Massive floods devastate China
Landslides triggered by torrential rain in southern China have killed at least 12 people and injured 24, while thousands of residents escaped unhurt after a rain-swollen river flooded their villages, the government said today, as the region braced for more heavy rain.
The landslides occurred yesterday in Wuzhou, a city in the Guangxi region, during nine hours of heavy downpour, the official Xinhua News Agency said.
The rain began around 1am and caused a series of landslides that collapsed 1,195 houses, Xinhua said. Some 14,929 people were evacuated, it said.
Officials telephoned at Wuzhou said today that they were too busy to talk and were “unclear” about details.
In Fujian province, also in the south, the bank of a rain-swollen river collapsed yesterday morning and flooded 11 villages while thousands of residents were still asleep, Xinhua said.
No injuries were discovered and water levels were receding, the agency said today, adding that the site of the breech has been plugged.
An official from the Fujian Provincial Anti-Flood and Drought Headquarters said he did not have any details or updated figures today morning. He refused to give his name.
The disasters come amid what the government says is the worst summer flooding in parts of China in three decades.
At least 55 people have been killed and 12 are missing in Fujian and two other provinces since late May from heavy rains that have caused floods and landslides and washed away part of a rail-link between Beijing and Hong Kong.
Heavy rain was predicted over the next two days for southern China and local governments were preparing for mudslides and landslides, according to Sina.com, a major Chinese news site.
Changting county in Fujian received more than nine centimetres of rain in two hours, causing the Bashili River to jump its banks and sweep through the 11 villages yesterday morning, Xinhua said, citing provincial flood control officials.
Some 3,500 families lived in the villages, parts of which were covered in as much as two metres of water, the report said.
Rescue crews, including paramilitary police and fire brigades, helped evacuate more than 16,000 people from the area and were reinforcing the river bank with sand bags, Xinhua said.
Across southern China, at least 378,000 people have already been evacuated from the provinces of Fujian, Guangdong and Guizhou due to floods prompted by an unusually heavy seasonal monsoon, the Ministry of Civil Affairs said.
Fujian has been the worst affected, with 28 deaths since late May and direct economic losses estimated at 2.19 billion yuan (€217m).
Guangdong and Guizhou provinces have reported 11 deaths each. Other provinces further inland and to the north have also reported scattered deaths and flood damage.
China suffers hundreds of deaths every year in floods set off during the June-to-August rainy season, although the season’s first storm arrived unusually early this year.
Rivers overflow and water rushes down mountains stripped of trees by decades of farming and logging, often causing deadly landslides.
The rains played havoc on transportation, flooding streets and requiring thousands of police and military officers to evacuate residents by boat.
