Floods, mudslides kill two in northwestern China city

[August 12, 2023]  SHANGHAI (Reuters) -Mudslides and flooding in the northwestern Chinese city of Xian killed two people and 16 others are missing, state-owned China Central Television (CCTV) reported on Saturday. 

The casualties come after heavy rainfall and floods devastated many parts of China, with some extreme weather following in the wake of Typhoon Doksuri, which made landfall in southern Fujian province almost three weeks ago.

A man holding a child walks across a damaged bridge after the rains and floods brought by remnants of Typhoon Doksuri, in Zhuozhou, Hebei province, China August 7, 2023. REUTERS/Tingshu Wang/File Photo

Two houses in a village in Xian have been washed away and infrastructure such as roads, bridges and power supply facilities has been damaged, CCTV said.

Search and rescue teams and river bank reinforcement personnel have been sent to the area, it said.

The Qinling Mountains in Xian will continue to experience extreme weather conditions, which will lead to soil erosion and possibly further mudslides, the broadcaster said.

In the capital Beijing and the northeastern city of Harbin, some trains were suspended on Saturday due to heavy rain and strong winds, CCTV said.

In southwestern Guangxi on Friday, heavy rainfall in the city of Nanning led to urban flooding, forcing rush hour commuters to drive vehicles and motorcycles through waterlogged roads, CCTV said.

Local authorities set up cordons to allow drainage work on some roads, while the city dispatched nearly 3,900 police to help.

In the northeastern province of Jilin, efforts were underway to fortify a 90-m (300-foot) breach in a river levee and protect 29 downstream villages, CCTV said. Some 500 officers and soldiers, 62 vehicles and three construction machines have been dispatched to seal the breach, it said.

In Huozhou city in the northern province of Shanxi, some low-lying houses faced stagnant water breaches, as floods from heavy rain trapped some residents in their buildings, the broadcaster said.

In the Inner Mongolia autonomous region, a flash flood swept away a road, trapping a number of people on Thursday, the official Xinhua News Agency said on Saturday, adding that more than 40 people were rescued.

(Reporting by Engen Tham; Editing by Miral Fahmy)

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