Rescuers have combed the debris-strewn banks of a river in central Japan trying to find victims after houses had been swept away in flooding and landslides that killed a minimum of six folks.
Heavy rain pounded the Noto Peninsula – an space nonetheless reeling from a devastating earthquake in January – over the weekend, remodeling the Tsukada River right into a muddy torrent that inundated roads and a distant hamlet.
After the skies lastly cleared, police and firefighters from throughout Japan had been joined by residents and the daddy of a 14-year-old lady who’s considered one of seven folks nonetheless lacking or whose standing stays unknown.
Public broadcaster NHK and different Japanese media retailers stated six folks had been useless.
Rain pounded the region from Saturday, with greater than 540 millimetres (21 inches) recorded within the metropolis of Wajima over 72 hours – the heaviest steady rain since comparative knowledge turned out there.
The flooding hit the area because it makes a fragile restoration from a magnitude-7.5 quake on New 12 months’s Day, which toppled buildings, triggered tsunami waves and sparked a significant hearth.
The flood waters inundated emergency housing sheltering individuals who had misplaced their houses within the January 1 earthquake, which killed a minimum of 374 folks.
On Monday afternoon, 3,700 households nonetheless had no energy, in accordance with the Hokuriku Electrical Energy Firm.
Greater than 100 areas within the area had been remoted, with roads blocked because of landslides.