IRIDeS Newsletter | International Research Institute of Disaster Science

2018.2.23

How to Utilize Uncertain Scientific Information to Mitigate Disaster: Exploration of “The Study Group for Countermeasures on the Forecast of Nankai Trough Earthquakes”

The “Nankai Trough” is a groove in the deep-ocean formed by plate subduction, which extends from off the coast of Shizuoka to off the coast of Miyazaki. In the vicinity of this area, large earthquakes have occurred quite frequently. Historically, there were cases in which Tonankai and Nankai earthqakes occurred consecutively, resulting in great disasters, such as the Ansei Earthquakes (1854) and Showa Earthquakes (1944 and 1946). In Japan, following the Great East Japan Earthquake, re-examinatio...

2017.12.1

We Held the First "World Bosai Forum"

What is the World Bosai Forum? In 2015, at the third UN World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction held in Sendai, Japan, the "Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030" was adopted. Japan, who hosted this conference, is expected not only to develop domestic disaster risk reduction policies further but also to strengthen cooperation with the international community, being a strong leader in the implementation of the Sendai Framework for Disa...

2017.11.10

“World Tsunami Museum Conference” Held in Ishigaki

In December 2015, a general assembly of the United Nations created a “World Tsunami Awareness Day.” November 5, 2017 was the second such “World Tsunami Awareness Day,” and the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction, Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and the Japan International Cooperation Agency, with the cooperation of IRIDeS, sponsored a “World Tsunami Museum Conference” in the city of Ishigaki, Okinawa Prefecture. The island of Ishigaki is thought to have bee...

2017.10.27

Excursion around Iwaizumi, Disaster Area in 2016 Typhoon No. 10

On August 30, 2016, Typhoon No. 10 struck Iwaizumi-cho in Iwate Prefecture, causing major destruction due to the heavy rain and flooding of the Omoto River. Just a little more than a year since the typhoon, on October 21, 2017, IRIDeS researchers, including Assoc. Prof. of history Yuichi Ebina and Assoc. Prof. Shuji Moriguchi who specializes in landslides, visited the site, with local disaster expert Toshimasa Morita and Yumiko Washizuka of local radio station FM Iwate’s Iwaizumi bureau, who was...

2017.1.29

Emergency Investigation and Analysis of the Fukushima Prefecture Offshore Earthquake and Tsunami

An earthquake with a maximum seismic intensity of 5-lower (M7.4), having its hypocenter in the ocean of Fukushima Prefecture, occurred on November 22, 2016. It was accompanied by a tsunami. The researchers at IRIDeS took immediate action following the earthquake and conducted a survey and analysis whose findings were released at a briefing session held one month later on December 22. Professor Fumihiko Imamura summarized the distinctive features of the occurrence and the dissemination o...