Typhoon Phanfone slammed into Japan yesterday, packing gusting winds and huge waves that swept three US military officials out to sea in a stark reminder of the country’s vulnerability to nature.
After a volcano killed dozens of hikers when it erupted without warning on Sept. 27, winds of up to 180kph whipped ashore yesterday, bringing heavy rain and travel chaos throughout a swath of Japan.
The storm whirled over Tokyo at about 11am and then headed northeast, dumping rain further up the coast of Honshu, while its eye moved out over the Pacific Ocean.
Photo: AFP
At least seven people were left dead or missing, including the three US military officials who had been photographing the storm, police and coast guard officials said.
Phanfone grounded more than 600 flights and caused the cancelation of dozens of bullet train services, leaving travelers stranded.
The leading edge of the storm brought a nasty commute to Tokyo’s morning rush hour, with hundreds of thousands of office workers caught in the driving rain.
Localized flooding was reported, while TV footage showed about 15 of the 20m-tall poles holding up the netting at a golf driving range had collapsed, crashing into houses in Chiba, east of Tokyo.
The storm also battered Japan’s auto industries. Toyota Motor temporarily suspended operations at its 12 factories in Aichi, central Japan, due to the impact of the typhoon on its parts supplies, a spokeswoman said, adding that production lines reopened by the evening.
Japan’s weather agency warned that even as the storm passed out to sea, landslides and floods were still a risk in a country where a relatively wet summer brought numerous landslides.
In central Shizuoka Prefecture, more than 50,000 people were ordered to evacuate, while about 1.7 million others were advised to take refuge, authorities said.
The three US officials were engulfed by waves on Okinawa, where they “were taking pictures with high waves whipped up by the typhoon in the background,” a police spokesman said. “One has been found dead, with the two others still missing.”
A 21-year-old surfer went missing in the Pacific off Fujisawa, a Japanese coast guard spokesman said, while a junior-high school boy disappeared after being swamped by waves at Yokosuka, south of Tokyo, a city official said. Rescuers were also looking for two missing people in the mess left by two landslides in Yokohama.
Japan has deployed long-range missiles in a southwestern region near China, the Japanese defense minister said yesterday, at a time when ties with Beijing are at their lowest in recent years. The missiles were installed in Kumamoto in the southern region of Kyushu, as Japan is attempting to shore up its military capacity as China steps up naval activity in the East China Sea. “Standoff defense capabilities enable us to counter the threat of enemy forces attempting to invade our country ... while ensuring the safety of our personnel,” Japanese Minister of Defense Shinjiro Koizumi said. “This is an extremely important initiative for
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) today accepted an invitation from Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to lead a delegation to China next month, saying she hopes to promote the peaceful development of cross-strait relations and bring stability to the Taiwan Strait. “I am grateful and happy to accept this invitation,” Cheng said in a statement from the KMT chairperson’s office. Cheng said she hopes both sides can work together to promote the peaceful development of cross-strait relations, enhance exchange and cooperation, bring stability to the Taiwan Strait and improve people’s livelihoods. At today's news conference, Cheng said any efforts to
MORE POPULAR: Taiwan Pass sales increased by 59 percent during the first quarter compared with the same period last year, the Tourism Administration said The Tourism Administration yesterday said that it has streamlined the Taiwan Pass, with two versions available for purchase beginning today. The tourism agency has made the pass available to international tourists since 2024, allowing them to access the high-speed rail, Taiwan Railway Corp services, four MRT systems and four Taiwan Tourist Shuttles. Previously, five types of Taiwan Pass were available, but some tourists have said that the offerings were too complicated. The agency said only two types of Taiwan Pass would be available, starting from a three-day pass with the high-speed rail and a three-day pass with Taiwan Railway Corp. The former costs NT$2,800
The nation’s fastest supercomputer, Nano 4 (晶創26), is scheduled to be launched in the third quarter, and would be used to train large language models in finance and national defense sectors, the National Center for High-Performance Computing (NCHC) said. The supercomputer, which would operate at about 86.05 petaflops, is being tested at a new cloud computing center in the Southern Taiwan Science Park in Tainan. The exterior of the server cabinet features chip circuitry patterns overlaid with a map of Taiwan, highlighting the nation’s central position in the semiconductor industry. The center also houses Taiwania 2, Taiwania 3, Forerunner 1 and
RSS