8.9 Earthquake hist Japan. 6 meter Tsunami follows

[Impulse97]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=80CH_XkpSCE&feature=player_profilepage

Horrible. Just horrible. I wish all those people the best. I just hope this isn't as bad as 04'.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

All the best for the people of Japan.

This is why I think we should have greater control over the natural world. It's beautiful, yes, but also dangerous.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

This is pretty bad. A friend of mine had all the glass in the house broken, her dad was stranded at work all night because no trains are running.. and they live hundreds of miles from the epicenter. Much worse for people at the epicenter and especially along the coast. People are dead, injured and stranded. Several nuclear plants are having problems, one so much so that the surrounding area has been evacuated. An oil refinery has been damaged too, leading to a massive fire.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

Another quake just hit. This is shaping up to be bad.

TOKYO (Reuters) – A strong earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 6.6 struck northwestern Japan on Saturday after a massive quake hit northeastern Japan, NHK reported.

[Tim Finnegan]

Saw this on the news at work today. Puts your crumbling about the price of biscuits in perspective, I must say...

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

The only real positive here is that Japan has constructed a number of earthquake proof buildings. Things could be even worse (look at Haiti). Still not good by any stretch of the imagination though.

[Decolonize The Left]

Here (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/03/pictures/110311-tsunami-earthquake-japan-hawaii-science-world-waves/?source=link_fb20110311tsunamiphotos)'s the National Geographic page. Lot's of pics.

- August

[Red Commissar]

Here (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2011/03/pictures/110311-tsunami-earthquake-japan-hawaii-science-world-waves/?source=link_fb20110311tsunamiphotos)'s the National Geographic page. Lot's of pics.

- August

Boston has put some in their bigpicture collection. Some of them are taken from the NatGeo collection posted.

http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2011/03/massive_earthquake_hits_japan.html

[Queercommie Girl]

This is why I think we should have greater control over the natural world. It's beautiful, yes, but also dangerous.


Completely agree. Very well said indeed.

[Tim Finnegan]

You guys realise that this earthquake was caused in part by the proximity of the moon to the earth, right? That's not something you can really control...

Edit: Did some reading, turns out the "moon causes earthquakes" thing is just scaremongering horseshit. But, given that you can switch out "proximity of the moon to the earth" for "tectonic activity" and still have it make perfect sense, I'd say that the point stands.

[Admiral Swagmeister G-Funk]

Nature is far more powerful than man will ever be, I would assume.

This is terrible, I hope that the level of casualty in Japan can be as small as possible.

[Ele'ill]

Whirlpool- spoiler tags for those with low spec machines.

n8WJ5tkghiI

[Queercommie Girl]

You guys realise that this earthquake was caused in part by the proximity of the moon to the earth, right? That's not something you can really control...

There is no absolute metaphysical limit on how advanced humanity can become.

[Queercommie Girl]

Nature is far more powerful than man will ever be, I would assume.


There is an old saying from Maoist China:

"The Universe is infinite, but the potential for the human understanding of the Universe is also infinite".

[Stand Your Ground]

There is no absolute metaphysical limit on how advanced humanity can become.
I don't believe nature will ever be something we can control. Nor do I think we should try to. We just must learn from it and better prepare ourselves for disasters.

[Queercommie Girl]

I don't believe nature will ever be something we can control. Nor do I think we should try to. We just must learn from it and better prepare ourselves for disasters.

I believe in the dialectical fusion of advanced technology and environmentalism.

Humanity must strive to live in harmony with nature and protect bio-diversity etc, but nature is not some kind of "god". There is no such "god" at all. I'm a humanist so my only "god" is humanity itself.

One of Marx's favourite heroes was the ancient Greek hero Prometheus, who stole fire from heaven to give warmth to the human world.

Long Live Humanity!

[Tim Finnegan]

There is no absolute metaphysical limit on how advanced humanity can become.
Arguably, but by the time that we can control the orbit of the moon, I think that we'll probably be past the point where we feel the need to do so.

[Magón]

Here in Santa Cruz, we got the tsunami's surge go right through our harbor and smash up some boats.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/g/a/2011/03/11/surge_santa_cruz.DTL&object=%2Fg%2Fav%2Fmovies%2F2011%2F03%2F11%2FSanta CruzTsunami_Lagos_02_822945558001.bcv&tsp=1

[MarxSchmarx]

The only realistic way, at least for the next few hundred of years, that earthquakes can be "controlled" is if we can advance geoscience enough to the point where they can be predicted enough in advance to evacuate, say, Tokyo.

We are getting somewhat better at doing this for tsunamis (at least in developed and wealthy places like Japan and Hawaii), but evidently not good enough. I suppose there may come a day when it will be possible to erect a super wall that can push back against a wave of sea water traveling at the speed of a jumbo jet and heavier at a ton per cubic meter with the push of a button. But personally I find a very effective warning system and some insurance scheme to replace material goods quite a bit adequate and that making sure such a system is in place not just in Japan or Holland or places like that but also in Bangladesh is a far better use of resources than investing in and building these button activated super walls, at least for the next several decades.

About the only good thing that can be said about this is that unlike the Hanshin earthquake of 1995, the Japanese government was prepared and quickly moved into action this time. The disaster then was due mostly to fires and an ineptitude in a response of a 1st world country not seen again until Katrina hit in America. Granted this time it struck a much smaller population center and the death toll is going to climb, but something like the Tsunami warning system did manage to save countless lives.

Although the situation with the nuclear plants is still really bad, as distressing as this earthquake and its tsunami is and as staggering as the rebuilding will be, at least it is a sign that human fallibility does not have to compound a natural disaster

Compared to where Japan was a mere 15 years ago or Haiti or Indonesia, perhaps one can find some small amount of solace in the notion that the human suffering of these disasters can be mitigated, and perhaps continue to be minimized to the point where sufficient evacuation notices can be made well in advance.

[Mather]

Whilst all earthquakes are bad from a human point of view and demonstrate the need for controlling nature to the best of our abilities to mitigate the effects of earthquakes, we also need to keep in mind that capitalism does play a part in this too. There is one reason why the earthquake in Japan (8.9 magnitude) has caused less structural damage and a much lower loss in human life than the 2010 Haiti earthquake (7.0 magnitude) and that is the level of economic and political development in these two respective countries. Haiti's complete lack of a developed infrastructure and the general poverty and underdevelopment of the country meant that Haiti would suffer much more than Japan, despite the Japanese earthquake being more powerful by a factor of 1.9 magnitude.

[Bright Banana Beard]

6 meters is around 19-20 feets

That is about 3 humans tall if they were on the top of each other.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

10,000 are feared to be dead: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/ap_on_bi_ge/as_japan_earthquake