Dozens of people from a Japanese coastal city took part in the country's first evacuation drill of a missile attack Friday, as regional tensions soar over accelerating North Korean threats. The exercise in the city of Oga came less than two weeks after three North Korean missiles landed in the Sea of Japan (East Sea) off the northern municipality.
Japan has been on edge over North Korean launches since a mid-range ballistic missile flew without warning over the northern part of the country and into the western Pacific in 1998.
A total of 110 residents, including primary school students, participated in the drill, an Oga city official said.
"A missile appears to have been launched; there is a possibility that part of the missile will come down; it fell in the Sea of Japan," read a series of mock alerts sent to officials in cities in Akita prefecture.