14 dead in floods in north-eastern China; Typhoon Khanun heads back for Japan
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Typhoon Khanun injured more than 100 and cut off power for several hundred thousand people in the southern Okinawa region last week.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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BEIJING – Fourteen people were reported to have died over the weekend in the Chinese city of Shulan due to flooding caused by Typhoon Doksuri.
North-eastern China, Beijing and Hebei province have seen heavy rainfall and floods since the typhoon made landfall in southern Fujian province two weeks ago.
The deaths in Shulan, in north-eastern Jilin province, add to the more than 20 fatalities last week in Beijing and Hebei. The authorities have yet to provide an overall death toll for the entire country.
Three officials were among the dead in Shulan, including a vice-mayor of the city of about 587,000 people, state media reported late on Sunday.
Water levels in the city have receded to safe levels and emergency response efforts have been mobilised to relocate residents and repair infrastructure. Power has been restored to 14,305 homes.
As the authorities scramble to restore normal living conditions following Doksuri’s onslaught, the national forecaster warned the north-eastern region to brace itself for Typhoon Khanun.
The typhoon, which has wreaked havoc in southern Japan and is expected to reach southern South Korea on Thursday, is forecast to bring winds and rainstorms to China’s north-east by the weekend as it travels over the Korean peninsula.
The typhoon last week reportedly killed at least two people in Japan, injured more than 100 and cut off power for several hundred thousand people in the southern Okinawa region
The weather system has since swung back to the Okinawa area and is expected to rumble northwards to the west of Kyushu on Tuesday and on Wednesday before veering towards South Korea,
The typhoon “could bring significant rainfall in wide regions”, an agency official told the briefing, adding that “heavy rainfall will increase the risk of disasters”.
The storm forced Nagasaki, one of the main cities on Kyushu, to scale down and move indoors its annual commemoration of the 1945 atomic bombing scheduled for Wednesday.
The ceremony is traditionally held outdoors at the city’s Peace Park and attended by government ministers, officials and thousands of guests, including survivors of the bombing.
The typhoon was located east of the island of Amami Oshima on Monday afternoon, some 350km south of Kyushu, gusting up to 144kmh, the JMA said.
The slow-moving nature of the typhoon could mean prolonged rainfall, increasing risks of disasters such as flooding and landslides, the agency said. REUTERS, AFP
