Japan mounts search for 5 lost Pinoy seamen

TOKYO (AFP) – A fresh search was mounted for five Filipino seamen yesterday as Typhoon Sinlaku hovered over the southwestern end of Japan’s Okinawan islands after causing injuries, damage to houses and powercuts, the meteorological agency said.

Japanese officials were searching for the five-member crew of a Philippine tugboat that went missing Thursday, said an official from the Okinawan prefectural government.

The Japan coast guard sent two patrol vessels as well as nine aircraft to search for the missing vessel and crew members, said a coast guard spokesman.

"So far, we have absolutely no clue as to where the vessel might have gone," the spokesman said, adding the current and wind might have carried it northwest of the main island of Okinawa.

The Philippines-registered tugboat Avoir went missing off Okinawa, after making a distress call upon developing engine trouble.

It had been sheltering in Nago Bay off Okinawa island, since Wednesday due to the strong winds, the coast guard said earlier.

Packing winds of up to 144 kilometers per hour, as of noon yesterday, the typhoon was located around 140 kilometers north-northwest of Miyako island, nearly 2,000 kilometers southwest of Tokyo.

"The typhoon has almost stopped moving," west, said an agency official.

The typhoon was causing waves as high as nine meters (30 feet) in the area, official said.

The Okinawa government also received reports of 33 minor injuries related to the typhoon, the official said.

Power was cut off from around 105,500 households, with 129 people evacuating their houses to shelter with relatives or at public offices, he said.

Thirty-four houses and buildings were damaged, including seven that were destroyed, he said.

"The typhoon is still causing heavy rainfall in the western islands of our prefecture. We are still carefully monitoring the typhoon," he said.

The main island of Okinawa was drenched by 255 millimeters (10 and a quarter inches) of rain in the 24 hours to midnight Thursday, while rain was falling at 20 millimeters an hour on Miyako island as of 1:00 pm, the agency said. Sinlaku is the name of a god in Micronesian legends.