Typhoon Dujuan swept through Japan's Kanto region on Monday, killing at least four people, injuring 22 others, and leaving tens of thousands of homes without power before moving out into the Pacific by Tuesday morning. The storm, Japan's 25th typhoon of the season, brought sustained winds of up to 130km/h and gusts reaching 194km/h, triggering dangerous landslides and record-breaking rainfall across the greater Tokyo area.
The heaviest toll fell on Chiba prefecture, a largely suburban and rural area east of Tokyo, where three people died in a series of landslides that caused homes to collapse. In Yokosuka, a coastal city in Kanagawa prefecture south of the capital, a woman in her 60s was killed when mud engulfed her home. Search and rescue teams continued to look for at least six people reported missing, including a couple in their 70s in Yokosuka. More than 45,000 households in Chiba remained without electricity on Tuesday afternoon, and over 460 properties across the region were reported damaged. Japan Airlines cancelled 135 flights and All Nippon Airways scrapped 140 more, while more than 1.6 million residents in and around Tokyo were urged — though not required — to evacuate.
Dujuan also dumped exceptional volumes of rain. Oshima, a volcanic island roughly 120 kilometres south of central Tokyo, recorded 832 millimetres of rainfall over just 48 hours — more than double the island's entire average September total. Tokyo's Edogawa ward recorded a historic 282.5 millimetres in a single 24-hour period. The storm disrupted several public events during a five-day national holiday, including the Tokyo Game Show, one of the world's largest video game trade fairs, which closed early, and concerts at the Rock in Japan music festival, which were cancelled. Some events at the Asian Games, currently being held in Japan, were also affected.
Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi offered condolences on social media and said she had instructed senior cabinet officials to manage the emergency response with "utmost preparedness" before departing on a scheduled trip to the United States, where she is set to address the UN General Assembly and meet US President Donald Trump.
Why this matters: Dujuan is the latest in a series of powerful Pacific storms intensified by a "super El Niño" weather pattern that has warmed ocean temperatures, providing more energy for cyclone formation. Scientists warn that human-driven climate change is compounding the risk further, as a warmer atmosphere holds more moisture and produces heavier rainfall. Japan is no stranger to late-summer typhoons, but the record precipitation recorded this week underscores how extreme weather events are growing more intense — a pattern also seen in floods and storms across east Asia, North America, and Europe throughout the year.