Thousands of evacuees have crowded Tokyo’s Narita airport in hopes of leaving Japan
The first US government-chartered evacuation flight has taken off from quake-hit Japan for Taiwan, amid rising fears over the country’s stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant.
France and China are also to evacuate thousands, while the UK and Australia have advised citizens to leave Tokyo.
Qantas is believed to have prepared evacuation contingency plans should the threat of radiation leaks intensify.
Most other countries have also advised their nationals to leave the north eastern region of Japan or to leave the country altogether.
The official toll of the dead and missing from the twin earthquake and tsunami disasters, which devastated Japan’s northeast coast, now approached 16,000, police said.
The number of confirmed dead rose to 5692, with more than 80,000 buildings damaged and 4798 destroyed.
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