OJIYA, Japan, (AFP) - More strong aftershocks jolted central Japan as exhaustion took its toll on thousands preparing for a third night in shelters after the country`s worst earthquake in nearly a decade that left 25 people dead.
About 380 tremors have followed the first quake of 6.8 on the Richter scale late Saturday in Niigata, a coastal area 200 kilometres (125 miles) northwest of Tokyo, with the biggest Monday measuring 5.6 at 6:05 am (2105 GMT Sunday).
Police said 25 people had died from the quakes with the death toll rising as residents -- particularly the elderly -- are worn down physically and mentally.
In the latest casualty, Ei Kikuchi, 74, died after spending a second night in a neighbour`s car and complaining of breathing problems. A 54-year-old also died of fatigue after he tried to clear his home of debris, police said.
Some 97,800 people have been evacuated amid warnings of new tremors, spending the night lodged in schools and other public buildings or, for those wanting more privacy, in cars. About 60,000 houses were still out of power.
Kimi Seki, a 81-year-old woman from the worst-hit town of Ojiya, told AFP she has been unable to sleep after seeing her house reduced to rubble and feeling the sporadic aftershocks.
"I still feel scared"," Seki said. "I can`t feel at ease staying with a lot of people," she said of the shelters.
Japanese newspapers were full of heart-wrenching accounts from Niigata, a largely rural and mountainous region on the Sea of Japan, also known as the East Sea.
Relatives could do nothing but listen to the cries of a 12-year-old girl calling out for help as she was trapped under her collapsed second-floor room, according to the Asahi Shimbun.
She died along with her 64-year-old grandfather who was also buried under the rubble.
And in a mountain village, a 42-year-old man who travelled 200 kilometres every weekend to take his 75-year-old mother to hospital died with her as the quake flattened their home, the Mainichi Shimbun said.
The dead also included a 76-year-old hospital patient whose artificial respirator was dislodged by the tremors and a two-month-old baby boy who died while fleeing in a car with his family.
At least 1,960 people have been injured in the earthquakes, police said.
The Meteorological Agency warned the already suffering residents of Niigata that worse may be in store -- including rain on Tuesday.
"There is a 30 percent probability of aftershocks of 6.0 or above on the Richter scale hitting the region within three days," said Masahiro Yamamoto, who heads the earthquakes division at the meteorological agency.
The agency boosted the probability from 10 percent "as aftershocks became more active today," he told a news conference in Tokyo, adding residents "should keep in mind that strong tremors may continue to occur."
Share prices on the Tokyo Stock Exchange slumped 1.82 percent Monday, in part due to nervousness after the quakes, dealers said.
Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi vowed to visit Niigata as soon as possible.
The government said it was ready to compile a supplementary budget for the current fiscal year to March 2005 to cope with damage from the quakes and a series of powerful typhoons including Tokage which last week killed some 80 people.
The quakes flattened hundreds of houses, cracked more than 1,000 roads and triggered 11 fires, municipal officials said.
Japan`s famed bullet train derailed for the first time since it was put on service in 1964. It is expected to take weeks before the bullet train service connecting Tokyo to Niigata returns to normal.
Some 90 landslides swept through the region, where the deadly typhoon this month softened the ground.
The earthquake was the deadliest to hit tremor-prone Japan since 1995 when 6,433 people were killed by a 7.3 Richter scale quake in western Kobe city.
10/25/2004 - 08:09 GMT - AFP