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At Least 22 People Remain Missing After Flooding In Japan

Family members clean a house on Friday after the flooding in Shimotsuma, near Joso, Ibaraki prefecture, northeast of Tokyo.
Shizuo Kambayashi
/
AP
Family members clean a house on Friday after the flooding in Shimotsuma, near Joso, Ibaraki prefecture, northeast of Tokyo.

Updated at 9:30 a.m. ET

A day after a flood berm failed in the city of Joso, northeast of Tokyo, Japan's weather service said the rain was headed farther north on Honshu Island.

On Friday, evacuation orders and advisories were extended to include 960,000 people.

City officials have said at least 22 people are missing in the flooding.

The flooding followed two days of heavy rain from the remnants of Typhoon Etau. In some places, 6 inches of rain fell in a 24-hour period.

Thursday in Joso, a city of about 60,000, houses were washed away and people stranded by high water were rescued by helicopter.

Joso was flooded when the Kinugawa River broke through its berm. Friday, the banks of the Shibui River in the city of Osaki collapsed, flooding nearby houses, according to The Japan Times.

The Japan Times reports:

"Residents rescued by helicopter recalled the terror they felt as the flood waters quickly rose.

"'There was a scene in front of me which was like the one in the tsunami disaster,' said Jiro Nakayama, 70, referring to the 2011 calamity triggered by a huge earthquake off northeastern Japan."

Japan's Fire and Disaster Agency confirms one fatality, a woman in her 60s whose body was found at the foot of a steep hill following a mudslide.

Copyright 2021 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

Mark Katkov