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At least 30 people have died in several days of heavy rain on the northern outskirts of the Chinese capital Beijing. According to Chinese media, more than 80,000 people have been relocated in the capital. Dozens of roads have been damaged and 136 villages have lost power. Chinese President Xi Jinping has instructed officials to make every effort to search and rescue the missing, properly resettle the relocated people and make every effort to reduce the number of casualties.
State broadcaster CCTV said on Tuesday that 28 people had died in Beijing’s worst-hit Miyun district and two in Yanqing by midnight. Heavy rains lashed the Chinese capital overnight. Reports on Monday said four people were killed in heavy rain and floods, while eight others are still missing. The victims were trapped in a landslide in Hebei province. This brings the death toll from the storm to at least 34.
Warning to stay away from low-lying areas
More than 40,000 people were evacuated from Beijing’s outlying districts and the neighboring city of Tianjin. Authorities released water from a reservoir in Beijing’s rural Miyun district, which was at its highest level since its construction in 1959. Officials warned people to stay away from low-lying areas of rivers as their water levels were rising and heavy rain was forecast.
Cars swept away due to floods
Heavy floods swept away cars and knocked down power poles in Miyun district, bordering Luanping County. According to China’s Xinhua news agency, Prime Minister Li Qiang said on Monday that heavy rains and floods in Miyun had caused serious casualties and called for rescue operations.
Water filled in houses
In Taishitun city, about 100 km northeast of central Beijing, there were piles of uprooted trees with their bare roots visible. The streets were flooded with water and mud had piled up on the walls. The flood came suddenly and quickly. In no time, the whole place was filled with water, said Zhuang Zhelin, who was cleaning mud from their building materials shop with his family.
Next door, Zhuang’s neighbor Wei Zhengming, a doctor of traditional Chinese medicine, was removing mud at his clinic. “There was water everywhere, back and forth. I didn’t want to do anything. I just ran upstairs and waited for rescuers. I remember thinking that if no one came to pick us up, we would really be in trouble,” Wei said.
Beijing on alert
Beijing authorities launched a high-level emergency response at 8 p.m. Monday, ordering people to stay indoors, close schools, suspend construction work and halt outdoor tourism and other activities until the response is lifted.
Heaviest rain expected
Beijing was expected to receive its heaviest rainfall today. Up to 30 centimetres of rain is forecast in some areas. CCTV reported that more than 30,000 people were evacuated from districts of Beijing, including about 6,400 from Miyun, where the reservoir is located. Another 10,000 people were evacuated from the nearby Jizhou district under Tianjin city, Xinhua reported.
The central government said in a statement that it has sent 50 million yuan (about 7 million US dollars) to Hebei and dispatched a high-level team of emergency responders to help the affected cities, including Chengde, Baoding and Zhangjiakou. Beijing and Hebei faced severe flooding in 2023.
