It was a natural disaster presented in a way never seen before. In an astonishing lesson in the immediacy offered by 21st-century technology, those unable to contact relatives in Japan by phone could watch their predicament in real time on television and online.
While the shaky mobile phone footage of the Boxing Day tsunami in 2004 took days to reach the outside world, Japanese television helicopters were already airborne as a wall of water swept inland on Honshu island.
Armchair earthquake-watchers sat enthralled and horrified as the devastation unfolded before their eyes in scenes straight out of a disaster film as cars, boats and entire houses were consumed by the relentless waters. Closed-circuit television cameras, webcams and a plethora of television crews served up the quake from every angle, witnessing office workers diving under their desks, tins toppling from supermarket shelves and the horror on the face of the Japanese Prime Minister.
The most compelling images, posted to YouTube minutes after they were broadcast, were relayed around the world at lightning speed thanks to Facebook and Twitter. Social networking sites also helped to bridge the communication gap as mobile networks jammed as a result of the volume of calls.
If the recent uprisings in the Arab world were the Twitter revolutions, then this was the Twitter disaster.