TOKYO: A normal if windy work day went south for one Japanese bureaucrat when documents containing residents' personal information were blown away in a real-life slapstick mishap.

The official in central Japan's Aichi region was using a trolley to transport a cardboard box filled with documents from one building to another when, to their horror, it toppled over.

Despite frantic efforts by the official to collect reams of paper strewn across the road by the wind, three sheets were lost, Aichi Prefecture said in an apology statement this week.

"More than 10 other officials joined the search" for the missing documents until sunset, prefectural official Akira Kato told AFP on Friday.

Aichi Prefecture has said it will now digitise its data to prevent a repeat of the embarrassing incident.

The three missing sheets contained data on 121 households, including residents' names and rental housing details, it said.

The cardboard box being transported by the official from the prefectural housing department had contained 1,696 pieces of paper in all.

The search was extended over the weekend after the incident last Friday, but the papers were not found.

"We have made phone calls or visits to all the households affected and apologised," Kato said.

"We express our sincere apologies to residents and other relevant people," the prefecture said, adding that "there have been no reports of abuse of the lost data."

 -AFP