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Trami batters Okinawa, home to major US base

Saturday, 29 September 2018 8:44 AM [ Last Update: Saturday, 29 September 2018 9:19 AM ]

A passer-by walks in heavy rain and wind caused by Typhoon Trami in the prefectural capital Naha, on the southern island of Okinawa, in this photo taken by Kyodo September 29, 2018. (Photo by AFP)

A powerful typhoon pummelled Japan's southern island of Okinawa Saturday, injuring at least 17 people before changing course toward the country's mainland.

Typhoon Trami, packing maximum gusts of 216 kilometres (134 miles) per hour near its center, forced some 700 people to evacuate to shelters in Okinawa and also cut electricity to nearly 200,000 homes, public broadcaster NHK said.

No fatalities were reported as a result of severe weather in the island which is home to the largest US Air Force base in the Asia-Pacific in which 19,000 US Marines are stationed.

The typhoon - which is forecast to hit the mainland over Sunday and Monday - has been rated category 2 by tropical storm risk, with category 5 being the highest.

It is the latest storm to threaten Japan in a year of grim weather-related woes, including punishing heat, heavy rains and landslides.

Outlying islands in the Okinawan chain, some 1,000 km southwest of Tokyo, were being pounded by heavy rain and high tides a day before an Okinawan gubernatorial election on Sunday.

Strong wind knocked down trees, blew off an outer wall from a building and left five people injured in Naha, a city in Okinawa. Trami also caused power outages in more than 30 towns in Miyakojima Island, according to public broadcaster NHK.

A picture taken in the city center of Naha, Okinawa prefecture, on September 29, 2018 shows a fallen tree as the island was the first part of Japan to face the typhoon Trami. (Photo by AFP)

NHK also said airlines had cancelled more than 380 flights, mainly those flying in and out of Okinawa.

Trami was about 60 km (37.3 miles) south of Kume Island, with winds gusting as high as 216 kilometers an hour (134 mph).

Churning north across Okinawa on Saturday, Trami is then predicted to move across the islands of Kyushu and the main island of Honshu on Sunday, a path similar to that taken by typhoon Jebi early in September.

Jebi, the most powerful storm to hit Japan in 25 years, brought some of the highest tides since a 1961 typhoon and flooded Kansai airport near Osaka, taking it out of service for days.

(Source: Reuters)

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