At least 17 people died as a powerful typhoon lashed Japan’s Pacific coast on Wednesday, media reports said, with the death toll likely to rise.
Typhoon Wipha, dubbed the strongest in a decade, caused landslides that buried houses as it churned past an island just south of Tokyo. Public broadcaster NHK and Jiji Press reported at least 16 people had died and 51 were unaccounted for on Oshima, after houses were destroyed or swept away by a series of landslides and floods on the island, 120 kilometres south of the Japanese capital.
“We’ve confirmed that 13 people have died, and the number is likely to increase later,” a police official in Oshima earlier told AFP. A woman was confirmed dead in western Tokyo after her body was recovered from a river.