This year marks the 100th anniversary of the Great Kanto Earthquake, which killed more than 100,000 people. Due to the fact that the earthquake occurred in the middle of the day, large-scale fires broke out in Tokyo and Yokohama, causing extensive damage.
In order to prevent fires caused by earthquakes, major gas companies in Tokyo are taking measures such as installing a detailed network of seismometers in the Tokyo metropolitan area and stopping the supply of gas in areas that are estimated to be heavily damaged.
There are microcomputer meters installed in ordinary homes as a mechanism to detect tremors and prevent fires caused by gas leaks, etc., but this system can prevent fires by quickly stopping the gas supply to the entire district. I’m doing it.
According to Tokyo Gas, in the Great East Japan Earthquake 12 years ago, the gas supply was automatically stopped in some areas of Hitachi City, Ibaraki Prefecture and Yokohama City, and no major damage caused by gas leaks occurred.
The seismometer data will be shared with the Metropolitan Police Department and the Metropolitan Expressway, etc., and will be used for traffic regulation in the event of a disaster.
Junichiro Aikawa, manager of the Tokyo Gas Network Disaster Prevention Group, said, “We have advanced our countermeasures in response to large-scale disasters such as the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake and the Great East Japan Earthquake. So, the awareness of disaster preparedness is very high, and I think that we have to keep walking so that we can improve even a little.”
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