Japan Quake Death Toll Rises as Rescuers End Searches
KUMAMOTO- Rescue teams in southwestern Japan used sniffer dogs on Friday to carry out a final search of a shopping mall devastated by an explosion following this week’s powerful earthquake, as the death toll from the disaster rose to 35 and authorities continued relief operations across Kumamoto Prefecture.
Government spokesperson Minoru Kihara said rescue workers were conducting a final inspection of the damaged Aeon Mall with specially trained search dogs to ensure no one remained trapped inside the building. By Thursday night, emergency crews had pulled 11 people from the site, including seven who were found dead.
The shopping mall had been evacuated before it was destroyed by what authorities suspect was a gas explosion more than an hour after Tuesday’s magnitude 7.1 earthquake. Local media, citing the mall’s operator, reported that all employees had now been accounted for.
Authorities also concluded search operations at a paper factory where a smokestack collapsed during the earthquake. Kihara said rescuers recovered nine bodies from the site and extracted two survivors before ending the operation.
The latest fatalities brought the overall death toll from the earthquake to 35. The powerful tremor caused widespread destruction across Kumamoto, damaging homes, bridges and other infrastructure while sparking multiple fires.
Recovery efforts have shifted increasingly toward restoring essential services and assisting displaced residents. Kihara said approximately 4,500 households remained without electricity on Friday, while around 79,000 households continued to experience water shortages.
The Japanese government has deployed about 5,100 military personnel to support relief operations, including the distribution of emergency supplies and assistance to affected communities. Thousands of residents remained in evacuation centers, many of them elderly people seeking shelter from temperatures expected to approach 40 degrees Celsius over the weekend.
Amid the extensive destruction, one positive development emerged from the Aeon Mall site. Twenty-five cats from a cat café inside the shopping complex were rescued and transferred to Hiroshima, a move that drew widespread expressions of relief on social media.
Japan is among the world’s most earthquake-prone countries because it lies at the convergence of four major tectonic plates along the Pacific Ring of Fire. The country experiences hundreds of earthquakes each year, although most are too weak to cause significant damage.
Kumamoto has experienced devastating earthquakes before. In 2016, the prefecture was struck by two major earthquakes that killed 273 people and injured more than 2,800, leaving lasting damage across the region.
Japan’s modern disaster preparedness has also been shaped by the 2011 magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami, which killed or left missing about 18,500 people and triggered the Fukushima nuclear disaster. That catastrophe remains one of the country’s worst natural disasters in modern history and continues to influence emergency planning and response.
Authorities said emergency operations in Kumamoto would continue as crews worked to restore utilities, assess structural damage and assist communities recovering from one of Japan’s deadliest earthquakes in recent years.
