Children Buried In Earthquake

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30469, 17 June 1964, Page 17

Children Buried In Earthquake

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright)

TOKYO, June 16. A strong earthquake which shook northern and central Japan early this afternoon was reported to have killed at least 12 persons and injured many others. The Japanese National Broadcasting Corporation reported 17 children were buried when a kindergarten building in Tsuruoka City, northern Japan, collapsed. The bodies of. two children were recovered. The 15 others dug out by rescue workers were all injured. Oil tanks at three refineries on the outskirts of Niigata City were on fire and a gas tank exploded. Fires broke out in the city. The Shinano river running through Niigata burst its banks, flooding many homes and tilting a four-storeyed ferro-concrete building.

Reports said some bridges, including railway bridges, over the river collapsed, and traffic became chaotic when cracks opened in the road and traffic signals stopped working. At Akita, northern Japan, at least two persons were reported killed and several injured by crumbling walls. People ran screaming into the streets. . Two persons were crushed to death by an uprooted tree in Nagano Prefecture, central Japan. Toyama Meterological Bureau said the earthquake’s epicentre was about 170 miles north-west of Toyama Bay, facing the Japan Sea. The bureau said the two needles of its seismograph were torn off by the force of the tremors.

The strength of the earthquake in Niigata City was about the same as the great earthquake which hit Tokyo and its surrounding areas in 1923, killing about 143,000 people, Kyodo news agency said.