A prediction made in a Japanese manga released a quarter century ago is seen as the cause for a significant drop in tourism reservations from several Asian countries to Japan.
The reports of a plummet in flight bookings to Japan from its main tourism markets are linked to The Future I Saw, a graphic novel by Ryo Tatsuki, which is based on the author’s supposedly prophetic dreams.
The original book cover, released as early as 1999, mentions a “great disaster” set to occur in Japan in March 2011—the month and year of the real-life earthquake and tsunami disaster. In a newer edition with additional content published in 2021, Tatsuki predicts that the next major catastrophe will occur on July 5, 2025. These claims have resulted in social media posts urging people to avoid traveling to Japan.
There is no scientific backing for the claims that reportedly spiked online speculation, but Tatsuki’s earlier mention of the 2011 disaster has lent some credibility when an earthquake and subsequent tsunami in northeast Japan killed more than 18,000 people and caused the triple meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant.
This situation is affecting bookings in South Korea, Taiwan, and Hong Kong the most, as per Bloomberg Intelligence, which monitored airline bookings through ForwardKeys data.
A travel agency in Hong Kong confirmed that bookings to Japan around the April-May spring break dropped by half from the previous year—an effect already visible due to the manga.
Greater Bay Airlines noticed that reservation expectations did not materialize following the norm, which usually sees high demand during Japan’s cherry blossom season and Hong Kong’s Easter holidays.
“The reservations were only at 40%, far less than the expected 80%,” stated Hiroki Ito, the general manager of the airline’s Japan office, in a recent interview with the Asahi Shimbun.
The airline and Hong Kong Airlines cut back their Japan services, even as officials urged travelers to disregard the rumors. Yoshihiro Murai, the governor of Miyagi—which was severely affected by the 2011 disaster—urged people to ignore the unfounded rumors.
This coincides with a surge in tourism that has seen a record number of visitors to Japan following the end of the COVID-19 pandemic. April had a record 3.9 million visitors, spurred by a weaker yen, with the government aiming for 60 million annual visitors by the end of the decade.
Public broadcaster NHK reports that the manga has spawned more than 1,400 YouTube videos seen over 100 million times, with some predictions including a volcanic eruption and a meteor strike.
Japan is one of the globe’s most seismically unstable regions, sitting on the Pacific’s “ring of fire.” However, earthquake timing and locations cannot be predicted accurately.
Fears of a major earthquake hitting Japan intensified in August when former Prime Minister Fumio Kishida canceled a foreign trip after seismologists indicated an increased risk of a “megaquake” after an earlier earthquake.
In April, a government task force warned that a magnitude-9 quake in the Nankai Trough, off of Japan’s Pacific coast, could kill up to 298,000 people and destroy more than 2 million buildings, with an approximate 80% chance of such an event in the next 30 years.
Tatsuki has cautioned against taking her predictions as literal, expressing satisfaction in an interview with the Mainichi Shimbun that her work has increased awareness of natural disaster preparedness, while also advising, “It’s important not to be unnecessarily influenced … and to listen to the opinions of experts.”
