the center of japan. that s a big city, sendai, there s a million people there. it s not just a little town in northeastern japan. this is what it looked like in sendai. all of thetsunami hit and you can see the water moving relentlessly? these pictures are heartbreaking to see the destruction? you have to imagine people were in the homes and cars and working those fields. it happened in mid afternoon in tokyo friday afternoon. and now 17 or 18 hours later we re only beginning to appreciate what s going on. it s approaching 9:00 a.m. in japan right now. we have a lot more to cover. the president of the united states, president obama, he spoke out about this, promising the japanese people the u.s. would do whatever it could to help. we ll check in with the white house. we ll go back, more i-reports coming in. our correspondent in japan are getting more i-witness accounts of what s going on.
as many people as they can. john. barbara, thank you. barbara starr hive for us at the pentagon. let s go back to wolf. you know, the pictures, as we look at the pictures, especially the live pictures coming from tbsi and nhk in japan, and you see the devastation, hard to believe that mother nature could cause this kind of destruction. an 8.9 magnitude earthquake followed by an enormous tsunami. this is something that s going to be hard for a lot of us to comprehend in the coming days as we watch this unfolding, not only the flood and the destruction but the fires that are still continuing as well. and, of course, we re looking at the area which has been flooded by the tsunami which is one of the coastal areas in the north of the country which has been particularly hard hit, but this earthquake was felt up and down the country, and what was interesting is the situation in tokyo, the capital, is that buildings there continue to sway for 30 minutes after this earthquake struck just
killer tsunami. this has been a devastating day for the people of japan. the whole world is watching right now what s going on. we re only beginning to appreciate the destruction and the devastation as it s daylight. clearly moved by the tragedy as well, president obama today expressed his deep condolences to the people of japan, and he vowed that the united states will do all it can to help. our white house correspondent briana keiller is standing by with more. wolf, after answering a lot of questions about the kind of logistics obama discussed his emotional response to this disaster. your personal feeling reporter: it was a japanese reporter who asked president obama how the earthquake affects hem on a personal level. i m heartbroken by this tragedy. i think when you see what s happening in japan, you are reminded that for all our
as it moved across. wiping the land and everything on it clean. you know, wolf, also some of those waves got as high as 20 to 30 feet, we saw a number of people stranded on top of those buildings, and now the rescue effort is only just beginning, wolf. what amazing devastating pictures. thank you very much. for sharing that with our viewers here in the united states and around the world. christi is with us in hong kong. as we show our viewers live pictures for japan, i want our viewers to take a look at the destruction. it s now 8:12 a.m. saturday morning in japan right now. and you can see what has happened, these buildings, these structures, simply destroyed as a result of the earthquake followed by the tsunami. it s heartbreaking to think about the people who may have been inside those buildings. and you multiply this image that we re seeing by hundreds, if not
communities. utter devastation. it is a sea of liquid destruction. water, mud and debris. again, the damage from the tsunami may be far, far worse. lisa sylvester is looking into that. we re going to get to lisa shortly. she has a special report for us. let s show the viewers some of the pictures that are so heartbreaking and devastating. you see the cars. you see the devastation. you can only imagine the people who have been killed by the earthquake and tsunami. the people who have been injured and the hundreds if not thousands of people who are still missing. we ve seen various reports. various reports of a lot of people who are missing. whole towns levelled. areas near the epicenter that