After seeing the region devastated by earthquakes, the Honda factory in the Kumamoto Prefecture is slowly coming back online. The Kumamoto factory (seen above, before the earthquake) has been offline since April 14th, though resumed minor operations on May 6th.
Honda says it has finally completed removal of debris from its most affected facilities; and as of June 6th, the company has partly resumed production of its main motorcycle models.
This is of particular note for American motorcyclists, as it means that Honda can once again being producing the Honda Africa Twin adventure-tourer, which was mid-production for the US market at the time of the earthquakes.
For those who missed our initial story on this, production at the Kumamoto factory came to a halt on April 14th, when a 6.4 magnitude earthquake struck the region.
After the foreshock grabbed headlines, a 7.1 magnitude earthquake then hit the Kumamoto Prefecture on April 16th, causing further damage.
These earthquakes came at the start of the production process for Honda Africa Twin motorcycles destined for the American market, which has meant a delay on the new model hitting US soil.
With the region devastated by the earthquakes, citizens of the Kumamoto Prefecture have had to rebuild their homes and businesses, which includes not only Honda’s Kumamoto factory, but also the support businesses in Kumamoto the provide work and parts for Honda’s production facility.
It should also be noted that Kumamoto continues to have sizable aftershocks and tremors, which add further delay and danger to the rebuilding process.
For now, Honda aims to slowly scale production back up at Kumamoto, and will elevate production levels in stages that correspond to its facility conditions.
Honda hopes to have the Kumamoto plat fully online by mid-August.
Source: Honda
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