KURASHIKI, OKAYAMA PREF. ¨C Residents were digging out a mud-caked area of Okayama Prefecture on Tuesday, as floodwaters from last week¡¯s record rainfall receded to reveal broad swaths of devastation from which it could take years to fully recover.
Mabicho, a district in the city of Kurashiki, was one of the hardest-hit areas in western Japan. With the sun now beating down on the destruction, road access to many parts of the area became possible Tuesday ¡ª a development expected to aid the delivery of water, food and emergency supplies.
Rescue workers ¡ª including Self-Defense Force personnel and local government authorities who were coordinating rescue and cleanup activities ¡ª arrived to find a very dusty landscape Tuesday afternoon, their vehicles making slow progress through roads caked with dried and drying mud in and around Mabicho.
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