Read more about 13 killed, over 100,000 evacuated as unprecedented floods hit central China on Business Standard. President Xi Jinping to deployed the Army to rescue those trapped in inundated subways, hotels and public places, amid fears of collapse of a dam posing flood risk to the provincial capital.
At least 13 people were killed and over a lakh evacuated in China’s central Henan province hit by the heaviest rainfall in 1,000 years, prompting President Xi Jinping on Wednesday to deploy the Army to rescue those trapped in inundated subways, hotels and public places, amid fears of collapse of a dam posing flood risk to the provincial capital. The massive floods, described by meteorologists as a once-in-a-lifetime event, has resulted in apocalyptic scenes in the provincial capital Zhengzhou, a metropolis of 12.6 million, with its public avenues and subway tunnels getting submerged with surging waters. Xi ordered the deployment of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) and said that authorities at all levels must give top priority to ensuring people’s safety and property as massive ravaged the province and Zhengzhou city. The People’s Liberation Army Central Theatre Command urgently dispatched troops to a county in rain-hit Henan where a dam is under threat of collapse due to serious damage caused by the rains, state-run Xinhua news agency reported. The PLA said on its social media account on Sina Weibo, China’s Twitter-like social media platform, saying that a 20-meter-long crevasse had appeared in the dam in Yichuan county of Henan Province, and could collapse any time. Videos posted on the Chinese social media showed petrified passengers trapped in subway trains clinging on to safety bars desperately waiting for help as floodwaters raised up to their necks.
