Japan has issued evacuation orders for nearly a million people in the path of Typhoon Shanshan, as the powerful storm brought torrential rains, strong winds, and landslides in which one person has been killed.
Factories have been shuttered, and hundreds of flights have been canceled as the typhoon barrelled towards the main southwestern island of Kyushu with gusts of up to 70 meters per second (157 mph).
Emergency warnings have been issued across much of the country as authorities say the typhoon could bring flooding, landslides and wind strong enough to knock down some houses.
One person died after a house with five people inside was buried in a landslide in the central city of Gamagori.
“Maximum caution is required given that forecasts are for strong winds, high waves and high tides that have not been seen thus far,” Satoshi Sugimoto, the agency’s chief forecaster, told reporters.
After striking Kyushu over the next few days the storm is expected to approach central and eastern regions, including the capital Tokyo, around the weekend, the agency said – but the typhoon’s path is proving difficult to predict.
More than 76,000 buildings were without power in Kyushu, the Japan Times reported earlier, citing Kyushu Electric.
Around 66,000 of those outages were reported in the Kagoshima Prefecture, while some 9,000 were in Miyazaki Prefecture.
