Beach in Fukushima Prefecture reopens for first time since 2011 disasters
Kitaizumi Beach in Minamisoma, Fukushima Prefecture, reopened Saturday after it was closed following the March 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami and subsequent nuclear accident. After it opened, the beach was filled with the noise of cheering children. "I was relieved to see the beach ...
Indonesia issues, then cancels tsunami warning after M6.9 offshore earthquake
A strong magnitude 6.9 earthquake struck off Indonesia on Sunday, the U.S. Geological Survey reported, triggering a brief tsunami warning that sent panicked residents fleeing to higher ground. The Southeast Asian nation is one of the most disaster-hit on Earth due to its position straddling ...
Get your fax right: Tepco workers accidentally spark Japan nuclear scare
Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings Inc. (Tepco) employees sparked a nuclear scare after a violent, late-night earthquake by ticking the wrong box on a fax form — inadvertently advising authorities that an accident had occurred when it had not. The workers at Tepco, operator of ...
At least 26 people were injured, including one seriously, after a magnitude 6.7 earthquake struck Japan's northwestern region late Tuesday, causing landslides and power outages in some areas. The quake hit Niigata Prefecture on Tuesday night, recording a maximum of upper 6 on the Japanese ...
Strong M8.0 earthquake hits Peru's Amazon basin, leaving at least one dead
A powerful 8.0-earthquake struck northern Peru in the early hours of Sunday, killing one person and injuring 18 others as the shock-wave extended into neighboring Ecuador. The force of the quake brought down many old houses in Yurimaguas, a town near the epicenter in a ...
A Tokyo-based nonprofit organization is using traditional karuta playing cards as part of a disaster-prevention effort to help foreign nationals living in Japan get information and overcome language barriers in times of emergency. In a karuta game, one person reads out the text on a ...
Magnitude 7.5 quake hits off Papua New Guinea; tsunami warning lifted
A shallow magnitude 7.5 earthquake struck close to Papua New Guinea's remote island of New Britain on Tuesday, the United States Geological Survey said, triggering a tsunami warning for parts of the Pacific that was later lifted. The offshore quake hit around 33 km (20 ...
Strong M6.1 earthquake hits Panama but no initial reports of casualties
A 6.1 magnitude earthquake hit Panama on Sunday near the border with Costa Rica, the U.S. Geological Survey said, but there were no immediate reports of damage or casualties. The quake struck at a depth of 37 km (23 miles) in the far west of ...
Body from March 2011 disaster identified from decade-old stamp
The Miyagi Prefectural Police have said that a corpse discovered in Ishinomaki, Miyagi Prefecture, after the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami has been identified as that of a 60-year-old woman from the Miyagi town of Onagawa. The identification was made with DNA samples from a ...
Defining the Heisei Era: Japan deals with death, disasters and a feeling of insecurity
Post-disaster Tohoku has been rife with supernatural sightings. Hauntings have been reported at homes and workplaces, in ruined towns and on beaches devastated by giant tsunami that crashed into hundreds of kilometers of Japan's northeastern coast on March 11, 2011, following a magnitude 9 earthquake ...
Fukushima radioactive contaminants found as far north as Alaska's Bering Strait
Radioactive contamination from the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant crippled by tsunami in 2011 has drifted as far north as waters off a remote Alaska island in the Bering Strait, scientists said on Wednesday. Analysis of seawater collected last year near St. Lawrence Island ...
Tsunami-hit Ishinomaki to return 1964 Tokyo Olympics cauldron lent as symbol of 3/11 recovery
The city of Ishinomaki in Miyagi Prefecture held a ceremony Sunday to return the 1964 Tokyo Olympics cauldron, after its four years on display to recognize the area's recovery from the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami. The Japan Sport Council offered the cauldron to the ...
