More than 7,500 remain in shelters one week after Kumamoto quake
More than 7,500 people remained at evacuation shelters in Kumamoto Prefecture as of Tuesday, a week after the 7.1-magnitude earthquake that damaged over 13,000 residential buildings in the southwestern Japan prefecture, JIJI Press reported.
Daytime temperatures exceed 35 degrees Celsius in hot summer weather in the prefecture, raising health concerns for evacuees and others affected by the July 28 quake, which registered up to 7 - the highest level on Japan's seismic intensity scale.
According to the Kumamoto prefectural government's disaster response headquarters, the death toll from the earthquake stood at 38 as of 6 p.m. Tuesday. Of the total, one person is believed to have died from heatstroke, and the case is suspected to be a death linked to the disaster because the individual was staying in a vehicle after evacuating. The cause of another death is being investigated.
Seven people died in an explosion that occurred at the Aeon Mall Kumamoto shopping facility in the town of Kashima shortly after the temblor. At the same time, nine lost their lives at Nippon Paper Industries Co.'s plant in the city of Yatsushiro, where a chimney collapsed due to the quake.
A total of 7,538 people were staying at 140 evacuation centers as of 6 p.m. Tuesday, decreasing from the peak number of 10,467 at 415 shelters on Thursday, two days after the quake struck. Still, the number of evacuees who stayed in their cars or self-evacuated outside official shelters was not accounted for.
Earlier, it was reported that Japan's government on Tuesday approved the allocation of approximately 20 billion yen (around $127 million) from its fiscal 2026 reserve funds to support recovery efforts in areas affected by the powerful earthquake that struck Kumamoto Prefecture.
