If you’ve been anywhere near Twitter or a TV in the past 12 hours, you’ve heard about the 8.9 magnitude that has rocked Japan, creating a tsunami that is still washing away everything in its path in the Miyagi Prefecture of northern Japan. It’s terrifying, really, so I felt compelled to point out some links and give anyone interested a place to discuss those events here.
- Images of the devestation can be found here. You will not be the first person to exclaim that these look like promotion still from any generic Hollywood disaster movie. Or the last.
- Al Jazeera is streaming a live news feed on YouTube. Yes, it’s in English.
- The tsunami is not expected to significantly impact the United States. Hawai’i has seen waves up to seven feet tall on its shores, and residual tsunami waves are expected to appear on the west coast. Even though those waves are not expected to be more than a few feet high, some southern California beaches are closing.
- Google has set up a person finder tool and a crisis response page.
- Late night TV host Jimmy Kimmel was visiting French Polynesia when the tsunami hit Sendai, Miyagi, about 6000 miles away from him. After a questionable attempt at humor, Kimmel reported that he and others were evacuating.
- The least deplorable humor-infused tsunami remark on Twitter came from Dave Chappelle, who tweeted, “maybe the Playstation 4 will be water-proof”…
- …but this might actually be worse than what Chappelle said.
Finally, here’s a video from a guy that apparently sat through one of the aftershocks of the quake. We’ll update this throughout the day; feel free to send us anything you find or write at withleather-tips@uproxx.com.
