June 13, 2008 Earthquake: Tokyo, Honshu, Japan

An earthquake occurred about 390 km north of Tokyo, Japan at 8:43 AM local time in Japan, Jun 14, 2008 (Jun 13 23:43:46 UTC). At least 13 people killed, 357 injured, 614 buildings damaged and landslides occurred in the Furukawa-Kurihara-Morioka area. Felt (VII) at Furukawa; (VI) at Sendai; (IV) at Misawa and Tsukuba; (III) at Tokyo. Felt as far north as Hirosaki and as far south as Yokohama. Recorded (6U JMA) in Iwate and Miyagi; (5U JMA) in Akita; (5L JMA) in Fukushima and Yamagata; (4 JMA) throughout northern Honshu. Recorded (1 JMA) as far south as Aichi. Recorded (3 JMA) in southwestern Hokkaido, (2 JMA) in the Tomakomai-Shizunai area and (1 JMA) throughout southern Hokkaido.

The Mw 6.8 Honshu earthquake occurred in a region of convergence between the Pacific Plate and the Okhotsk section of the North American Plate in northern Japan, where the Pacific plate is moving west-northwest with respect to North America at a rate of approximately 8.3 cm/yr. The hypocenter of the earthquake indicates shallow thrusting motion in the upper (Okhotsk) plate, above the subducting Pacific plate, which lies at approximately 80 km depth at this location. The earthquake occurred in a region of upper-plate contraction, probably within the complicated tectonics of the Ou Backbone Range, known to have hosted several large earthquakes in historic times.

(above from reference #1053)

A total of 23 people were killed or missing due to this earthquake. The earthquake caused many landslides, debris flows and landslide dams (reference #13604)