Misato can't do math.

[Craftee]

SPOILER: Show

Hmmm....
420,000m diameter explosion.
evacuate 120,000m radius = 240,000m diameter...
millions of Japanese dead...

[ElMariachi]

I think that it's more so no civilian could interfere with the operation to catch Sahaquiel(they didn't had any idea where he would crash precisely and thus gave themselves a very large margin), since no matter if Misato evacuates the civilians withing a 120 km radius or of Japan as a whole, if Sahaquiel impact with the ground, he'll reach Lilith immediately and the whole planet dies anyway.

[Craftee]

so Lilith is only 15km in the ground? seems a bit shallow dont ya think? imean geofront is only 13km wide. that means lilith is 2km under the entirety of geofront.

[ElMariachi]

Lilith is more like 7km under the Geofront, the image you posted in the Geofront/Moon stuff thread is wrong :


The geofront is only the "lens" just under Tokyo-3, just under there's the giant 13km wide sphere(chalice/screw in Rebuild) that is the Black Moon, with Lilith at the center of it.

The 15km deep impact calculations of Sahaquiel crashing on Earth assume that what's below the Geofront is just regular ground and rock, not the Black Moon which is extremely resistant(only an handful of NERV members know that they are actually inside a nigh-indestructible crashed alien spaceship)

Had Sahaquiel won and crashed on Earth, he would had probably only blasted through enough of the Black Moon to reach Lilith, since he wants to fuse with her, not vaporize her.

[Craftee]

OKAY!
that makes a whole lot of sense now.

[ElMariachi]

Eh don't worry, it happened to every of us! ;)

Evangelion is that kind of franchise that doesn't take you by the hand and you have to piece the elements of background, sometimes retro-actively, for some scenes to make sense. That's part of what makes that franchise so interesting!