Japan urges continued caution on potential tremors, tsunamis

Tokyo, Jan 20 (IANS) The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) has called for continued caution over potential tremors and tsunamis despite a gradual decrease in seismic activity a week after the magnitude 6.6 earthquake struck the Kyushu region.

The earthquake caused a tremor measuring 5 Lower on the Japanese seismic intensity scale in Miyazaki City and other areas, generating a tsunami with a height of 20 centimetres.

Since the January 13 earthquake, 12 aftershocks measuring 1 or higher on the seismic intensity scale have been recorded by 11 am local time on Monday, national broadcaster NHK reported.

The JMA stated that seismic activity was highly active for three days following the initial quake but has since decreased. While the likelihood of another tremor with a similar intensity of 5 Lower has diminished, residents are urged to maintain preparedness for both earthquakes and tsunamis, Xinhua news agency reported.

Last week, Japan’s Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) signed an agreement with Kumamoto prefecture to further develop a programme that estimates building damage caused by earthquakes using satellite imagery, local media reported.

Under the partnership announced on Friday, JAXA will utilise approximately 200,000 data on building damage from the 2016 Kumamoto earthquake to refine and enhance the accuracy of its technology, which is expected to be deployed nationwide, Kyodo News reported.

The programme will compare satellite images taken before and after an earthquake to assess the extent of structural damage within 2-3 hours of observation.

The programme can function effectively during nighttime and adverse weather conditions, according to the report.

JAXA anticipated the programme will be operational within a few years.

Last month, Japanese media reported that the Cabinet Office’s disaster management division plans to assign designated officers to each prefecture starting next fiscal year as a preparation for possible major disasters such as a Nankai Trough megaquake or a Tokyo metropolitan earthquake.

The Cabinet Office is moving forward with plans to deploy approximately 50 officers across prefectures to focus on promoting stockpile management and volunteer collaboration in normal times while taking charge of assessing damage and organising evacuation shelters during disasters, Xinhua news agency reported.

To support the initiative, the Cabinet Office plans to double its current staff of 110 and seek a corresponding increase in its budget for the upcoming fiscal year, according to national broadcaster NHK, citing interviews with government officials.

The latest initiative is part of the broader goal of establishing a ‘Disaster Management Agency’ by fiscal year 2026.

Recent disasters, such as the Noto Peninsula earthquake, revealed challenges such as limited supplies in municipal stockpiles and delays in setting up evacuation shelters in Japan.

The Japanese Government has an emergency broadcasting system called ‘J-Alert’. This system ensures that critical information reaches people in affected regions during various crisis, such as earthquakes, tsunamis, civil protection, and more. J-Alert employs various methods to communicate with the public.

Besides, since 2007, smartphones have been installed with an earthquake early warning system that sounds an alarm immediately before an earthquake strikes.

The first of its type in the world, this system generates an alert based on initial small tremors that occur seconds or tens of seconds before a large quake, urging people to prepare for evacuation.

The system uses seismometers and seismic intensity metres that measure the tremors from the Japan Meteorological Agency (roughly 690 locations nationwide) and a seismographic observation network from the National Research Institute for Earth Science and Disaster Prevention (roughly 1000 locations nationwide).

–IANS

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