Three people have been killed in an earthquake near Osaka in Japan.
The earthquake measured at magnitude 6.1. Over 300 people have been injured and hundreds of thousands of households are without gas and water.
NHK reports that a nine-year-old girl was killed by a collapsing wall at a swimming pool in the city of Takatsuki, north of Osaka. An 80-year-old man was also killed by a collapsed road. An 84-year-old man also died when a bookcase fell on him.
More than 300 people have been injured, according to the Japanese Emergency Management Agency, with most injuries being minor.
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says at a press conference that over 100,000 households are without gas. Many large residential areas have no water.
”Our first priority is to save lives, and we are working together to restart public transportation and provide people with access to water and gas,” says Shinzo Abe.
The magnitude of the quake was initially measured by various authorities at between 5.3 and 5.9. The latest corrected figure is that the quake had a magnitude of 6.1. The earthquake occurred at 8 am on Monday morning local time, 1 am Swedish time. Several railway lines were stopped in the middle of the morning rush hour.
The epicenter of the quake was in the middle of an important area for Japanese industry, and production was temporarily halted in the factories of several large companies.
The government says there is a risk of strong aftershocks in the coming days.
Source: TT
