Earthquake-resistance checks on old apartments not progressing
Of Japan's apartment buildings built prior to 1970 to older and less stringent earthquake standards, only 16% have been inspected to see whether they can withstand a large earthquake.
In February, the Condominium Management Companies Association conducted a survey of 2100 pre-1970 apartment buildings nationwide. From the individual management companies that responded, only 16% reported that a building inspection was carried out to assess their building's earthquake resistance, and almost all were found not to meet current standards. Only 3% of the surveyed buildings had actually carried out any earthquake reinforcing work.Read more
Compensation awarded to occupants of building with insufficient earthquake resistance
The Yokohama District Court has ordered that an architect office and building inspection company pay compensation of 1.4082 billion Yen (17.6 million USD) to owners of the 37 apartments in St. Regis Tsurumi after it was established that the building has insufficient earthquake resistance.
The building was inspected by Nippon ERI, who noticed that the building's strength did not meet standards and requested that the architect office correct the mistake. The mistake was corrected on paperwork in handwriting and ERI failed to notice the forged revision.Read more
An update on building damage from the Tohoku earthquake
Just after the March 11 Tohoku earthquake it was announced that zero buildings had collapsed, which everyone naturally assumed was a testament to the strict building codes in Japan.
However, it has now been acknowledged that 100 apartment buildings in Sendai city have been completely destroyed.