Monitoring Desk
ISLAMABAD/TOKYO: Heavy snowfall blanketed vast swathes of Japan on Wednesday, snarling traffic, forcing hundreds and thousands of flight cancellations and disrupting train travel, leaving at least one citizen dead.
Freezing, dry weather and highly low-pressure systems prompted the snow to fall, with strong winds blowing across Japan.
Heavy snowfall and cold weather
Snow was hefty on the side of the nation facing the Sea of Japan, with the city of Maniwa in Japan hit with a record 93 cm in the 24 hours to 8:00 a.m. on Wednesday.
Wednesday morning, chief cabinet secretary Hirokazu Matsuno said at a news conference that one person had died due to the storm, and two other deaths were being investigated. No further details were immediately available.
The media reported that domestic airlines, including ANA and Japan Airlines, canceled more than 300 flights, while bullet train services were suspended or delayed in northern Japan.
Public broadcaster NHK said that cars and trucks could not move in the snow over a distance of about 10 km on central Japan highways.
Some 3,000 citizens were stranded at two train stations in the western city of Kyoto after snow and winds forced service to be suspended, with some passengers forced to sleep on a floor at Kyoto’s central station.
Others were stuck on at least 15 trains between stations, in some cases from late on Tuesday to the early hours on Wednesday, with some having to hike through the snowfall to reach a station where shelter had been arranged.
