Hundreds of thousands of people across the country participated in annual disaster drills Tuesday, while many prefectures canceled or scale-downed their exercises in the wake of flood damage triggered by Typhoon No. 4.
Yamagata, Miyagi, Tochigi, Fukushima, Ibaraki and Chiba prefectures canceled their planned drills, putting priority on relief activities in the wake of torrential rains that lasted from Thursday to Sunday.
The central government also had planned to conduct mock emergency conferences and disaster drills Tuesday, but the government's Central Disaster Prevention Council, headed by Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi, decided Monday night to call them off.