Flood kills 29, brings fear of water contamination in northeast China province

At least 29 people were killed and 7 missing in a flood that hit northeast China's Jilin Province from Sunday to Wednesday, according to the latest death toll updated by the provincial authorities Thursday night.

In addition, more than 254,000 people were evacuated and 21,875 buildings collapsed in the flood, according to a statement from Jilin's civil affairs department.

27 KILLED IN YONGJI COUNTY

The death toll from a flood in Jilin's Yongji County has risen to 27, and two people were killed by floods in neighboring Shuangyang City, the statement said.

Flood triggered by torrential rains from Tuesday night to Wednesday noon submerged buildings as high as three stories during its peak. Now the water is about one-meter deep.

The overnight rainfall had reached 200 mm in Yongji by early Wednesday, making it the heaviest torrential rain on record in the county.

Jilin's meteorological bureau forecast no rains in the next 12 hours.

Water supplies, electricity and telecommunications have been cut in Kouqian Town.

Train services were suspended after Kouqian Train Station was surrounded by floodwater.

The flooding even swept two freight carriages 50 meters from where they were parked, the official said.

"I heard people crying 'flood, flood'. My son, daughter-in-law and I immediately rushed to the second floor," said Gao Xiuying, a resident of Kouqian Township, "From the second floor, we saw chairs, desks even cars tumbling in water. Everything happened within just one minute."

Gao's family had just opened a barbeque restaurant on the ground floor which was flushed by water.

Gao's neighbor, a man surnamed Liu, narrowly escaped his cellphone shop when the flood struck. But he suffered cuts and bruises on legs when he tried to break a pane.

7,000 CHEMICAL CONTAINERS WASHED INTO RIVER

Meanwhile, more than 7,000 chemical containers were washed into the Songhua River in Yongji County, Wednesday, after rain-triggered floods hit a warehouse of two chemical plants.

About 3,000 of the barrels contained 170 kilograms of chemicals each and the rest were empty, government officials said at a press conference Thursday. By 7:30 p.m. Thursday, nearly 1,500 barrels, empty or filled with chemicals, had been recovered.

The Songhua River is the largest tributary of the Heilongjiang River, a border river between China and Russia.

The incident has created fear of water contamination among residents of neighboring Heilongjiang Province on the lower reaches and prompted them to rush for bottled water.

The containers reminded the residents of a contamination of the Songhua River in 2005 after an explosion at a petrochemical plant in Jilin Province left 3.8 million people in Harbin, the capital of Heilongjiang, without drinking water for four days.

People were gathering in grocery stores and supermarkets to buy bottled water although the governments of Harbin and Jiamusi cities along the Songhuajiang River said domestic water supplies no longer came from the river.

Prices of bottled water have surged in some wholesale markets and grocery stores after the government said the water flow would enter Harbin in five or six days.

However, Ministry of Environmental Protection spokesman Tao Detian said Thursday that a water test conducted early Thursday morning showed the river water was not contaminated.

Source:Xinhua
【1】 【2】