The 1854 Nankai earthquake occurred at about 16:00

local time Local time is the time observed in a specific locality. There is no canonical definition. Originally it was mean solar time, but since the introduction of time zones it is generally the time as determined by the time zone in effect, with daylight s ...

on 24 December. It had a

magnitude Magnitude may refer to: Mathematics *Euclidean vector, a quantity defined by both its magnitude and its direction *Magnitude (mathematics), the relative size of an object *Norm (mathematics), a term for the size or length of a vector *Order of ...

of 8.4 and caused a damaging

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater explo ...

. More than 30,000 buildings were destroyed and there were at least 3,000 casualties. It was the second of the three

Ansei great earthquakes The Ansei great earthquakes (安政の大地震, ''Ansei no Dai Jishin'') were a series of major earthquakes that struck Japan during the Ansei era (1854–1860): * The Ansei Tōkai quake ( ja, 安政東海地震, Ansei Tōkai Jishin, label=none) ...

; the

1854 Tōkai earthquake The 1854 Tōkai earthquake was the first of the Ansei great earthquakes (1854–1855). It occurred at about 09:00 local time on 23 December 1854. It had a magnitude of 8.4 and caused a damaging tsunami. More than 10,000 buildings were destroyed an ...

of identical magnitude had hit northwest the previous morning, and the third

1855 Edo earthquake The , was the third Ansei Great Earthquake, which occurred during the late-Edo period. It occurred after the 1854 Nankai earthquake, which took place about a year prior. The earthquake occurred at 22:00 local time on 11 November. It had an epi ...

would strike less than a year later.

Background

The southern coast of Honshu runs parallel to the

Nankai Trough The is a submarine trough located south of the Nankaidō region of Japan's island of Honshu, extending approximately offshore. The underlying fault, the ''Nankai megathrust,'' is the source of the devastating Nankai megathrust earthquakes, wh ...

, which marks the

subduction Subduction is a geological process in which the oceanic lithosphere is recycled into the Earth's mantle at convergent boundaries. Where the oceanic lithosphere of a tectonic plate converges with the less dense lithosphere of a second plate, the ...

of the

Philippine Sea Plate The Philippine Sea Plate or the Philippine Plate is a tectonic plate comprising oceanic lithosphere that lies beneath the Philippine Sea, to the east of the Philippines. Most segments of the Philippines, including northern Luzon, are part of ...

beneath the

Eurasian Plate The Eurasian Plate is a tectonic plate that includes most of the continent of Eurasia (a landmass consisting of the traditional continents of Europe and Asia), with the notable exceptions of the Indian subcontinent, the Arabian subcontinent and ...

. Movement on this

convergent plate boundary A convergent boundary (also known as a destructive boundary) is an area on Earth where two or more lithospheric plates collide. One plate eventually slides beneath the other, a process known as subduction. The subduction zone can be defined by a ...

leads to many earthquakes, some of them of the megathrust type. The Nankai megathrust has five distinct segments (A–E) that can rupture independently, the segments have ruptured either singly or together repeatedly over the last 1300 years. Megathrust earthquakes on this structure tend to occur in pairs, with a relatively short time gap between them. In addition to the two events in 1854, there were similar earthquakes in 1944 and 1946. In each case the northeastern segment ruptured before the southwestern segment.

Damage

The damage due to the earthquake was severe with 5,000 houses being destroyed and 40,000 houses badly damaged. A further 6,000 homes were damaged by fire. The tsunami washed away a further 15,000 houses and a total of 3,000 people died from either the earthquake or the tsunami. The death toll associated with the tsunami was less than would be expected in comparison to the 1707 tsunami, because many people had left the coastal area following the large earthquake the previous day. In Hiro (now

Hirogawa 270px, Inamura no hi no yakata is a town in Arida District, Wakayama Prefecture, Japan. , the town had an estimated population of 6,778 in 2833 households and a population density of 100 persons per km². The total area of the town is . Geogr ...

), Goryo Hamaguchi set fires using rice straw to help guide villagers to safety. This story was turned into "A living god" by the Greek-born writer

Lafcadio Hearn , born Patrick Lafcadio Hearn (; el, Πατρίκιος Λευκάδιος Χέρν, Patríkios Lefkádios Chérn, Irish language, Irish: Pádraig Lafcadio O'hEarain), was an Irish people, Irish-Greeks, Greek-Japanese people, Japanese writer, t ...

Characteristics

Earthquake

Much of southwestern Honshu, Shikoku and

Kyūshū is the third-largest island of Japan's five main islands and the most southerly of the four largest islands ( i.e. excluding Okinawa). In the past, it has been known as , and . The historical regional name referred to Kyushu and its surround ...

experienced shaking of 5 or more on the JMA scale, with most of Shikoku and nearby coastal areas of

Kansai The or the , lies in the southern-central region of Japan's main island Honshu, Honshū. The region includes the Prefectures of Japan, prefectures of Nara Prefecture, Nara, Wakayama Prefecture, Wakayama, Kyoto Prefecture, Kyoto, Osaka Prefectur ...

suffering an intensity of 6.

Tsunami

On Shikoku, the greatest inundation heights were 7.5 m in

Mugi In cryptography, MUGI is a pseudorandom number generator (PRNG) designed for use as a stream cipher. It was among the cryptographic techniques recommended for Japanese government use by CRYPTREC in 2003, however, has been dropped to "candidate" ...

, 7.5 m in Kamikawaguchi (

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

: 上川口) of

Kuroshio The , also known as the Black or or the is a north-flowing, warm ocean current on the west side of the North Pacific Ocean basin. It was named for the deep blue appearance of its waters. Similar to the Gulf Stream in the North Atlantic, the Ku ...

, 7.2 m at Asakawa on the

Tokushima is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Shikoku. Tokushima Prefecture has a population of 728,633 (1 October 2019) and has a geographic area of 4,146 km2 (1,601 sq mi). Tokushima Prefecture borders Kagawa Prefecture to the north, E ...

coast, 7.4 m at

Usa The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

, 8.4 m at Ōnogō in the Susaki area, 8.3 m at Kure on the Kōchi coast and 5 m at both Hisayoshiura and Kaizuka on the coast of

Ehime is a prefecture of Japan located on the island of Shikoku. Ehime Prefecture has a population of 1,342,011 (1 June 2019) and has a geographic area of 5,676 km2 (2,191 sq mi). Ehime Prefecture borders Kagawa Prefecture to the northeast, Tokush ...

. A tsunami was observed in

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flow ...

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

, and a water surge of about 2 to 3 ''

Chi Chi or CHI may refer to: Greek *Chi (letter), the Greek letter (uppercase Χ, lowercase χ); Chinese *Chi (length), ''Chi'' (length) (尺), a traditional unit of length, about ⅓ meter *Chi (mythology) (螭), a dragon *Chi (surname) (池, pin ...

'' was recorded in

Huangpu River The Huangpu (), formerly romanized as Whangpoo, is a river flowing north through Shanghai. The Bund and Lujiazui are located along the Huangpu River. The Huangpu is the biggest river in central Shanghai, with the Suzhou Creek being its maj ...

Background

Damage

Characteristics

Earthquake

Tsunami

See also

References

Further reading