Japan warns of possible ‘mega-earthquake’ after Thursday’s tremor

Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has announced that he is canceling a planned trip to Central Asia after earthquake experts warned that Japan must prepare for a possible “mega-earthquake”.

Japan fears 7.1 magnitude earthquake after earthquake “megaseism”. “The probability of another powerful earthquake is higher than normal, but this does not indicate that an earthquake will occur with certainty”the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said on Friday, August 9. It is the first time such a warning has been issued since a new warning system was put in place after a powerful earthquake in 2011, which triggered a devastating tsunami.

In this context, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida has abandoned a planned trip to Central Asia. “As the prime minister with the highest responsibility for crisis management, I have decided to stay in Japan for at least a week,” he told the press.

No major damage was reported after Thursday’s earthquake, but the Fire and Disaster Management Agency reported that eight people were injured, including from falling objects.

The archipelago, home to some 125 million people, experiences about 1,500 tremors a year, most of them small. Even the strongest quakes generally cause little damage, thanks in part to the application of earthquake-resistant building standards and public awareness of emergency measures.

The Japanese government had previously stated that there was a 70% probability that a “megaseism” would hit the country within the next 30 years.“Although earthquake prediction is impossible, the occurrence of an earthquake generally increases the probability“That another one will happen,” experts describe in the specialist newsletter Earthquake Insights. But according to them, even as the risk of another earthquake increases, there remains “still low”.