A SAR officer is looking for other victims of Typhoon Hagibis. (Image via Mainichi.jp)

Typhoon Hagibis' aftermath, 40 dead, 16 missing, over 180 injured

Alfonsus Adi Putra
Social & Life
Weather
Oct 14, 2019
2615
On Saturday, typhoon no. 19, dubbed Typhoon Hagibis, swept through Japan's main island, Honshu. Even the capital did not escape the natural calamity. Throughout six decades in Japan, Typhoon Hagibis was considered the worst. The Japan Meteorological Agency issued the highest alert for some regions, telling over 6 million people to evacuate.

Accompanied by torrential rain, the river also overflowed, rendering a handful of residential areas inundated. Among the areas hit the hardest by Hagibis, Nagano was one of which. The bank of the Chikuma River destroyed, flooding the residential areas 5 meters deep.

Based on the information provided by local authorities and search-and-rescue (SAR) teams, 40 people died, 16 people missing, and about 189 people injured. Currently, SAR operations were ongoing in central, eastern, and northeastern regions. The number might be increasing.

On the last weekends, the figures were 5 people died, 11 people missing, and at least 90 people injured. Nonetheless, as the SAR operations continued, more victims had been found. The casualties died due to either drowning or being trapped. In nine prefectures, there were about 33 landslides and mudflows.

By Sunday morning, the evacuation alert had been lifted up, and some transportation services had already continued their services. Haneda International Airport had also continued its flight services. The typhoon, named Hagibis from Tagalog which means “swift”, drifted away to the Japanese archipelago, weakening to an extratropical cyclone.

In Chiba Prefecture, previously hit by Typhoon Faxai last month, Hagibis caused a major power outage. More than 100,000 houses were left powerless. In the northeastern region of Japan, more than 28,000 houses were powerless.

Due to Hagibis, Japan had to cancel some rugby matches. Currently, Japan is holding the 2019 Rugby World Cup.

Source: https://bit.ly/319fq8R

Disaster , Weather , Asia , Japan , Typhoon-Hagibis