TOKYO — Phone alarms and loudspeakers across much of Japan warned of a magnitude 9.9 earthquake on Friday — larger than any ever recorded — before the Japan Meteorological Agency withdrew the alert eight minutes later, The Japan Times and The Asahi Shimbun reported.
The real quake, magnitude 6.9, struck off Russia’s Kamchatka Peninsula at 12:38 p.m. local time and produced only shindo 1 shaking in Hakodate, Hokkaido. The JMA alert, issued at 12:40 p.m. for regions from Hokkaido to Tokai and the Izu Islands, had predicted shaking up to shindo 7, the top of Japan’s scale.
The agency said its system wrongly placed the epicenter near the Kuril Islands and overestimated the magnitude, in part by applying a formula designed for domestic quakes to a distant one. It ruled out a cyberattack. “We deeply apologize for the inconvenience. We are truly sorry,” a JMA official said, according to The Asahi Shimbun.
It was the first emergency quake warning the JMA has ever withdrawn with a second alarm, The Japan Times said. The Tokaido Shinkansen halted for 15 minutes, and Chief Cabinet Secretary Minoru Kihara said there were no reports of damage from the Kamchatka quake.
Sources: The Japan Times, The Asahi Shimbun, Japan Meteorological Agency
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