Japan: Thousands of quake victims gather in shelters
Tens of thousands of Japanese huddled in makeshift emergency shelters today after a string of earthquakes in northern Japan flattened homes, toppled bridges and derailed trains, killing at least 21 people and reportedly injuring 2,000 others. Eight people were believed missing.
A 6.8-magnitude quake centred in Ojiya, about 160 miles north west of Tokyo, rocked the area yesterday, knocking a bullet train from its rails, ripping through roadways and rattling buildings as far away as the Japanese capital.
Several strong quakes followed throughout the night, and aftershocks continued to jolt the area throughout today.
The disaster was the deadliest quake in Japan since a massive tremor struck the western city of Kobe in January 1995 and killed more than 6,000 people.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi today pledged that the government would set aside funding for reconstruction. But officials estimated it would take weeks to rebuild roads, bridges and homes and restore essential services.
Tens of thousands of rural residents – many of them elderly – were evacuated from flattened homes to emergency shelters. Officials handed out blankets and flew in bottled water since most utility services were cut off in the quake zone.
Japan’s military used helicopters to airlift stranded villagers from a riverside hamlet, Shiotani, that was cut off when the bridge connecting it to Ojiya was toppled. Several other villages were isolated, including Yamagoshi, a mountain village of 600, where a landslide swept away the only road.
The injured overwhelmed small local hospitals, where patients were being treated in the hallways.
Temperatures were expected to drop to 13 Celsius (55 degrees Fahrenheit) this evening, and some 60 people crowded into the lobby of the Nagaoka City Hall to take advantage of the heating, laying out thin foldable mattresses or garden chairs from home.
Despite the destruction, the areas hit were in largely rural Niigata district, sparing Japan a much larger death toll had the quakes struck a major city.
But the area was still dangerous. Japan’s Meteorological Agency registered more than 309 aftershocks – most too weak to be felt – following the big quake, and warned that another quake of similar power could rip across the region over the next week.
Japan’s Fire and Disaster Management Agency said today that 21 people had died and they had counted 1,217 injured.
Public broadcaster NHK, however, estimated that more than 2,000 had been hurt. Among the dead were five children, including a 2-month-old baby.
Sewage and water mains burst, gas and telephone services were down. Homes in 36 cities, towns and villages in Niigata district had no water. Close to 124,000 homes were without power by this afternoon, Tohoku Electric said on its website.
Across Niigata, 64,800 people were evacuated to emergency shelters. In Ojiya, 14,500 people had taken refuge at 93 different evacuation centres – mostly school gymnasiums and public halls – after many had spent the night in their cars. In Nagaoka, the largest city in the region, more than 34,000 people had been evacuated.
With roads blocked and traffic snarling, the parking lot outside Ojiya city hall had become a makeshift refuge.
The first quake hit at 5.56pm (9.56am Irish time) yesterday and was centred about 12 miles beneath the earth’s surface. At least a half dozen more tremors hit over the following hours, including magnitude-6.2 and 5.9 quakes.
Takejiro Hoshino, 75, lost his 12-year-old grandson when their house collapsed. “I got out and then we all went back to try to save the others, but it was too late,” Hoshino said.
The quakes came just days after Japan’s deadliest typhoon in more than a decade, which left 79 dead and a dozen others missing. Authorities said there were concerns that the shaking could cause topsoil loosened by the storm’s torrential rains to slide down hillsides.
Japan, which rests atop several tectonic plates, is among the world’s most earthquake-prone countries. A magnitude-6 quake can cause widespread damage to homes and other buildings if centred in a heavily populated area.
