The Japanese government has warned of catastrophic economic damage and nearly 300,000 deaths when the next “megaquake” hits the archipelagic nation.
Japan lies along the circum-Pacific seismic belt, better known as the “Ring of Fire,” located along the outer edges of the Pacific Ocean, where about 81 percent of the largest earthquakes in the world occur, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.
Quake-prone Japan’s four main islands and its outlying islands sit on five major and minor tectonic plates on the Earth’s crust—Amur, Okhotsk, Pacific, Philippine Sea, and Okinawa—which are slowly moving, and earthquakes are concentrated along their boundaries.
On March 11, 2011, the 9.0-magnitude Great East Japan Earthquake struck the country, making it the largest earthquake ever recorded in Japan. The unprecedented disaster triggered a tsunami and caused a nuclear accident, killing at least 19,729 people.
In the latest report prepared by a Japanese government earthquake task force, it was estimated that up to 298,000 people could be killed in a Nankai Trough megaquake with a magnitude of 8-9. The casualties would include 215,000 deaths caused by tsunami waves, the report said.
A Nankai Trough earthquake has struck Japan every 100 to 150 years—and experts have long feared that another could hit there in the near future. The last confirmed temblors linked to the trough were recorded in 1944 and 1946, hitting the country’s central to southwestern region.
At nearly 300,000, Tokyo’s current estimate of the potential loss of life is down by 10 percent from the previous report released in 2012, while projected economic losses rose to $1.8 trillion from $1.4 trillion.
There is a 70-80 percent chance of a megaquake occurring within 30 years, the Japanese government estimated. In a worst-case scenario, some regions could experience the highest level of 7 on Japan’s seismic intensity scale, as well as tsunami waves rising over 98 feet, according to official estimates.
Read in full: Japan Issues New ‘Megaquake’ Warning
AloJapan.com