This Earthquake Literally Moved All of Japan

All of Japan moved half a centimeter east back in 2011 and scientists just figured out why and how.

15 minutes after the magnitude 9.0 Tohoku earthquake, a seismic wave that traveled to the Earth’s core and back triggered four tectonic plates to shift together across the entire country. The slip stretched 3,000 km, which is nearly 7x longer than the earthquake’s actual rupture line and longer than anything ever recorded.

Study: Sunyoung Park et al. ,ScS-triggered slip on megathrust interfaces