Powerful Quakes Strike Western Japan

Tokyo, Jan. 6 (Jiji Press)–A series of powerful earthquakes struck western Japan on Tuesday, measuring up to upper 5, the fourth-highest level on the country’s seismic intensity scale, in the western prefectures of Tottori and Shimane. So far, nine people have been reported injured. According to the Japan Meteorological Agency, a quake with an estimated magnitude of 6.4 occurred at a depth of 11 kilometers in eastern Shimane at 10:18 a.m., registering upper 5 in the Shimane city of Matsue and the Tottori city of Sakaiminato. Another temblor struck at 10:28 a.m., logging lower 5, the fifth-highest level, in the Shimane city of Yasugi. A total of three women in their 60s-90s were injured in Sakaiminato, the city of Fukuyama in Hiroshima Prefecture and the city of Okayama in the namesake prefecture. Also in Fukuyama, a 24-year-old woman suffered minor burns after cooking oil spilled on her knees while she was cooking at a supermarket. In Matsue, one individual was severely injured, while two others suffered minor injuries. In Yasugi, one person was reported with serious injuries and another with minor injuries. The agency is urging caution against earthquakes measuring upper 5 or higher for about one week in areas that experienced strong shaking. “The latest earthquakes occurred due to a lateral shift of a fault in a place where no active faults were known to exist (up until now), but it is known from past cases that temblors tend to occur frequently in this area,” Ayataka Ebita, director of the agency’s Earthquake and Tsunami Observation Division, said at a press conference. In 2000, a 7.3-magnitude earthquake occurred in the western Tottori area, located east of the epicenters of Tuesday’s temblors, registering upper 6 in some areas. Meanwhile, the Japanese government set up a liaison office at the crisis management center of the prime minister’s office. In the western area of Tottori, class 4 long-period ground motion, the strongest in the four-level scale, was observed on Tuesday. It is the first time for a level 4 ground motion to be observed in the prefecture. Long-period ground motion could lead to stronger shaking of massive structures, including upper floors of high-rise buildings and large bridges, posing a risk of damage. After temporarily suspending all Sanyo Shinkansen bullet train operations between Shin-Osaka Station in the western prefecture of Osaka and Hakata Station in the southwestern prefecture of Fukuoka in the wake of Tuesday’s earthquakes, West Japan Railway Co., or JR West, gradually resumed services by 1 p.m. No abnormalities were found at Chugoku Electric Power Co.’s Shimane nuclear power plant in Matsue, with operations continuing as usual at the No. 2 reactor. END [Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]