BEIJING, July 6 (Reuters) – Flooding has killed at least two people in the southern Chinese city of Nanning, officials said on Monday, as rivers and reservoirs swelled with the passage of Typhoon Maysak, and forecasters warned of another typhoon threatening the east.
Maysak — which lashed Vietnam and China’s southern island province of Hainan over the weekend — will dump the water it sucked up on its way across the South China Sea as it weakens and heads inland, meteorologists say.
Around 55,000 people were already affected by floods in Nanning, capital of Guangxi region, and waters were overflowing or breaking through barriers at at least three reservoirs, deputy mayor Wei Jiang said late on Monday.
Authorities raised the flood control emergency response to its highest level due to “extremely heavy rain” that they said could make things worse and hamper rescue efforts.
SUPER TYPHOON BAVI APPROACHING
About 170 miles (270 km) away in the city of Guigang, floodwaters turned a wide road into a lake, submerging cars and cascading in brown torrents down a hill into a building site, a video posted on the Chinese social media platform Douyin and verified by Reuters showed.
The water level at Guigang Hydrological Station had risen to 42 metres by 12:30 p.m. (0430 GMT), the Ministry of Water Resources said in a statement.
Further south in Fangchenggang, another verified video showed a small car being washed down a street. The water rose to the level of another car’s steering wheel, and a man could be seen struggling to keep his electric scooter from being swept away.
China is also on alert for Super Typhoon Bavi, which is making its way across the Pacific Ocean towards Taiwan. The U.S. National Weather Service said it was packing winds of up to 180 miles per hour as it made its way across Guam, Tinian, Saipan and Rota on Monday.
Weather authorities warned that Bavi will bring strong winds and heavy rain to eastern China from Thursday, according to state agency Xinhua.
China, the world’s second-largest economy, faces growing threats from extreme weather, which meteorologists link to climate change.
Analysts say weather-related risks each year stand to wipe out tens of billions of dollars’ worth of commercial activity, as cities flood, industrial activity stalls and crops are submerged or washed away.
TURMOIL IN HAINAN AND VIETNAM
Maysak made landfall in the southern island province of Hainan on Friday, the first tropical cyclone to reach the Chinese mainland this year. The storm made its second landfall on Sunday in Vietnam, which shares a border with Guangxi.
In the Vietnamese border town of Mong Cai, the storm brought down trees and ripped metal roofs from buildings, state media reported, as it made its way into China.
Heavy rainfall is expected across Guangxi, Guizhou, Hunan and other regions in the coming days, according to Chinese meteorologists. The three areas alone are home to over 150 million people — more than the population of Russia.
Following the disaster, China’s state planner released 100 million yuan ($14.72 million) for relief work in Guangxi, while the finance ministry and emergency management authorities provided 160 million yuan to support flood and typhoon response efforts across six provincial-level regions, including Guangxi.
($1 = 6.7957 Chinese yuan renminbi)
(Reporting by Ryan Woo and Joe Cash; Editing by Christopher Cushing, Kate Mayberry and Andrew Heavens)
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