Snow hinders rescues and aid deliveries after Japan quakes kill 126 people

Rescue teams worked through snow to deliver supplies to isolated hamlets, six days after a powerful earthquake hit western Japan, killing at least 126 people.

Heavy snowfall forecast in the Ishikawa Prefecture later on Sunday and through the night added to the urgency.

After Monday’s 7.6 magnitude tremor, 222 people remain unaccounted for with 560 people injured. Hundreds of aftershocks have followed, rattling the Noto Peninsula where the quakes are centred.

Taiyo Matsushita walked three hours through mud to reach a supermarket in Wajima city to buy food and other supplies for his family.

The home where he lives with his wife and four children, and about 20 nearby homes, are among the more than a dozen communities cut off by landslides.

Power was out and, in a matter of hours, they could not even use their cell phones, he told Jiji Press.

Late on Saturday, a woman in her 90s was rescued from a crumbled home in Suzu in Ishikawa after 124 hours trapped in the rubble.

Chances for survival greatly diminish after the first 72 hours.

Ishikawa officials say 1,370 homes were completely or partially destroyed.

Many of the houses in the western coastal region of the main island are aging and wooden.

More than 30,000 people were evacuated to schools, auditoriums and community facilities where they slept on cold floors.

Some people were living out of their cars and long lines formed at gas stations. Food and water supplies were short with worries growing about snow and rainfall, which raise the risk of mudslides and further damage.

A fire that raged for hours gutted a major part of Wajima and a tsunami swept through homes, sucking cars into muddy waters.