Directions: Read over all of your details, and write down the 3-5 ideas that are most important to the story of the 2011 Japan earthquake.

The 2011 Japan earthquake was a magnitude 9.0 earthquake that took place at 14:45 Japanese time on Friday, March 11, 2011. Its epicenter was reported at sea, 130 kilometers east of the city of Sendai.  The quake caused a tidal wave up to 29.6 meters high, that hit Japan minutes after the quake and flooded up to 10 km inland. Japanese police have officially confirmed 11,828 dead, 2,876 injured and 15,540 missing, along with 125,000 damaged or destroyed buildings. It was the fifth largest earthquake in history in terms of magnitude. Its destruction and implications on the ground were not as severe as they could have been, mainly given the building structure of Japanese constructions, which are prepared to withstand this type of situation.