Most Fanapi deaths in China caused by mudslides
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Devastating mudslides triggered by historic rainfalls were blamed for the heavy casualty toll -- 70 dead and 65 missing -- in south China's Guangdong Province when typhoon Fanapi battered the region earlier this week, a government report said Saturday.
The loss caused by mud-flows and landslides in Guangdong's mountainous western region is "very serious", said a disaster assessment report conducted by provincial disaster relief authorities. "Large-scale mud-slides occurred in many places, cutting off traffic and communications to towns and villages."
In Magui Township, Gaochuan City alone, mud-slides left 66 dead or missing, it added.
Xinhua reporters riding helicopters above the disaster zones saw a number of brown stripes of mud-slides laced the otherwise green mountain slopes. Flood-waters continued to flow down through the mud-slide tracks.
Large swaths of farmlands were submerged in flood-waters while piles of rocks, debris, and trash dotted the basin at the foot of the mountains.
By 6 p.m. Friday, about 99,500 people in Guangdong were evacuated for the Fanapi-brought disasters. Some 3,765 houses collapsed, 42,190 hectares of farmland were damaged, and the economic loss reached 2.4 billion yuan, latest official data show.
Typhoon Fanapi, the 11th and strongest typhoon that hit China this year, landed in Fujian Province at 7 a.m. Monday, but wreaked most havoc in Guangdong, which neighbors Fujian on the south. No casualties have been reported in Fujian.
In the country's most devastating mud-slides in decades, nearly 2,000 people were killed in Zhouqu, Guansu Province after days of torrential rains poured the region in early August this year.
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