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On 3/14/2010 8:08:05 AM UTC an earthquake of magnitude 6.5 and depth 39km has struck an unpopulated area in the Tohoku Province (population: 9.9 million) in Japan. GDACS estimates the likelihood for need of international humanitarian intervention to be medium (Orange alert). This earthquake can have a medium humanitarian impact since the affected region is unpopulated and has high resilience for natural disasters. The earthquake 79km from the city of Sendai. The nearest populated places are [None]. It is a mountainous region with a maximum altitude of 1361 m.
Caution: this information is based on risk models. Whether international humanitarian aid is needed must be decided by an
expert.
This report was automatically updated by a computer on: 3/15/2010 7:47:35 PM UTC (1 day 11 hours 39 minutes after the event) Downloads: Word report, PDF report Explanation of alert calculation: Show |
Earthquake epicentre: best estimate |
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Geological map
Characteristics for this report
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Previous reports for this earthquake.
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The population in the area of this earthquake if 0 people/kmē. (Data source).
The earthquake occurred at 17h local time. At this time a day, more people are at work and therefore more vulnerable to collapsing office buildings. During traffic hours, people can be affected by collapsing bridges and other road infrastructure.
| Population Data | ||
|---|---|---|
| Radius (km) | Population | Density (people/kmē) |
| 1 | 0 | 0 |
| 2 | 0 | 0 |
| 5 | 0 | 0 |
| 10 | 0 | 0 |
| 20 | 0 | 0 |
| 50 | 923 | 0 |
| 100 | 2615366 | 83 |
| 200 | 8205067 | 65 |
The affected region has low level of urban area (0.2%) and a high level of cultivated area (5.2%). In urban areas more damage can be expected than in cultivated or natural areas. (Data source)
| Radius (km) | urban areas | cultivated areas | other |
|---|---|---|---|
| 200 | 0.25% | 5.27% | 94.46% |
| 100 | 0.43% | 4.41% | 95.14% |
| 50 | 0% | 0% | 99.99% |
| 10 | 0% | 0% | 1000% |
Resilience is the capacity of the population to cope with a hazard. Since much of investments in earthquake preparedness and available funds for quick response is related to household income, the GDP per capita can be used as a rough indicator of resilience.
Japan has a GDP per capita of 42317 PPP$ (Parity Purchasing Power Dollar, about 1 Euro) and is therefore part of the high level income countries. Therefore, the earthquake happened in an area of high resilience.
Based on the combination of 9 indicators, ECHO attributes Japan a low vulnerability.
Both conditions for survival and conditions for delivering aid strongly depend on the current weather and temperature. The following graphs show the current and forecast weather.
Current weather conditions and forecasts at earthquake location (lat: 37.7802 - long: 141.5623) (Data source).
More detailed observations at closest weather station (Sendai): WeatherByWeb - NOAA
Landslides: The maximum slope in the area of the earthquake is 27.031%
and the maximum altitude is 1361 m. Since this is a low
slope, the risk of earthquake induced landslides is low.
Note, however, that the slope data is not reliable on a local scale, while
landslides depend very much on local topography, soil and meteorological
conditions. More...
The following critical infrastructure is nearby and could be affected by the earthquake:
Nuclear power plants:
There are no nuclear facilities nearby the epicenter.
Hydrodams:
There are no hydrodam facilities nearby the epicenter.
The distance to nuclear installations is evaluated based on a 1999 UN dataset containing the location of nuclear plants in the world. If plants are near and the earthquake magnitude is above 6.5, the alert is set to orange. Note that the location of plants is approximate with errors of up to 100km.
The nearest civilian airport (Sendai) is at 70km from the epicenter. Other airports are: Otawara (169km), Fukushima (117km), Sendai (70km), Kasuminome (75km), Matsushima (76km), Junmachi (126km), Ojojibara (103km), Shonai (193km), Hanamaki (187km)
Ports nearby are: Hitachi (165km), Onahama (110km), Soma (53km), Shiogama (76km), Ishinomaki (73km), Onagawa (74km), Kesennuma Ko (121km), Sakata (196km), Ofunato (143km), Kamaishi (168km), Yamada (190km)
While we try everything to ensure accuracy, this information is purely indicative and should not be used for any decision making without alternate sources of information. The JRC is not responsible for any damage or loss resulting from the use of the information presented on this website.
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Population
Density near epicenter (people/km2). Image area: 6x4 decimal
degrees (approx. 650x450km2).
previous estimates: 
3/14/2010 8:08:05 AM (UTC, Universal Standard Time)
