughts are definitely with everybody who might be affected by this tragedy. Following on TV/online and can't believe what i'm seeing and hearing. Devastating to say the least.
 

Tetsujin

The Game Thread Dude
#6
The response by the Japanese government has been nothing short of amazing. So coordinated, so well-organized. Still, I would at least like to hear from my family before I sleep.
 
#10
That was devastating, had it happened in any other place in the world it would have caused much more victims.
Agreed! It's VERY tragic that there was loss of lives and homes in Japan, but they've built their entire country to 'sustain' earthquakes like this for the past 30-50 years, which is incredible! No other country in the world is better prepared for earthquakes like this than Japan.
 
#11
California is quite prepared, too. Japan and California have shared much engineering and structural developments designed to help minimize earthquake damage. Of course, this is a truly huge earthquake. Big enough to defeat a lot of engineering. A lot of the damage is from the tsunami, too.

Tetsujin, I hope you have heard from your family. I'll keep you, your family and all of Japan in my thoughts.
 

Tetsujin

The Game Thread Dude
#13
So things for us have gotten semi-desperate in my household. My uncle works in Nagano, which was struck by a 6.8 earthquake last night after the big one. My grandparents, I just found out, were supposed to be travelling through the Sendai area via train this week. There are still three trains missing. We have been unable to contact any of our family at all.
 
#14
So things for us have gotten semi-desperate in my household. My uncle works in Nagano, which was struck by a 6.8 earthquake last night after the big one. My grandparents, I just found out, were supposed to be travelling through the Sendai area via train this week. There are still three trains missing. We have been unable to contact any of our family at all.
Sorry to hear that, bro. My parents are US Government workers that work in Yokota AFB in Fussa. I couldn't sleep last night till I finally got a hold of them this morning. They are telling me its chaos out there right now.
 

Tetsujin

The Game Thread Dude
#16
My mom just got a call from them. All safe and accounted for. Thanks for all of the thoughts and prayers. Keep it up for all of the others not as lucky as I.
 
#18
Glad to hear your family is safe and sound Tetsujin. Our Japanese brothers and sisters are in my families prayers.

Im finding it disturbing how hard it is to get reliable info about the Fukushima situation. According to some sources there are 2 other nuclear plants being evacuated. Theres so much bad info out there. Also if there is a meltdown what does that mean for us here in CA, OR, and WA? The jetstream could potentially drop a lot of that fallout directly on us and our crops.
 
#19
Here in Japan

Hey guys. I am from Sacramento but I have lived in Japan 3 years now. I wanted to share my experiences and thoughts over the last few days. Before I begin I should mention that I live in Ishikawa Prefecture on the west coast of Japan which means my town was in no way impacted by the earthquake. Life in Ishikawa is pretty much normal and I have a belly full of Japanese curry. For all that I feel very lucky.

I was at work when the earthquake happened. I am a JHS English teacher so I was sitting at my desk in the staff room at the time. We are more than 200 miles from the epicenter so it was really weak where we were. The building slightly vibrated for about 2 minutes. It was so slight it remind me of my power razor. It gave me a really sick feeling and I thought there might be a gas leak. I looked out the staff room window and saw the school pool water was moving. Then the earthquake alarm finally went off.

My coworkers (all Japanese) laughed it off at first. No one took it seriously. Small earthquakes happen all the time and I have slept through 3 or 4 during my time here. Then we turned on the TV and saw the reality. I immediately contacted all my friends on the east coast. They were safe but a couple of them had close calls.

One of my friends was on a bus to Tokyo for an interview. The bus was on a bridge when it happened. Thankfully they cleared the bridge, but it collapsed only hours later. The company building where should was going to have the interview burned to the ground. The company politely called her to tell her that information (very Japanese style).

Another one of my friends lives to the north. From her house on a hill she watched her neighbors' houses get obliterated by the tsunami wave. Thankfully her house was unharmed, but two neighboring families now live in their tiny Japanese house.

Several of my other friends were trapped in Tokyo unable to commute home because transportation shut down. They were without access to food, electricity and phone usage was limited for 24 hours.

These are far from the worst cases, but they are more real to me because I heard them crying when they called me terrified and alone.

Aftershocks prevented people from relaxing and the TV only showed more and more destruction. In the beginning they counted only small numbers dead, and then the number kept rising and rising. 3, 7, 16, 34, 89, 115, 200, 450... and it keeps going.

Are things bad here? YES, probably worse than most people realize. 400,000 people are homeless and those "shelters" are junior high school gyms with no insulation (I know from first hand experience that those gyms are freezing cold. I cant stand 20 minutes in one for the morning assembly). It's around 30 degrees in the north and snowing.

Honestly, what is NOT important is the excessive worries over the reactor. Most of the "worst case scenarios" are still very remote chances. Nuclear explosion is impossible, a "poison cloud" hovering around the world is one in a million shot. Even if the core partially melts the results would likely be much like Three Mile Island. A scary and costly event, but overall relatively small. I live within 200 miles of the nuclear plant and I'm not worried, nor should you.
 

Warhawk

Give blood and save a life!
Staff member
#20
RunNGun - thank you for the update and sharing your experiences. Please know we are very concerned with the condition and well-being of the Japanese country and people.
 
#21
Tetsujin, I'm so gald you were able to confirm your family in Japan were all okay. RunNGun, I'm glad your friends are all okay.

The sheer devastation of it all is unbelievable. My thoughts have been on all those who died, but even more on the living, who have lost everything. The number of people homeless is mind-numbing. Its not just the evacuation, its the numbers of people who have no place to which they can return. And the people who have no job to go back to.....I just can't imagine such total loss.

I'm in California and I'm not worried about the radiation. At least not unless an authoritative source tells me to worry about it. (Not really likely.) Besides, the unliklihood of any danger here, nothing can compare to the brutal devastation and grief suffered by so many in Japan.

My thoughts and prayers are with the people in Japan. They are going to need all the help and support they can get.
 
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Tetsujin

The Game Thread Dude
#23
What is more dangerous than the radiation is the sheer panic and hysteria being cause by the media and foreign countries telling their ex-pats to get out of the country. By doing that, its causing a sweeping wave of unrest that is resulting in food being hoarded in safe places when it should really be going to the starving refugees up north. Even if things do lose that small semblance of control that they have now at the reactor, Tokyo should be far enough away from Fukushima to avoid any serious radiation or fallout. Its going to be the massive stampede for the nearest bullet train out of there that's going to kill people.
 
#24
What is more dangerous than the radiation is the sheer panic and hysteria being cause by the media and foreign countries telling their ex-pats to get out of the country. By doing that, its causing a sweeping wave of unrest that is resulting in food being hoarded in safe places when it should really be going to the starving refugees up north. Even if things do lose that small semblance of control that they have now at the reactor, Tokyo should be far enough away from Fukushima to avoid any serious radiation or fallout. Its going to be the massive stampede for the nearest bullet train out of there that's going to kill people.
You're right. It's getting out of control all over the country. I have to talk to my friends every day to try and calm them down about the radiation threat. Every day my coworkers tell me to go back to America (and this time they mean it in a caring way lol)

But in all seriousness. The way the media is scaring people IS KILLING. Right now the most dangerous thing to the Japanese is the panic. It's debilitating the economy even in places not impacted by the earthquake. Wild rumors are floating around about how all of Japan will be uninhabitable from radiation. And that there is another impending earthquake about to happen.

My friend in Mie Prefecture just told me that her supermarket is sold out of most things (even toilet paper) even though Mie is about 250 miles from the effected areas.

It's stupidity and I hope CNN and BBC burn for this.