
Thousands of people — an estimated 13,000 or more — have been evacuated in China following torrential rains and a reported dam breach, and consequent large-scale flooding.
Videos on social media show four-wheeler vehicles being swept away and large areas under water, with tall buildings and roads submerged.
Quoting the Chinese state news agency Xinhua, the Singapore daily The Straits Times reported a few days ago that “the breach occurred on the afternoon of July 5, in part of an embankment on the shore of Dongting Lake in central China’s Hunan province”.
However, according to some other reports, extreme weather vagaries for China began well before the date of July 5. There have been some reports by social media users of heavy rains in China since June 24 or so. There are also unconfirmed claims of a breach in the world-famous Three Gorges Dam, in the Hubei province, badly affecting nearby areas.
Xinhua itself posted on X on June 28: “Heavy flooding has returned to Rongjiang County in southwest China’s Guizhou Province, prompting local authorities to re-activate the highest-level emergency flood response, effective from 12:30 p.m. Saturday.” The post was accompanied by a video of vast flooded areas.
In a report dated July 9, the news agency Reuters said: “Torrential rains swept across swathes of China on Wednesday as Tropical Storm Danas drenched coastal tech hubs while monsoonal rains further inland unleashed deadly landslides and flash floods over a 1,400-km (870-mile) arc.”
Alongside the floods, China has also faced a heatwave in recent days. The Reuters report said: “Compounding the challenge for authorities, a subtropical high-pressure system has been baking the $19 trillion economy’s more north-easterly seaboard and central provinces since last week, straining power grids and parching croplands.”
Evacuation estimates range from 6,000 to more than 13,000 following the calamitous flooding.
A July 6 report by the Germany-headquartered news network Deutsche Welle reported: “A dam break in China’s Hunan province forced almost 6,000 people to evacuate, even as authorities rushed to stem the resulting floods, state media reported on Saturday.”
Reuters put the total number at more than 13,000. It said that 6,000 people were evacuated from Yibin, a city in southwestern Sichuan province, “after 14 hours of rain”; and more than 7,000 people were evacuated from Zhaotong, “a city about a three-hour drive from Yibin”.
Reuters also said: “Meanwhile, over 300 people had to be relocated following a flash flood near the foothills of the Himalayas in China’s Tibet, caused by a river in Gyirong bursting its banks.”
An X account named Tibetan Flora & Flora accused China of “unchecked dam-building on the Tibetan Plateau” without any “regional input”. Such Chinese actions were “destabilizing fragile ecosystems and turning the Himalayas into climate time bombs”, it said.