Researcher warns Tokyo could be hit with a major earthquake before 2016

May 8, 2012 – JAPAN – In a quiet room at Tokyo University, seismologist Shinichi Sakai points to steady, color-coded lines on a digital monitor. The screen displays real-time readings from Japan’s extensive network of seismometers. This is one of the most seismically active countries in the world, and the flat lines show that all is quiet across the region, at least for the moment. Then, as if on cue, two of the lines start to jump violently, splashing the screen with red and yellow pixels. They’re tracking a very small earthquake, centered just outside of Tokyo. Sakai says small quakes like this happen about ten thousand times a year in Japan, and for geologists like him, even the small earthquakes are worth paying attention to. He says there’s been a fivefold increase in small tremors around Tokyo since the huge quake off Japan’s northeast coast in March last year. And that adds up to a mathematical omen for scientists like him. In January, Sakai and the University’s Earthquake Research Institute crunched the new numbers and came up with a shocking prediction: There’s a 70 percent chance a major earthquake will hit Tokyo within the next four years. Sakai and his colleagues are among the country’s leading seismic authorities, so the prediction itself gave the country a jolt. The Japanese government has also predicted a similar chance of a major quake in the Tokyo area, but over a longer time period — sometime in the next 30 years. Sakai’s new four-year timeframe has brought a huge backlash among both scientists and political leaders. Sakai hasn’t retracted his prediction, but he now refuses to quote specific timeframes. “I cannot speak,” he said, with an ironic chuckle.  –PRI