Typhoon Matmo hits China

Typhoon Matmo hits China

24072014

U

Matmo, the second typhoon to strike China in a week on Wednesday battered the country’s southeastern coastline as the death toll from the super typhoon Rammasun rose to 56 with another 20 missing.

After landing, typhoon Matmo, however, weakened as it downgraded to a tropical storm, making landfalls in China’s heavily populated Fujian province.The country’s weather agency said that Matmo had gusts of 108 kilometres per hour and was moving at 20 kilometre per hour.

Authorities in Zhejiang province, south of Shanghai, had ordered fishing boats to return to port and stepped up patrols to watch for breaks in coastal and river embankments, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Matmo had lashed Taiwan with heavy showers, injuring five people and affecting 31,505 homes, according to the island’s Central News Agency.

Matmo was forecast to turn north and pass over areas west of Shanghai, China’s biggest business centre, according to the Hong Kong Observatory.

Rains of up to 300 millimetres were forecast in Shanghai and areas as far north as Jiangsu province.

Over 1400 tourists were already evacuated from the Nanji island situated in east China’s Zhejiang province with the assistance of 14 additional flights in the wake of typhoon Matmo, local official said.

Typhoon Matmo is the 10th typhoon which hit China this year and second in a week.

The super typhoon Rammasun, with winds of up to 216 kilometre per hour, killed 56 people and was the strongest typhoon to hit south China in four decades, bringing gales, downpours and floods.

It (Typhoon Rammasun) has affected more than 11 million people in the provinces of Guangdong, Hainan and Yunnan as well as Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, an official statement said on Wednesday, combined direct economic losses in affected areas amount to USD 6.16 billion.

Over 862,000 people have been resettled and some 261,000 are in urgent need of basic necessities.

The rain has destroyed 40,000 houses and 258,000 hectares of crops, the ministry said.