Rainstorms from typhoon Kaemi kill 18 in south China

BEIJING, July 27 (Reuters) Floods and landslides triggered by Typhoon Kaemi have killed at least 18 people and left more than 60 missing in southern China, state media said today.

Kaemi weakened into a tropical depression after sweeping across China's southeastern coast on Tuesday, but downpours it brought soaked at least four provinces, all of which are still reeling from damage by tropical storm Bilis.

Six people were killed when flash floods along a mountainside hit a military barracks in the eastern province of Jiangxi, Xinhua news agency said.

President Hu Jintao has ordered that ''the utmost effort'' be made to search for 38 officers, soldiers and family members who are still missing, it added.

Two girls -- aged nine and six -- died in southern Guangdong province after their house collapsed under a landslide.

Both incidents occurred in the early hours of yesterday when the victims were probably sleeping, Xinhua said.

Ten people were killed, mostly by flood waters, in Jiangxi's mountainous south, Xinhua said. About 20 were missing and roads and communications have been disrupted in some areas.

''The deaths were mainly reported in Shangyou county, which has also suffered many house collapses. Rivers and dams there are overflowing at alarming levels,'' an official at the provincial flood control office told Reuters by telephone.

Relief workers have been distributing blankets, clothing and instant noodles to the tens of thousands of villagers affected in the county, Xinhua said.

In neighbouring Hunan province, hundreds of thousands of people were relocated as streets in the city of Chenzhou, where Bilis killed almost 200 this month, were flooded and at least three were missing, Xinhua said.

A section of the Beijing-Zhuhai highway in southern Hunan, cut for days by Bilis, was submerged by water again and drivers were advised to take other routes.

In Fujian province, where Kaemi made landfall after sweeping through Taiwan, a levee collapsed, threatening the lives of more than 20,000 people in six villages, Xinhua said, adding that emergency repair work was under way.

Rain was likely to continue in the provinces through tomorrow, China's Central Meteorological Office said on its Web site (www.nmc.gov.cn).

The Meteorological Office said Kaemi carried less rain and would move away faster than Bilis, which killed 612 people and left 208 missing in southern China since it stuck the country on July 14, mostly in the provinces of Hunan, Guangdong and Fujian.

Tropical storms and typhoons frequently strike Taiwan, Japan, the Philippines and southern China during a season that lasts from early summer to late autumn.

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