CNN
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The Japanese government on Saturday warned about the possibility of a stronger earthquake in the waters southwest of the major island, but urged its people not to believe the unfounded predictions of a major disaster.
Authorities on Friday evacuated some residents of a remote island near the epicenter of a 5.5 magnitude tremor from the tip of Kyushu’s southernmost island.
The earthquake is strong enough to stand, one of more than 1,000 tremors on Kagoshima Prefecture Island in the last two weeks, and has promoted rumors derived from comic book predictions that this month’s disaster will fall on the country.
“With our current scientific knowledge, it is difficult to predict the exact time, location or scale of an earthquake,” said Ayataka Evita, director of the earthquake monitoring department at the Japan Meteorological Agency, after the 5.4 magnitude earthquake again shook the area on Saturday.
“We ask that people understand based on scientific evidence,” Evita told a press conference.
The comic, which was interpreted as predicting a catastrophic event on Saturday, urged some travelers to avoid Japan. According to the latest data, arrivals from Hong Kong, which are widely circulated, fell 11% from the same month last year.
Japan has recorded record visits this year, with monthly highs of 3.9 million travelers in April.
Ryo Tatsuki, the artist behind the manga “The Future I Saw,” which was first published in 1999 and re-released in 2021, said she was “not a prophet” in a statement published by the publisher.
Earthquakes are common in Japan and are one of the most seismically active regions in the world. This accounts for about a fifth of earthquakes around the world.
