Takeyasu Suzuki, chairman of the Disaster Prevention Promotion Organization and professor emeritus at the University of Yamanashi, says people should recognize that shaking of this magnitude can reach their own homes and that households that have not yet secured furniture against tipping should do so now.

Suzuki also pointed to what he called a “Yamanashi-specific issue,” in a situation where it was the first time in 102 years that shaking of intensity 6 or higher had been observed in the prefecture.

Suzuki said, “Because people have not experienced major shaking, old houses have remained as they are.The scale of the earthquake and the strength of the shaking matter, but the damage is determined by both the resistance to it, and the power to withstand it. Yamanashi is extremely weak in terms of that resistance.”