Dozens of residents have evacuated remote islands in southern Japan, which has been shaken by nearly 1,600 earthquakes in recent weeks, the local mayor said Monday.
There has been no major physical damage to the hardest hit Akuseki Island, even after an earthquake of 5.1 in size that hit overnight, said Genichiro Kubo, based on another island.
But the almost non-stop Jolts since June 21 have caused severe stress for residents of the area, many of whom have been deprived of sleep.
Of the 89 residents of Akuseki, 44 have evacuated to the regional hub in Kagoshima before Sunday, while 15 others also left another island nearby, Kubo told a news conference.
The municipality, which includes seven inhabited and five uninhabited islands, is about 11 hours away on a ferry from Kagoshima.
Since June 21, the area has experienced from the beginning of Monday what seismologists refer to as a sword of 1,582 earthquakes.
Experts have said they believe that an underwater warge and streams of magma can be the cause. They say they cannot predict how long the shaking will continue.
“We can’t predict what can happen in the future. We don’t see when this ends,” Mayor Kubo told journalists.
A similar period of intense seismic activity in the area occurred in September 2023, when 346 earthquakes were recorded, according to Japan Meteorological Agency.
Japan is one of the world’s most seismically active countries sitting at the top of four large tectonic plates along the western edge of the Pacific “Ring of Fire.”
Archipelo, home to about 125 million people, typically experiences about 1,500 Jolts each year and accounts for about 18 percent of the world’s earthquake.
Some foreign tourists have stayed by coming to Japan because of unfounded fears that were taunted by social media that a large earthquake was imminent.
To cause particular concern was a manga comic book, which was released in 2021, which predicted a major disaster on July 5, 2025 – which did not happen.
