Deaths mount as typhoon hits Japan

Heavy rains and mudslides from powerful Typhoon Talas have killed at least 15 people in Japan as the storm moved north today past the country’s western coast.

At least 43 other people are missing, local media said.

Evacuation orders and advisories were issued to 460,000 people in western and central Japan, Kyodo News agency said.

NHK TV footage showed a bridge that had been swept away after intense rainfall caused a river to swell. People holding umbrellas waded through knee-deep water in city streets and residential areas.

The centre of the season’s 12th typhoon was moving slowly north across the Sea of Japan off the country’s west coast, the Japan Meteorological Agency said.

It crossed the southern island of Shikoku and the central part of the main island of Honshu overnight on Saturday. The area is hundreds of miles from Japan’s tsunami-ravaged north-east coast.

Because of the storm’s slow speed, the agency warned that heavy rains and strong winds are likely to continue and could lead to flooding and landslides.

Three homes were buried in a landslide in Wakayama prefecture. One woman who was rescued later died, four remained missing and a 14-year-old girl was saved from the debris, police said.

Overall in the hard-hit prefecture, 10 people are dead and 32 missing, they said.

Seven people were reported missing in nearby Nara prefecture after homes were swept down a river, NHK said.

Among the dead was a woman who appeared to be in her 30s whose body was found in a river in Ehime prefecture on Shikoku, police said.

A 73-year-old man in Nara prefecture died after a landslide caused his house to collapse, police said.