Did I read this correctly? The earthquake has moved an island?

That’s what I heard. Also, I heard that the quake was upgrade to a 9.1, making it the fifth largest recorded quake in 120 years. I also heard that Japan can expect aftershocks for at least a week.

…the quake moved part of Japan’s land mass by nearly 2.5 meters…

…also threw the earth off its axis point by at least 8 centimeters…

Link

To try and respond to your questions:

1. The final damages cannot yet be assessed, although with the Pacific basin being what it is, it would not surprise me if this quake triggered others, perhaps in Indonesia, Chile, and/or California.

2. Yes. There will be more aftershocks.

Tis true, but this is a normal occurance.
Just last week I read an article that said that magnetic North is moving 40 feet closer to Russia every year.

The earthquake in Chile moved the earth off its rotational axis, shortening days. There can be hundreds of aftershocks.

You’re correct about the earthquake moving an island; the island of Honshu moved 8 feet to the east. They were hit with a series of aftershocks.

Listening to seismologists following the recent Christchurch (NZ) earthquake, aftershocks can keep happening for at least 1 year following an earthquake…

Yes, about 2 meters. And the Earth’s axis has shifted 10 cm (4 inches).

@CaptainHarley “with the Pacific basin being what it is, it would not surprise me if this quake triggered others, perhaps in Indonesia, Chile, and/or California.”

With the New Zealand one being so recent too, makes me wonder if there’s a connection. Like the NZ quake was a “pre-shock” to the Japanese one.

John, not sure how basic you want this question so I apologize up front if this is too basic. Earthquakes are caused by plates of land moving and scraping up against each other. As they want to move, due to underlying magma intrusions and pressures but as they are stuck against adjacent land plates pressure builds. Therefore after shocks all depend if all that energy has been released or how the intersecting points of those two surfaces will allow more movement, how jagged they are, how loose their compositions are, ect ect. So the fact that this quake was related to such a large movement and Axis shift makes sense given the scale, but it’s a little bit of the cart before the horse talking about the movement in relation to the scale of quake as it is the scale of quake resulting from the movement. Hopefully this sheds some light on something you may not have though about.

@downtide

They don’t call the entire Pacific rim “The Ring of Fire” without reason. The entire Pacific basin is slowly rotating in a ( I believe ) counter-clockwise direction, thus the earthquakes all round the rim. The recent earthquake in Japan could be only the beginning, although I pray it is not.