A race against time to find survivors will take place in Japan on Tuesday after an earthquake devastated the Noto Peninsula in the center of the country on Monday, killing 30 people, according to a new preliminary report. Authorities in Ishikawa department, which includes the Noto Peninsula, reported 30 deaths, 14 seriously injured and “many” minor injuries on Tuesday.
“It was such a huge shock,” Tsugumasa Mihara, 73, told AFP as he lined up with hundreds of other residents of Shika, a small town on the Noto Peninsula, to collect supplies from drinking water tanks at the town hall. “What a terrible start to the year,” he added.
Tsunami danger averted
At 4:10 p.m. (07:10 GMT) on Monday, the largest earthquake among the more than 150 significant tremors felt through Tuesday morning was recorded, with a magnitude of 7.5, according to the American Institute of Geophysics (USGS) and 7.6 according to data registered by Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA).
This earthquake, which was felt as far as Tokyo, 320 km as the crow flies from Noto, also caused immense material damage and on Monday there was a tsunami on the coast of the Sea of Japan, which ultimately remained of low strength, reaching 1.2 meters high measured.
The tsunami risk level, which initially triggered a rare maximum warning from the JMA, was then downgraded and permanently raised by the same agency at 10:00 a.m. (0100 GMT) on Tuesday.
“Numerous victims”
As the sun rose on Tuesday, the extent of the destruction became apparent: old houses and collapsed buildings everywhere, cracked roads, capsized or stranded fishing boats and ongoing fires amid smoldering ruins.
The earthquakes caused “many fatalities” and significant property damage, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on Tuesday. “We have to race against time” to save lives, he added.
A major fire particularly devastated part of the city center of Wajima, a small historic port in the north of the Noto Peninsula known for its artisanal lacquer products. A six-story commercial building also collapsed due to the earthquake.
“Hold on! Hold on!” firefighters shouted as they used an electric saw and crawled to cut an access path through the rubble, according to Japanese television images filmed in Wajima.
The firefighters were overwhelmed, an official from the Wajima rescue service told AFP on Tuesday. “We are dealing with multiple fires,” and the number of emergency calls and damage reports continues to rise, he said.
Evacuation instructions
More than 32,000 households remained without power on Tuesday and many towns in Ishikawa department no longer have access to drinking water. According to the National Fire and Natural Disaster Management Agency, more than 60,000 residents had received evacuation orders as of Monday.
A thousand soldiers from the Japan Self-Defense Forces (JASF) as well as more than 2,000 firefighters and around 630 police officers have arrived as reinforcements in the disaster areas, Kishida said on Tuesday.
The Prime Minister on Monday also announced the shipment of essential goods such as drinking water, food, blankets, gasoline and even heating oil by plane or boat.
“No anomaly” in nuclear power plants
In light of the disaster, the traditional public New Year's greetings of Japanese Emperor Naruhito and his family, which were scheduled to take place in Tokyo on Tuesday, were canceled.
Several damaged highways were closed to traffic and bullet train (Shinkansen) service between Tokyo and Ishikawa, suspended since Monday, was expected to resume Tuesday afternoon.
Japan is located on the Pacific Ring of Fire and is one of the countries with the most frequent earthquakes in the world. Therefore, extremely strict building standards apply in the archipelago, so that modern buildings can usually withstand strong earthquakes, but older houses are significantly less so.
Japan is haunted by the memory of the terrible 9.0 magnitude earthquake that struck the country's northeast coast in March 2011, followed by a huge tsunami that left about 20,000 people dead or missing.
This disaster also led to the Fukushima nuclear accident, the worst since Chernobyl in 1986. “No anomaly” was detected in the country's nuclear power plants, the Japanese Nuclear Safety Agency (NRA) assured on Monday.