This quake and tsunami were far more powerful than anything in Japanese recorded history (which goes back far, far longer than our young nation's history). Should they have anticipated something so devastating? And it's not like the engineers had NO clue that tsunamis were something to consider.

Let's consider another event. Was 9/11 and the collapse of the Twin Towers a black swan event? The Empire State building was designed to survive aircraft strikes and so was the WTC according to sites like this. It was designed to survive being hit by a jetliner. Does that fact make what actually happened in real life any less unexpected and surprising, i.e. a black swan event?