Japan’s prime minister vowed to provide “cease-less” support to areas devastated by the New Year’s Day earthquake as snow and sleet hampered rescue and relief efforts and local media reported that the disaster had now claimed at least 126 lives.
A woman in her 90s trapped for five days under the rubble by a huge earthquake in central Japan was rescued against the odds, but snow and storms were expected to complicate relief efforts on Sunday.
The hope of finding survivors usually fades three days after a destructive quake.
But the elderly woman spent five days under the wreckage of a collapsed house in the city of Suzu before being saved on Saturday.
She was taken to hospital for treatment and was responding clearly to questions, according to public broadcaster NHK.
“Hang in there!” rescuers were heard calling to the woman in police footage from the scene pub-lished by local media.
“You’re gonna be OK!” they shouted as rain fell around them. “Stay positive!“ A Tokyo police spokesman confirmed to AFP that the rescue had been carried out by officers from Tokyo and Fu-kuoka, but could not give further details.
The adverse weather on the Noto peninsula continued to vex survivors at the epicenter of the magnitude 7.6 quake that left more than 30,000 homeless and cut power to tens of thousands of residences and businesses.
At least 222 people are still reported missing and more heavy snow or rain is forecast overnight for the region.
Footage on national broadcaster NHK showed construction trucks digging through piles of dirt three meters (almost 10 ft)tall to unearth houses buried by landslides.
“Rescuing people trapped under the rubble and responding to isolated areas are issues that must be tackled with the highest priority,” Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said on an NHK program on Sunday.
“As we move forward with ceaseless recon-struction and recovery efforts, we must not hesitate in responding due to budget constraints in the disaster-affected areas,” he added.
Kishida had said on Friday that his government would tap 4.74 billion yen ($32.77 million) of budget reserves for reconstruction efforts.
The governor of Ishikawa Prefecture, where the Noto peninsula is located, declared a state of emergency on Saturday, calling the quake “an unprecedented disaster” for the region, NHK reported.
In the city of Wajima, on the peninsula’s northern coast, a line of cars stretching as far as the eye could see had formed to refuel at a petrol station as fuel supply to the region gradually returned.
Prefectural governments have sent trailers equipped with several flushable toilets to evacuation centres in Wajima and other disaster-struck cities, where water supplies are only just restarting, NHK reported.
At a centre near Wajima’s famed “Asaichi” morning market, which was burnt to the ground after the quake, some of the 700 people taking shelter there stood in a line on a stairway, passing boxes of water to higher floors.
“Some people have left as electricity is restored in parts of the city (but) we are still at capacity and not accepting new evacuees,” the centre’s receptionist said. —APP
