Staff writer SHIMOSUWA, Nagano Pref. -- It began raining heavily around 1 p.m. on Jun. 29, 1999. Startled by a strange sound from a nearby river, Koichi Kato approached the bank to see a dirty torrent swelling up to only 30 cm below the edge of the embankment.
The roar of the current, carrying earth and rocks, continued even after the sun set.
"If the rain had continued one more hour, I think (the embankment) would have collapsed," recalled Kato, who works at a beauty salon in Shimosuwa, a small town in southern Nagano Prefecture.