Soldiers and emergency workers combed through a badly damaged shopping mall and collapsed houses looking for trapped survivors yesterday after a powerful earthquake that killed at least 18 people, including a foreigner, in southwestern Japan.
The magnitude 7.1 earthquake that hit a day earlier in the Kumamoto area on the southern main island of Kyushu also left at least 62 people injured, six of them seriously, the prefectural government said. The tally has been steadily growing, fanning fears it may continue to rise.
The sweltering weather heightened worries about the survivors as rescuers braved the heat. It remained unclear how many people might still be missing.
Some of the most serious damage was at the Aeon Mall shopping center in Kashima city, which was bustling with thousands of people when the quake happened. The company said some 3,000 customers were evacuated to a parking lot before a gas explosion happened in another part of the mall, where some people were still working.
The mall’s second floor collapsed, trapping people. Witnesses said the explosion shook the area as much as the quake.
Three people remained missing, while four deaths were confirmed at the mall site, according to Aeon President Akio Yoshida.
Japanese media footage of the mall showed that part of the ceiling had caved in, and metal pieces and other debris were scattered about as helmeted and masked rescue workers searched the area.
Nearly 34,900 homes were still without electricity and some 15,000 homes without running water, Kumamoto officials said. More than 8,800 people left their homes to stay in over 400 shelters, where power sources were being added to provide air conditioning.
Aerial police footage showed some homes in residential areas were completely flattened, including a few that crumbled into a nearby river.
Japan’s Self Defense Forces joined rescue workers in the search and rescue operations. Hundreds of professionals were helping with the effort, including firefighters from Taiwan.
Bullet train services remained suspended. Although operations at Aso Kumamoto Airport resumed Wednesday, some airlines canceled flights as a precautionary measure.
Kumamoto was hit with a deadly quake in 2016 that killed at least 50 people. Japan is one of the most quake-prone nations in the world.-AP
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