Destiny of Warning

Chile is one of the well-known wine producers in the world. In Japan, the name is also common as a tsunami producer. The great earthquake with strength of M8.2 in offshore Chile on Tuesday brought Japan a broad warning. After tsunami reached Japan coast, news reports kept on providing live footage from devastated area of the great disaster three years ago.

The quake occurred under the sea eighty miles from the coast of northern Chile. It at least caused six deaths, thousands of building collapses and a number of evacuations. Tsunami with the height of six feet washed some cities on the coast. From there, tsunami wave spread to entire Pacific Ocean.

Big earthquakes in Chile brought devastations in Japan, located thousands of miles away. In 1960, a quake sent great tsunamis to Japan, causing 142 deaths and missing, 855 injured and 46,000 of collapse of houses. Tsunami originated along Pacific coast of South America is analyzed that it is concentrated around Japan, after it once spread all around Pacific Rim.

Japan Meteorological Agency delivered early warning on Wednesday that the tsunami from Chile might be reaching Japan early Thursday morning. Cities facing Pacific Ocean in Tohoku and Hokkaido region encouraged evacuation from seaside area, and many local government prepared evacuation place in public buildings. Governments tried to make sure that tsunami may arrive many times and its height may vary according to the shape of coastline.

The first wave was measured in Kuji city, Iwate, few minutes after 7 a.m. Thursday morning. News casters warned TV watchers to evacuate from coast line and never return until tsunami leaves. Since tsunami travelled thousands of miles, reaching time and size of waves were not accurately calculated. Actually, it reached Japan three hours later than prediction and the size was as low as a foot, significantly smaller than expectation. There was no report that any nuclear power plant was affected by it, except temporary intermission of efforts of dismantling First Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant.

Nevertheless, most people were satisfied with those overestimations, because memory of devastation was too fresh. Tsunami is a kind of disaster, which can correctly be understood only when it appeared. After the land along Pacific coast sank by the great earthquake, coastal area became more vulnerable to great waves. The residents must be highly careful about tsunami since then. The Japanese have to understand that frequent warning of earthquake and tsunami is the destiny of the nation.