498 mm of rain fell in Lushan [FOTO & VIDEO]

Today, Tuesday, June 20, heavy rains hit the central Chinese province of Henan, flooding major rivers, flooding the streets of a dozen cities and leading to the closure of the famous Shaolin Temple. Henan, a major logistics center, was hit by storms over the weekend in an unusually active rainy season. Rail services have been suspended, while many highways have been closed and flights have been delayed or canceled.

In the provincial capital of Zhengzhouon the banks of the Yellow River at least three people died. Social media videos showed passengers in a flooded subway car in central Zhengzhou clinging to handles as water rose to shoulder height, with some standing on seats. All stations on all metro lines were closed due to bad weather.

According to reports from the People’s Daily, state newspaper, numerous houses collapsed. Local media also reported that two people were killed by a collapsed wall in Zhengzhou. In Ruzhou, a city southwest of Zhengzhou, the streets were turned into streams, wiping out cars and other vehicles, social media footage showed.

The rising Yi River has also threatened to hit Longmen Grottoes, a UNESCO World Heritage Site with millennial Buddhist statues carved into the limestone cliffs near Luoyang city. Like the Longmen Grottoes, the Shaolin Temple in the city of Dengfeng, famous in the West for its martial arts, has been temporarily closed. Also in Dengfeng, an aluminum alloy plant exploded on Tuesday when water from a river entered the factory.

At least 31 large and medium-sized reservoirs in the province have exceeded alert levels.

Heavy rains in Dengfeng City, Zhengzhou, Henan Province cause waterlogging
Bridge washed out
July 20, 2021 #水水水街 pic.twitter.com/pymwIoK7xd

— White Seven (@tw_tomy_) July 20, 2021

From Saturday to Tuesday, 3,535 weather stations in Henan recorded precipitation above 50mm, of which 1,614 recorded levels above 100mm and 151 above 250mm. The highest was in the city of Lushan, which saw 498mm of rain, according to the provincial meteorological bureau.

“This is the heaviest rain since I was born, with so many familiar places flooded“Said an internet user in the flooded city of Gongyi on Chinese social media. The rain is expected to stop by Thursday. Floods are common during the rainy season in China, which causes annual chaos and wipes out roads, crops and homes. But the threat has worsened over the decades, in part due to widespread construction of dikes and levees that disrupted connections between the river and adjacent lakes and disrupted the floodplains that had helped absorb the summer surge.

Earlier this month, hundreds of flights were canceled in the capital Beijing and other nearby cities with schools and tourist sites closed as torrential downpours and gale force winds hit the region.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vh-FGTRExMQ

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