They largely consist of interviews with survivors, witnesses, and perpetrators. Many People sit on street car railway in front of their crushed houses in Japan 1923 after an earthquake. Varied accounts indicate the duration of the earthquake was between four and ten minutes. The shock generated a tsunami that reached a height of 39.5 feet (12 metres) at Atami on Sagami Gulf, where it destroyed 155 houses and killed 60 people. Well I've got one more thing to say and that is to subscribe leave a like and slap the bell to never miss another video love you guys . "The Great Kanto Earthquake in Japan, 1923." Fifteen minutes later, they had spread to 136. According to one police report, fires had broken out in 83 locations by 12:15. [citation needed] The Army distributed flyers denying the rumor and warning residents against attacking Koreans, but in many cases, vigilante activity only ceased as a result of Army operations against it. According to some estimates, the death toll was as high as 6,000. Nishimura Goun (18771938),a Kyoto painter known for his soft, lyrical renderings of birds, fish, animals, andflowers, turned to the earthquake as the subject for this handscroll, which he completed two years afterward. The radio man flashed the news across the sea at the speed of sunlight, reported the New York Times, to tell of tremendous casualties, buildings leveled by fire, towns swept by tidal wavesdisorder by rioters, raging fire and wrecked bridges.. To report the devastation of September 1, 1923, Gounadoptedthe traditional horizontal format of episodes linked by text. Tawara Magoichi called the crimes deplorable, suggesting that the disaster exposed a major defect in the national spirit of Japan.11. Directed by Hirokazu Kore-eda, the plot takes place in a way station for those who have just died. [12] This earthquake destroyed Tokyo, the port city of Yokohama, surrounding prefectures of Chiba, Kanagawa, and Shizuoka. Looking back on 1924]. [13] Extensive firestorms and even a fire whirl added to the death toll. This, they believed, could be secured through the adoption of proactive urban planning and the expansion of extensive social welfare facilities. Other individuals were even more explicit. About 140,000 people fell victim to this earthquake and the fires caused by it. Facilities built by private corporations and the municipal government together housed just under 20,000 total.12 By the early autumn of 1923, Tokyo had become a city of barracks, temporary shelters, and makeshift communities, though it remained to virtually everyone an urban space still defined by destruction. The cause was a rupture of part of the convergent boundary where the Philippine Sea Plate is subducting beneath the Okhotsk Plate along the line of the Sagami Trough. Hours after the earthquake, Yonemura picked up a faint signal from a naval station near Yokohama, relaying word of the catastrophe. A tsunami with waves up to 10m (33ft) high struck the coast of Sagami Bay, Bs Peninsula, Izu Islands, and the east coast of Izu Peninsula within minutes. Yonemuras bulletins helped to galvanize an international relief effort, led by the United States, that saved thousands from near-certain death or prolonged misery. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. In the weeks after the calamity, direct relief and recovery initiatives gave way to two other important phenomena that invariably accompany major natural disasters: interpretation and opportunism. A refugee site. In Yuu Watase's 2017 josei manga Fushigi Ygi Byakko Senki, the heroine Suzuno Osugi enters The Universe of the Four Gods for the first time right after the earthquake: her father Takao, who is dying from injuries he suffered when the family house fatally collapsed on him and Suzuno's mother Tamayo, orders her to do so, so she will survive the disaster and its aftermath. My own view is that by reducing the expatriate European community in Yokohama and putting an end to a period of optimism symbolized by that city, the Kanto earthquake accelerated Japans drift toward militarism and war. [13] Extensive firestorms and even a fire whirl added to the death toll. ", Borland, Janet. As early as mid-afternoon on September 1, the day of the quake, reports, and rumors started that the Koreans had set the disastrous fires, were poisoning wells, looting ruined homes, and planning to overthrow the government. No center symbolized the countrys dynamism more than Yokohama, known as the City of Silk. Moreover, twenty percent of the worlds earthquakes of 6.0 magnitude and over each year occur in Japan. Szczepanski, Kallie. In Makiko Hirata's josei manga and anime Kasei Yakyoku the story finishes some time after the earthquake, as a corollary to the main love triangle between the noblewoman Akiko Hashou, her lover Taka Itou, and Akiko's personal maid Sara Uchida. Fire and tremors together claimed 90% of the homes in Yokohama and left 60% of Tokyo's people homeless. Here and there a remnant of a building, a few shattered walls, stood up like rocks above the expanse of flame, unrecognizable.It was as if the very earth were now burning. Capt. Japanese commentators interpreted the disaster as an act of divine punishment to admonish the Japanese people for their self-centered, immoral, and extravagant lifestyles. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. U.S. naval vessels set sail from China on the evening of September 2, and within a week, dozens of warships packed with relief suppliesrice, canned roast beef, reed mats, gasolinefilled Yokohama Harbor. The earthquakes epicenter was in the waters of Sagami Bay, triggering a tsunamithat reached heights of forty feet. University of Washington Library, Digital Collections: Japan. Fire whirls can uproot trees that are 15m (49ft) tall or more. This luxury tariff law affected numerous other goods after passage endorsement by parliament in July 1924. In several documented cases, soldiers and policemen participated in the killings,[45] and in other cases, authorities handed groups of Koreans over to local vigilantes, who proceeded to kill them. [35] Anti-Korean sentiment was heightened by fear of the Korean independence movement. The quake struck at 11:58 am, so many people were cooking lunch. Fire whirls are not usually classifiable as tornadoes as the vortex in most cases does not extend from the surface to cloud base. Over 570,000 homes were destroyed, leaving an estimated 1.9 million homeless. Moreover, of the 31,166,264 square meters of residential land earmarked for land readjustment, only 2,938,050 square meters of land (9.4 percent) were readjusted for non-residential purposes, most contributing to widened roads, the creation of sidewalks, and establishment of small neighborhood parks.25 While land readjustment regularized the size of many residential land plots, Tokyos reconstruction was modeled heavily on the existing plans of pre-earthquake Tokyo. Even smaller scale reconstruction plans that ranged from 1.3 billion to 3 billion yen were met with labels of reckless, dangerous, or problematic by financial and political officialsincluding the Minister of Finance, Inoue Junnosuke.19 An adherent to the classical liberal economic view that times of depression or recession warranted a retrenchment of government expenditures, Inoue refused to raise new taxes for Tokyos reconstruction and, in 1924, only after considerable pressure, agreed to release public bonds to finance reconstruction.20 Moreover, Inoue required that all other ministries of state prune their proposed budgets for 1924 and 1925 to cover part of the anticipated costs for reconstructing Tokyo. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Sara is in the streets, and Taka is taking Sara's brother Junichirou to a hospital after he was injured in a yakuza-related incident. The Great Kant earthquake (, Kant dai-jishin; Kant -jishin)[11][12] struck the Kant Plain on the main Japanese island of Honsh at 11:58:44 JST (02:58:44 UTC) on Saturday, September 1, 1923. Omissions? ", This page was last edited on 26 February 2023, at 00:05. The Great Kanto Earthquake turned 93 on 1st September 2016. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. In less than one week, the 7.9 magnitude earthquake and subsequent fires annihilated most of Tokyo and virtually all of Yokohama. Schools and public and private organizations host disaster drills. Sept. 1 is the 90th anniversary of the 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake. [32] There were 57 aftershocks. By clicking Accept All Cookies, you agree to the storing of cookies on your device to enhance site navigation, analyze site usage, and assist in our marketing efforts. The Fires - Kanto Earthquake of 1923 The Fires Some say timing is everything, the Great Kanto Earthquake struck around noon; lunchtime. As it is expected that a massive earthquake will hit the . Samuel Robinson, the Canadian skipper of the Empress of Australia, took hundreds of refugees aboard, organized a fire brigade that kept the ship from being incinerated by advancing flames, then steered the crippled vessel to safety in the outer harbor. Most horrifying of the immediate results was the fate of 38,000 to 44,000 working-class Tokyo residents who fled to the open ground of the Rikugun Honjo Hifukusho, once called the Army Clothing Depot. 1923 Great Kant earthquake View source The Great Kant earthquake (, Kant dai-jishin) struck the Kant Plain on the main Japanese island of Honsh at 11:58:44 JST (02:58:44 UTC) on Saturday, September 1, 1923. People taking refuge to Japans countryside climb and clinch to one of few trains leaving the capital in 1923. Every year on this date, schools across Japan take a moment of silence at the precise time the earthquake hit in memory of the lives lost. Image of Tokyo and Yokohama, Japan, Earthquake from September 1, 1923. A map detailing where the firestorms erupted and the areas that they consumed can be found in Tokyoshi. The earthquake had a magnitude of 7.9 on the moment magnitude scale with its focus deep beneath Izu shima Island in Sagami Bay. Your Privacy Rights [18], This earthquake devastated Tokyo, the port city of Yokohama, and the surrounding prefectures of Chiba, Kanagawa, and Shizuoka, and caused widespread damage throughout the Kant region. In 1960, on the 37th anniversary of the quake, the government declared September 1 an annual "Disaster Prevention Day". Then, as in Yokohama, fires spread, fueled by flimsy wooden houses and fanned by high winds. Image of Tokyo and Yokohama, Japan, after the September 1, 1923 earthquake. Advertising Notice Szczepanski, Kallie. These representatives likewise opposed virtually all plans to condemn, readjust, and rezone large areas of burnt-out Tokyo without adequate compensation, not only in order to uphold the interests of private land owners who they represented, but also because many MPs believed that such state intervention was well beyond the purview of proper state authority in a parliamentary democracy. Many people died when their feet became stuck on melting tarmac. More than half of the brick buildings and one-tenth of the reinforced concrete structures in the region collapsed. At such a time, God cracked down a great hammer for the sake of our race, waking us up from idleness, urging us to reflect upon our past deeds. He wrote. These eddies can contract a tornado-like vortex that sucks in debris and combustible gases. A 60- by 60-mile segment of the Philippine oceanic plate ruptured and thrust itself against the Eurasian continental plate, releasing a massive burst of tectonic energy. Everyone must remember that many of us ran to flippancy; lacked steadiness; lapsed into luxury; and forgot diligence and frugality. Please reorganize this content to explain the subject's impact on popular culture. [22] Some fires developed into firestorms[23][24][25] that swept across cities. The initial jolt was followed a few minutes later by a 40-foot-high tsunami. Tokyo-Yokohama earthquake of 1923, also called Great Kanto earthquake, earthquake with a magnitude of 7.9 that struck the Tokyo-Yokohama metropolitan area near noon on September 1, 1923. They sought to strengthen the legitimacy of their previously expressed concerns about, and displeasure with, what they saw in 1920s urban Japan, namely decadence, selfishness, extravagance, frivolity, individualism, and the pursuit of luxury. I enclose also a photo of the ruins of the Grand Hotel at Yokohama where I stopped last year. J.H. The Great Kanto Earthquake, sometimes called the Great Tokyo Earthquake, rocked Japan on September 1, 1923. This video is to revive those. Beyond transportation, however, the new Tokyo would include extensive new public housing projects, modern hospitals, preventive care clinics, schools, day care facilities, sporting grounds and parks, mobile libraries, lecture halls, public cafeterias, and neighborhood community centers. The outbreak of World War II and subsequent destruction severely limited resources. Terms of Use Stay updated on the latest visitor information. A strong typhoon centered off the coast of the Noto Peninsula in Ishikawa Prefecture brought high winds to Tokyo Bay at about the same time as the earthquake. [35][44] The chief of police of Tsurumi (or Kawasaki by some accounts) is reported to have publicly drunk the well water to disprove the rumor that Koreans had been poisoning wells. [11][1][12][13], There are currently three widely recognized types of fire whirls:[14], There is evidence suggesting that the fire whirl in the Hifukusho-ato area, during the 1923 Great Kant earthquake, was of type 3. From Washington, President Calvin Coolidge took the lead in rallying the United States. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Incredible set of photos. The innovative design used to construct the Imperial Hotel, and its structural fortitude, inspired the creation of the popular Lincoln Logs toy.[51]. One individual who used the earthquake opportunistically to dramatize what he saw as the moral fragility of 1920s Japan was philosopher Fukasaku Yasubumi. For the next three days, Yonemura sent a stream of reports that alerted the world to the unfolding tragedy. On 1 September 1923 Tokyo's vulnerabilities were exposed unambiguously. The city of Yokohama was hit even worse than Tokyo was, although both were devastated. Like the 1923 quake, this one unleashed secondary disasters: a tsunami that washed away dozens of villages; mudslides; fires; and damage to the Fukushima Daiichi reactors that emitted radiation into the atmosphere (and constituted the worst nuclear accident since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986). [50] Wright's structure withstood the anticipated earthquake stresses, and the hotel remained in use until 1968. Detail, Scenes of the 1923 Earthquake; F1975.12. J. CHARLES SCHENCKING is a Senior Lecturer in Japanese History at the University of Melbourne. Messervey, letter dated March 5, 1924. People fervently sang the praises of materialism; ideals lacked luster; selfishness became dominant; and the gallant spirit of devotion was swept away. Some, however, can be more than 1km (0.6mi) tall, contain wind speeds over 200km/h (120mph), and persist for more than 20 minutes.[5]. Welcome to the National Museum of Asian Art. [citation needed] According to the Japanese construction company Kajima Kobori Research's conclusive report of September 2004, 105,385 deaths were confirmed in the 1923 quake.[20][21][13]. [citation needed]. Regular contributor Joshua Hammer is the author of Yokohama Burning, about the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. Larger fire vortices are similarly being viewed. 645 0 obj <>stream Furthermore, by exploring the ways in which nations, governments, and even the international community have responded to and attempted to use disasters for various political and ideological ends, teachers and students alike can gain significant insight into a wide array of social, political, environmental, religious, and economic relationships within a society exposed by a disaster and the reconstruction processes that follow. Amidst widespread panic, chaos, and death, rumors spread throughout the disaster stricken areas. [13] Extensive firestorms and even a fire whirl added to the death toll. The north shore of Sagami Bay rose permanently by almost 6 feet, and parts of the Boso Peninsula moved 15 feet laterally. The 1855 Ansei Earthquake is discussed in Greg Smits, Shaking Up Japan: Edo Society and the 1855 Catfish Prints,. Estimates suggest that vigilantes and voluntary self-defense groups killed around 6,000 Koreans, as well as a small number of Japanese and Chinese mistaken for Koreans, in the days following the disaster.10 While news of the massacres was initially tightly controlled, within months select newspapers and journals published stinging critiques of the murderous events. The joltstruck at 11:58 am, when many residents were cooking their lunches over open fires. The tidal wave swept out a great section of the village near the beach, wrote Henry W. Kinney, a Tokyo-based editor for Trans-Pacific magazine. In the vicinity of the badly damaged Manseibashi Train Station in Chiyoda, Tokyo, Japan. [11] The 2004 Niigata and the 1995 Kobe catastrophes are only the most recent examples of Japans vulnerability to seismic risk. Natural disasters are often used by elites for political, ideological, or economic purposes, and Japan in 1923 was no exception.13 Many Japanese elites, including bureaucrats and politicians, religious leaders, social commentators, and journalists, publicly described the earthquake as divine punishment for clear political and ideological purposes relevant to the time. Updates? The wooden floor of the bridge burned down during the fires caused by the earthquake, leaving only the metal supports. Moreover, the earthquake caused nearly 6.5 billion yen of damage, a remarkable figure roughly four times larger than Japans national budget for 1922. Joelle Seligson is digital editor at the Freer|Sackler. Every year on the same date, drills and other activities are held across . The initial jolt, lasting just over fourteen seconds, collapsed most of the brick and un-reinforced concrete buildings throughout the Kant region. The Great Kant earthquake [11][12] struck the Kant Plain on the main Japanese island of Honsh at 11:58:44 JST on Saturday, September 1, 1923. "'Extreme confusion and disorder'? Most horrifying of the immediate results was the fate of 38,000 to 44,000 working class Tokyo residents who fled to the open ground of the Rikugun Honjo Hifukusho, once called the Army Clothing Depot. Many homes were buried or swept away by landslides in the mountainous and hilly coastal areas in western Kanagawa Prefecture; about 800 people died. It lasted between 4 and 10 minutes. [15] Other mechanism and fire whirl dynamics may exist. Extensive firestorms and even a fire whirl added to the death toll. Before the Great Kanto Earthquake struck, Japan was full of optimism. ", "The Occurrence and Mechanisms of Fire Whirls", "Proposed Nomenclature for Fire-induced Vortices", Tornadoes of Fire at Williamsonville, Wisconsin, October 8, 1871, "Whirlwinds At Oil-Tank Fire, San Luis Obispo, Calif", 10.1175/1520-0493(1926)54<161:WAOFSL>2.0.CO;2, "Intense Atmospheric Vortices Associated with a 1000 MW Fire", 10.1175/1520-0477(1980)061<0682:IAVAWA>2.0.CO;2, "California 'fire tornado' had 143mph (230km/h) winds, possibly state's strongest twister ever", "The Giant Fire Whirl From California's Carr Fire Produced Damage Similar to an EF3 Tornado in Redding, an NWS Survey Found", A fire tornado warning? 11:08, Video of a Fire Tornado in San Diego country, 1923 Great Kanto Earthquake - Fire Tornado | Video, Native American use of fire in ecosystems, List of atmospheric pressure records in Europe, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Fire_whirl&oldid=1138622806, Short description is different from Wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Worldwide (most frequent in areas subject to wildfires), Wind damage, burning, propagation/intensification of fires. On that fateful day in 1923, thousands of people lost their lives, and millions were rendered homeless. Tenriky Priest Okutani Fumitomo suggested that Tokyo, as the center of many western-inspired, foreign ideologies and behaviors, was singled out by Gods (kamisama ) fury. Major social policy and infrastructure renovation plans for Tokyo likewise dissipated.23 Indeed, projects that fell under the heading social welfare totaled 4,525,000 yen, or an equivalent of 0.69 percent of the overall reconstruction budget. https://www.thoughtco.com/the-great-kanto-earthquake-195143 (accessed March 2, 2023). The statue of Takeo Hirose. In revealing, disasters give students and scholars wonderful insights into human nature, cultural and social constructions, and illuminate the many relationshipsbetween man, nature, state, and even the cosmosthat define our existence. The total death toll from the earthquake and its aftereffects is estimated at about 142,800. IAIz \0V1G/^~n ^F|OY,)G~o{s:8u]:4cN}Uxi!T|yLx0F7! [16] Drills, as well as knowledge promotion events, are centered around that date as well as awards ceremonies for people of merit.[17]. In the background is the gutted domed building Kokugikan, National Sumo Wrestling arena, in the Ryoguku district. More than this, however, many rural MPs contested Gots vision of a modern, metropolitan Japan revolving around the imperial capital; numerous parliamentarians argued that the countryside, not Tokyo, was the true heart of Japan, or as a number declared, the foundation of the nation. More than a few astute parliamentarians used the post-disaster reconstruction debates opportunistically to highlight what they saw as the plight of rural Japan. The Philippine plate is estimated to have moved as much as three and a half meters horizontally as well as vertically: parts of the Miura peninsula were thrust vertically upwards by as . Moreover, they endeavored to create a highly centralized and planned city in which the state could better manage its subjects and ameliorate social ills and the perceived moral, economic, and political regress of society. qT }17GGiHKzB>EW"B =-UJ6)wt^!0&tlMLl;b7"^k+D}; gYCSK [15] Other mechanism and fire whirl dynamics may exist. y)8$(I. The state, he suggested, must use the earthquake as a turning point to reorient society away from the luxurious and extravagant habits, loose morals, and flippancy. Both proved far more difficult to secure than anticipated. ", Hunter, Janet, and Kota Ogasawara. And the quake may have emboldened right-wing forces at the very moment that the country was poised between military expansion and an embrace of Western democracy, only 18 years before Japan would enter World War II. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Got and the constellation of urban planners, social welfare advocates, and engineers he surrounded himself with sought to reconstruct Tokyo as the city of the future. Soon, the entire city was ablaze. Perhaps a former refugee site devastated by fire, with burnt cars, tires, canisters, and pieces of debris. Benio barely survives when the Christian church she's getting married in collapses, and then she finds her long-lost love Shinobu whose other love interest Larissa is among the victims; they get back together, and Tousei allows them to. In Yasunari Kawabata's 1930 novel The Scarlet Gang of Asakusa several chapters deal with the Great Kant earthquake. The SS Dongola's captain reported that, while he was anchored in Yokohama's inner harbor: At 11.55 a.m. ship commenced to tremble and vibrate violently and on looking towards the shore it was seen that a terrible earthquake was taking place, buildings were collapsing in all directions and in a few minutes nothing could be seen for clouds of dust. , triggering a tsunamithat reached heights of forty feet terms of Use Stay updated the! Leaving the capital in 1923, thousands of people lost their lives and... Reorganize this content to explain the subject 's impact on popular culture of 7.9 the., Kanagawa, and parts of the badly damaged Manseibashi Train station in Chiyoda,,. And verify and edit content received from contributors dynamism more than a few later... Sagami Bay initial jolt, lasting just over fourteen seconds, collapsed most of Tokyo and all. 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