On Saturday, a heavy rainstorm along with the strong winds hit Tokyo as well as its surrounding areas as a powerful typhoon made its landfall in the southwest of Tokyo, with streets, beaches along with train stations deserted. This is considered to be the powerful and worst typhoon to hit Japan in six decades.
Live Updates: Typhoon hits Japan
In advance, the Japan Meteorological Agency has already warned the general public regarding the dangerously heavy rainfall in Tokyo and surrounding prefectures, comprising Gunma, Saitama as well as Kanagawa.
Meteorological agency official Yasushi Kajihara stated while adding that areas commonly safe from disasters may prove vulnerable, he said, “Be ready for rainfall of the kind that you have never experienced,”
“Take all measures necessary to save your life,” he further added.
On Saturday evening, shortly before the typhoon made landfall in Shizuoka prefecture, an earthquake shook the area drenched by the rainfall.
As per to the US Geological Survey, the magnitude 5.3 quake was centred in the ocean off the coast of Chiba, near Tokyo, along with this it was fairly deep, at 59.5 kilometers (37 miles). Deep quakes have a tendency to cause less damage as compared to the shallow ones.
Typhoon Hagibis hits Japan
Kajihara also said that the people who live near rivers must take shelter on the second floor or else to the higher one of any sturdy building if an officially designated evacuation centre wasn’t certainly available. At the same time he also expressed fears that disaster may have already struck in some areas.
Hagibis, meaning “speed” in Filipino, was proceeding north-northwestward with full sustained winds of 162 kilometers (100 miles) per hour, as per to the meteorological agency.
The storm also brought very heavy rainfall in wide areas of Japan all day in advance of its landfall, comprising in Shizuoka as well as Mie prefectures, southwest of Tokyo, along with Chiba to the north, which saw power outages and damaged homes in a typhoon previous month.
At last, on Saturday, a tornado ripped through Chiba, overturning a car in the city of Ichihara along with killing a man inside the vehicle, a city official Tatsuya Sakamaki said. There were five people who were injured when the tornado ripped through a house and their injuries were not life-threatening, Sakamaki said.
Tokyo Earth Quake Updates
For the risk areas, evacuation advisories were issued, which also comprised of Shimoda city, west of Tokyo. There are dozens of evacuation centres that have been set up in coastal towns, as well as people rested on gymnasium floors.
On the other hand, All Nippon Airways and Japan Airlines grounded most domestic as well as international flights at the Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya airports. Along with airlines, the Central Japan Railway Co. also cancelled bullet-train service between Tokyo and Osaka except for few early Saturday trains that are connected to Nagoya and Osaka.
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