Typhoon No. 14 made landfall in southwestern Japan on Sunday night, as authorities urged hundreds of thousands of people to take shelter from the powerful storm's strong winds and heavy rain.
The Japan Meteorological Agency said the typhoon officially made landfall around 7pm as its eyewall approached the city of Kagoshima.
It was packing gusts of up to 234 km/h and dumped up to 500 mm of rain in less than 24 hours on parts of southwestern Kyushu.
At least 20,000 people were spending the night in shelters in Kyushu region's Kagoshima and Miyazaki prefectures, where the agency issued a rare "special warning" - a warning issued only after one in decades. The bar predicts the conditions to be observed.
NHK, which gathers information from local authorities, said more than seven million people had been told to go to shelters or take shelter in fortified buildings to avoid the storm.
Evacuation warnings are not mandatory, and officials have sometimes struggled to convince people to move to shelters ahead of severe weather.
They tried to drive home their concerns about the weather system over the weekend.
"Please stay away from dangerous areas, and please leave if you feel even the slightest hint of danger," Prime Minister Fumio Kishida tweeted after calling a cabinet meeting on the storm.
It would be dangerous to leave there at night. Please proceed to safety while it is still light outside.
The agency warned that the region could face an "unprecedented" risk of strong winds, storm surges and torrential rains and described the storm as "highly dangerous".
Hiro Kato, head of the Weather Monitoring and Warning Center, told reporters on Sunday that "the typhoon-hit areas are seeing unprecedented rainfall."
"Especially in areas where landslide warnings have been issued, it is highly likely that some types of landslides are already occurring."
"Extreme precautions should be taken even in areas where disasters do not occur normally," he stressed.
As of Sunday evening, utility companies said about 200,000 homes were without power across the region.
Trains, flights and ferry runs were canceled until the storm passed, and even some convenience stores — normally open around the clock and considered a lifeline in disasters — were closing their doors.
"The southern part of the Kyushu region may experience unprecedented violent winds, high waves and high tides," the agency said on Sunday, urging residents to "all Use more caution than
On the ground, an official in Kagoshima's Izumi city said conditions were deteriorating rapidly by Sunday afternoon.
"The wind has become very strong. The rain is also getting harder," he said. "It is completely white outside. Visibility is almost zero
In Kyushu's Minamata city, fishing boats crashed into the waves for safety, as bands of sea spray and rain battered the boardwalk.
The typhoon, which has weakened slightly as it approaches land, is expected to turn northeast and spread across the main island of Japan by early Wednesday.
Japan is currently in typhoon season and experiences about 20 such typhoons a year, typically with heavy rains that cause landslides or flash floods.
