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Strong quake rocks Japan
16/07/2007 07:21 - (SA)
Tokyo - A strong earthquake jolted north-western Japan on Monday, killing at least two people, injuring more than 200 and flattening houses, Japanese media and officials said.
Two women in their 80s died when their homes collapsed due to
the magnitude 6.8 tremor, centred some 250km northwest of Tokyo, Japanese media said.
"I was on the street, and there was strong sideways shaking.
I couldn't remain standing. One wall has collapsed," gasoline
station worker Hiroki Takahashi told public broadcaster NHK in
Kashiwazaki City, near the focus of the quake, where there were
reports of at least 12 people trapped under collapsed houses.
Nuclear reactors shut down
Buildings swayed as far away as Tokyo, and nuclear power
reactors in Niigata prefecture were shut down for checks but
there were no radiation leaks reported.
Black smoke billowed from a fire in an electrical transformer
building at the Kashiwazaki Kariwa nuclear power plant - the
world's largest - near the epicentre.
The fire was largely out by noon.
Japan's Meteorological Agency warned that aftershocks could
continue to rock the area, where evacuation centres were being
set up.
Troops and extra emergency teams were being sent to help with
rescue and clean-up efforts in the area, where TV pictures showed
several houses and a temple had collapsed.
Bullet trains halted
Bullet trains to the area were halted briefly and local
trains stopped. TV pictures showed one train had toppled off the
rails, but media said no one was injured. Some 37 000 households
were without water service, public broadcaster NHK said.
The 10:13 quake was centred around 60km southwest of Niigata. Monday is a holiday in Japan so financial markets were closed.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe had cut short campaigning for an
upcoming Upper House election and was returning to Tokyo, Chief
Cabinet Secretary Yasuhisa Shiozaki told a news conference.
Tsunami warning sirens sounded along affected stretches of
the Sea of Japan, with a surge of up to about 50cm predicted, but the warning was later withdrawn.
Niigata was the site of an October 2004 earthquake with a
matching magnitude of 6.8 that killed 65 people and injured more
than 3 000.
That was the deadliest quake since a magnitude 7.3 tremor hit
the city of Kobe in 1995, killing more than 6 400.
- Reuters
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