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SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Heavy rain and thunderstorms are wreaking havoc across China, with floods along major rivers destroying bridges, and blocking roads and railways.
Weather authorities are forecasting more downpours throughout the country on Saturday, with floods and landslides expected in the southwestern province of Sichuan.
Heavy rain and flooding hits much of this year, often with hundreds of casualties, but the number of casualties in this area has been relatively low, at least in the early summer, with one province reporting 12 dead and another three.
The National Meteorological Center said rainfall could exceed 80 mm per hour in some regions on Saturday. It is also known to be flooded in the northeast and is called upon to provide services for collapsing structures.
The flood-prone Yangtze River, which runs from Yunnan in the southwest to Jiangsu and Shanghai on the east coast, has seen a mbadive increase in water volumes, causing flooding in many of its tributaries and bringing water volumes into the giant Three Gorges reservoir close to record levels.
State news agency Xinhua reported on Friday that more than 10 highways in Sichuan were inaccessible as a result of flooding, and a bridge across Sichuan's Min river, a Yangtze tributary, had collapsed.
Floods in the province of about 2.4 trillion yuan ($ 358.74 million) by Thursday, according to the Ministry of Emergency Management.
Meanwhile, the nearby city of Chongqing had evacuated more than 80,000 residents by Friday, Xinhua reported.
Heavy rain has also caused the Yellow River, which runs through northern China, to burst its banks, blocking a section of a railway line in the northwest province of Shaanxi.
Gansu province, also in the northwest, reported 12 people killed and more than 1 million affected by a week of heavy rain and flooding, the official China Daily said on Saturday.
The Normally Arid Region of Inner Mongolia, which was released on Friday.
($ 1 = 6.6900 yuan)
Reporting by David Stanway; Editing by Robert Birsel
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