More than 20 injured after earthquake of magnitude 5.9 shakes Japan

The government set up a task force to assess the extent of possible damage, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said | File Photo: AP/PTI

A moderate earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.9 rattled eastern Japan, including the Tokyo area, early Sunday, injuring more than 20 people, most of them slightly, officials said. There was no danger of a tsunami.

According to the Japan Meteorological Agency, the quake occurred in the southern Ibaraki prefecture, at a depth of 70 kilometres, an area of Japan prone to frequent quakes. The US Geological Survey recorded a preliminary magnitude of 5.8.

Twenty-three people were injured in four prefectures in the region -- nine in Saitama, another nine in Kanagawa, four in Chiba and one in Ibaraki -- according to prefectural officials.

Most of them were injured when they fell down or hit themselves against furniture or doors as they were caught off guard by the quake while sleeping and got out of bed in a panic, officials said. Among them was a woman in her 80s who fell off the bed and suffered a serious hip injury in Yokohama, in the Kanagawa prefecture, the Yomiuri newspaper reported.

The quake caused delays to express trains serving Tokyo and Narita Airport and other local trains serving northeastern regions, but Shinkansen bullet trains were running normally, their operator East Japan Railway Company said.

The government set up a task force to assess the extent of possible damage, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said on X.

The temblor set off emergency quake alerts on mobile phones and also significantly shook Tokyo. NHK public television showed traffic on roads in nearby cities, including Mito and Saitama, seemingly normal.

An underground water pipe ruptured in Tokyo's eastern ward of Koto, with water pouring out onto the road, NHK footage showed. The pipe has been repaired and the leak was stopped later. The earthquake caused blackouts to about 460 homes in Tokyo, but power was restored by later Sunday morning, according to TEPCO Power Grid.

There were no reports of anomalies from about a dozen nuclear power plants and other facilities that handle nuclear materials, the Nuclear Regulation Authority said.

Last month, a magnitude 7.1 quake struck the Kumamoto area on Japan's southernmost island of Kyushu, killing 38 people and injuring 364. It also destroyed more than 1,500 buildings and damaged nearly 20,000 others.

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