Japanese blizzard

Snow in Japan kills three

Tokyo: Japan's road, rail and air travel services is facing further disruptions, reports and officials say, after a fresh snow storm killed three people and injured 850 others following last week's deadly blizzard.

SMH

16 Febraury, 2013

Snow began falling on Friday morning in the capital Tokyo and piled up to 26cm by early Saturday, a week after the heaviest snowfall in decades left at least 11 people dead and more than 1200 injured across the nation.

A driver was killed on Friday in a crash involving his car and a truck on an icy road in Shiga, central Japan, while a farmer died after a tractor overturned on a snow-covered road in southwestern Oita, local media said.

In a separate snow-related accident, a driver was killed and three others injured on an expressway in central Shizuoka, the news reports said.

Public broadcaster NHK said some 850 people, including one in a coma, have been injured in snow-related accidents across the nation since snow hit western Japan late Thursday.

Drivers were struggling to move their cars in the capital's residential district of Setagaya, while snow started melting and flooding some roads in downtown Tokyo.

Television footage showed hundreds of passengers resting on benches and floors under blankets at Haneda airport in Tokyo as public transport services were suspended due to heavy snow.

Some 187,000 households lost power mainly in eastern Japan due to snow and strong winds, NHK said.

The meteorological agency continued warning of heavy snow in eastern Japan as well as strong winds and high waves along coastal areas, which may cause snowslides.