Guangzhou: More than 340,000 people had been relocated in south China’s Guangdong Province by 4 pm Saturday as Typhoon Noul approached the coast, the provincial flood, drought and typhoon control authorities said.
Typhoon Noul, the 12th typhoon of the year, is expected to make landfall along the coast between Shenzhen and Huilai in Guangdong between Saturday evening and Sunday morning, with an intensity ranging from typhoon to severe typhoon level, Xinhua News Agency reported.
China’s State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters raised its emergency response for flood and typhoon control in Guangdong to Level III Saturday.
A total of 19 cities and 135 county-level regions in Guangdong had activated emergency responses for strong winds or flooding by 4 p.m. Saturday. Shanwei and Huizhou, along with 10 county-level regions, launched the highest-level response, while 12 cities introduced full or partial shutdown measures.
Maritime authorities have guided 5,109 vessels in Guangdong’s coastal waters to safe areas. Another 418 vessels were directed across jurisdictional boundaries to shelter in western Guangdong, Hainan Province and waters off northern Fujian Province.
Meanwhile, China’s Ministry of Water Resources activated a Level-IV flood-control emergency response Saturday in seven provincial-level regions.
China has a four-tier flood-control emergency response system, with Level I being the most severe.
The seven regions are Fujian, Jiangxi, Henan, Hubei, Hunan, Guangdong and Guangxi, covering large parts of eastern, central and southern China. Rivers at higher flood risk in these regions include some of the country’s major waterways, such as the Pearl, Yangtze and Huaihe, according to the ministry.
To brace for potential flooding, the ministry has urged local water conservancy authorities to closely monitor weather changes, issue timely warnings, and make targeted use of flood-control infrastructure.
On the same day, the Ministry of Emergency Management activated a Level-IV emergency response for geological disasters in Jiangxi and Hunan, while maintaining a Level-IV response of the same type in Guangdong and Fujian.
