{"id":829282,"date":"2026-07-28T15:06:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-28T15:06:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/829282\/"},"modified":"2026-07-28T15:06:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-28T15:06:18","slug":"people-trapped-in-japanese-mall-hit-by-earthquake-with-others-missing-after-factory-chimney-collapse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/829282\/","title":{"rendered":"People trapped in Japanese mall hit by earthquake, with others missing after factory chimney collapse"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Kumamoto area was hit by deadly earthquakes in 2016published at 15:19 BST<\/p>\n<p>15:19 BST<\/p>\n<p>      <img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"A man on a bicycle next to the rubble of a collapsed house in\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/dd0822c1-ecf0-453e-9be4-05fbaad9def9.jpg.webp\"  width=\"594\" height=\"334\" class=\"ssrcss-egie1y-Image edrdn950\"\/>Image source, Getty ImagesImage caption, <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The town of Mashiki, pictured on 20 April 2016<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The Kumamoto prefecture is no stranger to earthquakes, and has been hit by powerful ones in the past. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In 2016, the prefecture was struck by a series of earthquakes. These included a magnitude 6.5 which hit the town of Mashiki on 14 April, and a magnitude 7.3 which struck the same area two days later.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">According to Japan&#8217;s public broadcaster NHK, 278 people were killed by those earthquakes in Kumamoto and in the neighbouring Oita Prefecture.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">There were also a number of deaths linked to health problems caused by the stress of evacuation, the outlet says. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Speaking at a press conference earlier, Shinji Kiyomoto of Japan&#8217;s Meteorological Agency asked the public to &#8220;remain vigilant&#8221; for additional earthquakes, referencing the events of 2016. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Emergency responders dig holes\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/f634e0bf-6580-4e2c-bb95-c162344f65a8.jpg.webp\"  width=\"594\" height=\"334\" class=\"ssrcss-egie1y-Image edrdn950\"\/>Image source, Getty ImagesImage caption, <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The 2016 earthquakes required an enormous recovery operation<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Kumamoto area was hit by deadly earthquakes in 2016published at 15:19 BST 15:19 BST Image source, Getty ImagesImage&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":829283,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[64,63,75,128],"class_list":["post-829282","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=829282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/829282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/829283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=829282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=829282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=829282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}