A general view of the beach due to the impact of Typhoon Yagi in Do Son district of Hai Phong city, Vietnam on September 7, 2024. | Photo credit: Reuters
Vietnamese officials say Typhoon Yagi The storm that hit the northern part of the country on Saturday (September 7, 2024) afternoon has killed at least four people and injured 78 others.
Vietnamese meteorological officials described Yagi as “one of the most powerful typhoons to hit the region in the past decade.” The storm hit the Southeast Asian country after killing three people and injuring nearly a hundred others in China’s Hainan province.
State media reported the typhoon hit Vietnam’s coastal provinces of Quang Ninh and Haiphong with winds of up to 149 kilometres per hour (92 mph). Before the storm made landfall, strong winds knocked down a tree in the capital Hanoi, killing a woman, local media reported on Saturday (Sept 7).
Quang Ninh is home to the UNESCO World Heritage Site Ha Long Bay, known for its many towering limestone islands. Hundreds of cruises to the popular destination were cancelled before the storm hit, according to local media. Haiphong is an industrial hub, home to large factories, including EV maker Vinfast and Apple supplier Pegatron.
The storm has disrupted power supply to large parts of Quang Ninh and Thai Binh provinces.
Earlier, the government had issued several alerts and areas prone to floods or landslides were evacuated. Four airports, including Hanoi and Haiphong, were closed.
Authorities trimmed trees in Hanoi to prevent them from falling, but the wind and rain brought down many trees and even toppled billboards in northern cities. Local media reported that several boats were washed out to sea.
Yagi struck the city of Wenchang in China’s Hainan province on Friday afternoon (Sept. 6), with wind speeds of about 245 kilometers per hour (152 mph) near the center.
According to the local administration, officials said three people were killed and at least 95 others were injured due to the storm. More than 12 lakh people have been affected by it till Saturday afternoon. Global Times Newspaper.
About 420,000 residents of Hainan were relocated ahead of the typhoon’s arrival. More than half a million people were evacuated in Guangdong province ahead of Yagi’s second landfall in the province’s Xuwen county on Friday night.
Meanwhile, the meteorological observatory in Haikou city raised its typhoon signal from red to orange on Saturday as the storm moved further away.
Before leaving Hong Kong, Yagi forced more than 270 people to take refuge in temporary government shelters on Friday, and the storm caused more than 100 flights to be cancelled in the city. Heavy rain and strong winds knocked down dozens of trees, and halted trading on 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 20 people and left 26 others missing, most of them in landslides and widespread flooding that have affected more than 2.3 million people in northern and central provinces.
More than 82,200 people were displaced from their homes in Philippine provinces, and classes, work, inter-island ferry services, and domestic flights were disrupted for several days in many places, including the densely populated capital region, metropolitan Manila.
Warm water in the oceans fuels storms, and as they warm due to climate change, a UN climate change report warns that intense storms are becoming more common, especially in Southeast Asia.
Published – September 07, 2024 06:09 PM IST