By MASANORI ISOBE/ Staff Writer
April 1, 2022 at 18:27 JST
The derailed Tohoku Shinkansen in Shiroishi, Miyagi Prefecture, on March 17 (Hiroyuki Yamamoto)
The March 16 earthquake that struck off the coast of Fukushima Prefecture was stronger where a Shinkansen was derailed than the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, according to East Japan Railway Co. (JR East).
The railway operator reported the findings at a meeting of officials from the transport ministry and Japan Railway companies on March 31 to discuss measures to prevent bullet trains from derailing during a major earthquake.
The Tohoku Shinkansen derailed about 2 kilometers southwest of Shiroishi-Zao Station in Shiroishi, Miyagi Prefecture, in the March 16 quake that registered a maximum intensity of upper 6 on the Japanese seismic scale of 7.
A seismometer installed near the derailment site recorded 89.4 kines and 582.7 gals following the earthquake, according to JR East.
A kine is a unit for a spectral intensity (SI) value that indicates how much a structure shakes in a quake, while a gal is a unit of acceleration that measures the extent of an earthquake’s seismic waves.
The Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011, registered 67.6 kines and 514 gals at the same location.
The SI value also shows the duration of tremors, which is used to gauge the extent of damage to railway tracks and elevated bridges.
JR East refers to the value when deciding whether or not to reduce the speed of trains running on the Tohoku Shinkansen Line and other lines or suspend the services.
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