Floods in Japan have already left 70 dead – 07/08/2018

Japan leads a race against time to save thousands of people and locate dozens of missing people in floods and landslides caused by torrential rains in the west of the country makes more than 70 dead

The dozens of deaths, which are feared that the number will increase with the pbadage of the hours, while the relief efforts continue and that the medical body confirms the state of those found in stop cardiorespiratory, add more than 60 missing persons, according to the latest figures of the public network NHK

About 54,000 soldiers including soldiers of the Self-Defense Forces (army), Police and firefighters, They participated today in rescues, for which they were also deployed 41 helicopters.

From the crisis cabinet established by the central government, the Japanese Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, called for giving priority to rescues and evacuations of civilians to avoid further damage, in what he described today as against time. "

This is the first time that the Japanese executive has convened an emergency relief cabinet since 2016, when the prefectures of Oita and Kumamoto (southwest) were struck by two powerful earthquakes

order or recommend momentarily this Sunday the evacuation of six million people in the west of the country, and several tens of thousands remained in shelters in the early afternoon, according to the local news agency Kyodo .

Emergency services have received more than a hundred calls alerting cars that have been washed away by the city. water and other weather-related accidents

Local media continued to broadcast live images of flooded places, buried homes in mud and Rescue bodies during dramatic rescues.

In Okayama prefecture (west), one of the three where more deaths were recorded (only surpbaded by Hiroshima and Ehime), about 2,000 people were rescued in the boats and helicopters. Most had been trapped on the roofs of submerged buildings, which had been salvaged to escape the floods.

The government plans to mobilize around 20 fire trucks to drain the flooded area but it is estimated that the completion of drainage will take at least several weeks, Kyodo says.

Torrential rains have started on Thursday and have left record rainfall in several Since 1965, the Japanese Meteorological Agency (JMA) recorded 1,687.5 millimeters of rain in the city of Motoyama (Kochi). ), 1,058 millimeters in the city of Gujo (Gifu) and 744,5 millimeters in Mikuri (Ehime) and 454 millimeters in the city of H iroshima

In some places, rainfall in recent days was almost four times more than the amount usually recorded throughout the month of July, explained the agency.

Of the 47 prefectures (provinces) that make up the country, 12 remain alert for the risk [ of overflowing rivers, floods, landslides and landslides. field, after more than thirty the day before (including some in high alert, an exceptional case)

J apón has not experienced such a disaster since August 2014, when 77 people died in Hiroshima torrential rains.

Agencia EFE.