Have you guys been following this? I don't know what it says about my character, but I've been following it closely, especially the developing nuclear issues. I definitely feel for them... I feel a lot of the same emotions (to a lesser extent) as when 9/11 happened to my country.

Anyway, I wish them the best, but it's fascinating as well. If I were nearby, i think I'd be helping.

I've been following it. Surprised it took this long to get a topic actually.

I found out about it on Friday via a gaming website; a random topic about sending prayers to Japan so followed the link to the BBC site. It's really quite shocking, particularly to see the videos of how fast the waters rise (in one there's a 3 or 4 story building that gets almost entirely underwater in... 30 seconds?) and how fully villages have been wiped away. A lot of the aerial photos that you see, you'd be hard pushed to even realise a village used to be there, let alone less than a week ago. And of course now there is the whole nuclear threat hanging over it all.

The stuff I've found most interesting is looking into the biggest earthquakes recorded. After hearing this one was the 6th biggest I immediately googled the 10 biggest recorded and it's quite amazing to realise the power nature has. I find it incredible such a wave could be caused that it literally travelled the entire ocean and was still recognisable as something abnormal when it hit the other side, as opposed to just a slightly larger wave.

I on the other hand haven't really been following it. Learned some stuff about nuclear reactors though.

What's the death toll up to?

Reports are mixed, but this news report from 14 hours ago puts it at 3373.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c2abe3e6-4f40 ... z1Gl7sHtkG

Meanwhile the nuclear situation appears to be getting even more dire. High levels of nuclear radiation at reactor #3 making getting water to it difficult for aircraft.

http://www.thehindu.com/news/internatio ... 543367.ece

Not good. If they're seeing really high levels of radiation around the reactor, its core is probably damaged, and if they can't keep it cool, it's going to melt down. This stuff will, of course, negatively impact nuclear power everywhere, even though these reactors are 40 years old, suffered a double ding of earthquake and tsunami, and probably have flaws more recent designs have overcome. *shrug*

Here's an article on the nuclear plants that does a pretty good job of explaining how it works and what's going on. It's slightly out of date now, of course, but things are moving really quickly.

http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/ ... ear-plant/

oh, man, that's horrible.

How stupid are some people?

That's retarded. And mainstream economics says this quake and tsunami are good for Japan. Rationale: Japan's economy was stagnating, now they have to do lots of rebuilding to do which will boost the economy.