All across Japan, which is heading to the polls today, tens of thousands were evacuated, hundreds of flights cancelled and train services were disrupted when Typhoon Lan swept ashore and brought strong winds and heavy rains.
The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) has downgraded the once category 4 Super Typhoon as it neared Tokyo, where it is expected to hit hardest Monday morning local time.
<blockquote class="twitter-video" data-lang="en-gb"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Typhoon Lan is barreling towards Tokyo, and I've never seen the Kanda River run this high. <a href="https://t.co/G4SeFoNYhx">pic.twitter.com/G4SeFoNYhx</a></p>— Davey Young (@SecondUtensil) <a href="https://twitter.com/SecondUtensil/status/921979358574555136?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">22 October 2017</a></blockquote>
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The outer bands of the storm have been lashing parts of Kyushu and Honshu for the past day.
The Japanese capital did already receive some 101mm of rain in the past 24 hours. That is well over half the October rainfall average. Oshima recorded 204mm of rain, Shionomisak was even wetter notching up 236mm in the same period.
The storm is expected to bring wind gusts of up to 100 mph with it.
<blockquote class="twitter-video" data-lang="en-gb"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Large swell ahead of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/typhoon?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#typhoon</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Lan?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Lan</a> crashing ashore near Shizuoka <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Japan?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#Japan</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/%E5%8F%B0%E9%A2%A8%E7%AC%AC21%E5%8F%B7?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#台風第21号</a> <a href="https://t.co/BKoOKSrkbE">pic.twitter.com/BKoOKSrkbE</a></p>— James Reynolds (@EarthUncutTV) <a href="https://twitter.com/EarthUncutTV/status/921961058146721792?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">22 October 2017</a></blockquote>
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Another similar amount of water is expected to fall from the sky over the next 24 hours. The heaviest rain will come on the higher ground where totals are approaching 400 to 500mm of rain are possible.
Furthermore, Honshu is likely to receive its heaviest snow of the season so far as the storm sweeps through during Monday. All should be quiet by Tuesday with barely a cloud in the sky.
Meanwhile voting in the national election continues. Japanese voters did turn out to brave the rain as they headed to polling station. By 4pm in Tokyo, turnout was a very low 26.3 per cent, 2.8 percentage points lower than in 2014.
Early voting hit a record high at 20 per cent of the electorate as the people knew the heavier rain and winds would come later.
<blockquote class="twitter-video" data-lang="en-gb"><p lang="und" dir="ltr"><a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/TyphoonLan?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#TyphoonLan</a> x <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/JapanElection?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#JapanElection</a> = 🌀🌀 <a href="https://t.co/jGXXxI8Rza">pic.twitter.com/jGXXxI8Rza</a></p>— Ta (@tmnk09) <a href="https://twitter.com/tmnk09/status/922042404160520192?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">22 October 2017</a></blockquote>
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