Nine people died and 860 others were injured after a powerful earthquake jolted southwestern Japan on Thursday night, local police said Friday. 
The magnitude-6.5 quake at 9:26 p.m. originated at a relatively shallow depth of around 11 kilometers in Kumamoto Prefecture and registered a maximum 7 on the Japanese scale in the town of Mashiki in the prefecture, the Japan Meteorological Agency said. 
Among the injured, 53 were seriously hurt, while up to 44,400 people were taking shelter at about 500 sites in the prefecture, KYODO news quoted the prefectural government as saying.

Source: QNA