44 dead or missing in flood-stricken Chinese county
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E-mail Xinhua, July 7, 2017
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Citizens watch the flood on a bridge in Changsha, capital of central China's Hunan Province, July 2, 2017. Days of torrential rain in Hunan Province raised the water level of the Xiangjiang River, a major tributary of Yangtze River, to exceed its record flood level Sunday morning. (Xinhua/Long Hongtao) |
A total of 44 people have died or are missing after floods hit Ningxiang County in central China's Hunan Province, local flood prevention headquarters said Friday.
Heavy downpours have pounded the county since June 22, leading to the area's worst natural disaster in 60 years.
About 815,000 people, or 56 percent of the county's population, suffered property damage in the floods, it said.
In southern China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, floods left 20 dead and 14 missing. Around 20,000 houses collapsed or were damaged.
Torrential rain since late June has caused flooding along several tributaries of the Yangtze, China's longest river.
The water level of the Xiangjiang River, a major tributary of the Yangtze, exceeded its record flood level Sunday morning.
Since Saturday, reservoirs in the upper and middle reaches of the Yangtze have managed to control the flood, holding back more than 10 billion cubic meters of floodwater, according to the Yangtze flood control and drought relief headquarters.
The efforts made by the Three Gorges Reservoir and upper reservoirs on Jinsha River in the upper reaches of Yangtze, and Yalong River, Jinsha's tributary, have greatly reduced water levels of rivers and lakes in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze, the headquarters said.
According to the headquarters, local water authorities have repaired 42 sections of banks along the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze, which collapsed due to floods last year, the most severe since 1998.
The projects on the sections, with a total length of 23 kilometers, cost more than 100 million yuan (14.7 million U.S. dollars).
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