MASSIVE Earthquake hits Tokyo

Stuart Ablett

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Tokyo Japan
Emiko and I are fine, Mizuki is at School, so I will assume she is fine.
Huge number of bottles of booze busted, lots of damage in our house, as in stuff flew off the shelves, I doubt there is any serious structural damage.

Still shaking, the building that is, as I type. They are talking a 6 meter tsunami.

Alex, Kyle and anyone else in Japan, I hope you are OK.

Stu
 
tokyo earthquake

To my friends and family,

Liang and I were at the Foreign Correspondents Club in Yurakucho on the 20th floor. The earthquake started slowly but it was a little different in that it was up and down as well as sideways. This is not good. It got progressively worse and what was equally scary it did not stop and sometimes got really strong. It did not stop. Seemed like at least five minutes (but I really do not know) and even after it "stopped" the building was still moving back and forth enough to make it difficult to stand. Must have been about 150 people in the Club and we all moved back from the windows. All the cabinets with dishes emptied and a lot of the bottles in the wine refrigs came tumbling out. Everyone there was very scared. For those minutes our lives were not in our control. All of us were afraid the building would come down. It was that strong and lasted that long. We just found out it was an 8.4 on the Japanese scale. This makes it over a 9 on the Reichter scale (or at least I think so.).

To my knowledge, no one in the club was hurt. I looked out the windows in all directions and only at ODaiba could you see huge black smoke coming up. The streets below were moving, although slowly.

The elevators were all shut down, so with some friends we all walked down. I got the car and we drove home. The streets and parks were full of people. Everything was orderly and the police were strongly present. Once home we checked the house and a few things had fallen but nothing major.

This is definitely the strongest earthquake I have ever experienced. Once is enough and I hope that this is the legendary Kanto Earthquake everyone talks about. As I said once is enough.


I am glad Stu and family are safe. Hope Alex and others are as well.
Best wishes,

Kyle
 
I woke up and saw the Breaking News story on Msnbc/fox. They are showing the water coming ashore. It is an impressive sight.

Good to read that some of the fww-Japan group are reporting their condition.
 
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Wow! Glad the Abletts and Murphys are OK. Kyle, sounds like one heck of a ride. Stu's doesn't sound all that fun, either.

Off to go Google the news...

Looks like the tsunami damage is gonna be extensive. :(
 
Kyle - That makes for incredible reading...can't imagine what it's like to experience in person. Our weather in Rochester sucks often, but very little of it is ever life threatening.
 
I'm in Osaka, so we were not affected adversely by the quake, but did feel it. As you can imagine, it's on every channel. The videos on the web pretty much tell the story of the force, but the damage reports are just beginning to come in. The death toll will be high when they can finally get into all the places.

They just posted a warning for another big "shake", according to their sensors.

This was a big one, but not "the" big one, for sure.
 
Just awoke to the news of the quake. They are saying it was a 8.9 on the Richter scale. Hawaii is bracing for tsunami around 3AM Hawaiian time. They are also warning the west coast from Washington to Southern California.

Glad to hear from everyone over there.

Karl
 
Good to see you chime in, Greg. I was wondering when we'd hear from you. Glad to see you didn't get hit too bad. Anybody know where Alex is located in relation to the tsunami? You Japanese family members stay safe...all of us are pulling for you.

And you Family members in Hawaii and Alaska...heads up. Looks like a good time to get to higher ground if you're close to the coast.

The Pacific ring of fire has been getting busy lately. We're pretty well prepared here in case things get shaky, but I'd much rather be an observer than a participant in this type of thing.
 
I woke this morning and saw that this was going on and thought of you folks living there. My prayers are with you and for all over there today.
 
Just saw the news.....My family's prayers are going out to everyone affected. Be safe.....we are all thinking of you
 
I just saw this on the web a bit ago and the first thing I thought about was the members on this list that live in Japan. I'm glad to hear that everyone is OK at this point and I hope that the after shocks aren't as serious as the primary. Quakes are really unpredictable and about the scariest thing that I've ever experienced. I lived in Japan for about 2.5 years and southern California for about 20 years, so I've seen my fair share of them. Let us know if you need anything.
 
Just heard the news at 5:30 am Alex Please check in we are all worried here at home. Stu if you hear if he is ok Please let me know mom & dad are down in California and I am out of touch with them right now. Thanks
 
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