Quake rumor in Hong Kong puts flight bookings to Japan at risk

Asahi Shimbun

26-04-2025

A rumor circulating in Hong Kong that a huge earthquake and tsunami will hit Japan this summer led to such a sharp drop in flight bookings that one airline was forced to reduce its services to Japan.
The impact of the hearsay prompted the Cabinet Office in Tokyo to post the following to its official X account on the evening of April 24: 'It is difficult from current scientific knowledge to predict earthquakes by specifying the time and location.'
An official in the section that handles disaster management said the move was in response to several 'prophecies' that sprung up after a forecast by the Japanese government's Earthquake Research Committee of around an '80 percent chance' of a megaquake hitting a wide area of Japan's Pacific coastline within the next 30 years.
The death toll from such a Nankai Trough earthquake with a magnitude of 8 or 9 was put at 298,000.
Fears that Japan would face a disaster comparable to the one that devastated northeastern Japan in 2011 apparently spread in Hong Kong through social media by those who had read or heard about separate prophecies by a famed local feng shui master and a Japanese manga artist.
Around mid-May, Hong Kong-based Greater Bay Airlines decided to suspend one roundtrip flight a week on two routes linking Hong Kong with Sendai in the Tohoku region and Tokushima in Shikoku in central Japan.
The airline noticed in late February that reservations for late March and April were not increasing as they had in past years, which was strange because bookings are traditionally in demand for cherry blossom viewing in Japan as well as the Easter holiday in Hong Kong.
'We expected around 80 percent of the seats to be taken, but actual reservations came to only 40 percent,' said Hiroki Ito, the general manager of the airline's Japan office.
Demand for the Tokushima flights also decreased sharply, apparently due to the rumors.
One trigger for the drop in flight reservations was apparently due to a manga published in 2021 by Ryo Tatsuki titled 'Watashi ga Mita Mirai, Kanzenban' (The future that I saw, complete edition).
The strip cartoon, which became a best-seller, featured dialogue about a major natural disaster striking Japan in July 2025.
Ito said many Hong Kongers are superstitious and believed in the 'prophecy,' with the result that flights bookings dropped off sharply.
However, Greater Bay Airlines has no plans to reduce the number of flights from Hong Kong to Narita and Kansai airports.
Japan Airlines and All Nippon Airways, which operate similar flight routes, said there was no noticeable decrease in reservations on their flights.
The Japan National Tourism Organization's Hong Kong office said it was aware of the rumor making the rounds in Hong Kong, China and Taiwan of an impending major earthquake in Japan.
An official said the office is still collecting information to confirm reports about prospective visitors to Japan cancelling their plans.
Miyagi Governor Yoshihiro Murai told an April 23 news conference, 'It would be a major problem if the spread of non-scientific rumors on social media had an effect on tourism.'
He added, 'There is no reason to worry because Japanese are not fleeing abroad. I hope people will ignore the rumors and visit.'
Hiromichi Nakamori, a professor of natural disaster information studies at Nihon University in Tokyo, noted it was easy for such rumors to spread in Japan and elsewhere because the frequency of quakes in Japan produces a subliminal worry.
He added that the six students from China who he supervises had all read or heard rumors over social media that an earthquake would strike Japan on July 5.
Based on past research, Nakamori said that rumors often come in cycles after a famous prognosticator or fortune teller gets quoted as having said something of interest, even if it is made up, resulting in a vicious cycle
Social media simply makes the spread of rumors easier and faster.
(This article was written by Shoko Rikimaru, Ikuko Abe, Ryo Oyama, Koki Furuhata and Shiori Tabuchi.)