Japan has a deserved reputation for its earthquake-resistant construction technology. Located on the Pacific “ring of fire”, the country is the most seismically active in the world, experiencing about 1,500 noticeable quakes a year.
Buildings constructed after 1981 are designed to withstand even powerful earthquakes,skyscrapers with shock absorbers and pendulums. Finding oneself stuck on the upper floor of a swaying Tokyo skyscraper during a powerful quake can be deeply unsettling. But there is an expectation that the structure will remain upright, thanks to innovations including massive soft rubber cushions installed beneath the foundations, shock absorbers on each floor and, in some cases, enormous pendulums at the top to counteract the movement of the building.
But on Tuesday, the aftermath of the Noto disaster told a very different story. While coast guards checked the sea for people who may have been swept out by tsunami waves of up to 1.2 metres in height, rescue workers continued to retrieve bodies – and a small number of survivors – from the rubble.
The victims had died in a way Japan had not witnessed on this scale since April 2016, when a magnitude 7.0 quake killed 273 people in the Kumamoto region in the south-west. Japanese of a certain age will also recall the January 1995 quake that sparked blazes that swept through neighbourhoods in Kobe, a port city in western Japan, killing 6,000 people. In Noto, large numbers of people died a way that shocked many in “earthquake-resilient” Japan.
In terms of their ability to withstand powerful quakes, Monday’s disaster highlighted the yawning gap between isolated, depopulated communities such as Wajima and Suzu, where 78 people had been reported dead as of Friday, and cities such as Tokyo, 450km (280 miles) away.
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