Rainy Deluge Sweeps Across Southern China, Leaving Trail of Destruction

Heavy rainstorms that swept across southern China over the weekend killed at least four people and left many more missing, as floods swamped cities in the densely populated Pearl River Delta. The torrential rains, which were the heaviest in decades, caused widespread damage and chaos, leaving thousands of people stranded in their homes.

According to state media, a search was under way for 10 others who were missing after the record-breaking rains sparked concerns about the region’s defenses against bigger deluges induced by extreme weather events. By Monday, about 110,000 people had been evacuated across the province, while 25,800 people were in emergency shelters, according to Xinhua.

In Guangzhou, the capital of Guangdong province, the government said the city had logged a cumulative rainfall of 60.9cm in April, the highest monthly rainfall since record-keeping began in 1959. The country’s highest-level red rainstorm warning was issued for parts of Guangdong, including the megacity of Shenzhen, the city’s meteorological observatory said.

Rescuers were working tirelessly to evacuate those stranded by the floods, with footage on state broadcaster CCTV showing rescuers in rubber boats evacuating residents from inundated shopping streets and residential areas. Floods also battered neighboring Jiangxi province, where local media reported 459 people had been evacuated, while rains and floods have affected 1,500 hectares of crops and caused financial losses of more than 41 million yuan ($5.7m).

Guangdong, once dubbed the “factory floor of the world,” is prone to summer floods, and its defenses against disruptive floods were severely tested in June 2022 when the province was pounded by the heaviest downpours in six decades. Hundreds of thousands of people were evacuated.

The province has been battered by unusually heavy, sustained, and widespread rainfall, with powerful storms ushering in an earlier-than-normal start to the province’s annual flooding season in May and June. Waterways in the province have overflowed, including in some villages where floodwaters reached the second storey of houses after washing out paddy and potato fields.

In Qingyuan, a relatively small city of 4 million, rescuers tackled neck-high waters to extract residents, including an elderly lady trapped in waist-deep water in an apartment building. Others remained on the upper floors of their houses, waiting for the waters to recede as friends delivered food by boat.

The relentless rainfall has left many residents counting their losses, with one farmer telling Reuters that their rice fields had been “fully flooded”. “I won’t be making any money this year, I will be making losses,” Huang Jingrong said, estimating his losses at about 100,000 yuan ($13,800). “What can we do? We won’t get reimbursed for our losses.”

The extreme weather events in China have become more intense and unpredictable because of global warming, scientists say, with record-breaking rainfall and drought assailing the world’s second-largest economy, often at the same time.