Typhoon Dujuan, the 13th to hit China this year had moved to the
coastal area near the mouth of the Pearl River in south China's Guangdong
Province by yesterday afternoon.
At 8 am yesterday morning, Dujuan arrived on the sea 400
kilometers southeast of Shenzhen, Guangdong, and it was moving in a
northwesterly direction, spreading across the province at a speed
of 30 kilometers per hour.
Areas where the eye of the typhoon passed through were hit by
strong winds at the speed of 45 meters per second.
As of 10 am yesterday, a total of 58 cities and counties had
issued typhoon warnings.
All seagoing vessels have been safely berthed in harbors.
Primary schools in all the typhoon-hit areas dismissed their
students earlier yesterday afternoon.
Businesses and schools in Hong Kong shut down and residents
scrambled for shelter yesterday as Typhoon Dujuan bore down on the
territory after lashing Taiwan, where it caused a major blackout
and left two people dead.
The typhoon, packing winds of 43 meters per second, also caused
massive disruption at the Hong Kong's airport, where officials said
151 flights were cancelled and 115 were delayed.
The storm uprooted many trees in the territory and triggered two
minor landslides, a government statement said. No one was reported
injured.
In northwest China's Shaanxi
Province, which has been hit by a continuous heavy rain, a
total of 38 people have been reported dead and 34 people have been
missing since last Thursday.
The latest statistics released by the Ministry of Civil Affairs
showed that a total of 4.924 million people in Shaanxi's 67
counties and districts were hit by the disaster.
The ministries of civil affairs and finance have allocated an
emergency fund of 20 million yuan (US$2.4 million) and 6,500 tents
to the province to help local people resettle in areas away from
the flood-stricken area.
The second flood crest on the Weihe River passed Huayin County
in eastern Shaanxi yesterday. With the end of the continuous heavy
rain, the water level in the river started to drop down slowly.
The Weihe River, the Yellow River's largest tributary which
crosses central Shaanxi from west to east, witnessed historically
high water levels caused by heavy rain, and the embankments of the
Weihe River's tributaries burst in five places on Monday.
The latest statistics showed that some 46,000 houses and 318,000
hectares of farmland were destroyed in the flood. The direct
economic loss reached 3.02 billion yuan (US$363.8 million).
In central China's Henan
Province, 36 counties have suffered from the heavy rains and
the flooding, the local Dahe Newspaper reported
yesterday.
Ten people lost their lives in the flood and a total of 14.64
million people were affected.
The flood had also ruined 1,189 hectares of farmland and damaged
38,000 houses by noon on Monday, causing a direct economic loss of
4.2 billion yuan (US$506 million).
However, the rainfall has also relieved the drought that has
recently prevailed in northern areas of China.
(China Daily September 3, 2003)