Typhoon Haikui makes landfall

Typhoon Haikui thundered ashore in eastern China early Wednesday, unleashing heavy rains and flooding in a region already hit by two typhoons this week. China's observatory in Zhejiang province, where the storm made landfall in Hepun township near the Sanmenwan Gulf with maximum wind speed of 93 miles per hour, said Haikui was already wreaking havoc, stranding people in rain-triggered flooding, Xinhua News Agency reported. Authorities in the provincial capital of Hangzhou said by 8 a.m. local time, at least 123 people had been rescued but rescuers had yet to reach 10 more people in local hotels because of flooded roads in the vicinity. The storm comes on the heels of typhoons Saola and Damrey, which came ashore during the weekend. Prior to checking into China, Saola devastated northern Philippines, leaving more than 50 people dead in that country and also causing much damage in Taiwan. In preparation for Haikui, Chinese authorities had been evacuating people from Shanghai, the country's largest city and its commercial hub. About 374,000 people have already been evacuated from Shanghai and another 250,000 from Zhejiang, CNN reported. "Due to the uncertainty of the typhoon, we will relocate all people facing possible risks," one official told Xinhua. The Shanghai municipal government has stopped all group outdoor activities and asked all companies and institutions unrelated to people's livelihoods and city operations to be ready to close and give workers days off. Experts said Haikui could be the worst typhoon to directly affect Shanghai since 2005 when the city was struck by the deadly typhoon Matsa. Haikui was forecast to bring heavy downpours and severe rainstorms through Thursday. The death toll from incidents in east China blamed on Saola and Damrey has already risen to 23, while another nine remained missing. In Hubei province alone, one of the seven provinces hit by the two storms, 14 people had been confirmed dead and another five were missing as of Monday evening. Even before the arrival of the latest three storms, vast regions of China, including capital Beijing, had been reeling after being hit by heavy rains since July. The death toll from those rains and related incidents in Beijing alone has reached 79.