On Wednesday 16 March, Kyoto University's Tokyo Office hosted the second installment of its 21th public lecture series, "Mega Earthquakes: What Will Happen and How We Prepare", organized as part of its Tokyo de Manabu Kyoto no Chi ("Ingesting Kyoto University's Knowledge -- in Tokyo ") program.
The featured speaker was Professor Manabu Hashimoto of Kyoto University's Disaster Prevention Research Institute (DPRI), who addressed the "Challenges of Predicting Mega Earthquakes and the Limitations of Earthquake Science".
Prof Hashimoto explained that there are many different types of large-scale earthquakes, and predicting one with any degree of accuracy would be an extremely difficult task. Focusing on the one anticipated to occur along the Nankai Trough in the near future, he described the likely location of the epicenter and the expected intensities of the ground shaking and tsunami it could entail, as well as possible predictors and the issues associated with them. He then sought to underscore the diversity of earthquakes by referring to past occurrences, including the 684 Hakuho (Temmu) Earthquake, and comparing the areas involved. In addition, Prof Hashimoto mentioned social and economic hurdles to building new earthquake monitoring networks and the limited benefits of trying to accumulate know-how and learn from the past when dealing with major earthquakes, which usually occur only once in several generations.
Having listed all these challenges, he suggested that we must focus our efforts on making the most of our limited expertise, which he said would require the involvement of the entire community.
Lecture venue
Prof Hashimoto
