thanks for being with us. it s friday, march 11th. i m kiran chetry. i m t.j. holmes. it s 8:00 right now in tokyo with a massive rescue effort is underway right now. again, we told you this is a two-prong disaster. there was the initial 8.9 magnitude quake. that is a historic earthquake. one of the fifth largest since 1900. one of the largest ones the world has ever seen. that has triggered a massive tsunami that is hitting japan right now, but also we have tsunami warnings in at least 20 other countries right now. so let s tell you what s going on. get you caught up right now. again, this is a historic earthquake, folks, we have seen. you see where it struck there, about 80 miles off the coast and about 230 miles from tokyo. this took about 8.9 magnitude quake. that was a powerful quake and it was fairly shallow, so that has increased, if you will, the
my pleasure, and i appreciate your good wishes. absolutely. good luck to you for sure. and they obviously have a preparation level, something that we, you know, can only imagine because they re used to this. but there are still some big impacts taking place. we can t control mother nature. we ve learned that the hard way many times. christine romans with more on how the earthquake is affecting airports. this airport has been closed. these are the pictures you re seeing with people on their roof. looks like water washing over the runways, through the parking lots. that airport is closed because of the flood waters, the tsunami, but tokyo s airport has canceled all the flights for the rest of the day. please check. you heard barbara starr report that some of the passenger planes are being allowed to commercial planes are being allowed to land at u.s. military facilities. so clearly there s a lot of trans-atlantic flights trying to
people understand this isn t a nuclear meltdown or any huge problem, but it is something that they do want to make sure that people are mindful of and stay in their homes. you were talking earlier about the experience in tokyo, a city of 13 million people and many people felt this very large earthquake hundreds of miles from the epicenter. just take a look at our office, and you ll see that what we have here on our floor is strewn papers. if you look at our tape library, the tapes have fallen all on the ground, and this is just one office, one small place that experienced the earthquake. i was at tokyo station and really that s where you felt the ground severely shaking because we were underground. and a lot of people who were there at the station were quite alarmed because even though this is a country where you do experience quite a few earthquakes. i mean, i ve experienced dozens in the short time i ve been here. this was dramatically different.
24 minutes past the hour on this american morning. we have a special edition here because we have a breaking news situation and a disaster developing on two different fronts. this is happening in japan. it s now nightfall there. and there is an effort underway to try to save as many people right now as they can. this nation was hit by an 8.9 magnitude earthquake. it was just off the coast about 80 miles. the rescue is underway right now, but the hospitals are being overwhelmed. elementary schools that are serving as little refuge centers right now. those are already full. take a look at some of the pictures here. this is the shaking. this is the power of the earthquake. this thing was about 230 miles, the epicenter was, away from tokyo. but people thought the shaking went on for up to two minutes. many buildings were damaged. some destroyed, as well. cars knocked off of bridges. japan s news agency reporting that more than 50 people now
but you can still refinance to a fixed rate as low as 4.75% at lendingtree.com, where customers save an average of $293 a month. call lending tree at. today. 42 minutes past the hour right now. we re following breaking news. a developing disaster as we speak in japan. and now has night falls, the rescue effort it s still unknown just how many people there are going to be able to rescue and how much progress is being made on that front. many who were there say it will be some time before we know the scope of this disaster. just to update you on what happened. the nation was hit by an 8.9 magnitude earthquake. this is an earthquake of historic proportions. easily in the top five recorded since the 1900s. and japan is reportedly asking u.s. troops for help with the