Sixteen killed, one million evacuated as Typhoon Chanchu hits China

TERRA.WIRE

Sixteen killed, one million evacuated as Typhoon Chanchu hits China
BEIJING, May 18 (AFP) May 18, 2006
Sixteen people were killed and more than one million people evacuated as Typhoon Chanchu swept through China's Guangdong and Fujian provinces Thursday, local governments said.

Eight people were killed in Guangdong in southern China and another eight in neighboring Fujian in the country's southeast, governments in those provinces said.

The eight deaths in Fujian were reported Thursday evening by the Fujian Water Resources Bureau's website. No information was immediately available on them.

The victims in Guangdong, including two children, were killed when their houses collapsed in Shantou city following a landslide caused by torrential rain, an official at the local flood control center told AFP.

Meanwhile, the number of people evacuated rose to more than one million people after the Fujian bureau reported 709,000 had been evacuated in the province. A total of 327,000 people in Guangdong province were evacuated.