A six-year-old boy was killed and another child seriously injured after being hit by snow that fell from the roof of their kindergarten in north-eastern Japan, police said on Monday, as reports put the death toll from extreme weather at 100.
The boy died in hospital late on Monday after about 50cm of snow slid off the roof of the two-storey public kindergarten in Fukui prefecture without warning, striking him and two other playmates, said local police official Tetsuya Yamauchi.
A five-year-old boy was seriously injured, while another child suffer a minor shoulder injury, said Yamauchi.
Heavy snow across Japan since December has been blamed for hundreds of injuries and cut off access to several mountain villages, prompting the military to mobilise about 2 000 troops to remove snow from roads and homes.
Earlier on Monday, a government team visited Nagano prefecture, one of the hardest-hit regions, to meet local officials and survey relief efforts, according to official Hisashi Yumoto.
Nagano officials asked the central government for more money to clear snow and compensate farmers whose crops were damaged, Yumoto said.
The team will also visit Tsunan town in Niigata prefecture, which was blanketed with 2,89m of snow, the Cabinet Office said in a statement.
Kyodo News agency said on Monday there had been 100 snow-related deaths since early December, including the kindergartner’s, citing its own tally. The figure is the highest since the winter of 1983/84, when snow claimed 131 lives in northern Japan, according to the Meteorological Agency.
Fukui, Nagano and Niigata prefectures are between 180km and 240km north of Tokyo.
The snow and cold spell had caused damage to Japan’s agriculture and fisheries worth about 3,67-billion yen ($32-million) by January 13, Mamoru Ishihara, Vice-Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, said on Monday.
Low temperatures ruined vegetables and fruits, while greenhouses collapsed under the weight of snow, said agriculture ministry official Mitsuru Fukuda. — Sapa-AP