Large parts of Japan have been blanketed with snow, as the lowest temperatures this winter disrupted rail and air travel, amid warnings that more heavy snowfall was expected through the weekend.
Residents struggled to dig out cars that had been buried by snow in just a few hours, with the meteorological agency describing the cold front as the “strongest in several years”.
Hokkaido, Japan’s northernmost main island and the Japan Sea coast have been hardest hit, forcing domestic airlines to cancel flights between cities in the region and Tokyo. Train services in parts of central Japan were also cancelled, according to the Kyodo news agency. The snow closed several roads, prompting officials to urge motorists to fit snow tyres.
The town of Shirakawa in Gifu prefecture saw 129 cm of snowfall in just 48 hours – a record high, the meteorological agency said, while snowfall reached almost a metre in depth in Joetsu, Niigata prefecture, and Honbestu in Hokkaido.
The weather agency said extremely unstable atmospheric conditions would generate significant amounts of snowfall in the coming days, including in regions along the Pacific coast, where snowfall is rare. Officials urged people in regions where heavy snow is forecast to avoid non-essential outings.
Unusually warm weather throughout January had, ironically, caused anxiety among organisers of this year’s snow festival in Sapporo, where about 200 ice and snow sculptures went on display this week.
When local people began creating the sculptures last month, the snow barely covered roads in Sapporo, Hokkaido’s biggest city, forcing organisers to import enough snow to fill 2,500 10-tonne trucks from other towns in the region.
The most eye-catching creations include the Japanese baseball star Shohei Ohtani and his dog Dekopin, and a 12m-high re-creation of the former Hokkaido prefectural government building.
About 80% of the works were made by citizen sculptors.
Article by:Source: Justin McCurry in Tokyo
