Magnitude 8.1 Mw Areas affected Japan Casualties 33 dead, 287 injured | Depth 45 km Tsunami Yes | |
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Date March 2, 1952 (1952-03-02) | ||
The 1952 Hokkaido earthquake, which occurred at 10:22:41 local time on 4 March in the sea near Tokachi District, Hokkaidō, had a magnitude of 8.1 on the moment magnitude scale.
Damage
There was earthquake and tsunami damage in an area ranging from Hokkaido to the northern part of the Tohoku region. As a result, 28 people were killed, 5 people were missing, and 287 were wounded. In addition, 815 houses were completely destroyed, 1324 half-damaged, and 6395 partially damaged. Ninety-one houses were swept away, 328 suffered flooding, 20 were lost to fire, and 1621 became uninhabitable. Furthermore, 451 ships were damaged.
In Hamanaka, in the Akkeshi District, Hokkaidō, a tsunami destroyed numerous homes. It is thought that drift ice was pushed up by the tsunami and exacerbated the damage. Eight years later, this area was devastated by the tsunami caused by the 1960 Chile earthquake, killing 11 people.
Akkeshi Bay saw the highest tsunami surge, of 6.5 meters, with Hachinohe in Aomori also seeing a 2-meter wave. This was the first large tsunami after the inception of Japan's tsunami warning system. Fortunately, the previous day, March 3, was the anniversary of the 1933 Sanriku earthquake, and the large number of training and evacuation drills held that day bolstered the response to the real disaster on March 4.