Natural Disasters

Japan is at the top of the list of countries that face the most danger from earthquakes. Geologists talk about the subduction of the restless Philippine Sea plate that lies beneath the Okinawa plate and the Amurian plate that triggers high-intensity earthquakes. Many cities of Japan carry sad memories of earthquakes that have ravaged their region. Not all of Japan’s most destructive earthquakes come from those offshore plate boundaries, however. Some of the worst have struck directly beneath cities, along active faults running through the crust itself. Kobe’s tragedy began at 5:46 a.m. on January 17, 1995. The epicenter of what would become known to history as the Great Hanshin/Awaji earthquake was at the northern end of Awaji Island, 20 kilometers south of the Kobe waterfront. The seismic event lasted only around 20 seconds but was more powerful than a typical Japanese earthquake because it occurred along an active fault line. These “inland shallow earthquakes” are extremely fearsome because they begin so close to the earth’s surface. The Scope of the Disaster in Kobe In Kobe, the overhead Hanshin Expressway toppled and around 105,000 buildings were destroyed and a further 144,000 damaged. Of the 150 quays in the Kobe port,…