Kildare man in Japan feared for his ill girlfriend after missile launch

An Co Kildare man living in Japan feared that his ill girlfriend might be abandoned in hospital if North Korea hit the country with a ballistic missile.

Maynooth native Brendan Walsh lives on Japan's Hokkaido Island and said he was woken up yesterday morning by an emergency state text alert, advising people to take cover after North Korea launched a missile over the island.

The missile flew for around 2,700km before it broke into three pieces and landed in the sea.

Mr Walsh said the terrifying incident had prompted him to pack an emergency kit in case the worst happened.

"I was in bed and I had my alarm set for 6.40am but I was woken earlier by an emergency text alert; we might get those alerts for tsunamis or volcano alerts from the government," he said.

"The word emergency is in English and the rest is in Japanese, I looked and saw 'North Korea has launched a missile'.

Mr Walsh, who has lived in Japan for 14 months, said he immediately thought about his ill partner.

He told RTÉ: "It was very strange, I didn't know how to feel. My first concern was that I would need to get to my girlfriend because she's ill in hospital at the moment.

"She's on the fourth floor, she's very weak, she can barely move. I just kept thinking would they leave her there and run? I knew I had to get to her."

While he hopes that North Korea won't target Japan again, he said the incident had prompted him to think about his options in case war breaks out. "I'm not going to lose sleep over this, if there's another one I might consider coming home a bit more."