Hi All. The 1995 Kobe quake was Japan's worst earthquake since 1923. The next Tokyo quake will make the Kobe quake seem like a cakewalk in comparison. The Japanese people know the destruction from the quake itself will be bad enough, but it will be the fires that occur after the quake that will kill the most people and destroy more then the quake itself.

I watched a 1-hour special on TV last week covering quakes in various parts of Japan. One of the things that Japanese officials are concerned with is people finding their way out of the city after the quake occurs. This was seen in the Kobe quake. The damage was so great and complete that people didn’t recognize the streets. Not even the one they once lived on. They couldn’t find the streets that they knew would lead them out of the devastated area.

Land is a premium in Japan so they have to build up as opposed to building out. The tall buildings are built close together and in many way some are much closer then anything seen in California, which was the area they used in comparing the Tokyo area to other areas. They put their shake table to use, which by the way is the largest in the World. What they learned has them scared. Tall buildings are much more susceptible to low frequency waves then short buildings and as the results they will sway more. What they learned is that when the tall buildings start to sway they don’t all start at the same time. What this means is that buildings could be swaying into one another. While they may survive the quake itself the swaying and crashing into one another could bring them down. This is not say that it will happen only that it could happen.

Two million of Tokyo's 2.6 million structures, including mid-rise concrete apartments, were erected before the earthquake standards for new construction were instituted in 1974 and strengthened in 1981. City officials in Tokyo themselves expect a magnitude 7.2 earthquake in Tokyo to kill more than 7,000 people, injure 160,000, leave at least 2.3 million people homeless and destroy more than 500,000 buildings.

The areas surrounding Tokyo will not fare much better. Again because land is at a premium homes are built next to one another, small shops are built next to one another and in some cases share the same walls. Streets are very narrow and in some cases a vehicle can’t even drive down them. In the areas where there are streets that a vehicle can be driven down the collapse of one building could close it. This was the case in the Kobe quake.

The culture in Japan may in part be responsible for some of the deaths in the Kobe quake. Japan has evolved into a welfare state, which means that citizens expect official government institutions to do the rescue work. The Kobe tragedy showed that people did little to help themselves and the people around them. In Japan's hierarchical society, many people think it is improper to assume jobs to which they have not been assigned. They have also grown more affluent, more isolated and living in apartments where they do not know their neighbors and so feel reluctant to help them. Take Care…Don in creepy town