Oct. 27, 2004
By Kimimasa Mayama
NAGAOKA, Japan (Reuters) - In a drama played out live on Japanese television, a two-year-old toddler was rescued Wednesday, four days after a deadly quake triggered a landslide that buried the car carrying him and his family.
The boy's mother was airlifted to hospital later but was pronounced dead, and rescue workers had to call off efforts to save his three-year-old sister after darkness fell on Wednesday.
Orange-clad rescue workers shifted huge boulders that had crashed onto the family's van to reach two-year-old Yuta Minagawa, who was trying to stand up between the rocks.
They gently passed him from hand to hand before airlifting him by helicopter to hospital, where he called out: "Mama."
Despite hours of intense effort as aftershocks jolted the area, the workers could not rescue Yuta's sister, Mayu.
Media reported that the girl, apparently still under the car, was not showing any signs of life.
But after a break of few hours, rescue workers resumed their operations and worked through the night to try to find the girl.
Takako Minagawa, 39, and her children were on their way home from visiting friends when the quake struck Saturday, killing at least 32 people and injuring more than 3,400 in the rural Niigata region, 250 km (150 miles) north of Tokyo.
The 6.8 magnitude earthquake was Japan's deadliest since a quake with a reading of 7.2 killed more than 6,400 in the western city of Kobe in 1995.
More than 100,000 survivors of Saturday's quake, many of them elderly, were still camping in their cars or living in makeshift shelters, and the prolonged stress and fatigue raised fears the death toll could rise.
Temperatures were set to fall below 5 Celsius (41 Fahrenheit) by Thursday morning in Niigata, a mountainous rice-growing area.
The rescue operation, broadcast live for hours by most television networks, was preceded by another powerful tremor.
At least one building collapsed in Ojiya, one of the towns hardest hit by Saturday's big quake. Officials said many buildings in the region had been weakened by recent tremors.
Wednesday's major aftershock had a magnitude of 6.1, hitting at 10.40 a.m. (0140 GMT). It was also felt strongly in Tokyo, but there were no reports of damage in the capital.
A man in Ojiya was taken to hospital after apparently suffering a stroke, and four others were injured, media said.
About 1,000 people were briefly evacuated from the main train station in Nagaoka, which has a population of about 200,000.
"I thought the roof might come down on us," an elderly woman in Nagaoka said on television.
CAN'T GO HOME
Many of the injured in Saturday's quake and subsequent series of big aftershocks were elderly people who had suffered heart attacks, strokes or shock, and authorities were concerned that cold weather and fatigue could claim more lives.
"There weren't too many quakes yesterday but today's was big. I was scared. I hope this settles down. We can't go home," 58-year-old Yoko Sakamaki told Reuters at the high school gymnasium to which she had been evacuated.
People including elderly and children at another evacuation center flattened themselves on the floor as the latest tremor struck, many calling out: "I'm scared, I'm scared."
Tokyo Electric Power Co said that all of its nuclear reactors in Niigata were operating normally.
But regional utility Tohoku Electric Power said more than 8,200 households were without electricity.
Many also lacked water and gas service.
The focus of Wednesday's big tremor was 10 km (6 miles) below the surface of the earth, the Japan Meteorological Agency said, adding that there could be more large aftershocks.
John Bellini, a geophysicist at the U.S. Geological Survey National Earthquake Information Center in Golden, Colorado, said the initial quake had been followed by more large aftershocks than was usually the case.
"These could go on for days or weeks," he said.
The earthquake and aftershocks have raised concerns about the economic impact of a recent natural disasters in Japan.
Japan has also been hit by a record 10 typhoons this year, including one that killed at least 84 people last week.
The government has said it may have to compile an extra budget to cover the costs of recent natural disasters.
Tokyo share prices slipped into negative territory after the quake shook the capital, one of the world's major financial centers, but prices recovered a bit in afternoon and the Nikkei average closed 0.18 percent higher.
The yen got a small jolt too, but also recovered.
"Investors just shied away after the quake, feeling uneasy," said Masaharu Sakudo, adviser at Tachibana Securities.
The magnitude of the earthquakes was measured according to a technique similar to the Richter scale, but adjusted for Japan's geological characteristics. The U.S. Geological Survey rated the latest quake at magnitude 5.7 on its own scale.
(Additional reporting by Elaine Lies, George Nishiyama, Kazunori Takada, Linda Sieg and Teruaki Ueno)
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