Helpless:
A ship, dwarfed by the sheer size of the whirlpool, is drawn ever
closer towards the vortex as is tossed about in the foaming waters off
the port of Oarai, Ibaraki

 

 

 

Menace: Wave upon wave heads towards the coastline which has already been breached by an earlier onslaught

 

 

 

 

 
 

 

 
 

 

 

 

With fires and destruction all around him a man picks his way carefully though the rubble while (right) there's gridlocked in either direction in Sendai as people try to escape the coastal city

 

 

 

 

 

This extraordinary image shows how the quake split this road in Satte on the island of Honshu right down the middle

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Two women in Urayasu city, Chiba, scramble up a
road that was buckled by the force of the quake. Right, a young woman
wells up and leans on her friend as the true scale of the disaster that
has claimed the lives of hundreds of people becomes apparent

 

 

Collapsed: Three shocked employees look at what has become of the factory in Sukagawa city, Fukushima, where moments earlier they had been working

 

Raging seas: The tsunami pours through trees and engulfs homes on the coast of Natori, Miyagi Prefecture, after the earthquake struck

The same scene just moments later shows how the entire area with dozens of homes is completely obliterated by the unforgiving
waters which swept away anything in their path. Bobbing about on the surface is all the debris the waters have picked up along the way

 

 

Swelling: The murky flow of mud and debris trapped in the tide of water washes over the tarmac car park at Sendai airport in northern Japan

 

 

 

Destruction: Tsunami tidal waves race upstream along the Naka
river at Hitachinaka city in Ibaraki hours after the massive 8.9 magnitude
quake struck this morning

 

 

Red alert: Flames engulf homes that were hit with the full force of the tsunami in the Miyagi region of north eastern Japan

 

Debris: An eerie mist sweeps across the debris of destroyed homes and cars
caught in the raging tsunami waters in Kesennuma in Miyagi,
northern Japan

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Explosion: Flames reach hundreds of feet into the sky after a natural gas facility in Chiba near Tokyo explodes after the earthquake, while right, a fire tears through residential houses in Yamada in northern Japan

 

 

 

 

Stranded: Shoppers sit on the floor of a department store as train and bus services were suspended due to the earthquake

 

 

 

Cold: Elderly women who are likely to have experienced a number of
earthquakes in their lifetime sit on the street as they take in the most
recent disaster which is one of the worst in recent history

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stuck: Stranded commuters inside Tokyo railway station prepare themselves for a long wait as the city, where infrastructure is designed to withstand disasters, recovers from the earthquake

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Aftershocks: A frail elderly man rests under a blanket as all around him the country is gripped by the full scale of the earthquake and right, young Japanese people evacuated from buildings at risk of collapsing wrap blankets around themselves

 

 

 

 

 

At risk: Confusion spead amoung passengers who were taken off planes at Narita International Airport in Naita city, suburban Tokyo

 

 

Pile-up: New cars ready to be shipped are stacked on top of each other after the water gushed through Hitachinaka city in Ibaraki prefecture

 

 

The sheer force of the quake is evident in this image of the road in Fukushima which has been flipped, buckled and broken

 

Aftermath: The remains of houses are surrounded by broken wood and concrete after flood waters engulfed Iwaki town, Fukushima prefecture