13 dead after record snowfall in Japan

Thirteen people died and more than a thousand were injured in Japan after the worst snow storm in decades swept the country.

On Monday (February 10) footage from Japanese broadcaster TBS showed schoolchildren slipping through snow and ice on their way to class and helping push a teacher's car stuck in the drifts in the northern city of Sendai.

The storm dumped 35 cm (13.8 inches) of snow on the area, parts of which were devastated by the March 2011 tsunami, the heaviest fall recorded there in 78 years.

In nearby Ishinomaki, the drifts surrounded temporary housing erected for people left homeless by the disaster were the most snow they had seen in 91 years.

As much as 27 cm (10.6 inches) of snow fell on Tokyo by late Saturday (February 8), the most in 45 years, Japan's Meteorological Agency said.

Snowdrifts and frozen slush choked the roads on Monday morning, forcing commuters in heavy boots to pick their way carefully to work and disrupting public transpor