Earthquake of Kantō of 1923

The large one devastated the plain of Kantō, which is located at Honshū, the principal island of the Japan, on September 1st 1923 with 11:58. This Séisme was estimated in 1977 at a magnitude of moment of 7.9. It caused serious damage at the towns of Yokohama, of Kanagawa, Shizuoka, and Tōkyō.

The seism

The fault

The Tectonique of this area is complex with four tectonic plates distinct (the peaceful Plaque, the Plaque of Philippines, the Eurasian Plaque and the North-American Plaque) and two triple points with less than 200 km of distance one of the other. The seism took place on the Subduction which connects these two triple points. The Fosse generated by this subduction of the plate of Philippines under the American Northern plate is called the Fosse of Sagami.

The exact geometry of the plan of Faille is not defined with certainty. Various studies proposed more or less complex models, including/understanding one, two, to see three segments of fault to explain the static movements of the ground observed during the seism (geodetic observations). The fault plunges towards north - north is with a dip around 27° compared to the horizontal one. The segmentation of the fault at its western end comes from a possible curve of the fault plane. The movement on the fault plane is opposite with a taking down component dextral.

The tsunami

Geodesy

Damage

The official report published on August 30th, 1926 gives a report on 141.720 dead. It is however important to recall that in the article of T.A. Jaggar published in 1924, the author mentions 400.000 dead. Several sources speak about dead about a crowd about 32.000 people in the district about Honjo. Fire with Tōkyō was not controlled and out of many victims were killed due to general panic.

The official report speaks about 580.397 destroyed buildings.

According to the most reliable sources, at least 105.385 people lost the life and more than 37.000 were reported missing and presumedly died. The majority of deaths must with 88 fires which ignited separately and were quickly propagated because of the strong winds coming from a typhoon close to the Péninsule to Noto. As the earthquake had destroyed the accesses to water, it took two days to extinguish all fires.

More than 570.000 houses were destroyed, leaving approximately 1.9 million Sans-abri S. the damage were estimated at more than one billion American dollars with the contemporary values, T.A. Jaggar estimates the damage at 4,5 billion dollars of the time.

The chaos and panic created by the earthquake brought to the development of Korean rumors showing the to poison the wells and to light fires. Thousands of Korean and people originating in Okinawa were killed by civil militia. It was estimated that approximately 6.000 Korean was killed, by counting those died during the earthquake.

After the earthquake, Goto Shinpei organized a plan of rebuilding of Tōkyō

In 1960, September first was indicated day of the prevention of the disasters to commemorate the earthquake and to remind the people the importance to prepare, September and October being located in the middle of the season of the typhoons.

See too

Internal bond

Stamps of the earthquake of 1923, provisional emission of Tōkyō.

External bonds

Great Kanto Earthquake 1923 Online photo gallery by A. Kengelbacher
USGS Earthquake Lists
has Study by Kajima Construction Company
The 1923 off Kanto Massacre Koreans in Japan: In Japanese Professor Reveals the Truth Article from Korean newspaper

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