VLADIVOSTOK, September 5 (Itar-Tass) — Typhoon Talas that is raging over the Sea of ··Japan (East Sea) will transform into a cyclone and will affect the Sakhalin Island on September 6-7. The island is facing heavy rainfall, up to 33 millimetres, and the water level may rise up to 1.5 metres in the rivers in the Nevelsk, Kholmsk, Aniva, Korsakov, Dolinsky and other districts of the island region. The Sakhalin hydrometeorology service department management reported this on Monday.
The Russian Emergency Situations Ministry’s (EMERCOM) main department for the Sakhalin region has advised the island residents not to leave their settlements and told tourist groups that are on the route, as well as hunters and fishermen to find shelter to hide during the bad weather.
Typhoon Talas overnight to Monday approached the Primorsky Territory. Rains of varying intensity started in its eastern part. The precipitation level was 68 mm in the Rudnaya Pristan settlement during the night, 1.5 times exceeding the norm. Rains are continuing in central and eastern parts of the territory. The Olga settlement had 71 mm of rain falling in three hours. There have been no reports so far about emergency situations.
On the coast, including Vladivostok, the north wind force has intensified with gusts reaching 16-21 metres per second. The ferry service and boat trips to the islands of Russky and Popov have been cancelled in the capital of the Primorsky Territory because of the bad weather.
In Japan, Typhoon Talas has killed 27 people and another 54 people are still unaccounted for.
Typhoon Talas (international designation: 1112, JTWC designation: 15W) was an unusually large but weak tropical cyclone that caused several deaths and severe damages in the island nation of Japan. It was the 12th named storm, the 7th severe tropical storm and the 5th typhoon of the 2011 Pacific typhoon season. Talas is also the worst typhoon to directly impact the nation in seven years.
Talas slowed down on approaching Japan, bringing heavy rainfall all over the southern coast. In Tokyo, roads were flooded already and more rain was expected over a prolonged period of time as the slow moving typhoon approached. In Shunan, Yamaguchi, extremely heavy rainfall of 66.5 millimetres per hour was observed, with rainfall of 69.0 mm in Yamanakako, Yamanashi, and 49.5 mm in Ichinoseki, Iwate which exceeded overall records for the entire month of September. As the typhoon approached, The Fujisankei Classic, an annual golf event on the Japan Golf Tour was disrupted by the heavy rain. Heavy rains triggered flash flooding, which killed one person, and injured 17 leaving three more missing soon after the landfall. Some 3,200 people were evacuated in 16 prefectures after the typhoon slammed the island nation with extremely heavy rains. The Central Japan Railway Company had to suspend its bullet train services on the Tokaido Shinkansen Line between Gifu-Hashima and Maibara railway stations because of the storm. More than 300 houses were flooded while several landslides were reported since the storm's landfall in southern Japan. Also, since the storm was moving unusually slow, it worsened the condition. NHK confirmed that the number of dead was 26, the number of injured was 105 and the number of missing was 50.
As many as 700 houses were completely inundated by the floodwaters spawned by Talas in eastern and western Japan and about 9,500 households in nine prefectures across the nation were without power after power outages. More than 400 flights were cancelled leaving 34,000 stranded. Most of the devastation occurred in Osaka, where a flooded river washed away two complete houses and a landslide destroyed four houses. Extremely heavy rainfall of as high as 170 centimetres (67 in) was dumped over Osaka since Talas approached Japan. The heavy rainfall triggered obvious flooding in the rivers, but so extreme that an entire bridge was washed away.
Talas poured very heavy, never before seen record rainfall across the nations stranding thousands, turning towns into lakes and washed away cars, setting off mudslides. More than 460,000 people had to be evacuated to evacuation centres thousands of miles from their homes. The storm also damaged the Nijo Castle, a flatland castle located in Kyoto, Japan.