At least three people have been injured in Maoming in the western part of South China's Guangdong Province when typhoon Wongfong battered the area yesterday.

Wongfong, the 14th typhoon or tropical storm to strike Chinese coastal areas this year, struck the two port cities of Maoming and Zhanjiang in the western coastal area of Guangdong yesterday, causing widespread economic damages, according to Guangdong Provincial Anti-Flood Headquarters.

More than 26 counties and cities of Guangdong have sounded the alarm to fight or prepare for fighting against the heavy rain and floods caused by the storm.

Meanwhile, Wongfong has been moving north at a much quicker speed. It has brought heavy rain to the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Hunan Province, Guizhou Province and several other provinces in southern China yesterday.

The water level in Dongting Lake in Hunan Province, which is one of the biggest lakes located along the Yangtze River, surpassed the warning line yesterday.

Before the arrival of the storm, heavy rain brought serious floods to many places of China. Experts said the storm will aggravate the disaster areas in the coming days.

As of last Friday, a total of 231 people had been killed by floods, landslides, mudflows and other natural disasters since the beginning of the flood season this year, China News Service reported yesterday.

In Guangdong, local anti-flood departments in storm-hit cities and counties are still busy tallying the casualties and the economic losses yesterday.

In the city of Leizhou, two coastal dykes were destroyed, flooding a large number of crop lands. Local residents have used more than 4,000 sand bags to help fortify coastal dykes.

In Maoming, at least 92 houses have been destroyed, and more 400 hectares (988.4 acres) of crop lands were flooded. Electricity and water supplies in some flood-hit areas in Maoming were cut off.

In Guangzhou, more than 2,000 passengers were stranded at the Tianhe Railway Station when four scheduled flights had been delayed for more than five hours yesterday.

The delays were caused by a landslide in Jiangxi Province that had destroyed the railway track and led to the suspension of railway service.

(China Daily August 21, 2002)