Japan Tsunami Devastation 2011

This is a brief case study with links and information on the Japan Tohoku Earthquake/Tsunami of 11 March 2011

Where?

Japan 2011 Earthquake location

The earthquake occurred 140km off the coast of Honshu (the largest of the Japanese islands) in Japan.  The focus (sometimes referred to as a hypocentre)  of the earthquake was 32km.

The USGS recorded the information here.

Click here to see an excellent timed interval of the earthquake and the many aftershocks that occurred following the earthquake.

When?

Japan Earthquake Clock Time

Friday 11 March 1446 local time

The earthquake occurred at 2.46pm which resulted in many lives being lost in the initial earthquake due to many office buildings being full as well as busy roads however a large number of lives were saved as it meant that many people were ready to act when the tsunami warning was heard.  Had it been early in the morning many people would have been at home where the chances of their homes collapsing would have been less but then they would probably have responded slowewr to the tsunami warning.  This however is a point of debate.  Please feel free to comment below.

How strong?

The earthquake was originally described as 8.9 on the Richter scale but then later upgraded to 9.0 making it the 4th largest earthquake ever recorded since 1900.  See the article here.

Why?

What were the causes?  This is a complex tectonic area.  Japan is located at the boundary between many tectonic plates.

The Sendai earthquake was caused by the Pacific Plate descending beneath Japan at the Japan trench/subduction zone.

Effects

• 15,845 deaths
• 5,893 injured
• 3,380 people missing
• 125,000 buildings damaged or destroyed
• Heavy damage to roads and railways and other infrastucture
• Fires
• Fujinuma Dam collapse
• 4.4 million households without electricity
• 1.5 million without water
• Fukushima Nuclear Power Plant complex shutdown and meltdown – 20km radius evacuated (US Citizens were told to evacuate by at least 80km)
• Loss estimates £150 billion (US$235)
• The tsunami broke icebergs off the Sulzberger Ice Shelf in Antarctica, 13,000 kilometres away
• Along the Pacific Coast of Mexico and South America, tsunami surges were reported, but in most places caused little or no damage.

What Happened Next?

Japan Three Months After the Tsunami

3 months later these pictures from the Boston Globe showed the progress that was being made in the slow clean up.  The before and after pictures are particularly interesting

I think I’ve discovered the perfect laptop computer for use in schools.  It’s a Chromebook.  I’ve been trialling one for about 6 months now in a Cornish classroom in the UK.   I’ve found that it ticks many of the boxes when it comes to the use of computers in an educational setting.

POSITIVES

1. The biggest issue I find with students is the need to be able to have access to their files wherever they are.  A student who is working on an essay or assignment in Geography may wish to carry this on later in the library and then pick it up again at home.  Because of the fact that the operating system is essentially a web browser and students simply login with their Google Apps password everything is automatically saved onto the school Google apps domain.
2. No wait of boot up.  From complete  poweroff to the login screen is 10seconds.  The login takes a couple of seconds.  The average time for a school networked windows machine in a school environment is between 2 – 5 minutes.  This is to a login screen which then requires a login and can take another 1-2 minutes to login once all the drivers and file set up process takes place.  This is too much time for a student to be bashing, crashing, poking, fiddling, pulling cables etc and the average teenager is pretty impatient!
3. 8-10 hours battery life!!  I was sceptical of this at first but am truly amazed at how good the battery life is.  This means that a laptop fully charged at the start of the day will still have a good 25% left at the end of a typical school day even with intensive use.  I can vouch for this through practical experience at Bodmin College.  Your average Windows/Macbook laptop needs recharging after 2-3 hours.  Not practical if you want to move them quickly from one class to another and you can’t have power cables running across a classroom.
4. Chromebooks can be completely figured to fit in with your school network environment.  See here
5. No virus updates required as all is driven from the browser
6. No costly licence fees for software such as Office/Virus Protection / Back up solutions / Network software
7. No need to worry about backups as everything is on the Google Cloud and lets face it if Google can’t get that right then no one can
8. Updates seamlessly done so no need for any downtime due to patches/upgrades etc..
9. It has a keyboard.  Try typing an essay on an iPad..

NEGATIVES

• On Amazon UK a Chromebook is £349.  In the US on Amazon.com they’re $349 which is £225!  That’s a lot cheaper.  
• The education version being sold to the UK which includes an administrative panel, is supposedly of a higher build quality and includes a no questions asked returns policy if the Chromebook fails, is £540!  This is too expensive especially when you compare it to a Windows Laptop despite all the issues with regard to them (slow boot, not cloud integrated, poor battery life). Come on Google start subsidising these especially to schools.
• The current hardware is on the lightweight side and I have noticed that You Tube on occasion can be a little choppy however more recent models are better specced apparently.  

Thank you to Mr Caine for pointing out these beautiful Lenticular Cloud pictures on the BBC website here.  They are often mistaken for UFO’s and can be found at low , mid or high levels.

How are they formed? They are formed when moist air flows over raised ground, such as a hill or mountain peak. When the air consists of alternating moister and drier layers of air, it can lead to lenticular clouds  They are also known as pile d’assiettes (French for ‘a stack of plates’).

As a member of the Cloud Appreciation Society I’m always very interested in anything cloud based.  I’m not into Blue Sky Thinking at all..

World Money & Happiness

This interesting map from FedEx takes an interesting Topological look at a variety of development statistics.  I like the Happiness Index and the fact that Costa Rica is one of the happiest countries in the world.  It might have something to do with the fact that it has no armed forces.  Having lived in San Jose and worked as a teacher there for a couple of years and had a truly amazing time, I can really agree with the idea of ‘Pura Vida’ which roughly translates as ‘Full of Life’.  The picture below is of a sloth on electrical lines in the beautiful village of Cahuita.  No link really but it reminds me so much of the laid back lifestyle!

Found this beautiful and quirky species distribution map from one of my stumble links.  Love the Penguin in Antarctica.  IF anyone knows where I can buy one of these I’d be really interested.  Maybe the brilliant Worldmapper could do one for endangered species with the relevant countries big or small depending on how much at risk each of the animals are.

This sunset photo following Hurricane Irene in New York City is beautiful.  Taken by Inga Sarda-Sorensen which I found through my Twitter Feed, it underlines the amazing combination of modern communication technology to embrace some truly incredible natural scenes.

Some Hurricane Irene Links:

• Hurricane Irene has been tracked by Google Maps here 
• An interesting comparison of Hurricane Irene and Hurricane Katrina here
• National Hurricane Centre Irene here
• Hurricane Irene NASA picture here and excellent detailed information here
• Wikipedia Hurricane Irene here

A world of 7 Billion People

The National Geographic have produced some excellent visual diagrams on world population here.  Make sure you check out the zoomable human face.

Although several population clocks already show us as being at 7 billion people many show us as still to reach this figure by the end of 2011.  A list of fairly decent population counters and clocks follows

• US Census Bureau clock
• IBIBLIO- Allows you to enter an exact date so the algorithm can calculate the actual population
• Worldometers
• World Clocks and Productive Land
• Interactive Maths allows you to change the date
• Poowaddle - Graphical look at several interesting geographical statistics although a bit too advertising heavy

Professor James Lovelock and his groupie!

I was fortunate enough to meet and then hear the eminent climatologist Professor James Lovelock speak at the excellent Charles Causley festival in Launceston Town Hall last week.  The 92 year old(!) Professor Lovelock has written numerous books on the concept of the earth organism known as Gaia.  I have long been an admirer and it was great to talk to him so candidly about his rather pessimistic outlook for our planet over the next 20-30 years.  He has been a strong advocate of nuclear power for many years and he made a good analogy of having visited the French Nuclear waste processing plant at Le Hague and then returning to Cornwall where you only have to go to St.Ives to be exposed to three times the radiation!  He was also very dismissive of wind generation and referred me to the excellent Sustainable Energy without the Hot Air by David MacKay, Professor of Physics at the University of Cambridge.  It seems that turning my thermostat down is the easiest contribution I can make to saving the planet as well as buying an electric car if I could afford one!

If you haven’t read any of his books then I strongly recommend the Vanishing Face of Gaia which is very readable but ultimately very depressing.