60,000 People Trapped in Beijing’s Fangshan District After Heaviest Rain in Decades

Credit: Visual China

BEIJING, Aug 1 (TiPost) ——About 60,000 households lost power in the Fangshan District of Beijing due to heavy rainfall, according to information released by the Beijing Government on Tuesday.

Flash flood damaged part of the power supply poles and transformers, leading to power supply cutoff and communication interruptions. 3,410 households in 28 villages had power outages. The telecommunication is problematic in seven townships and 62 villages.

The Fangshan District is fully determined to organize emergency repair and coordinate municipal professionals to make joint efforts to resume power supply and telecommunication.

At the same time, the government will send helicopters to airdrop food, drinking water, emergency lights, and other supplies to villages with impassable roads starting from Tuesday, to protect the basic life of the masses living in the mountains.

He, whose family lives in the mountainous area, said that at about 3 p.m. on Monday, some of the buildings in her neighborhood lost power. The reason for the power outage is that substation equipment was in the water, affecting the west side of the Beijing-Hong Kong-Macao Expressway power supply.

This round of heavy rainfall is mainly concentrated in Fangshan and Mentougou Districts in southwest Beijing. Mentougou District suffered a rare historical continuous heavy rainfall. The current cumulative average rainfall in the district far exceeded the rainstorm level on July 21, 2012, reaching 471.1 mm, the maximum rainfall points up to 723 millimeters, which is the highest number since the meteorological records have been kept.

Some areas in Mentougou also suffered power outages and communication signal disruptions. According to the State Grid Beijing Power, the company has deployed professionals, carrying small generators, lighting sets, charging square pods, satellite communication vehicles, satellite phones, and other equipment to support in response to the severe situation of power supply in local areas of Mentougou. At present, a generator has been arranged to assist the Mentougou District Government to generate electricity, and a distributed emergency generator has been arranged to provide electricity for hospital use.

At the same time, the flood situation in many places in Hebei Province is also exceptionally severe. Baoding City located to southwest of Beijing, and Zhangjiakou City located to northwest of Beijing are seriously affected by the flooding, and many villages and towns appear to be trapped due to power failure.

Xi Jinping, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China Central Committee and the President of the country, gave important instructions on disaster relief work on Tuesday. It is required that all places make every effort to search and rescue missing and trapped people, treat the injured and comfort the families of the victims, and minimize casualties. To properly resettle the affected people, urgently resume transportation, communications, electricity, and repair damaged infrastructure, to restore normal production and life as soon as possible.

Affected by the rainstorm disaster, the property insurance industry in Beijing received 6786 claims, and the reported loss amounted to 166 million yuan.

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