Thursday May 15
11:00
Ignore At Your Peril?
When I first moved to Korea, one of the things that surprised me was that South Koreans are completely unconcerned about the fact that they are still technically at war with North Korea. Outside Korea, almost the only news you hear of the Koreas is the threat of North Korea - but inside the country, people only care about being reunited with their families. The risk of North Korea never crosses their mind. They don’t even see it as a risk. In the words of one Korean friend: North Korea would never invade South Korea.
The frequency and severity of the earthquakes in Tokyo has been increasing recently. Being stuck in a room while it shakes like crazy is pretty scary, believe me. Being up 20+ floors working and suddenly feel the building lurch to the side certainly is pretty scary also. What would it take for the buildings to crumble?
The Japanese seem to have no fear or concern for earthquakes at all. Partially I can understand that, because in my first year or so in Tokyo, I had a “North Korea” attitude to earthquakes: I didn’t really see them as a risk. But the last couple have been freaky. To say I no longer have concern would be to tell a lie.
My company doesn’t help things, continually sending out “Earthquake Training” notices. (How you can train an earthquake, I don’t know.)
The news in China doesn’t help things.
My vivid dreams don’t help things.
And my Japanese friends don’t help things either: “Osaka was hit by an earthquake 10 or so years ago where many people died,” one of them told me, “All the houses in our street were destroyed, except my parents house. So after the earthquake, people were coming to our house to use the shower, gas,..”
The BBC report the incident here, noting:
Japan is one of the world’s most earthquake-prone countries and experiences thousands of minor tremors each year.
But the Kobe earthquake was one of the worst in the country’s history - 6,433 people died.
Nearly 27,000 people were injured, and more than 45,000 homes were destroyed.
The total cost of repairing the damage was estimated at more than $100 billion.
Japanese scientists have since tried to improve prediction of quakes, but seismology is an inexact science and it is extremely difficult to forecast when and where quakes it will occur.
Kobe struggled to overcome the huge impact of the 1995 earthquake.
New office blocks and malls were built to attract back the 50,000 people who left after the quake.
The fact that Tokyo is “due” another big earthquake has been discussed here before (see comments). No-one knows, of course, when the next big earthquake will come. However all around me at the moment, everything is shouting “Earthquake!”, and I can’t help wondering whether they are warning signs of the next big earthquake that I shouldn’t ignore.
