Major Japan earthquake to trigger $6.4bn in insured losses: KCC
Total insured losses from the 7.5 magnitude earthquake that struck Japan on January 1, on the Noto peninsula off the west coast of the island of Honshu, are projected to reach $6.4 billion.
Residential losses are anticipated to account for over two-thirds of this total, according to the high-resolution Karen Clark & Company (KCC) Japan Earthquake Reference Model.
At approximately 16:10 JST (2:10 AM EST) on January 1, Japan was hit by a M7.5 earthquake 7 km north‐ northwest of Suzu on the Noto Peninsula of Ishikawa Prefecture in Japan. It was the largest earthquake since 2015, and the deadliest in the country since 2016.
The earthquake was a result of shallow reverse faulting, which means that geological strata on one side of a fault plane are pushed up over the strata on the other side, KCC explained. Shallow earthquakes like this one tend to cause more damage than their deeper counterparts due to the proximity of the released energy to the Earth's surface — the earthquake had a depth of 10.0 km (6.2 mi), it noted.
The Noto Peninsula, while a less seismically active region than the east coast of Japan, most recently was struck by an earthquake on May 5, 2023, which resulted in casualties and hundreds of damaged buildings.
Japan typically experiences earthquakes off its east coast, where the Pacific Plate subducts beneath the country. Over the past century, 30 earthquakes with magnitudes of 6 or higher have occurred within 250 km of the event, with three of them affecting the Noto Peninsula.
KCC analysts estimate over half a trillion USD of exposure in the ground motion footprint, including residential, commercial, and industrial properties. Residential property losses are expected to exceed those of commercial and industrial properties.
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