>More quakes rattle northeastern Japan

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A fresh round of tremors, including one with a magnitude of 6.3, shook northern Japan on Tuesday afternoon, the Japan Meteorological Agency reported.

The quake was centered in Fukushima Prefecture, near Japan’s Pacific coast and about 64 kilometers (40 miles) southwest of the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Workers retreated to earthquake-resistant shelters during the event, but there was no loss of power at the plant, the Tokyo Electric Power Company told CNN.

It followed a magnitude-6.4 quake Tuesday morning that killed at least six people when it triggered a landslide in Iwaki, north of Tokyo.

The earlier quake buried three homes, the Iwaki fire department said. Three people were rescued and hospitalized, and fire officials were working to rescue an unknown number of others believed to be trapped, the department said.

The quake struck at about 8:08 a.m. Tuesday (7:08 p.m. Monday ET), according to the U.S. Geological Survey. It had a depth of about 13 kilometers (8 miles) and was centered about 77 miles east-southeast of Tokyo.

Monday night, one person was killed in Iwaki and several others were trapped when a powerful 6.6-magnitude earthquake triggered landslides there, the fire department said. It happened exactly one month after the country’s devastating 9.0-magnitude quake and tsunami.

Since the March 11 disaster, there have been more than 400 aftershocks of magnitude 6.0 or greater.

The earlier quake was centered about 100 miles (164 kilometers) northeast of Tokyo and about 30 miles (50 kilometers) southwest of the nuclear facility, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The landslides in Iwaki buried three houses. Police in Fukushima Prefecture initially reported that four people were trapped. The Iwaki Fire Department later said more than four people were trapped, but the exact number was unclear.

>Another 200 bodies found in quake-hit coastal areas (Photos)

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Police in Japan said Sunday they have found another 200 bodies in the quake-ravaged coastal areas of the north.
Police officials in Miyagi told the Associated Press that authorities were recovering the bodies, but did not provide further details and declined to be identified, citing departmental policy.
Meanwhile, Japan’s Meteorological Agency has upgraded the magnitude of Friday’s quake to 9.0 after analyzing seismic waves. The agency earlier measured it at 8.8 magnitude.
The quake was the biggest to hit Japan since record-keeping began in the late 1800s. The agency warned Sunday of more strong aftershocks after Friday’s quake which unleashed massive tsunamis and killed at least 763 people — with estimates nearing the 1,700 mark.
The U.S. Geological Survey has measured the quake at magnitude 8.9, and that number remained unchanged Sunday.
Rescue and recovery
The Japanese government increased the number of troops dedicated to rescue and recovery operations from 51,000 to about 100,000.
Around 10,000 people are still unaccounted for in the Japanese port town of Minamisanriku which was virtually obliterated after the quake and tsunami. Large areas of the countryside were surrounded by water and unreachable.
Rescue teams searched for missing people along hundreds of kilometres of the Japanese coast. At least a million households are still without water and some 2.5 million households don’t have electricity.
Meanwhile, strong aftershocks continued Sunday, including one with a magnitude of 6.2 that originated in the sea, about 179 kilometres east of Tokyo.