An earthquake measuring 7.0 on the Richter scale rocked the southern Japanese island of Kyushu yesterday, killing at least one person and injuring 400 others, officials and press reports said.
The quake, which occurred at 10:53am, also collapsed houses and roads, caused landslides and disrupted land and air traffic.
The government's Meteorological Agency immediately issued tsunami warnings but lifted them one hour later after detecting no significant rise in the tide.
The Kyodo news agency reported about 400 people received treatment at hospitals for injuries. Police confirmed 64 injuries, six of them serious, caused by splinters from shattered window panes and falling objects.
Glass splinters cascaded down from an office building in a business district in Fukuoka, sending passersby rushing away in panic, according to television footage on the Japan Broadcasting Corp.
A 75 year-old woman died after she was crushed by a falling block wall in Fukuoka, a city official said.
"She suffered internal bleeding and a fractured pelvis," the official said by telephone.
Some 10 people were injured on the islet of Genkai at the mouth of Fukuoka Bay as landslides and heavy jolts crushed more than 20 houses, a local official said.
"There was an awful jolt and it rolled for a while, dragging down the chest of drawers and the cupboard in the kitchen at my house," Chizumi Nakamura, secretary of the Genkai community center, said by telephone.
"Children, elderly people and women among the 750 islanders are being evacuated to the city as aftershocks continued," she said, adding no one was reported buried in the landslides.
The epicenter was located in waters off Fukuoka, a major city on the island's northern coast, the meteorological agency said. Its focus was 9km below surface.
Akikichi Matsuzaki, a 50-year-old fisherman on Genkai who was aboard his boat when the quake struck, told Jiji Press, "I heard an enormous bang from the seabed. We felt a shock as if the boat's bottom bumped a big thing."
"The boat swayed greatly. I don't know what happened at all."
A spokesman for the Fukuoka prefectural police headquarters said five hours after the quake that police confirmed 64 injuries, five gas leaks, and damage to four roads and 138 houses. There were also three landslides.
He said a crack, 2cm wide and 100m long, was found on a road near Fukuoka Dome, a seaside baseball park. The surface of the road also buckled out 30cm at one point.
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
UPDATED FORECAST: The warning covered areas of Pingtung County and Hengchun Peninsula, while a sea warning covering the southern Taiwan Strait was amended The Central Weather Administration (CWA) at 5:30pm yesterday issued a land warning for Typhoon Usagi as the storm approached Taiwan from the south after passing over the Philippines. As of 5pm, Usagi was 420km south-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost tip, with an average radius of 150km, the CWA said. The land warning covered areas of Pingtung County and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春), and came with an amended sea warning, updating a warning issued yesterday morning to cover the southern part of the Taiwan Strait. No local governments had announced any class or office closures as of press time last night. The typhoon
DISCONTENT: The CCP finds positive content about the lives of the Chinese living in Taiwan threatening, as such video could upset people in China, an expert said Chinese spouses of Taiwanese who make videos about their lives in Taiwan have been facing online threats from people in China, a source said yesterday. Some young Chinese spouses of Taiwanese make videos about their lives in Taiwan, often speaking favorably about their living conditions in the nation compared with those in China, the source said. However, the videos have caught the attention of Chinese officials, causing the spouses to come under attack by Beijing’s cyberarmy, they said. “People have been messing with the YouTube channels of these Chinese spouses and have been harassing their family members back in China,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
RSS