Toll in record Japan rains hits 100
TOKYO (AFP/Reuters) - The toll in days of devastating rains in Japan has risen to 100, the government's top spokesman said Monday, as searchand-rescue operations continued.
Yoshihide Suga said 87 people had been confirmed dead from the severe floods, with another 13 found with no vital signs, adding that more than a dozen people were still missing.
Evacuation orders were in place for nearly 2 million people and landslide warnings were issued in many prefectures.
In hard-hit western Japan, emergency services and military personnel used helicopters and boats to rescue people from swollen rivers and buildings, including a hospital.
Scores of staff and patients, some still in their pajamas, were rescued from the isolated Mabi Memorial Hospital in boats rowed by members of Japan’s Self Defence Forces.
A city official said late on Sunday that 170 patients and staff had been evacuated, while public broadcaster NHK later said about 80 people were still stranded.
“I’m most grateful to the rescuers,” said Shigeyuki Asano, a 79-year-old patient who spent a night without electricity or water. “I feel so relieved that I am now liberated from such a bad-smelling, dark place.”
Television footage showed a massive rescue operation, with 2,310 rescued in the city by evening, according to NHK, while search-and-rescue teams looked for others.
The overall death toll from the rains in Japan rose after floodwaters forced several million people from their homes, NHK reported early on Monday.
An additional 58 were missing, NHK said, and more rain was set to hit some areas for at least another day.
The rain set off landslides and flooded rivers, trapping many people in their houses or on rooftops.
“This is a situation of extreme danger,” an official at the Japanese Meteorological Agency (JMA), told a news conference.
Japan’s government set up an emergency management center at the prime minister’s office and some 54,000 rescuers from the military, police and fire departments were dispatched across a wide swath of western and southwestern Japan.
“There are still many people missing and others in need of help, we are working against time,” Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said on Sunday morning.
Emergency warnings for severe rain in 11 prefectures - the most since a new warning system was introduced in 2013 - had been lifted by evening, but advisories for heavy rain and landslides remained in effect in many areas.
TV footage showed convenience stores with shelves mostly bare while elsewhere, residents lined up to receive water. Some 276,000 households were without water supply, Kyodo said.
Roads were closed and train services suspended in parts of western Japan, while Shinkansen bullet-train services resumed on a limited schedule after being suspended on Friday.