The world is in distress, that tsunami is back again and this time in Japan. The Sendai earthquake and tsunami was an 8.9-magnitude earthquake and resultant tsunami waves. It was located off the east coast of Tohoku, Japan on Friday, March 11, 2011 at 05:46:23 UTC at a depth of 32 km. Originally a 7.9 on the Moment magnitude scale, it was upgraded to an 8.8, then again to an 8.9 by the United States Geological Survey making it the largest earthquake to hit Japan in recorded history.
This earthquake has triggered a tsunami scare not only for Japan's Pacific coast but various other countries like New Zealand, Australia, Russia, Guam, Philippines, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Nauru, Hawaii, Northern Marianas (USA) and Taiwan. A 10-meter tsunami was observed at Sendai airport in Miyagi prefecture, which has been flooded, with waves sweeping along cars and buildings as they traveled inland.
What is Tsunami? A tsunami is a series of water waves caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, usually an ocean, but can occur in large lakes. Tsunamis are a frequent occurrence in Japan. Approximately 195 events have been recorded so far in Japan. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater explosions, landslides and other mass movements, and other disturbances above or below water all have the potential to generate a tsunami.
The Greek historian Thucydides was the first to relate tsunami to submarine earthquakes, but understanding of tsunami's nature remained slim until the 20th century and is the subject of ongoing research. Many early geological, geographical, and oceanographic texts refer to tsunamis as "seismic sea waves."
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