Mw 7.2 Near East Coast of Honshu, Japan

On 9 March 2011 a major earthquake occurred near the East Coast of Honshu, Japan at a depth of 9 km. The seismic event occurred at 02:45:17 UTC and had an estimated moment magnitude (Mw) 7.2. It was a foreshock of the great earthquake on the 11th.

Critical planetary geometry occurred from 5 to 9 March with no less than five planetary alignments involving Mercury and Venus. The alignments on the 6th and 7th in particular were critical as they converged with a high lunar peak (index 18). The geometry involved Jupiter and Saturn, which were on opposite sides (grand opposition).

The first seismic increase occurred on the 6th with two strong tremors at Tarapaca, Chile and the South Sandwich Islands Region respectively, peaking Mw 6.6. A day later a Mw 6.4 tremor occurred at the Solomon Islands. The major earthquake on the 9th followed on the Venus-Mars-Uranus alignment, which greatly added to the critical geometry involving Mercury. Two more strong tremors occurred later on the 9th and 10th (not counting aftershocks), after which seismic activity peaked in the morning of the 11th.

Sun-Mercury-Uranus        2011-03-02, 19:27:00    0°11'07"
Mercury-Sun-Saturn        2011-03-05,  8:14:21  192°44'22"
Sun-Mercury-Jupiter       2011-03-05, 11:05:33   13°21'09"
Jupiter-Mercury-Saturn    2011-03-06, 15:58:41  193°00'51"
Venus-Mars-Uranus         2011-03-07,  1:28:56    2°02'53"
Earth-Mercury-Uranus      2011-03-09, 16:00:08  359°42'42"

Earth-Moon-Neptune        2011-03-03, 14:19:11  328°45'48"
Earth-Moon-Mars           2011-03-04,  7:09:25  337°09'23"
Earth-Moon-Sun            2011-03-04, 20:26:30  343°45'23"
Earth-Moon-Mercury        2011-03-05, 12:36:11  351°45'55"
Earth-Moon-Uranus         2011-03-06,  4:16:32  359°30'58"
Earth-Moon-Jupiter        2011-03-06, 23:26:00    8°58'46"
Moon-Earth-Saturn         2011-03-07, 13:03:21  195°42'31"
					

SSGI depiction of planetary (PG) and lunar (LG) geometry


SSGI depiction of total — non-interpreted — geometry