Japan

Japan is located in the north-western part of the Pacific Ocean. The topography of Japan is marked by mountains and volcanoes (active and dormant), including Mount Fuji. The country is part of the Pacific Ring of Fire and is one of the most geologically active, resulting in a high number of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions (Encyclopædia Britannica). The disaster type with the highest occurrence between 2000 and 2018 is storm, with 73 occurrences (54% of disasters recorded), followed by earthquake (24 occurrence, 18%). Even if earthquakes are the second type of disasters per occurrence, it is the deadliest disaster type in Japan, with 20 033 fatalities (89%). Most of the fatalities are the result of the 2011 earthquake (9 on the Richter scale), resulting in a tsunami. Flooding is the disaster type that affected the most people over the same period, with 2 068 352 affected people (45 % of people affected), followed by storm (28%) and earthquake (22%). The floods resulting from the tropical storm Praipiroon affected the most people over this period, with an estimated 1 500 000.

Mapping natural disasters from 2000 until 2018

Proportional Symbol Map

Number of times a region has been affected by disasters.

A proportional symbol map uses simple map symbols (usually a circle or square) that vary in size to represent a quantitative value found at that location.

Choropleth Map

Number of disasters per 1 000 km².

In a choropleth map, divided geographical areas or regions are coloured, shaded or patterned in relation to a statistical variable that represents an aggregate summary of a geographic characteristic within each area.

Kernel Density Map

Kernel density estimation (quadratic kernel).

The kernel density map produces a processed, smoothed visualization of the density of occurrences in the neighbourhood of each resulting map cell. The kernel density map makes it possible to see a concentration of event occurrences. A qualitative scale is used here to ease interpretation.

How to access the EM-DAT database

Go to public.emdat.be

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