It is unfair to compare tragedies in terms of their costs and impacts. But the scale of some tragedies is such that comparisons with earlier ones are inevitable. Cursory comparisons show that what happened in Japan on March 11, 2011, has few parallels.

The initial response on part of most was to compare and contrast the developments with the Hanshin quake in Kobe in 1995. Kobe?infamously reputed as the most costly of earthquakes in modern times?was struck by a quake with an intensity of 6.9 on the Richter scale. The Sendai quake on March 11 had a magnitude of 8.9 on the Richter scale. Preliminary estimates show that the quake was almost 180 times more powerful than the one that struck Kobe. Japan is probably the world?s most resilient nation in fighting earthquakes. Its seismological vulnerability has not only made it familiar with quakes but has also trained its people and systems in methods of coping with quakes. But this time the situation was different. It was not only the sheer power of the quake that heightened the calamity. It was the 10 metre tsunami that followed, which caught Japan completely off-guard. To make matters worse, nature decided to unleash its full fury on the hapless Japanese by prompting volcanic eruptions. And as later events show, in addition to loss of lives and property, the damage suffered by nuclear facilities contains a different danger that few had anticipated. The disaster is now being compared with the Chernobyl disaster in Northern Ukraine in April 1986?the worst nuclear plant accident in recent memory.

The initial couple of days after the incident had mixed responses on its impact. Sendai in Northeast Japan is not one of the most economically active regions. Japan?s major agricultural and industrial areas were unaffected. Major business and commercial centres are also unhurt. The commercial losses would have been almost incalculable had Tokyo or Osaka been affected. Most estimates point to aggregate losses of 14-15 trillion yen. This would be roughly half of the economic damage suffered at Kobe in 1995. The final comparative estimates though will need to take into account the recovery costs, which will be known only later. Some estimates suggest that the housing and infrastructure losses could be as much as those in Kobe. Most agencies expect GDP growth for the current year to decline by around half a percentage point. The consensus estimate for GDP growth now is around 1.5% for 2011. There are bound to be short-term impacts like disruption in trade and volatility in yen arising from fluctuations in capital repatriation. Japanese bonds are expected to face volatility for some time ahead. As it happens in a globalised economy, troubles for some might mean bonanzas for others. A cutback in trade might be an unexpected opportunity for China, India and other Asian economies to fill up the global trade space. Similarly, there are reports that supply chain disruptions in Japan in terms of closure of quite a few steel and automobile plants might bring unexpected benefits for US automakers such as General Motors and Ford.

Japan has not been in the pink of economic health for quite some time. Depressed demand conditions have forced the economy into prolonged stagnation. Optimists felt that the reconstruction costs following the earthquake would breathe fresh life into the economy. Reconstruction costs are estimated at around 1% of the Japanese GDP. Bank of Japan stepped into action immediately by injecting 15 trillion yen for averting liquidity shortfalls. It is also expected to substantially increase its asset purchase programmes. However, the optimism over economic recovery through pump-priming appears to have subdued in view of the downsides of the nuclear damage.

The quake hit a region that had three nuclear power facilities. The Fukushima plant of TEPCO has been the worst affected. Multiple explosions and breakout of fire at the plant have resulted in widespread concern not only among the Japanese but also in the region and the rest of the world. Prime Minister Naoto Kan has warned that the radiations are now serious enough for endangering human lives. His apprehensions of the radiation having already spread and the risk of further leakage have changed concerns initially limited to contamination to full-blown threats of a repetition of Chernobyl.

The nuclear fallout has added a different dimension to the catastrophe, with panic reactions surfacing in different quarters. Stock markets have tumbled, with the Asian bourses experiencing the biggest losses. Europe and US markets have also taken to panic selling. The largest offloads are seen in nuclear-related equities, particularly technology counters. The volatility has affected commodities too, with oil and gold prices heading southward. For commodity traders though, the movements might mean unexpected relief, since oil and gold prices were hardening rapidly following the crisis in the Middle East.

The nuclear crisis has revived the global debate on safety and feasibility of nuclear power plants. The debate will intensify following Germany?s decision to shut seven nuclear reactors and EU?s plans to ?stress test? all its plants. India, on the verge of installing French reactors at Jaitapur, has begun feeling the heat of the debate. As the alert level at Fukushima inches closer to Chernobyl?s, Japan?s latest catastrophe might result in nuclear nightmares coming back to haunt the world again. While these prospects are definitely alarming, nuclear fears building up over the last couple of days have diverted attention from the staggering loss of human lives. With more than 10,000 dead, the toll is far higher than Kobe. Compounded with the threat of nuclear radiation taking and damaging more lives, the land of the rising sun could have hardly faced darker days.

The author is a visiting senior research fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies in the National University of Singapore. These are his personal views