• Contact
• About
• Archives
• Home

The aftershocks continue in Niigata, but thankfully none have been larger than a 4 on the Japanese scale. 18 people have been confirmed dead, 1,400 injured and over 50,000 people can’t return to their homes. Gas and water services have not yet been resumed.

The scenes on the TV today are quite shocking. Houses completely crushed, roads fallen off mountains, train lines twisted and bent. Helicopters are scouting the area in the hopes of rescuing people who have been stranded, unable to drive to safer areas because of cracks in the roads.

The Emergency services are putting in an amazing effort. Food and water is being distributed to people who have been evacuated. Suginami-ku, a couple of hours ago, sent off a ten truck envoy with supplies and extra people.

And the words on everyone lips? “We were lucky”.

As horrific as the scenes are they don’t match the images that come out from the Great Hanshin Earthquake. And Niigata had the equivalent of 3 quakes in half an hour. Fires were contained quite quickly and did not spread. On the whole people have been quite calm and not panicking. At this point it seems that there won’t be another major quake in the near future. The main priority is to get the water and gas back up for those people that still have homes standing. Then the massive job of cleaning up will begin.

As expected the phone calls came in from family and friends checking in on me. And I have a little bit of a bone to pick with the way foreign news services have reported on the quakes. Although the quakes were felt all over Japan and yes in Tokyo we did have a 4, some of them made it sound as if Godzilla has surfaced and was running wildly down Meji-dori. This was simply not the case. Although they have changed the heading now BBC online was an offender by emphasizing Tokyo as being affected in their initial report - which only serves to panic people who have relatives here. Niigata is a place that is quite well known - it’s not as if people wouldn’t recognize or be interested in a major earthquake happening because it didn’t happen in Tokyo itself.

14:21 - ok check that “maybe no more big ones” - they just had a 5….

In this screenshot from NHK you can see a list of all the major quakes since yesterday. They have only listed 5s and 6s. There have been 17 quakes that have been level 4 on the Japanese scale.

Some of the scenes from Niigata (screenshots from NHK TV)

• Thanks for putting up the TV screen shot, MJ. We haven’t seen any of the devastation on the ‘Net, but it is quite impressive via NHK.

  Kristen
  04/10/24 04:32 AM

• I didnt get a chance to watch tv yesterday, thanks for the NHK pics! That was pretty major! They were lucky indeed!

  j-ster
  04/10/24 07:49 PM

• Not sure if it’s still there, but there was some Japanese TV footage on the BBC webpage. On the English voiceover, they claimed that the image of the Tokyo Tower wobbling around was being shown *from Niigata*! Ignorant Brits!

  Gary
  04/10/24 10:32 PM

• I just read your comment about the earthquakes in Niigata on your blog site.

  I run a non-profit news site on Japan and am looking for people who can leave some short personal comments about their experience of the quake. Even if they don’t live in Niigata itself.

  A simple comment would be fine. Anything more detailed would be fantastic.

  I would appreciate it a lot, as it would give a more human voice to the reports about the quake.

  My site: http://www.iKjeld.com
  The page for comments: http://www.ikjeld.com/japannews/00000061.php

  Feel also free to submit your blog at my Japan Links directory at http://www.ikjeld.com/linker/index.php?cat=300
  I like your blog a lot!.

  Speak to you soon!

  Kjeld Duits
  04/10/25 09:26 PM