Rumours of massive earthquake in Japan scare off Hong Kongers

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Rumors of the unfounded Internet that a massive earthquake will soon hurt Japan’s travel agencies and airlines business, which reports a reduction in demand from Hong Kong’s troubled citizens.

In 2024, Hong Congress traveled to Japan about 2.7 million times.

Although it is impossible to know when the earthquakes will occur, the pride of the city’s residents has spread widely.

Some false posts referred to a Japanese manga humor, which was re -published in 2021, which predicts a major natural catastrophe in July 2025, based on the author’s dream.

Other posts give different dates, while a Facebook group that claims to predict disasters in Japan has a quarter of a million members, especially in Hong Kong and Taiwan.

“The earthquake forecast has led to a major change in our consumer priorities,” said Frankie Chu, head of the Hong Kong Travel Agency’s CLS Holiday.

Chu told AFP that his company in March and April received about 70-80 percent less questioning than last year’s trip to Japan.

“I’ve never experienced it before,” Chu said, who also operates the booking website Fly Aagen.com.

He said that when some people changed their destination, others did not dare to travel.

Mild to moderate earthquakes are common in Japan, where the codes of hard -building buildings reduce damage, even with big shaking.

But the nation is not a stranger to major disasters, including a magnitude -9.0 earthquake in 2011, killing 18,500 people or missing and causing a devastating malfunction at the Fukushima nuclear plant.

Zhou said earthquakes are rarely felt in Hong Kong, but some people are easily disliked.

‘Huge earthquake’ alert

Last month, the cabinet office of Tokyo said on the social media platform X: “It is not possible to predict the earthquake through history, time and space based on current scientific knowledge.”

A cabinet office official told AFP that the X post is part of its usual information about earthquakes.

But Japan’s Asahi Shimbon Daily reports that in January, the Japanese government panel is responding to the prophecies after issuing a new estimate for the possibility of “megacic”.

The panel said that in the next three decades, the chances of a massive earthquake in the south of Japan have increased to 75-82 percent.

This was followed by a new estimate of the damage from the cabinet office in March, which said that Nanaki’s trough megacic and tsunami could cause 298,000 deaths in Japan.

Despite the usual updated of the previous 2014 data, it seems that the fears of tourists have been born.

A video of YouTube, which includes Feng Shui Master, has urged the audience not to visit Japan, which has been seen more than 100,000 times by local media outlet HK01.

Don Hun does not fully believe in online claims, one of the 7.5 million Hong Kong residents, but is still affected.

The 32 -year -old social worker said, “I will only take it as a precaution, and I will not make a special plan to travel to Japan.”

And if a friend asks him to meet Japan in July, Hun can “suggest going somewhere else”.

‘Non -scientific rumors’

A local tourist official told AFP that Hong Kong -based Greater Bay Airlines has reduced flights to Japan’s southern Tokoshima region.

“The company told us that the demand among the rumors has decreased,” he said.

“From May 12 to October 25, weekly three round -trip flights will be reduced to two round trips each week.”

Airline is also reducing its flights to Sandai in the northern region of Miyagi.

Miagi Governor Yoshiro Murai assured the passengers, “There is no reason to worry,” he added that the Japanese people are not fleeing.

He said last month, “If non -scientific rumors on social media are affecting tourism, this will be a major problem.”

According to the Japan National Tourism Organization, the number of Hong Kong visitors in March was 208,400-which is about 10 % less year year.

However, the decline began in mid -April this year instead of March due to Easter holidays.

Hong Kong-based EGL Tours, Hong Kong, has not seen a massive decline in users traveling to Japan, said its executive director Steve Haven Cook.

But the recent booking in two hotels in Japan shows less than Hong Kong guests, while the number of other global locations is stable.

“In any case, in the possibility of not predicting,” people will realize that this is not true, “he said.