Typhoon Yagi kills 2 and injures 92 in China’s Hainan as it makes its way to northern Vietnam

In this photo released by Xinhua news agency, coconut trees hit by Typhoon Yagi lie beside a road in Haikou, southern China’s Hainan province, Friday, Sept. 6, 2024. | Photo credit: AP

A powerful typhoon killed two people and injured at least 92 on the southern Chinese island of Hainan, officials said on Saturday (Sept 07, 20204), as heavy rains and winds left more than 800,000 homes without power.

Typhoon Yagi is currently heading toward northern Vietnam over the Gulf of Tonkin on Saturday, with Vietnamese officials describing Yagi as “one of the most powerful storms to hit the region in the past decade.” The storm struck the city of Wenchang on Hainan on Friday afternoon, with wind speeds near its center estimated at about 245 kilometers per hour (152 mph).

China’s national meteorological authorities said Yagi was the strongest autumn typhoon to hit China.

About 420,000 residents were evacuated in Hainan before the typhoon made landfall. More than half a million people were evacuated in Guangdong province before Yagi made a second landfall in the province’s Xuwen county on Friday night.

Haikou’s meteorological observatory raised its typhoon signal from red to orange on Saturday as the storm moved further away from the city.

In Hong Kong, more than 270 people were forced to take refuge in temporary government shelters on Friday and more than 100 flights were cancelled in the city due to the storm. Heavy rain and strong winds knocked down dozens of trees and halted trading at the stock market, banking services and schools.

Typhoon Yagi was still a typhoon when it struck the South China Sea off northwestern Philippines on Wednesday. The storm has killed at least 16 people and left 17 others missing, triggering landslides and widespread flooding that has affected more than 2 million people across the archipelago.

More than 47,600 people were displaced from their homes in Philippine provinces, and classes, work, inter-island ferry services, and domestic flights were disrupted for days in many places, including the densely populated capital region, metropolitan Manila.