Twitch streamer captures moment 7.6 magnitude earthquake hit Japan: 'I was scared'

A Twitch streamer in Niigata, Japan, was livestreaming on Jan. 1 when she got an earthquake alert on her phone. Shiori, the streamer, received the notification about six minutes into her livestream, according to clips from the video, and announced to her viewers that she had to run outside.

This came only a couple minutes after Shiori said she experienced a smaller quake during the livestream.

Shiori left her camera on, so followers were able to witness the effects of the earthquake impacting her home.

After about two minutes, Shiori returned to the camera and assured viewers that she and her family were safe and preparing to evacuate properly. Shiori also confirmed to Yahoo News that she and her grandparents, who she lives with, are safe.

Shiori said that the comments from her followers brought her a little bit of relief and solace after she returned to her computer once the earthquake was over. She mentioned that ultimately she was glad she had left her camera on.

“I was not panicking, but I was scared how big the earthquake [was] going to be,” she told Yahoo News. She added that the house she and her family live in is a 60-year-old building. “I’m always worried that it [will] collapse from [a] big quake.”

Shiori said she has lived through three other major earthquakes in Japan, in 2004, 2007 and 2011.

The Jan. 1 earthquake had a reported magnitude of 7.6 and hit Ishikawa in central Japan — about 200 miles away from Shiori’s home — early Monday morning. A magnitude 7.6 is classified as a “major earthquake” on the Richter scale, and the U.S. Geological Survey reported that it was the strongest earthquake to hit the region in more than 40 years.

The earthquake immediately set off 3-foot waves along Japan’s west coast and parts of South Korea’s coast. The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) first issued a major tsunami warning before downgrading it to an advisory. The last time JMA announced a major tsunami warning was in March 2011, when an earthquake and tsunami hit northeastern Japan and killed an estimated 20,000 people.

As of reporting, the Jan. 1 earthquake has killed at least 55 people and knocked out power to tens of thousands of homes in coastal areas.

Twitch, which launched in 2011, exploded during the pandemic, accumulating 17 billion hours of watch time in 2020 alone. Shiori has a little over 2,000 followers, but the Twitch clip of the earthquake has almost 170,000 views in less than 24 hours.

Twitch’s livestreaming capabilities have captured all sorts of unplanned moments over the years, including pickpockets, dangerous cooking mishaps and life-changing surprises.

It’s also not the first time a streamer has caught a natural disaster in real time. In February 2023, Twitch streamer Burak “Kirmizi Kep” Şener was filming when a 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit Turkey. He and his family survived the quake, but over 50,000 people were killed in Turkey and 8,000 people were killed in Syria.