TR EMERITUS

Beijing’s 22 million residents were asked to stay indoors on Saturday, as powerful winds swept across northern China. The winds toppled trees, disrupted travel and sports, and caused dust storms across the region.

The winds reached 150 miles per hour on Saturday afternoon local time, stemmed from a polar vortex in Mongolia and sent temperatures plunging, according to the Chinese state news media. Wind and rain began hitting the region on Friday.

By Saturday afternoon, more than 800 trees had been knocked over and nearly 7,000 people had been evacuated in Beijing, the state media reported. Meteorological data showed that on the afternoon of April 11, heavy rainfall occurred in Wuhan Economic Development Zone, Caidian and northwest Jiangxia, with rainfall between 30-50 mm; the rest of the area had rainfall below 15 mm.

Shanghai was hit by severe convective weather, with local short-term heavy rain accompanied by thunderstorms of 8-10 levels, and gusts of 11 levels in the Yangshan Port area.
 

One Response to “Chaos in China as extreme storm destroys homes and cars”