Typhoon Ampil approaches Tokyo, holiday traffic snarled

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TOKYO (Reuters) – Typhoon Ampil bore down on Tokyo on Thursday, prompting airlines to cancel hundreds of flights and railways to suspend part of their operations in the peak summer travel season.

The typhoon, categorised as “strong” by the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA), was about 690 km (430 miles) off Japan’s Pacific coast at 9:00 a.m. (0000 GMT on Thursday), heading towards Tokyo and surrounding regions. The agency has two higher categories – “very strong” and “violent”.

Ampil was blowing winds of 35 metres per second (78 mph), with maximum gust of 50 metres per second (112 mph), according to the JMA.

“With this typhoon approaching, we urge the public to be highly vigilant against storms, high waves and heavy rains,” a JMA official told a news conference.

Japan Airlines said it planned to cancel 191 domestic and 26 international flights, many of them leaving or arriving at Tokyo’s Haneda airport, on Friday.

Another major airline, ANA, announced it would cancel 280 domestic flights that were originally slated for Friday, affecting more than 60,000 passengers.

Central Japan Railway said it would cancel all the “Shinkansen” bullet train services between Tokyo and Japan’s industrial heartland of Nagoya on Friday.

(Reporting by Mariko Katsumura, Kiyoshi Takenaka; Editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)