Japan homes left without power as earthquake kills four

Tens of thousands of Japanese households remained without power on Thursday morning after a magnitude 7.4 quake struck shortly before midnight, throwing a swathe of northeastern Japan into darkness, severing key transportation links and killing four. Companies including Toyota Motor Corp and chipmaker Renesas Electronics Corp raced to assess the impact, with any supply chain disruption likely to add pressure to strained global output of smartphones, electronics and automobiles.

 Areas of Tokyo lost power immediately after the quake, though most regained it within three hours. But some 24,270 households serviced by Tohoku Electric Power Co in northeast Japan remained without electricity by 10:00 a.m. local time (0100 GMT) on Thursday, although the firm said it expected most will have supply restored later in the day. Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said four people had died and that the government would be on high alert for the possibility of further strong tremors over the next two to three days. The quake, initially measured at magnitude 7.3 but later revised up to 7.4 by the Japan Meteorological Agency, hit at 11.36 p.m. local time just off the coast of Fukushima prefecture at a depth of 60 kilometres.

The temblor revived memories of the March 11, 2011 disaster in the same area, and left Shinkansen bullet train service indefinitely suspended, with at least one major highway to the region closed for safety checks. The 2011 quake and tsunami off Fukushima - commemorated across the country less than a week ago - left some 18,000 dead.