Taiwan forum dispels Japanese manga quake prediction
台灣論壇駁斥日本漫畫地震預測
| TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Japanese manga artist Tatsuki Ryo's "The Future I Saw" gained international attention for predicting a megaquake in the sea near Japan on July 5, with an ensuing tsunami potentially affecting Taiwan.
Experts from Taiwan and Japan addressed public concerns at a forum at Nantou's Chelungpu Fault Preservation Park on Saturday. Each agreed it was impossible to predict the exact date of seismic activity, though they warned disaster preparedness should never be overlooked, per UDN. 70-year-old Tatsuki predicted a massive fissure would open up in the seabed between Japan and the Philippines, causing the sea to “boil” and send waves three times as tall as those from the Tohoku earthquake in 2011. She predicted the tsunami would destroy one-third of Japan, with a similarly devastating impact on Taiwan. Hsiung Kan-shi (熊衎昕) of the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology said major seismic events in the area the manga artist described, the Nankai Trough, occur every 100 to 150 years. The most recent of which was the Tonankai earthquake in 1944. Hsiung said a major underwater seismic event will certainly happen again, with experts being able to predict the potential impact, including size and associated tsunami. However, he said it is impossible to predict the exact date and time of such an event. Wu Tso-ren (吳祚任), a professor at the College of Earth Sciences at National Central University, said Taiwan has multiple tsunami warning systems in place. Should seismic activity occur in the Nankai Trough, a tsunami would impact Taiwan's east coast in 2.5 hours with a height of one meter, posing little threat, though low-lying areas such as Yilan may be affected. Hsu Tien-yu (徐典裕), deputy director of the National Museum of Natural Science, said geoscience is currently unable to predict the time and location of earthquakes. He said scientific monitoring of the Nanhai Trough could alleviate public anxiety. The most far-fetched prediction by the manga artist was that seismic activity would partially submerge Japan, which would reshape the coastlines of neighboring areas, linking Taiwan, Hong Kong, and the Philippines. Liang Wen-tzong (梁文宗), senior research scientist at the Institute of Earth Sciences, Academia Sinica, described this part of the prophecy as "nonsense." Liang said the Tohoku earthquake saw a fault rupture of around 600 km, though the maximum slip near the trench was about 60 meters, which is wildly inconsistent with Tatsuki's prediction. Furthermore, he said the largest volcanic eruption in Indonesia's history, Mount Tambora in 1815, killed or injured 60,000 to 70,000 people but resulted in no major plate shifts. |
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| Sean Scanlan Taiwan News, Staff Writer | |
| 2025-07-01 |
