Part of the roof at Kyoto Station also fell in as staff scrambled for safety.
As a typhoon-prone country, people in Japan are used to being alerted to regular storm warnings and advisories. However, when the 21st typhoon of the year started barreling towards the mainland earlier this week, it became clear that this was a major storm not to be underestimated.
Typhoon Jebi — the name means “swallow” in Korean — made landfall on the southern island of Shikoku at around midday today, before hitting the mainland two hours later at Kobe, the capital city of Hyogo Prefecture. With wind gusts reaching up to 180 kilometres (111 miles) per hour, it was Japan’s strongest typhoon in 25 years, and evacuation advisories were immediately issued for more than one million people in parts of Hyogo, Kyoto, Osaka, Nara, Ehime, Kagawa, and Wakayama prefectures, which lay directly under the path of the storm.
▼ The path of Typhoon Jebi.
Hundreds of flights were cancelled and train services in the region were stopped ahead of the typhoon’s arrival, as authorities toook every precaution possible to keep people safe. It’s a good thing they did, as frightening images shared by residents online showed just how powerful the storm was and the path of destruction it left in its wake.
In Osaka, roofs blew off houses, throwing debris up into the air, which caught light after coming into contact with power lines.
Falling trees and flying debris caused widespread power outages to thousands of residences.
These clips show the reason why it’s so important to heed advice from authorities to stay indoors during a typhoon.
In areas like Hyogo Prefecture, where this clip was filmed, strong wind gusts toppled cars and trucks on roads and bridges.
▼ Cars were thrown about in carparks by the strong wind gusts.
This scene from outside the Aeon shopping mall at Moriguchi in Osaka Prefecture was so terrifying it elicited screams from onlookers.
Bike stands at this apartment block blew away, taking the bicycles into the air with them.
This Twitter user shared a scene from inside their friend’s home, which had been hit by an airborne solar panel.
Panels from the outside of buildings, like this one from a hotel at Osaka’s Universal Studios Japan, were blown off and sent into the air. USJ had closed its park ahead of the typhoon so there were few people in the area at the time.
Perhaps most frightening of all, though, were these scenes, which showed the outside walls being torn off a building in Osaka.
No injuries were reported from the scene, as department stores in Osaka, as well as Kobe and Kyoto, had decided to close for the day, which meant that the usually busy streets were deserted.
At Kyoto Station, police say some members of staff suffered slight injuries when a panel from the roof fell in, smashing into shards below.
According to NHK, Japan’s national broadcaster, two men died in Osaka in separate accidents after one fell from a roof and the other fell from a terrace on the second floor of his home. In Shiga Prefecture, a company manager was killed after being crushed in a collapsed warehouse. Reports say at least six people have been killed and 163 people have been injured so far, due to the effects of Typhoon Jebi.
The western region of Japan has been hit by a string of disasters due to earthquakes and floods recently. Hopefully Mother Nature will ease up on the region soon, and for those who’d like to help the area recover, you might want keep an eye out for these earthquake/flood relief Kit Kat Minis, which use a portion of their sales to assist with reconstruction efforts.
Source: Twitter/#台風21号
Featured image: Twitter/@madoriiiinu