1923 Great Kanto Earthquake

The Great Kanto earthquake struck the Kanto Plain of Japan's main island of Honshu on 1 September 1923 at 11:58:32 local time, registering about magnitude 8.0 on the moment magnitude scale with its epicenter roughly 100 kilometers southwest of Tokyo. Modern research indicates the event was actually three shocks in quick succession, a megathrust rupture followed within minutes by two smaller shocks beneath Tokyo Bay and Yamanashi Prefecture. Fires, driven by strong winds from a nearby typhoon, caused the great majority of the destruction and deaths: of the roughly 105,000 confirmed fatalities recorded in the modern disaster report, about 87 percent died in fire rather than building collapse. Over half of Tokyo and nearly all of Yokohama were destroyed, leaving about 2.5 million people homeless.