Provinces along Yangtze on alert for more flood emergencies as heavy rain continues in China
As Yangtze River levels have rapidly risen, the Three Gorges Dam has increased discharge volumes and the reservoir in Zhejiang’s Xinan River has opened more floodgates to release water.
In Zhejiang, more than 16,000 people in Jiande, Tonglu county and Fuyang district have been evacuated.
Provinces along the Yangtze River – including Zhejiang, Anhui, Jiangsu, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Guizhou and Sichuan as well as Shanghai and Chongqing municipalities – will receive persistent heavy rain on Wednesday and Thursday, the China Meteorological Administration (CMA) forecast.
It also warned that on Wednesday there was a high risk of flash floods, geological disaster, urban and rural waterlogging and flooding in small and medium-sized rivers in these regions.
The middle and lower Yangtze region has entered its annual “plum rain” season, which is characterised by heavy rainfall, humid weather and high temperatures in June and July. Rain is forecast to continue in these areas for at least the next few days.
Chen Tao, chief forecaster at the National Meteorological Centre, told state news agency Xinhua the recent heavy rainfall often intensified at night, leading to severe precipitation across a wide area of the country.
In addition to eastern and southern China, flooding has also reached northeastern parts of the country.
On Tuesday, a level 4 emergency response to flooding in northeastern Heilongjiang province was activated by China’s Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters.
Some 35 rivers across the nation have had flood levels exceed warning levels, with three rivers exceeding the flood-stage level by Tuesday morning, the water resources ministry said.
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Among them, 15 rivers in the Ussuri and Songhua river basins in northeastern China remain above warning levels. The Woken River – a tributary of the Songhua River – hit a record flood level, state broadcaster CCTV reported on Tuesday.
Work teams from the water resource and emergency management ministries have been sent to the Yangtze and northeast regions to help local governments carry out flood prevention measures.