Hong Kong Airlines cut all flights between Kagoshima and Kumamoto in July and August (peak summer travel seasons) due to declining passenger interest|TANAKA Juuyoh|CC BY 2.0
A decades-old manga predicting a “real catastrophe” in July 2025 is spooking travelers across East Asia, leading to flight cancellations and a decline in tourism in Japan’s southern regions.
The 1999 manga “The Future I Saw” by Ryo Tatsuki eerily claimed that a “great disaster will occur in March 2011.” It came true with a deadly triple disaster: earthquake, tsunami and the Fukushima nuclear meltdown, one of the biggest nuclear disasters in history.
Now, the manga’s July 2025 prophecy—amplified across East Asian social media—has led to a sharp drop in flight bookings from Hong Kong, China, Taiwan and South Korea.
-
Hong Kong Airlines cut all flights between Kagoshima and Kumamoto in July and August (peak summer travel seasons) due to declining passenger interest.
-
Shinji Hirai, governor of Tottori Prefecture in Japan, said flight occupancy to the city fell from 85% in April to 43.3% in May.
Despite official reassurances from Japan’s Meteorological Agency that date-specific quake predictions are “scientifically impossible,” paranoia is spreading.
Still, Japan welcomed 3.7 million visitors in May, up 21.5% from last year. It is projected to surpass the 2024 record of 36.8 million total arrivals in 2025.