Mag 8.9 off of Japan. Tsunami warning issued

FluffyMcDeath

FluffyMcDeath

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The wave has already come ashore in Japan. There is a tsunami warning out for the Oregon coast for a wave of less than 3 feet around 7 am Tuesday morning. This quake comes on the heels of the smaller 7.6ish quake of a couple of days ago.
 
Video of the tsunami

[youtube:kd7v2lyh]WPFdGH-V1J8[/youtube:kd7v2lyh]
 
Some buildings have been compromised. A refinery is currently burning. There will be aftershocks. Casualties so far unknown.

Tsunami warnings have been issued for Russia and Hawaii.
 
Tsunami warnings now extend to Hawaii, the west coast of the USA including Alaska, Canada and South America.

Early yesterday afternoon we had some wicked, unexpected bad weather pass through South Florida. Pretty much out of nowhere near hurricane force winds, driving rain and in parts hail. This type if weather is out of place for March, especially when there is no warning. This was the headline story locally last night before I went to bed. Obviously this morning Japan is the headlines news and our minor wicked weather is no longer even mentioned. There is no comparing the 2 events. The only reason I mention it, I can't help but wonder if they are connected in some way. Could our bad weather have been a precursor to the Quake in Japan? Probably a silly thought, just something that popped in my head as I watched the news waking up.
 
Best of luck to all.

Japan is apparently still having after shocks. The nuke plants have been shutdown. It was reported there's a cooling problem with 1 plant. One could imagine the horror if it Japan accidentally nuked itself. UGH!

Early news this morning was the Tsunami hit Hawaii around 7:00AM CDT. The projected size was 6'. I expect minor damage. Skyscrapers in Hawaii are built with the expectation that the first floor will absorb most of the tsunami damage. They'll still stand when the first floor is flooded. Of course a tsunami isn't just a single wave so I suspect they'll hunker down for most of the day.

Anyone hear what's expected for the West Coast? Hopefully it'll be minor.
 
faethor said:
Best of luck to all.
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Indeed, we had many Amiga users from Japan on AO over the years. I hope they are all doing well through all this. Japan is not all that big of a country...
 
It's been quite amazing to watch the video and reports coming in. The unstoppable wall of water taking over the land like shuffling zombie hordes. Unfortunately I checked the news before I went to bed and the hypnotic destruction has cost me some sleep.

There was talk last night, but I haven't seen anything today, of fears for the low lying islands which were often remote and with poor communication. Quite a few may have been completely inundated and without warning. The outcome for those locations is still unknown.

To more prosaic matters, Japan is not like the poor parts of the world that were wiped out by the Boxing Day Tsunami in 2004. Japan is much richer and more sophisticated and so they will be insured to the hilt. That means the insurance industry will be taking a hit and that is not likely to play out well in the financial markets if they need to liquidate instruments to cover the payouts.

Watching the aftermath was also pretty instructive. Historically (or rather pre-historically) Vancouver gets quakes of this magnitude with a periodicity of about 350 years. There hasn't been one of these since the founding of the city but the quakes are off-shore and tsunami generating like this Japanese quake. Also we have a lot of low lying agricultural land on a fertile river delta - and a lot of people live on the delta as well. When we get our 9 we could lose a lot of people.
 
I'm just numb.

When they are reporting that the main quake lasted about 2 minutes in Tokyo (about 150 miles from the epicenter) and that they have been getting Continuous aftershocks since yesterday afternoon, I'm just horrified.
The LA 6.9 was bad enough for me.

AND they are dealing with TWO nuclear reactors overheating.

what fun :(
 
Scary stuff. It may be time to start building an ark. Sure makes last night's blizzard look like a joke. But ya, if I lived on the West Cost deltas I'd consider selling for higher ground.
 
Ya I heard about that. If it hasn't spread radioactive debree by now they're probably safe. But I would sure like to know why it got critical like that. And Stephen Harper should take a close look at that before he decides to fire another nuclear safety regulator.
 
FluffyMcDeath said:
One nuclear reactor has suffered a small explosion.
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the reports are the the plants lost both grid power and then the backup diesel generators shut down after running for only 1 hr.

the explosions are due to hydrogen accumulations

Fukushima is a boiling-water reactor, in which the reactor, inside a containment vessel, sends its steam out of containment to a turbine. The turbine converts the steam’s energy into rotary motion, which turns a generator and makes electricity.

the coolant used is distilled water, to protect the pipes and valves from mineral accumulation

Reports say they are flooding the reactor core with sea water, so there must be no fresh water available at the plant due to the earthquake. Using sea water will effectively destroy the plant from ever being rebuilt, even if (very unlikely now) damage was minor.

We know from studying the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings, who were bathed in horrific doses of high level radiation - that ionizing radiation from nuclear energy is a carcinogen, but a relatively weak one.
 
Third blast at Japan nuclear plant

A quake-stricken nuclear plant in Japan has been hit by a third explosion in four days, amid fears of a meltdown.

The blast occurred at reactor 2 at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, which engineers had been trying to stabilise after two other reactors exploded.

The protective chamber around the radioactive core of reactor 2 has been damaged and radiation levels near the plant have risen, officials say.
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Not good.
 
[youtube:ow7cki78]rzqMljEPdd8[/youtube:ow7cki78]
 
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