Japan quake death toll reaches 28 as rescue window closes in Kumamoto

Two days after a magnitude 7.1 earthquake struck the Kumamoto region of southwestern Japan, the narrow window of rescue has nearly closed, leaving at least 23 to 28 people confirmed dead and thousands more displaced in a landscape of collapsed buildings, severed power lines, and persistent aftershocks. The disaster, which struck on a Tuesday afternoon and tore through a shopping mall, a paper factory, and countless homes across Kyushu, has given way to a second, slower emergency — one measured not in rubble but in heat, hunger, and the quiet anguish of families still waiting for word of the mi