The death toll from the powerful New Year's Day earthquake that struck Ishikawa Prefecture and surrounding areas in central Japan reached 180 with 120 others unaccounted for, local authorities said Tuesday, Kyodo reports.
Local police are set to embark on a large-scale search operation later Tuesday with some 100 personnel in the rubble of a fire-gutted morning marketplace in Wajima, where a major blaze broke out following the magnitude-7.6 quake.
More than 28,000 people continue to shelter at evacuation centers in Ishikawa Prefecture, with around a dozen reportedly infected with the coronavirus at three locations in a town, while at least 3,300 people, mainly in Wajima and the adjacent city of Suzu, remain isolated due to severed roads.
More than 80 schools, including in Wajima and Suzu, cannot hold classes due to damaged facilities.
At the Wajima marketplace, around 200 buildings were destroyed in the fire that began on Jan. 1, according to the local municipal government and firefighters.
There were many wooden buildings in the market, which was popular with tourists due to its more than 1,000 years of history.
Deaths from the quake, which registered a maximum 7 on the country's seismic intensity scale, have been concentrated in Wajima and Suzu, while the number of people who are unaccounted for has fluctuated due to conflicting information.
On Tuesday, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida's Cabinet approved the allocation of 4.74 billion yen ($33 million) from reserve funds of the fiscal 2023 budget to support the victims of Noto Peninsula quake, including measures to help those affected cope with cold weather.
The government also plans to increase reserve funds earmarked in the draft budget for the next fiscal year starting April from the current 500 billion yen, to fund disaster recovery efforts, according to Kishida.
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