Japan bracing for dangerously powerful typhoon

TOKYO — Japan is bracing for a dangerously powerful typhoon approaching its southern regions this weekend on the heels of an earlier storm that injured dozens of people in the country and on the Korean Peninsula.

Typhoon Haishen, or Sea God in Chinese, could bring nearly unprecedentedly severe rain, rough waves, and high tides to Okinawa and Kyushu by early Sunday, Japan Meteorological Agency officials said.

Agency weather forecaster Yoshihisa Nakamoto, in a televised news conference, urged people in the typhoon’s path to take precautions and secure extra stocks of water, food, and other necessities.

This Thursday, Sept. 3, 2020, satellite image released by NASA Worldview, Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) shows tropical storm Haishen, lower center, sweeping northward. Haishen could gain in ferocity before slamming into Japan’s southern islands of Kyushu and Shikoku before reaching the Korean Peninsula on Monday. (NASA via AP)

The typhoon was moving north in the Pacific Ocean at a speed of 15 kilometers (9 miles) per hour. By Sunday it is projected to have winds of up to 198 kph (122 mph).

Officials said Haishen is comparable to a September 1959 typhoon that killed more than 5,000 people in central Japan.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said the government is setting up a crisis response team and urged people to take precautions “to protect your own lives.”

He said water was being released from nine dams in Nagasaki, Kagoshima and other southwestern prefectures to lower the risk of flooding.

Typhoon Maysak hit the region earlier this week, injuring dozens of people, cutting power to thousands of homes, and causing other damage. A search continued Friday for a livestock cargo ship carrying 43 crew members and 5,800 cows from New Zealand that capsized during the typhoon. Rescuers have found only one survivor, a chief officer from the Philippines.