Scary stats from the 2011 earthquake

In this article, we are going to look at some scary and depressing facts about the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and tsunami. Some data may not be accurate.

the earthquake

• Magnitude: 9.0
• Energy released: 480 megatons (a magnitude 9.0 earthquake releases more energy than 32,000 magnitude 6.0 earthquakes)
• Energy released was 600.000.000 times the energy of the Hiroshima bomb
• The size of the earthquake was the fifth biggest in history of the world;
• The duration of the strong shaking of the earthquake was up to 5 minutes.
• The number of replicas had more than 900 tremors secondary that can last for years;
• Na primeira réplica houve 3 aftershocks of magnitude 7.0 or greater within 45 minutes of the earthquake
• The earthquake changed the entire island of Japan (Honshu) leaving 2.4 meters closest to North America
• The earthquake shifted the Earth's axis to 10 cm
• The quake made the days shorter by: 1.8 microseconds
• Japan's earthquake warning system sent a warning to Tokyo residents: 1 minute before the Tokyo quake
• The earthquake shifted a 180 km wide stretch of seabed by up to 8 meters (26 feet);

The Tsunami

• The height of the tsunami peak was 40.5 meters (133 feet) in Miyako – equivalent to a 13-story building;
• A tsunami of 3 meters is already considered large.
• The tsunami reached up to 10 km in Sendai;
• Total land area affected by the tsunami is 561 square kilometers.
• The total area of icebergs that the tsunami hit in Antarctica was 125 square kilometers. 
• The residents of Sendai had 8 minutes before the tsunami struck.
• The number of people who managed to evacuate before the arrival of the tsunami was 42%. 
• More than 101 designated evacuation areas were hit by the tsunami;

The Fukushima nuclear disaster

• The size of the waves that hit the Fukushima Power Plant were 15 meters. 
• Number of complete nuclear leaks at the nuclear power plant were 3;
• The communities were instructed to keep a distance of around 25 km from the disaster site.
• More than 100,000 people were affected in just the first few days;
• Severity of the Fukushima disaster on the International Nuclear Event Scale was: 7 (maximum severity)

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Consequences

• The estimated cost of the disaster was more than 300 billion dollars. 
• More of 45.700 buildings were destroyed;
• More of 230.000 cars and trucks were destroyed;
• More of 15,828 people were killed and 3.760 missing;
• 378 deaths and 158 disappearances were of children;
• 236 children were orphaned;

Despite all these frightening data, we must make it clear that despite all these earthquakes and tsunamis, Japan is a much safer country than our dear Brazil. So don't use Japan as something dangerous or scary. Many more people die in 1 year in Brazil because of violence and recklessness in traffic than in 20 years of earthquakes and tsunami in Japan. To learn more about earthquakes and tsunamis in Japan read the following articles:

• The tsunamis that happened in Japan
• The Worst Earthquakes in Japan's History 

SourceJapanTalk