With the country still reeling from the effects of Thursday's deadly earthquake which claimed nine lives and injured thousands, Japan was hit by yet another massive magnitude-7.0 tremblor on Saturday morning. What's worse is that Saturday's quake hit the very same region that Thursday's magnitude-6.2 tremors struck.
The center of Saturday's earthquake was determined to be a half-mile from Kumamoto, which is the capital city of the Kumamoto prefecture. The area is located on the island of Kyushu, the southernmost of Japan's main islands with a population of 13 million.
The U.S. Geological Survey has recorded the new earthquake, with Doug Given a geophysicist stating that the new tremblor was very significant.
"No question, this is a large and very important earthquake. And it will do a lot of damage," he said.
Due to the magnitude of Saturday's earthquake, the Japan Meteorological Agency issued a tsunami advisory to the populace in the coastal regions of Japan on the Ariake Sea and Yatsushiro Sea. Issuing an advisory means that there is a possibility that a tsunami between 0.2 to 1.0 meters would hit the areas.
So far, however, there have been no reports of tsunamis in the country's coastal regions.
Seismologists believe that Saturday's earthquake was the result of two tectonic plates converging. Currently, the Philippine Sea plate is in the process of sliding under the Eurasia plate at a speed of about 2 inches per year. Despite the incremental speed, however, the movements of the two plates usually result in notable earthquakes.
Thursday's magnitude-6.2 earthquake caught the Far Eastern nation by surprise, with Japanese broadcaster NHK announcing that residents all over the region were reporting injuries and people were trapped in collapsed houses and buildings.
Saturday's earthquake is much more massive than Thursday's, with the latest tremors estimated to be about 30 times more powerful than the deadly 6.2-quake that struck the area two days before.
With the Kyushu region being struck once more, the damage to structures and people's lives are indeed notable. Though Japan as a whole is quite prone to experience earthquakes rather frequently, Thursday's tremors became quite notorious for the damage they caused. With Saturday's earthquake coming soon after, it would take some considerable effort for Japanese people in Kyushu to rebuild once more.
