Strong quake kills at least 5 in Japan(CBC News)

Monday, July 16, 2007


At least five people were killed and more than 500 others were injured as a strong earthquake rocked northwestern Japan Monday morning.

The 6.7-magnitude quake struck around 10:13 a.m. local time off the coast of the Niigata area, about 260 kilometres northwest of Tokyo, the country's meteorological agency said.

Police said five elderly people, four women and a man, were crushed to death when buildings collapsed. Japan's national broadcaster, NHK, reported that more than 500 people were hurt, with injuries including broken bones, cuts and bruises.

"I was so scared — the violent shaking went on for 20 seconds," local resident Ritei Wakatsuki told the Associated Press by telephone from Kashiwazaki. "I almost fainted by the fear of shaking."

The quake destroyed dozens of houses in the hardest hit city of Kashiwazaki and caused a fire at a nuclear power station. The fire at the plant's electrical transformer was put out shortly after noon and there was no release of radioactivity or damage to the reactors, said Motoyasu Tamaki, a Tokyo Electric Power Co. official.

Nearly 300 buildings in the city were destroyed, AP quoted a fire official as saying. The force of the quake buckled seaside roads and bridges, and one-metre-wide fissures could been seen in the ground along the coastline.


The meteorological agency also issued a tsunami warnings for the coastal area of Niigata, but the warnings were later lifted.

Aftershocks possible for a week: official

Some 2,000 people in Kashiwazaki were evacuated from their homes, city official Takashi Otsuka said.

The area was plagued by a series of aftershocks, the strongest of which was magnitude 5.8 and made buildings in Tokyo sway. It was also felt in northern and central Japan. Meteorological agency spokesman Koichi Uhira warned that the aftershocks could continue for a week.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said he would head to the damaged area.

"We want to do all we can to ensure safety … and to quell everyone's concerns," the prime minister said after interrupting a campaign stop in the north for upcoming parliamentary elections. "I want to get a picture of what happened and also want everyone to feel a little bit more secure."

Japan sits atop four tectonic plates and is one of the world's most earthquake-prone countries. The last major quake to hit Tokyo killed about 142,000 people in 1923 and experts say the capital has a 90 per cent chance of suffering a major quake in the next 50 years.

In October 2004, a magnitude-6.8 earthquake hit Niigata, killing 40 people and damaging more than 6,000 homes. It was the deadliest to hit Japan since 1995, when a magnitude-7.2 quake killed 6,433 people in the western city of Kobe.




















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I just came back from volunteer meeting and turned on the TV. I live in Tokyo, so didn't feel any earthquake this morning.... My cabin is almost on the border between Nagano prefecture and Yamanashi prefecture, so really concerning about this news.

I will update more new info later.