The death toll from a series of powerful earthquakes, with the largest measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale, hit central Japan and surrounding areas to 24, as search operations for survivors continued, authorities said on Tuesday.
On Monday, an earthquake hit the Noto Peninsula in Ishikawa Prefecture at a shallow depth, reports Xinhua. The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) has officially named it the 2024 Noto Peninsula Earthquake. At least 155 earthquakes have hit Japan since Monday. According to Wajima City Hall, a teenager was among the victims.
A massive fire broke out around the famous Wajima morning market, engulfing around 200 buildings. The city also experienced building collapses where 14 people were buried. As more damage reports and information about people trapped in other municipalities continued to come in, injuries from collapsed or damaged buildings were reported in Niigata, Toyama, Fukui and Gifu prefectures.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida on Tuesday described rescuing those affected by the earthquake as a race against time, saying the government had already sent a number of self-defense units to the affected areas and would continue to provide aid.
Meanwhile, all tsunami warnings in Japan have been lifted, JMA said in its latest update on Tuesday morning. After the tremors, the Agency for the Noto Region issued a major tsunami warning and urged people to evacuate immediately. A tsunami warning was also in effect for Niigata, Toyama and Ishikawa prefectures.
The first waves reportedly hit the coast just over 10 minutes after the earthquake struck. Tsunami waves as high as 4 feet hit a number of areas along the country’s west coast. About 45,700 households are currently without power in Ishikawa Prefecture, according to Hokuriku Electric Power on Tuesday.
Japan’s public broadcaster NHK said four bullet trains whose high-speed runs were halted on Monday have now resumed service to their destinations, CNN reports. High-speed trains are stuck between the central cities of Toyama and Kanazawa. After standing still for more than 11 hours, the two trains arrived at Toyama Station at 4 a.m. Tuesday, officials said.
Another two trains traveling in the opposite direction arrived at Kanazawa Station in Ishiwaka Prefecture. Nearly 1,400 passengers were stranded on high-speed trains, NHK reported, citing Japan Railways West.
Japan is one of the most seismically active nations on Earth, thanks to its location on the so-called Pacific Ring of Fire, where many tectonic plates meet. A 9.0-magnitude earthquake that struck Japan in 2011 resulted in a tsunami – which hit the country’s northeastern coastal communities, killing nearly 18,000 people and displacing tens of thousands.
These tsunami waves triggered a nuclear meltdown at the Fukushima plant, causing the worst nuclear meltdown since Chernobyl.
