Presented by: The Lessons of Japan


On March 11, 2011, a massive earthquake and tsunami proved that for all of Japan’s awareness and preparedness, its disaster experts had severely miscalculated the potential for damage.


It’s an important issue for scientists in Japan and scientists and engineers and disaster managers in the U.S. and elsewhere: There really was a miscalculation of the hazard and the risk.


Laurie Johnson, Lexington Insurance Company


When it comes to earthquakes and tsunamis, Japan has a long history and strong culture of awareness, preparedness and mitigation. But when the country experienced the most devastating and costly natural disaster in its history, it became evident that its disaster preparation and mitigation efforts were largely based on a faulty assessment of the risk.


All eyes are on Japan now to see how it responds to its new seismic reality – how it re-evaluates the hazard and how it incorporates this information into rebuilding standards. Disaster planning experts in the U.S. and around the world that use a similar consensus-based process for developing hazard maps, catastrophe models and building codes will be watching Japan closely to take lessons from its experience.


Copyright © 2011 by A.M. Best Company, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this report may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means; electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise.


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