A government spokesman said on Tuesday (September 20) that Typhoon Nammaado passed through Japan over the weekend, killing four people and injuring more than 100. The typhoon made landfall near Kagoshima in the country’s southwest on Sunday night, bringing strong winds and heavy rain to the large island of Kyushu, before moving northeast along the coast of the Sea of Japan.
It was downgraded to an extratropical cyclone Tuesday morning due to a gradual loss of speed. But in Kyushu, the storm caused fallen trees, smashed windows, flooded rivers and dumped a month’s worth of rain in parts of Miyazaki prefecture and dumped a month’s worth of rain within 24 hours, with two confirmed deaths.
Government spokesman Hirozaku Matsuno said two other people had been located. “No vital signs”a term used in Japan, officially certified by a doctor before death.
Storm intensities intensified by climate change
Matsuno added that the death toll could rise further as authorities are checking two other people for typhoon-related links and they are looking for missing persons.
In addition, at least 114 people were injured, 14 of them seriously, a government spokesman said. About 140,000 households across the country remained without power as of early Tuesday, mostly in Kyushu.
Japan’s typhoon season peaks from August to September and is characterized by heavy rains that can lead to sudden flooding and deadly landslides. Scientists estimate that climate change is increasing the intensity of storms and making extreme weather events more frequent.