We’ve had some terrible tragedies here in the states over the past few years, but nothing compares to what’s going on in the east.

1,597 deaths have already been confirmed by the Japanese government, according to Japanese broadcaster NHK.

That does not include the 200 to 300 bodies that washed up on the shores of Miyagi following the violent tsunami that came shortly after the 8.9-magnitude quake.

1,841 people are now being officially counted as “missing.”

Japanese officials in the Miyagi region, which was among the hardest hit by the tsunami, are saying that up to 10,000 people may have been killed.

Prime Minister Naoto Kan described the on-going events in Japan as the worst disaster since World War II. The Japanese are dealing not only with the human and infrastructural losses brought on by the quake but also by the damage inflicted by the tsunami and Japan is also doing everything in its power to off-set a possible nuclear disaster as the Fukushima nuclear power plant situation remains dire.

Millions of people remain without electricity and approximately 310,000 people have been evacuated to government-run shelters.

Onagwa, another nuclear site, is now under a state of emergency as radiation levels climbed beyond permissible levels.

10,000 is an obscene number of people to die at any one time, but considering this was a natural disaster it makes it all the more difficult to fathom that kind of destruction.

Let’s continue to pray for Japan!