Storms kill ten peopel in Central China

Beijing, July 29: Fierce storms and hail killed 10 people in central China, adding to the hundreds killed this summer in floods, landslides and other natural disasters, state media reported.

The deaths occurred in Hubei province, where lashing rains and hail have accompanied swollen waters along the Yangtze River, the official Xinhua news agency reported late yesterday.

In the hardest-hit Huangpo district of Wuhan, the provincial capital, seven people were killed and 1,600 had to abandon their homes, the report said. Across Hubei, the violent weather injured 223 residents, the China news service reported.

Weeks of rain along the upper and middle reaches of the Yangtze, the nation's biggest river, have threatened Wuhan with dangerously high waters, state media said.

More than 500 people have already died nationwide in floods and landslides this summer, underscoring the vulnerability of its huge rural population to natural disasters.

Authorities in Hubei have mobilised tens of thousands of people to check embankments of the swollen Han River, a major tributary of the Yangtze.

Along the Huai River in eastern China, flood waters remain dangerously high but have begun to retreat after inundating villages.

But forecasters warned torrential rains are likely to hit parts of Sichuan and Shaanxi provinces in the country's west in coming days.

''There is the strong possibility of landslides, mudslides and other geological disasters,'' the national weather authority said, according to Xinhua.

Other parts of China are suffering meteorological misery of different kinds.

The northeast is suffering drought and the coastal east, including Shanghai, is forecast to endure more days of sweltering heat reaching up to 40 degrees Celsius.

Reuters>