Heavy rain causes flooding near Tokyo that kills 4 and strands travelers

Record-breaking rainfall that pounded cities east of Tokyo overnight has flooded roads and dozens of homes, stranded thousands of people, caused power outages and left at least four people dead and one missing

TOKYO -- Record-breaking rainfall that pounded cities east of Tokyo overnight flooded roads and dozens of homes, stranded thousands of people, caused power outages and left at least four people dead and one missing.

The Japan Meteorological Agency downgraded its most severe warning for heavy rain in more than a dozen municipalities in Chiba prefecture as rain subsided Friday morning but forecast more rain later in the day.

Photos and television footage showed widespread damage after daylight, with homes, cars and parts of railway tracks flooded with muddy water.

The Ground Self-Defense Force said it dispatched buses to pick up about 4,000 stranded people who stayed overnight at the Soga train station, a local route that also serves Tokyo Disney. The theme park did not report any damage.

Thousands more people were stuck overnight at the Narita airport serving the Tokyo region, with trains out of the area stopped. Services partially resumed Friday morning with delays, while flights in and out of Narita were operating normally Friday, with many people returning home at the end of Japan's Bon Buddhist holiday week. Hundreds of people took shelter overnight at the Chiba prefectural government building.

The prefecture said four people were found dead and another person was missing. The victims included a man found floating on a flooded road in Ichikawa city and a woman who had been stuck in a flooded car in Sakura city. Another person pulled from a flooded car in Kashiwa city was presumed dead.

More than 80 homes were flooded in the prefecture and nearly 230,000 residents across the prefecture were advised to take shelter, Chiba officials said.

The torrential rain and flooding also knocked out power to about 23,000 homes Friday morning, down from 68,000 earlier, according to the TEPCO Power Grid.

Record-breaking rainfall of 11.5 centimeters (4.5 inches) fell in just one hour in Chiba City and 9.7 centimeters (3.8 inches) fell in one hour in Sakura, which was also a record. JMA forecast official Takuya Hosomi told a televised emergency news conference that unprecedented levels of rainfall were recorded.