NHK interviewed a geology professor. He says all three major tectonic plates, under Japan, acted to create the quake/tsunamis. Professor Kato also says the numerous and powerful aftershocks are due to the Pacific, Philippine and Eurasian plates continuing to move violently.
Professor Kato explained that not all earthquakes are the same.
Prime Minister of Japan announced that radiation levels have reached dangerous levels.
Officials trying to put out fire at reactor 4 say flames are now visible outside the reactor.
“It looks like the situation is creeping towards a radiological disaster,” said John Large, a nuclear consultant. He also says that he believes Japan will experience a worst case scenario. Partly due to officials not being honest about the situation.
Another problem is that the weekly weather forecast is predicting the winds will shift southward, which would blow radiation clouds onto Japan. Currently the winds are blowing eastward.
Retail pharmacies in Japan report they have run out of anti-radiation Iodide pills.
Richard Thornburgh, who was Governor of Pennsylvania during the Three Mile Island incident, says “You can’t assure against every kind of natural disaster.” He also admitted that officials are helpless in the face of natural disasters.
Vladimir Zhirinovsky has offered an invitation to the People of Japan, to move to unpopulated areas of Russia.
He says they will never half to worry about living on an unstable island again.
His also let slip his real reason for wanting Japanese to move to Russia: “Russia will even benefit if such hardworking people join us.”
Zhirinovsky also invited Muammar Gaddafi to move to Moscow.
France 24 reporters, in Japan, are reporting that tens of thousands of bodies have been found.
The reporters say at least 2000 bodies have been found on beaches and along the coast line.
Another reporter said that in one city local police are keeping people out of one part of the city. The reporter asked why and was told that they found at least 13,000 bodies piled in that part of the city.
Currently, the official Japanese government report of dead is at 1800. It’s clear that the Japanese officials are masters of understatement.
I am looking into seismic events around the Pacific Ring of Fire. I was thinking of doing a review of the past 12 months, however, it has become clear by going back just to January of 2011, that the Ring of Fire is going non-stop with seismic events, so it might be a daunting task.
The events picked up frequency and intensity since the end of February, especially around Japan. Hawaii is also seeing a change in seismic activity.
People might say: Hawaii and volcanoes, so? The recent volcanic activity in Hawaii is cause for concern because the type of seismic readings geologist have gotten have radically changed. The tremors have become denser. Back in February a U.S. Geological Survey report said there was a “…unusually high number…” of volcanic tremors.
The most recent Global Volcanism Program report (from the first week of March) on volcanic activity shows almost all activity is around the Pacific Ring of Fire. Most activity is in East Asia, mainly Japan, but also in Kamchatka, Luzon (Philippines), and Java (Indonesia). There is also activity in Hawaii, Mexico and Guatemala. A volcano in the British Caribbean colony of Montserrat is also active, but that’s not in the Pacific.
Something of interest, in looking at maps I have discovered that Hawaii, Guatemala, Luzon and the volcanic activity in Mexico, takes place between the Tropic of Cancer and the Equator. Even Montserrat, in the Caribbean, is between the Tropic of Cancer and the Equator (as well as Haiti, remember their big quake?).
I hope to get more done on this, to establish a time line that shows whether there is an increase in geologic activity, or not.
WeatherSpace.com is reporting that two volcanoes, on the Russian Kamchatka Peninsula north of Japan, and one other volcano in Indonesia, erupted almost at the same time.
They erupted on March 12. They are considered to be connected to the big quake event in Japan. They are part of the Ring of Fire.
The Shinmoedake volcano on the southern island of Kyushu, has erupted, again. The volcano started erupting back in January. This was part of a series of volcanic events that lead some people to predict a major geologic event for Japan.
The volcano had settled down for the past two weeks, but now, after the big quake event, it has roared back to life. Witnesses say it is hurling huge boulders, and ash.
The weather forecast, for northern Honshu, is for a week of rain and snow. This will exacerbate landslide conditions. Already there have been 66 confirmed landslides.
An NHK reporter discovered, in an abandoned fishing town of Kesennuma, that fires that destroyed the city have spread to the country side.
No firefighting capabilities due to the destruction. Wild fires likely to spread.
The reporter talked to the few survivors in the area and they said the fire was spread by a fishing boat, that was on fire, being pushed around the city by the tsunami. Kesennuma was destroyed by flood and fire.