Photo/Illutration A rescue helicopter arrives at a location in Fukushima on Feb. 12, transporting tourists trapped at a spa resort after a road was cut off by avalanches. (Susumu Okamoto)

FUKUSHIMA—Forty people have been evacuated by helicopter after avalanches left them stranded for days at a hot spring resort here.

Authorities dispatched two helicopters to the scene on the morning of Feb. 12.

The avalanches occurred on Feb. 10, first around 4 a.m. and again before noon, blocking a road and trapping 62 people at three hotels in the Tsuchiyuonsenmachi district on the western outskirts of the city.

Fukushima prefectural officials decided to airlift the isolated tourists to safety after concluding that clearing snow from the road was not immediately possible due to the risk of further avalanches.

While utilities and communication lines to the hotels remained operational and all the trapped individuals were in stable condition, there had been no immediate prospect of leaving.

One of the rescued tourists was a 66-year-old man from Saitama city who had been visiting the Noji spa resort with his wife.

“I thought it was just a road being cut off, I didn’t expect it to last long,” he said.

He added that, while stranded, he had not been worried, because the resort staff kept him informed of the situation.

Another rescued tourist was a 41-year-old woman from Kawaguchi, Saitama Prefecture, who had been on vacation with her daughter.

She said that the hotel provided them with food and that they were not inconvenienced by the situation.

ACCIDENTS NATIONWIDE

The rescue operation took place following the season’s harshest cold wave, which has brought heavy snow across the country since Feb. 4.

Resulting snow-related accidents claimed 12 lives across eight prefectures and injured another 158 people across 15 prefectures, according to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency.

Niigata Prefecture topped the list of fatalities with three, followed by Fukushima and Shimane prefectures with two, respectively. The remaining five prefectures—Yamagata, Toyama, Ishikawa, Fukui and Nagano—each reported one victim.

Injuries were reported over a wider area, including Hokkaido and the main island of Shikoku.

Prefectures facing the Sea of Japan were particularly hard hit, with 37 people injured in Niigata, followed by 33 in Yamagata, 22 in Toyama and 19 in Fukui.

Disaster Management Minister Manabu Sakai warned of a growing number of accidents while shoveling snow.

“Be careful of snow falling from roofs and be sure to clear snow with family members or neighbors so they can assist in an emergency,” he said.

(This article was compiled from reports by Susumu Okamoto, Nobuyuki Takiguchi and Shoko Rikimaru.)

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