From 5 August, fears of another major earthquake in Japan began to spread on Twitter. The source of the unease was a screenshot from a Japanese talk show, which laid out the following series of earthquakes leading up to the Tohoku earthquake in 2011, alongside a similar series of earthquakes which have struck in recent days.

Here are the two sequences of events.

  • In 2011:

22 February, magnitude 6.3 earthquake in New Zealand

15 days later…

9 March, shindo scale “strong 5” earthquake in Miyagi Prefecture

2 days later…

11 March, the catastrophic Tohoku earthquake and tsunami

  • In 2013:

21 July, magnitude 6.5 earthquake in New Zealand

14 days later…

4 August, shindo scale “strong 5” earthquake in Miyagi Prefecture

…

Basically, the “pattern” of two quakes which hit recently strikingly resembles the two which presaged the horrific 2011 Tohoku earthquake two years ago. So if this was indeed a pattern, a large earthquake would be expected to hit on 6 August, 2 days after the Miyagi quake.

On Twitter, people in Japan expressed their feelings about this rumour:

“It’s the usual fear.”

“It’s scary, huh (´；ω；｀)”

“Well, probably just a coincidence but…”

“You can’t just take one example to use as a basis, ignoring all other patterns.”

“I wish they’d stop putting this kind of thing on TV!”

While we want to believe this is merely a far-fetched story aimed at boosting viewing figures, it’s important to always be prepared for an earthquake. In any case, we can only fervently hope that these fears are unfounded.
[ Read in Japanese ]