An unprecedented level of precipitation caused flooding and landslides in western Japan, leaving at least one dead and two missing on Saturday, August 14. Authorities in the department of Hiroshima and northern Kyushu Island have issued the highest level of alert to be evacuated. As part of this alert, which is not mandatory, 1.4 million people are invited to leave their homes immediately, said the public channel NHK.
Japan’s meteorological agency JMA reported unprecedented levels of precipitation in the region, and heavy rains are expected to continue to fall over large parts of Japan for several days.
Television footage shows people rescued from lifeboats in the submerged streets of Kurume town (Fukuoka prefecture) as a muddy current begins to overflow in neighboring Saga prefecture.
A 59-year-old woman has died and two members of her family are missing in Unzen (Nagasaki prefecture, southwestern Japan), after two houses were entombed by a landslide, according to a local official, Takumi Kumasaki.
“More than 150 soldiers, police and firefighters have been sent to take part in the relief operations”, he detailed. “They are looking for missing people, while monitoring possible landslides as heavy rains continue to fall. “
Increased risk due to global warming
Scientists say global climate change is causing a warmer atmosphere to hold more water, increasing the risk and intensity of extreme precipitation.
“Unprecedented levels of precipitation have been recorded”, said Yushi Adachi, a JMA official, at a press conference in Tokyo. “Maximum alert is necessary even in regions where the risks of landslides and floods are generally not so high”, according to him.
In early July, heavy rains caused a devastating mudslide in the resort town of Atami, about 100 kilometers west of Tokyo, which left 23 people dead and four missing. In July 2020, floods in southwestern Japan left more than 80 dead and missing. Two years earlier, more than 200 people were killed in violent floods in the west of the country.