2018 in Japan

heavy snow hit in Utsunomiya, Tochigi Prefecture on 22 January

• 22 to 23 January : A heavy snowfall hits around Tokyo Metropolitan Area. According to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of Japan in a confirmed report, 956 people were injured.[2]
• 23 January : Mount Kusatsu-Shirane erupts. According to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of Japan in a confirmed report, 1 fatality results and 11 people are injured in Gunma Prefecture.[3]
• 31 January : A fire burns an elderly support facility in Higashi-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido. According to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of Japan in a confirmed report, 11 people died, with three injured.[4]

• 5 to 8 February : A heavy snowfall hits the Sea of Japan. According to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of Japan in a confirmed report, 22 people died, with 320 injures.[5]

• 1 to 12 March : According to the Japan Meteorological Agency in a confirmed report, a volcano erupts in Shinmoedake, Kyushu Island.[6][7]
• 12 March : According to the Japanese Government, an official confirmed that the Japan Ministry of Finance rewrote 14 decision documents in accordance with the response about a cooperative school in Osaka Prefecture to the National Assembly in 2017.[8]
• 13 March : According to the Japan Forestry and Forest Products Research Institute, an official report confirmed the Kumano cherry tree (Kumanozakura) as a new species Cherry tree (Sakura). The tree was discovered widely throughout the Kii peninsula. The last new type of Sakura tree found in Japan was in 1915.[9]

• 8 April : According to National Police Agency of Japan official confirmed report, a thirty-eight years old men arrested on suspicion of five local residents murdered, and suspects confessed in Hioki, Kagoshima Prefecture.
• 9 April : A Richer Scale 5.7 magnitude earthquake hit in Oda, Shimane Prefecture, according to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of Japan in a confirmed report, nine person were injures.
• 11 April : According to the Fire and Disaster Management Agency of Japan in a confirmed report, a sudden landslide occurred on a mountain slope in Yabakei, Nakatsu, Oita Prefecture, where six person fatalities in the incident.
• 19 April : According to a Japan Meteorological Agency confirmed report, Mount Iou erupted for the first time since 1768 in border between Miyazaki Prefecture and Kagoshima Prefecture.[10]

Damage done by the 2018 Osaka earthquake, in Ibaraki, Osaka Prefecture on 18 June.

• 9 June - According to the Japan National Police Agency in a confirmed report, 22-year-old unemployed Ichiro Kojima was detained by police after stabbing 3 passengers, killing one, on a bullet train leading from Tokyo to Shin-Osaka, nearby Odawara, Kanagawa Prefecture.
• 18 June - 2018 Osaka earthquake, According to Japan Fire and Disaster Management Agency in a confirmed report, a 5.5 Richter scale earthquake killed four and injured 434 people in Takatsuki, Osaka Prefecture.
• 26 June - According to Japan National Police Agency confirmed report, a man murdered the police officer in policebox, depriving the handgun and escaping, after a man killed to a security guard man near a nearby elementary school in Toyama City. A twenty-two years old detained, after critical condition by with attempted suicide.
• 29 June - According to Japan Meteorological Agency confirmed report, a F2 level tornado hit in around area of Maibara, Shiga Prefecture. According to local government official confirmed, many houses were collapsed and damaged, total eight person were wounded.

• 28 June – 9 July: 2018 Japan floods - Heavy floods was started in western areas of Japan, most in the Hiroshima Prefecture, which has been hit by torrential rain. As of 20 July, 225 people were killed, another 13 were declared missing and 1.5 million people were displaced.[11]
• 9 July – 26 August: The 2018 Northeast Asia heat wave kills least 116 people, due to heat-related causes, and at least 22,000 more suffer from heat strokes
• 26 July: A fire at under constructing technology centre fire in Tama City, Tokyo. According to Fire and Disaster Management Agency confirmed report, total five workers fatalities with 42 were injures.[12]

• 9 August: According to Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism official confirmed report, nine people lost their lives when a Bell 412EP helicopter crashed into forest site, Nakanojo, Gunma Prefecture.

Accident occurs when the roof falls in Tsurumi-ku, Osaka, affective by Typhoon Jebi on 5 September 2018

Retired singer, Namie Amuro in 2017

• 4 September: Typhoon Jebi. Storm surge in Osaka Bay inundated Kansai International Airport and pushed a tanker vessel into the bridge that connects the artificial island to the mainland, damaging it. According to Japan Fire and Disaster Management Agency official report, strong wind and damage around Kansai area resulted in thirteen fatalities and 912 people receiving injuries.[13]
• 6 September: 2018 Hokkaido Eastern Iburi earthquake, A Richter scale 6.6 earthquake created a region-wide power outage, because of damage to a thermal power station in the hard-hit town, Atsuma. According to a Japan Fire and Disaster Management Agency official report, 41 people were killed and 692 people were wounded.[14]
• 16 September: Namie Amuro, a famous pop singer, officially retired after 25 years in the entertainment industry.[15]
• 20 September: Prime Minister Shinzō Abe won the Liberal Democratic Party (Japan) leadership for a new 3-year term.[16]

• 19 November - According to Tokyo District Public Prosecutors Office Special Prosecutors Department official confirmed report, Carlos Ghosn, CEO of Nissan Motor, was arrested by the prosecutor special authority for alleged false statement of the securities report that he declared the compensation inexorably. Ghosn president position and position of representative director of Nissan, succeeded at the Board of Directors on 22 November.
• 23 November - Osaka decide on the venue on Expo 2025 the winner at BIE's 164th General Assembly.
• 26 November - According to Japan National Police Agency confirmed report, six person were murdered, with a suspicion suicide onto Gokase River, in Takachiho, Miyazaki Prefecture.

• 26 December - Japan announced that since the International Whaling Commission IWC failed its duty to promote sustainable hunting, which is one of its stated goals, Japan is withdrawing its membership and will resume commercial hunting in its territorial waters and exclusive economic zone from July 2019, but will cease whaling activities in the Antarctic Ocean.[17][18]
• 27 December - Japan executes two more prisoners, bringing 2018 executions to 15 taking annual total to highest since 2008.[19][20][21]

Senichi Hoshino

Jiichiro Date at the 1976 Olympics

Isao Takahata

Takeshi Onaga

Kirin Kiki

• 1 January – Katsuhikari Toshio, sumo wrestler (b. 1942)
• 4 January – Senichi Hoshino, baseball player and manager (b. 1947)[22]
• 5 January – Mikio Fujioka, guitarist (b. 1981)
• 7 January – Marley Carib, manga artist (b. 1947)[23]
• 11 January – Sumiko Iwao, psychologist and educator (b. 1935)
• 14 January – Yosuke Natsuki, actor (b. 1936)
• 18 January – Yasuo Tanaka, astrophysicist (b. 1931)
• 20 January – Miyako Sumiyoshi, speed skater (b. 1987)[24]
• 21 January – Tsukasa Hosaka, football player and manager (b. 1937)
• 26 January
  • Hiromu Nonaka, politician (b. 1925)[25]
  • Yukiaki Okabe, freestyle swimmer (b. 1941)
• 27 January – Tadashi Sawashima, film director (b. 1926)
• 31 January
  • Tadashi Sasaki, engineer (b. 1915)
  • Itokin, musician (b. 1979)

• 4 February – Takuya Iwasaki, archaeologist (b. 1929)
• 5 February – Yoshihide Kozai, astronomer (b. 1928)
• 10 February
  • Michiko Ishimure, novelist (b. 1927)[26]
  • Tamio Kawachi, actor (b. 1938)
• 18 February – Eido Tai Shimano, Buddhist monk (b. 1932)
• 20 February
  • Jiichiro Date, freestyle wrestler (b. 1952).[27]
  • Tōta Kaneko, poet (b. 1919)
• 21 February – Ren Osugi, actor (b. 1951)[28]

• 24 March – Hidetoshi Nagasawa, sculptor and architect (b. 1940)

• 5 April – Isao Takahata, film director (b. 1935)
• 21 April – Nabi Tajima, supercentenarian (b. 1900)
• 23 April – Sachio Kinugasa, baseball player (b. 1947)
• 27 April – Yukiji Asaoka, actress (b. 1935)

• 16 May – Hideki Saijo, singer and actor (b. 1955)
• 17 May – Yuriko Hoshi, actress (b. 1943)
• 21 May – Nobukazu Kuriki, mountaineer (b. 1982)

• 18 June – Go Kato, actor (b. 1938)

• 2 July – Katsura Utamaru, rakugo comedian (b. 1936)
• 6 July –
  • Shoko Asahara, doomsday cult leader (b. 1955).[29]
  • Seiichi Endo, cult member and criminal (b. 1960).[29]
  • Kimishige Ishizaka, immunologist (b. 1925).[30]
  • Tomomitsu Niimi, cult member and criminal (b. 1964).[29]
• 19 July – Shinobu Hashimoto, screenwriter (b. 1918)
• 21 July – Ryu Matsumoto, politician (b. 1951).[31]

• 4 August – Masahiko Tsugawa, actor (b. 1940)
• 8 August – Takeshi Onaga, politician (b. 1950)
• 10 August – Kin Sugai, actress (b. 1926)
• 13 August – Unshō Ishizuka, voice actor (b. 1951)
• 15 August – Momoko Sakura, manga artist (b. 1965)
• 25 August - Miyoko Asō, voice actress (b. 1926)
• 27 August - Aya Koyama, mixed martial artist (b. 1973)

• 15 September - Kirin Kiki, actress (b. 1943)
• 18 September - Norifumi Yamamoto, mixed martial artist (b. 1977)

• 8 October - Wajima Hiroshi, sumo wrestler (b. 1948)
• 11 October - Yoshito Sengoku, politician (b. 1946)
• 17 October - Kōji Tsujitani, voice actor (b. 1962)
• 19 October - Takanobu Hozumi, actor (b. 1931)
• 27 October - Kyoko Enami, actress (b. 1942)

• 6 November - Tetsuo Gotō, voice actor (b. 1950)
• 11 November - Hiroyuki Sonoda, politician (b. 1942)
• 27 November - Mahito Tsujimura, voice actor (b. 1930)
• 28 November - Masahiko Katsuya, columnist (b. 1960)
• 29 November - Harue Akagi, actress (b. 1924)

• 28 December - Toshiko Fujita, voice actress (b. 1950)

• March 11: Ishikawa gubernatorial
• April 8: Kyoto gubernatorial
• June 10: Niigata gubernatorial
• September 30: Okinawa gubernatorial

• The 53rd single 10th Sekai Senbatsu Sousenkyo was held on Nagoya Stadium, Aichi Prefecture, Japan on June 16, 2018

Final Senbatsu Results:

• • 1. Jurina Matsui (Over-all center girl, SKE48-Team S)
  • 2. Akari Suda (SKE48)
  • 3. Sakura Miyawaki (HKT48)
  • 4. Yuka Ogino (NGT48)
  • 5. Nana Okada (AKB48/STU48)
  • 6. Yui Yokoyama (AKB48)
  • 7. Tomu Mutou (AKB48)