Catastrophic floods threaten millions of people as several rivers overflow in South China | STR/CNS/AFP/METSUL METEOROLOGY
More than 100,000 people left their homes after heavy rains and floods affected southern China, where the government issued the maximum warning level for storms on Tuesday in some areas of Guangdong province. The province has been the scene of torrential rains since Thursday last week, which caused rivers to flood and the threat of the biggest floods in a century.
The large city of Shenzhen, with more than 17 million inhabitants and on the border with Hong Kong, records “intense to very intense storms”, reported the local meteorological observatory. Authorities later reduced the weather alert with a reduction in the level of storms, but asked residents to remain cautious against possible disasters.
Images from the city of Qingyuan, in northern Guangdong and the Pearl River Delta, show a building almost completely submerged. Official media reported on Sunday that more than 45,000 people abandoned their homes in Qingyuan, a city crossed by the Bei River, a tributary of the Pearl River, the third longest in China.
State news agency Xinhua reported that 110,000 residents of the province had been relocated since the rains began. To date, four deaths and missing people have been reported due to the floods.
In Foshan, central Guangdong, another four people were missing after a boat collided with a bridge, an incident that “could have been caused by flooding”, Xinhua reported on Tuesday. The ship, carrying nearly 5,000 tonnes of steel, collided with the Jiujiang Bridge on Monday night and some of the 11 crew members fell into the water. Seven were rescued and four remain missing.
Guangdong is China’s most populous province, with 127 million inhabitants, and the pillar of the country’s industry, with tens of thousands of export-oriented factories. The floods, therefore, are expected to impact a very high number of Chinese people and affect local manufacturing production.
Aerial drone photo of Hanguang city in Qingyuan, Guangdong province, South China. A total of 38 hydrological stations on 24 rivers in Guangdong province reported water levels exceeding the warning limit, according to the provincial water resources department. The provincial disaster reduction committee has initiated a Level IV emergency response to tackle the floods that hit the cities of Shaoguan and Qingyuan in Guangdong. | HUANG GUOBAO/XINHA/AFP/METSUL METEOROLOGY
Southern China experiences heavy rains in the summer, a season that is also marked by typhoons. In spring, however, storms are infrequent. In recent years, the country has suffered several episodes of extreme weather conditions, from major floods to droughts and record heat.
In September, Shenzhen recorded the highest level of rainfall since 1952, when this meteorological data began to be compiled. The rains also caused landslides in some mountainous areas.
Six people were injured and several were trapped in a landslide near the city of Jiangwan, northern Guangdong province, state broadcaster CCTV reported. The images shown by the channel show houses destroyed by a torrent of mud on the bank of a river and emergency teams providing care to displaced people on a flooded sports field.
Last year, China faced “more intense and extreme” rainfall during the flood season than in previous years, with 72 national weather stations recording record daily rainfall and 346 stations breaking monthly records, according to the China Meteorological Administration. China.
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