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Typhoon Roke toll rises to 11 dead and five missing in Japan
Alert levels for possible floods or landslides caused by heavy rains remain high. The Japanese Meteorological agency monitors the level of the rivers and land stability. Roke’s passage over Fukushima has not apparently caused further damage to the nuclear power plant following the crisis last March. Over a million people evacuated.
Tokyo (AsiaNews / Agencies) - The official death toll of Typhoon Roke in Japan has risen to 11, while five people are still missing. The Japanese Kyodo News agency reports warnings of possible floods and landslides in many areas marked by heavy rain fall. The Japanese Meteorological Agency also maintains a high alarm level as it monitors land and rivers to prevent new disasters. Japan is still scarred by the earthquake and subsequent tsunami on 11 March, which led to the accident in the nuclear power plant in Fukushima, in the north-east of the country.
Roke - the 15th typhoon that hit the land of the Rising Sun this year - yesterday headed towards the north-east, moving up to the northern island of Hokkaido. Experts have continued to closely monitor its passage, fearing it could hit the nuclear power plant and cause further damage, but so far this has been avoided. In recent days, winds and rains - which have reached 216 km / h - have invested the capital, Tokyo, causing the disruption of transport including the underground network.
Local sources speak of seven wounded at the passage of typhoon in the prefectures of Kanagawa, Gifu, Aichi, Ehime, Saga and Nagasaki. In the morning rescuers found the body of a man between 50 and 60 years of age, near the Nagoya River. For now the order to evacuate 60 thousand people living in Aichi and Mie prefectures remains in force. At least 240 thousand citizens of the prefectures of Odawara and Kanagawa had to abandon their homes because of the risk of floods and landslides. The evacuation orders have affected some 1.21 million Japanese belonging to 512 households.
Roke also led to the cancellation of more than 300 domestic flights in Japan and the suspension of Tokaido Shinkansen railway lines, connecting Tokyo and Osaka and Yamagata Shinkansen Line, which connects Fukushima and Shinjo in the northeast.