TOKYO — A devastating tsunami hit the coast of northeast Japan on Friday in the aftermath of an 8.9 magnitude earthquake about 80 miles offshore. Television images showed waves of more than 12 feet roaring inland. CNN reported that air and land transportation was severely disrupted.
At least 30 people were injured in the cities of Tokyo and Osaki, the Kyodo news service reported.
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NHK, via Associated Press Houses were washed away by tsunami in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture in eastern Japan, after Japan was struck by a magnitude 8.9 earthquake off the northeastern coast. |
The wave drew a line of white fury across the ocean, heading toward the shoreline. Cars and trucks were still moving on highways as the water rushed toward them. The floodwaters, thick with floating debris shoved inland, pushed aside heavy trucks as if they were children’s toys, in some places carrying blazing buildings toward factories, fields, highways, bridges and homes. The spectacle was all the remarkable for being carried live on television, even as the waves engulfed flat farmland that offered no resistance.
The force of the waves washed away cars on coastal roads and crashed into buildings along the shore, The Associate Press reported. Television footage showed a tsunami wave bearing down on the Japanese coastline near the community of Sendai.
NHK television transmitted aerial images of huge billow of flame rising from an oil refinery and flood waters engulfing Sendai airport, where survivors clustered on the roof of the airport building. The runway was partially submerged. The refinery fire sent a plume of thick black smoke from blazing spherical storage tanks. A television commentator called the blaze an “inferno.”
Oil refineries were also burning in Tokyo, local television broadcasts showed.
The images showed survivors in a home surrounded by water, waving white sheets from the upper floors of buildings. News reports said the earthquake had forced the Tokyo subways to empty while airports were closed and many residents took to the streets, desperately trying to leave the city.
A second major earthquake of 7.4 magnitude was reported as aftershocks shook the region. Japanese media reported mobile phone networks were not working.
Cell phone service was severely affected as residents rushed to call friends and relatives as aftershocks struck.
CNN said the tsunami was set to arrive in coastal areas of Russia, the island of Guam, Taiwan, the Marshall Islands, Papua New Guinea and Australia later in the day
The United States Geological Survey said the earthquake had a magnitude of 8.9, which the agency labeled a “mega” quake. The tremor occurred at about 230 miles northeast of Tokyo and at a depth of about 15 miles.
The quake occurred at 2:46 p.m. Tokyo time and its location was off Honshu, Japan’s most populous island.
A tsunami warning was in effect for Japan, Russia, Marcus Island and the Northern Marianas, according to the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. Japan’s meteorological agency warned that a tsunami as high as 20 feet could strike the coast near Miyagi prefecture, closest to the epicenter.
The Associated Press, citing public broadcaster NHK, reported that a large ship swept away by the tsunami rammed directly into a breakwater in Kesennuma city in Miyagi prefecture.
Japanese television showed major tsunami damage in northern Japan. Video footage also showed buildings on fire in the Odaiba district of Tokyo, The Associated Press reported.
“It just seemed to go on and on,” Katherine Wallace told the BBC, who was in an office building in Tokyo, said of the quake tremor.
Several quakes have struck the same region in recent days, including a 7.3 magnitude one on Wednesday.
The Hang Seng index in Hong Kong and the Straits Times in Singapore slumped after news of the quake. Both were about 1.1 percent lower by mid-afternoon.
Source: The New York Times
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