A strong magnitude 6.3 earthquake occurred at 5:01:29 (UTC) on Monday, June 12, 2006, in the Kyushu region, Japan, 40 km Wes of Oita, at a depth of 154.8 km.
A strong magnitude 6.5 earthquake occurred at 13:13:12 (UTC) on Friday, December 2, 2005, near the East coast of Honshu, Japan, 110 km East of Sendai. The hypocentral depth was estimated to be 50.8 km.
A strong magnitude 6.2 earthquake occurred at 15:36:31 (UTC) on Monday, November 21, 2005, in Kyushu, Japan, 80 km south-west of Kagoshima, at a depth of 147.7 km.
Authorities asked thousands of residents to leave their homes incase a small tsunami wave hit the coast.
Tsunamis measuring up to 50 centimetres landed on the east coast of northern Japan about one hour after the undersea quake hit at 6:39 am (2139 GMT, November 14, 2005). No damage or casualties were reported. Some of the highest waves were observed in Ofunato, a city in Iwate prefecture in the northern part of Honshu. The quake triggered an automatic suspension of the Tohoku line of the Shinkansen bullet train, but the service resumed normal operations shortly afterwards. Japan has one of the world's most advanced tsunami early warning and emergency response systems. Within minutes of a tremor, the research centres can predict whether there is a risk of a tsunami.
A strong magnitude 6.9 earthquake occurred at 21:38:54 (UTC) on Monday, November 14, 2005, located off the East coast of Honshu, Japan, 350 km East of Sendai. The hypocentral depth was estimated to be 30 km.
A strong magnitude 6.5 earthquake occurred at 11:44:43 (UTC) on Wednesday, October 19, 2005, near the east coast of Honshu, Japan, at a depth of 37.2 km
Early reports put the magnitude at 6.8 but that number had been revised to 7.2 by the U.S. Geological Survey.
The quake knocked out power to about 17,000 households and suspended bullet train services in northern Japan and temporarily grounded flights at Tokyo's Haneda airport. However, a nuclear power plant in the neighbouring state of Fukushima was not affected by the earthquake.
The quake was followed by at least four aftershocks and additional quakes of up to magnitude 6 could follow. Two very small 10 centimetre tsunamis hit the nearby coast about 15 minutes after the original quake.