Rain-triggered landslides leave 10 dead, 19 missing
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At least 10 people were killed, four injured and 19 are feared buried Friday following rain-triggered landslides in east and south China, local authorities said.
A landslide struck Gaosha Town of Shaxian County, in Sanming City of eastern Fujian Province, at about 5:35 p.m., burying up to 19 people, a spokesman from the Sanming municipal government said.
By 9 p.m. seven people had been rescued and local police, firemen, militia and residents were struggling to search for the other missing residents, he said.
Another landslide hit Taolin Village Chun'an County in eastern Zhejiang Province at 5:00 a.m. as villagers were being evacuated from their homes. The area had been pounded by rain since Thursday afternoon, said Tong Xiaowei, deputy county head.
Debris carried in the landslide swamped two residential houses, burying six residents as well as two people assisting with the evacuation, Tong said.
Four bodies have been recovered, and three survivors were being treated at hospital for unidentified injuries after being rescued.
About 300 fire fighters, policemen, medical personnel and villagers were still searching for one other missing person, Tong said.
Also in Zhejiang, five people were killed and another was injured Friday afternoon after a landslide buried a house in the Dasai Village of Lanju Township, in Longquan City.
In southern Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, a lumberman was killed and six others were missing after a landslide hit their work shed in a village in Rongshui county early on Friday.
The Ministry of Civil Affairs said, by 4 p.m. Friday, the heavy rains that began pounding south China Sunday had left 69 dead, 44 missing and forced the evacuation of 493,000 people in Fujian, Jiangxi, Hunan, Guangdong, Sichuan and Guizhou provinces as well as Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
Further, the rainstorms are being blamed for economic losses of 6.5 billion yuan (952 million U.S. dollars), according to the Ministry.
Torrential downpours have also triggered flash floods, caused rivers to swell, inundated crops, and disrupted traffic and telecommunications.
The county seat of Shunchang in Fujian was turned into an isolated town Friday as it has been besieged by floodwater, said Lin Zhengrong, a local publicity official.
"All the roads leading to the county seat were cut off.Telecommunications and Internet were cut off. Water and electricity supplies in some districts were also cut off," he told Xinhua via a maritime satellite phone.
