Big earthquake in Japan

[protheus]

Originally Posted by RealJames

The article makes it seem like shit was tense until a schoolgirl was gang-bang raped by two soldiers...

Western media....Did you expect something more elevated? I'm disgusted about what the TV has become.

[hennaz]

I'm not going to go to Japan this year. It looks very dangerous.

I have contacts who live in Japan, but they all live in the Tokyo-Yokohama area, so they're all safe. I truly was saddened by this disaster. I'm always praying for those still missing; gambare Nippon, I'm always supporting you.

I just know there's gonna be another earthquake as devastating as the one on 11th March in my lifetime. An earthquake of ANY size can literally strike ANYWHERE in Japan at ANY time. I don't think it's safe to live there anymore, in case an earthquake as tragic as this one happens again. And I'm completely baffled about how many people have died in this disaster; how could a country
as rich and developed as JAPAN lose over 12,000 people to an earthquake?

I wish everyone affected by this earthquake all the best. Be strong, Japan.

[philostyle]

hennaz, while I do understand what you were saying about how dangerous earthquakes are. I am quite baffled at how baffled you are about how a country like japan lost 12,000 lives. It's not about how rich and developed a country is, nature has ways that are more powerful than any technology or amount of money. Besides, it's not really the earthquake that caused most of the deaths.. it was the tsunami.

[Nyororin]

Originally Posted by hennaz

how could a country
as rich and developed as JAPAN lose over 12,000 people to an earthquake?

Japan didn`t.

It lost them to a tsunami.
I think the count for the earthquake itself was in the low hundred range.

It was the tsunami that followed which ended up causing all the deaths. The earthquake alone knocked stuff down but didn`t do THAT much damage. You can prepare for shaking - you can`t really prepare too much for a huge surge of water that submerges and washes everything away.

[JohnBraden]

Originally Posted by hennaz

how could a country
as rich and developed as JAPAN lose over 12,000 people to an earthquake?

Since when does wealth and development have ANYTHING to do with deaths in an earthquake?

Is that why the poor and undeveloped Haiti lost over 200,000? Oh, btw, most of the 30,000 or so predicted deaths (dead plus missing) weren't due to the earthquake, but the tsunami that followed....

And how about the nearly 300,000 deaths in southeast Asia in 2004?

[Nyororin]

Originally Posted by JohnBraden

Since when does wealth and development have ANYTHING to do with deaths in an earthquake?

Is that why the poor and undeveloped Haiti lost over 200,000? Oh, btw, most of the 30,000 or so predicted deaths (dead plus missing) weren't due to the earthquake, but the tsunami that followed....

And how about the nearly 300,000 deaths in southeast Asia in 2004?

It has a lot to do with earthquake deaths, actually. Wealth and development generally comes hand in hand with building codes and safer construction - things that drastically reduce earthquake deaths. When it is a country accustomed to earthquakes, like Japan, this means that the building codes are set to withstand most of the shaking.

It`s a moot point, really, because as you said - most of the deaths were from the tsunami. Even if the earthquake had not hit Japan, but instead had happened somewhere far out to sea - a tsunami of the same size would have caused as much damage and death.

[MMM]

Originally Posted by protheus

Western media....Did you expect something more elevated? I'm disgusted about what the TV has become.

How can the media from half the globe be accurately lumped into two words?

And this was an AP article, not a TV story.

[protheus]

I was not referring exactly to the written article, but to the news created from it, which I saw on, ProTV (romanian tv), and after that on TV5 (French), RTL (Deutsch) and many other European televisions and newspapers. This is what western media means for me, West Europe.

[GoNative]

Originally Posted by hennaz

I don't think it's safe to live there anymore, in case an earthquake as tragic as this one happens again.

In terms of earthquakes it's never, ever been what you might consider 'safe' to live in Japan. Earthquakes are a way of life here. They have happened throughout it's history and will happen throughout it's future. Some of us just understand that and live here anyway, along with the 130 million Japanese who also choose to live here.

[hennaz]

Originally Posted by GoNative

In terms of earthquakes it's never, ever been what you might consider 'safe' to live in Japan. Earthquakes are a way of life here. They have happened throughout it's history and will happen throughout it's future. Some of us just understand that and live here anyway, along with the 130 million Japanese who also choose to live here.

I know that, I've been to Japan twice. On both occasions, I felt completely safe. I understand that earthquakes happen everyday in Japan, because it lies on 3 tectonic plate boundaries, and for the most part, they aren't serious. But even for Japan, earthquakes of that size and these consequences is unbelievable. In my lifetime, there's SURELY gonna be another earthquake as devastating as this one, and it can strike anywhere in Japan. That's why I even though I do love Japan and have always wanted to live there, I don't think it's safe to now, because something like this is SURELY gonna happen again.