Viral rumors of imminent disaster derived from a comic prediction have taken the brightness of the tourist boom in Japan, and some airlines cancel flights from Hong Kong, where the number of passengers has collapsed.
Japan has seen a record number of visitors this year, with April establishing a monthly maximum of 3.9 million travelers.
However, that was immersed in May, with the arrivals of Hong Kong, the Supplica City controlled by the Chinese where rumors have circulated widely, 11 percent more interannual, according to the latest data.
Steve Huen of the Hong Kong -based travel agency, Egl Tours, blamed a large number of social networks predictions linked to a manga that represents a dream of a massive earthquake and Tsunami that arrived in Japan and neighboring countries in July 2025.
“Rumors have had a significant impact,” said Huen, added that his company had seen his business related to Japan in half. The discounts and the introduction of earthquake insurance had “prevented trips to Japan to fall to zero,” he added.
Branden Choi, a 28 -year -old Hong Kong resident, said he was a frequent traveler to Japan, but doubted visiting the country during July and August due to manga prediction.
“If possible, I could delay my trip and go after September,” he said.
Ryo Tatsuki, the artist behind the manga entitled The future I sawPublished for the first time in 1999 and then relaunched in 2021, has tried to cushion speculation, saying in a statement issued by its editor that she “was not a prophet.”
The first edition of the manga warned about a great natural disaster in March 2011. That was the month and year when a massive earthquake, tsunami and nuclear disaster hit the northeast coast of Japan, killing thousands.
Some have interpreted the last edition such as predicting a catastrophic event specifically on July 5, 2025, although Tatsuki has denied it.
Located within the ‘Fire Ring’ of the Pacific Ocean, Japan is one of the most prone countries to the earthquakes in the world. In recent days, there have been more than 900 earthquakes, most of them small tremors, on the islands of the southern end of Kyushu.
But Robert Geller, a professor at the University of Tokyo who studied Seismology since 1971, said that even the prediction of scientist -based earthquakes was “impossible.”
“None of the predictions I have experienced in my scientific career has approached at all,” he said.
However, low -cost carrier Greater Bay Airlines became the last Hong Kong airline on Wednesday to cancel Japan flights due to low demand, saying that he would indefinitely suspend his service to Tokushima in western Japan as of September.
Serena Peng, 30, a visitor to Tokyo from Seattle, initially had tried to convince her husband to visit Japan after seeing the speculation of social networks.
“I am not very worried at this time, but I was before,” he said, talking outside the bustling Senso-Ji temple of Tokyo.
An earthquake with a preliminary magnitude of 5.5 hit a remote island in southwest Japan on Thursday, Japan’s weather agency said.
The Epicenter of the earthquake was in front of the coast of the Tokara island chain in Kagoshima prefecture, almost 1,200 kilometers from Tokyo, said the agency, adding that a Tsunami warning had not been issued.
The earthquake hit at a depth of 20 km, giving a seismic intensity of ‘6 lower’ on Japan’s 1-7 scale on Akuseki’s island, the agency said. Akuseki has a population of 89. Intensity is classified as a level that makes it “difficult to remain standing,” according to the agency.
More than 1,000 tremors have been detected with a seismic intensity of 1 or more on the Japanese scale around the island chain between June 21 and July 3, the agency said.
