The storm officially made landfall around 7 p.m. local time (11 a.m. BST) as its eyewall – the area just outside the eye – came close to Kagoshima, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said. It had gusts of up to nearly 150mph and had already dropped up to 500mm of rain in less than 24 hours on parts of southwestern Kyushu. At least 20,000 people spent the night in shelters in Kyushu’s Kagoshima and Miyazaki prefectures, where the JMA has issued a rare “special warning” – a warning issued only when it predicts conditions seen once in several decades. National broadcaster NHK, which is gathering information from local authorities, said more than 7 million people had been told to move to shelters or shelter in durable buildings to escape the storm. Evacuation warnings are not mandatory, and authorities have at times struggled to get people to move to shelters ahead of extreme weather. They tried to drive home their concerns about the weather system all weekend. “Please stay away from dangerous places and please evacuate if you feel even the slightest hint of danger,” Prime Minister Fumio Kishida tweeted after calling a cabinet meeting on the storm. “It will be dangerous to evacuate at night. Move to safety while it’s still light outside.” The JMA has warned that the region could face an unprecedented risk of strong winds, thunderstorms and torrential rain and described the storm as “very dangerous”. “The areas affected by the storm are seeing the kind of rain that has never been experienced before,” Hiro Kato, head of the Weather Monitoring and Warning Center, told reporters on Sunday. “Especially in areas under landslide warnings, it’s extremely likely that some kind of landslide is already happening.” He urged “maximum caution even in areas where disasters do not normally occur.” By Sunday afternoon, utility companies said nearly 200,000 homes across the region were without power. Trains, flights and ferries were canceled until the storm passed, and even some convenience stores – generally open around the clock and seen as a lifeline in disasters – closed their doors. “The southern part of the Kyushu region may see a kind of violent wind, high waves and high tides that have not been experienced before,” the JMA said on Sunday, urging people to be “with the utmost caution.” Archie Bland and Nimo Omer take you to the top stories and what they mean, free every weekday morning Privacy Notice: Newsletters may contain information about charities, online advertising and content sponsored by external parties. For more information, see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and Google’s Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. On the ground, an official in Kagoshima’s Izumi city said conditions had worsened rapidly by Sunday afternoon. “The wind has become extremely strong. The rain is also coming down hard,” he told AFP. “It’s a total out. Visibility is almost zero.” The storm, which weakened slightly as it approached land, is expected to turn northeast and sweep over Japan’s main island on Wednesday morning. Japan is now in typhoon season and faces 20 such storms a year, often seeing heavy rains that cause landslides or flash floods. In 2019, Typhoon Hagibis hit Japan as it hosted the Rugby World Cup, killing more than 100 people. A year earlier, Typhoon Jebi closed Kansai Airport in Osaka, killing 14 people. And in 2018, floods and landslides killed more than 200 people in western Japan during the country’s annual rainy season. Scientists say the climate crisis is increasing the intensity of storms and causing more frequent and intense extreme weather events, such as heat waves, droughts and flash floods.
