This is like a really bad joke, only it's not.



http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2 ... lders.html

An 8.9 is massive. According to Wikipedia, that's the 5th largest on record. It seems the Japanese people had a great infrastructure in place that will hopefully keep the casualties down.

However, doesn't it seem that there is an increase in the frequency of natural disasters in recent years?

A wonderful tool by Google to post information about missing people as described by Engadget. http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/11/google-reacts-to-japanese-tsunami-with-a-person-finder-tool/

This is the true power of the internet.

Seriously, it seems like the world is falling apart. Really.

Yeah, it does.

Insane cold/snow, insane heat...

If I really believed in such things... 12/21/12 would scare me.

I wonder if they felt it in South Korea.

What an awful, terrifying ordeal. There does seem to be an increase in global goings-on, no doubt. Wars, rumours of wars...

Plus the massive amount of birds dropping dead out of the sky a couple months back, and fish washing ashore dead around the same time.

Explosions at one of the nuclear plants in Japan now. Tsunami warnings in effect due to underground earthquakes.

what the blazes! is going on ???

I don't want to turn this topic completely off where it should be focused, which is on the people of Japan.

But I have to throw in that I've been hearing a lot of national politicians on both sides of the aisle talking the last couple of years about "safe" nuclear power as a means of solving some of our country's energy needs and reducing our dependence on oil.

And the people promoting nuclear power often say how it's been years since Chernobyl or Three Mile Island and how the plants are so much safer.

Ask the poor people in Japan about the safety of living near a nuclear plant.

The United States is subject to earthquakes, too.

Didn't feel it here.

You do realize how many nuclear plants are operating continuously throughout the world with no safety issues? And that it took an 8.9 earthquake just to cause a "partial" possible meltdown?

How many people die in coal mines each year, or from manufacturing solar panels and windmills? Everything is dangerous. Just build nuclear plants far enough away from cities and towns (in this country, there is plenty of options for remote areas like that, especially west of the Mississippi).

Nuclear power is one of the cheapest, most efficient and greenest options for power. That's just a fact. Yes it'd be great if solar and wind were as efficient, but they are just not cheap quite yet. The technology isn't there and we can't force it with subsidies and tax breaks.

Another earthquake today, 7.9 magnitude. This is incredibly sad. I visited Japan in my youth and went to many little villages, interacting with the locals. I will never forget this one old woman who made us the most amazing rice balls. I think every day about what happened to that little village in particular and that woman. I pray for them every night.