The death toll in typhoon Prapiroon rose to 38, and 14 more remained missing in south China's Guangdong Province by midday on Saturday, local sources said.

Prapiroon brought along torrential rains in this southern Chinese province, with Taishan, Enping, and Yangchun being worst hit, affecting 3.72 million people and razing 7,000 houses. The direct economic losses are forecast at 2.4 billion yuan (US$300 million).

Detail of the damages is still under further investigation, said a spokesman from the Guangdong Provincial Office for Drought, Flood and Wind Control.

Typhoon Prapiroon made landfall at the coastal area between Yangxi County and Dianbai County in western Guangdong at 7:20 PM Thursday. With a speed of 33 meters per second, the wind power reached 12 degrees on the Beaufort Scale near its eye.

Under the impact of the outer air current caused by typhoon Prapiroon, a tornado struck areas including Foshan, Shanwei and Shaoguan in Guangdong on Friday, causing nine deaths in Foshan.

By Friday morning, Prapiroon's wind speed had dropped from typhoon level to tropical storm after it swirled into the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, just west of Guangdong, early Thursday morning and dumped rain in areas it swept through.

The tropical storm attacked Yulin in Guangxi in the front on Friday, where 100,000 people were forced to evacuate, and the damages were placed at 40 million yuan (about US$5 million), said information from the Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters of Yulin City.

Prapiroon, which means Rain God in Thai, formed in the South China Sea and strengthened into a typhoon on Wednesday noon.

(Xinhua News Agency August 5, 2006)