First thing first: what's happened in Japan is a human tragedy of enormous scale, and our first thoughts go out to the people of Japan. But many of you continue to ask about the impact on Nikon, so I've tried to keep up with the live TV feeds out of Japan and with friends in the area, and will report what I see or know. Please understand that there is much still chaos and not a lot of verifiable information getting out of the most affected areas, as the power, telephone, and transportation infrastructures have been severely hit.
All this is the result of the strongest recorded quake to strike Japan. This tremor hit the Northeast coast of the main island of Honshu. The 9.0 (recalculated) Japan-scale quake was relatively shallow (no more than 15 miles) and as close as 81 miles (130km) east of Sendai, and caused a tsunami that added to the damage in coastal areas.
That city name will be familiar to Nikon users: it's where Nikon's professional camera body manufacturing plant is located. D700, D3s, and D3x cameras are made there, as would be the followup camera to the D700 and the D4 expected later this year. The Sendai airport, which is not far from the plant, suffered massive flooding from a 10m-high tsunami wave that hit the coast (see this video). Initial reports said that the Nikon plant was not significantly affected, but almost certainly there are power, people, transportation, and perhaps even more issues that will directly impact the plant, even if it wasn't hit with the water. I currently doubt those initial reports, as earlier this morning I saw an aerial video passing over the Sendai area that I'm pretty sure included the Nikon plant. That video seemed to show at least some cosmetic damage to the structures in those blocks. Asahi.co.jp is reporting that the Nikon plant cannot reopen on Monday mostly due to lack of electricity.
In one post-tsunami image I've seen, it's clear that the water did not get to the plant (it's under the cloud in the upper left in this image, but I can triangulate using known buildings and the water line doesn't approach the area). According to NHK, power has been restored to some parts of Sendai, but there's also heavy devastation in the area between Natori where the plant is located and the coast (see this Terra satellite comparison). In an area south of where the Nikon plant is, there's this before/after comparison (Natori is above and to the left of where this pair of images show). Here's another interesting set of before/after comparisons of places near the plant. This devastation certainly has had to directly impact some Nikon Sendai employees, and they have our sympathy and condolences for their losses.
If you're interested in seeing the Nikon plants most threatened by the quake, type "277, Aza-hara, Tako, Natori, Miyagi, Japan" into Google maps. That's the Sendai plant. Google maps doesn't recognize the lens plant factory address, but you get to the region by typing "Midori, Otawara, Tochigi, Japan" and then look at the top entry. Another map put together by one of my readers (thank you) with locations of where key videos that are circulating on the net were taken.
Sigma's COO tweeted that there was damage to machines and faciilities at their Fukushima Aizu factory, but no injuries or casualties. He later tweeted that they hope to resume production next week some time.
If you'd like to see just how many large scale earthquakes are happening in the area, the USGS maps this and you can see that here. As I write this, the threats to the area clearly are not over, as there have been repeated 5+ and 6+ magnitude quakes, including one at 6.8. The current prediction from Japan's geological experts is that there is more than a 70% chance of another quake as high as 7.0 in the next week. Since these are happening close to coast, the tsunami threat is also still present, though the overall warnings have been dropped at the moment. One geologist interviewed seems to think that the quake actually put more stress on other areas in the zone, which would mean continued quakes for awhile, and doesn't rule out the possibility of another very large one. The biggest worry about the plate structure off the coast of Japan is south of the area where these quakes are occuring, and much closer to Tokyo itself.
Again, our sympathy and support goes out to all those who have had their lives impacted by this event. I'm sure that the entire camera-using community is thinking of our camera-making friends and wishing them the very best in this tragic situation. When things settle down some and it is clear how we can best help, I'll post that information here.