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Kumano, Japan – Rescuers on Monday tried to find missing people in mud-covered neighborhoods and in the rubble of homes in western Japan, where 75 people died after torrential rains.
In Kumano City, known around the world for its make-up brushes, appreciated by the world's greatest actresses, huge landslides have swept away houses that are no more than heaps of wood, journalists said from AFP.
The burning sun was beginning to dry up the mud. Equipped with construction equipment, shovels or chainsaws, rescuers were looking for traces of a dozen residents missing the call.
" We are removing debris with heavy equipment where we can, we are also clearing destroyed houses, otherwise it is impossible to reach potential survivors trapped underneath ", explained a soldier.
" I would have liked my sister and her family to evacuate earlier ," laments Kosuke Kiyohara in front of the ransacked home of missing relatives.
Everywhere, returning to their homes after the end of the rain, the inhabitants began to realize the extent of the disaster, with entire neighborhoods drowned, homes upside down, cars lying in craters completely collapsed roads, gigantic landslides, bridges carried away, and other scenes of desolation.
In the city of Kurashiki (Okayama province), " no one seems to be asking for help " from the roofs or terraces of this city's buildings, according to observations made by helicopter , told AFP Monday morning a first aid.
" The rescuers were traveling with boats yesterday because of the magnitude of the floods, but the water is gradually withdrawing today and if the level drops sufficiently, they will be able to reach the areas hard hit by the road or on foot ", also told AFP by telephone a spokesman for the Office of Disaster Management of Okayama Prefecture.
" It is not raining today, but we must remain vigilant against the mudslides ," she insisted.
The official toll (75 deaths) after the rainstorms that fell for several days over western Japan is still temporary. The media announce 94 dead and 57 missing.
This is one of the most serious disasters of this kind in recent years in Japan, with a number of casualties now exceeding that recorded during landslides in Hiroshima in 2014, with 74 deaths.
It is now necessary to go back in the annals to the pbadages of two typhoons in August / September 2011 to find a comparable disaster (a hundred deaths).
The maximum alert state was raised every Sunday in the day, but lower level ratings are maintained.
– Weather situation " abnormal " –
" Relief operations are maintained 24 hours a day ," Yoshihide Fujitani, a senior official, told AFP on Sunday. of the disaster management of Hiroshima Prefecture. " We also take care of evacuees and try to restore vital infrastructure such as the water network and the distribution of gas ," he said. " We are doing our best. "
Food is lacking in convenience stores that are no longer supplied.
" This is an abnormal situation ," said a senior weather agency official, Yasushi Kajiwara, during a press briefing on Sunday.
Precipitation between Friday and Sunday reached record highs in 93 observation points in 14 prefectures.
Some 54,000 firefighters, police and military self-defense forces were deployed on the ground, " doing their utmost to save lives ", in the words of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.
Up to 5 million people were asked to evacuate, but these orders were not binding, and sometimes when water rose very quickly, it might be more risky to try to escape. than to take refuge on his roof.
Factories (Panasonic, Mitsubishi Motors, Mazda) were forced to stop production in the region, as well as services like Amazon.
Japan is often crossed by important rainy fronts in addition to the sometimes deadly typhoons that sweep it regularly in summer.
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