Nearly 260,000 people have been ordered to leave their homes in southern Japan, with Okinawa’s main airport shut and more than 500 flights cancelled as Typhoon Dolphin sweeps across the country's southern islands and brings heavy rain to a region still recovering from last week's deadly earthquake.
Dolphin passed close to Okinoerabu, one of a chain of small islands between Kyushu and Okinawa, on Friday morning, moving west at 25kmph with sustained winds near its centre of 144kmph, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. A gust of 148kmph was recorded on Tokunoshima, further north in the same chain, shortly before 7am.
