Lekima, the 15th severe tropical storm of this year, is leaving China for Vietnam on Wednesday after more than 225,000 people were evacuated in the southernmost Chinese province of Hainan, the local meteorological observatory said.

Most of the evacuees are fishermen and dwellers in ramshackle houses, said Yang Yunxian, an official with the provincial taskforce against flood, drought and typhoons.

Typhoon Lekima, named after a fruit in Vietnam, weakened into a severe tropical storm after it made landfall in Sanya, a coastal city in Hainan, at 11:00 PM on Tuesday.

It has brought downpour and high wind to nearly every city and county in Hainan.

By 8:00 AM on Wednesday, 15 of the 18 cities had received more than 100 mm of precipitation. The worst-hit city of Wenchang reported 268.5 mm of rainfall.

At 10:00 AM on Wednesday, the center of Lekima was located at 17.5 degrees north latitude and 107.9 degrees east longitude, about 100 kilometers north of Vietnam, the Hainan provincial meteorological observatory said.

Packing winds of 108 km per hour at its eye, Lekima is heading southwest at 15 km per hour and is expected to make landfall in the coastal areas of central Vietnam on Wednesday night, it said.

The observatory has forecast high wind on seawaters off Hainan Island and Beibu Bay from Wednesday afternoon through early Thursday.

More than 20,000 fishing boats have been recalled to harbor.

The local flood prevention authorities opened sluice gates at 17 of the province's total 21 major reservoirs on Tuesday to divert possible flood water.

The tropical storm has caused a sharp drop in the number of tourists and many hotel room reservations have been canceled at the last minute, a heavy blow to local tourism industry that was expecting large crowds of holidaymakers during the week-long National Day holiday starting on Monday.

"Compared with previous National Day golden weeks, this year's holiday was rather 'bleak'(in terms of tourism)," said Feng Yu, a business manager of Hainan Tourist Corporation, helplessly looking at pages of lists of tourist names who could not arrive as scheduled.

Six flights were canceled Tuesday morning due to bad weather at the Meilan International Airport located at the provincial capital of Haikou, but the other 143 flights were not affected, a spokesman with the airport told Xinhua.

Lekima killed at least eight people in northern Philippines and triggered landslides, floods and big waves.

(Xinhua News Agency October 3, 2007)