China’s Nanning on top alert as Typhoon Maysak triggers catastrophic flooding
BEIJING, July 6 (Reuters) – Chinese state media said on Monday that Nanning, the capital of China’s southwestern Guangxi province, has maximized its flood control response as rivers and reservoirs swelled with the passage of Typhoon Maysak.
Maysak, now a slower-moving tropical storm, has winds of no more than 50 mph (80.5 km/h), which hit Vietnam and China’s southern island of Hainan over the weekend. However, Chinese meteorologists say that as the storm moves inland and weakens, it will discharge the water it absorbs into the South China Sea, which will trigger devastating floods.
Authorities in Nanning, a city of about 9 million people, raised the flood control emergency response level from III to I due to “extremely heavy rain”, China Central Television (CCTV) reported.
So far, a breach has been reported at a medium-sized reservoir in Hengzhou, Nanning, and people in the area were being evacuated, state-run Xinhua news agency reported, citing local officials.
A video posted on Chinese social media platform Douyin and verified by Reuters showed floodwaters turning a wide road into a lake in the city of Guigang, about 170 miles (273.6 km) away, submerging cars and flowing in brown torrents down a hill toward a construction site.
The water level at the Guigang Hydrological Station rose to 42 meters at 12:30 pm (04:30 GMT), the Ministry of Water Resources said in a statement.
Further south in Fangchenggang, another verified video showed a small car being dragged onto the street. In the same footage, water rose up to the level of the steering wheel of another car and a man could be seen trying to prevent his electric scooter from skidding.
EXTREME WEATHER RISKS
China, the world’s second largest economy, faces increasing threats from extreme weather conditions that meteorologists attribute to climate change. Analysts say weather-related risks will wipe out tens of billions of dollars worth of business activity each year, as cities are flooded, industrial activity halted, and crops submerged or washed away.
Maysak arrived in the southern island province of Hainan on Friday; this became the first tropical cyclone to reach mainland China this year. The storm reached Vietnam, which shares a border with Guangxi, for the second time on Sunday.
In the Vietnamese border town of Mong Cai, the storm downed trees and ripped metal roofs off buildings as it moved towards China, state media reported.
According to Chinese meteorologists, heavy rainfall is expected in Guangxi, Guizhou, Hunan and other regions in the coming days. More than 150 million people live in three provinces alone; That’s more than the population of Russia.
The region is also on alert for Super Typhoon Bavi, which is moving across the Pacific Ocean towards Taiwan. The U.S. National Weather Service said wind gusts of up to 280 mph crossed over Guam, Tinian, Saipan and Rota on Monday.
(Reporting by Ryan Woo and Joe Cash; Editing by Christopher Cushing and Kate Mayberry)
