Record rain in Japan: four dead and maximum alert in Chiba

At least four people have died and one is in a serious condition after torrential rain hit eastern Japan for twenty-four hours. The Japan Meteorological Agency issued a level 5 warning, the highest on the scale, for more than a third of the municipalities in Chiba prefecture, east of the capital. Landslide warnings were issued at the same time for several municipalities, including the cities of Chiba and Ichihara.

According to the agency, the intense rainfall was produced by warm, humid air from the east meeting cold air aloft, a combination that made the atmosphere extremely unstable. Forecasts suggest the rain could continue in the area throughout the day. Local authorities urged residents to move to safety immediately given the flooded roads.

More than four hundred thousand people affected

The Fire and Disaster Management Agency reported that evacuation orders initially covered more than 400,000 people in Chiba and Ibaraki prefectures. At seven o'clock on Friday morning they remained in force for around 126,000 residents. More than two hundred evacuation centres were set up across Chiba, Ibaraki, Saitama and Gunma prefectures.

Among the confirmed victims, a man was found on a submerged road in Ichikawa and a 66-year-old woman became trapped in her car in Sakura. Two further deaths were confirmed in Yachiyo and Sakura. A woman trapped in her vehicle in Kashiwa was taken to hospital.

In Chiba hundreds of people sought shelter on flooded streets as water surged out of manholes. Tokyo Electric Power reported that around 45,000 homes lost power.

Deaths in vehicles are a recurring feature of urban flooding. A few tens of centimetres of moving water are enough to make doors impossible to open, and underpasses fill faster than drivers can judge.

Japan has one of the most advanced warning systems in the world, structured in five levels, where the fifth means the emergency is already under way and people must reach safety with whatever means they have. That it was reached across a third of a prefecture's municipalities indicates the scale of the event more clearly than the death toll does.