Large areas of China's central Henan province were inundated with floodwaters on Wednesday following the worst rainfall in 1,000 years, according to Reuters.
From Saturday to Tuesday, 26.5 inches of rain fell on Zhengzhou, surpassing the annual average of around 24 inches. Just on Tuesday, 8.2 inches fell in a single hour.
Zhengzhou, the capital of Henan, is a massive industrial hub. The largest iPhone assembly plant, operated by Foxconn, said operations have yet to be affected. They released a statement that said: "no direct impact on our facility in that location to date," adding it was closely monitoring the situation.
However, Nissan Motor halted production at its facility due to devastating floodwaters. The extent of the damage to businesses in the city and across the province is unknown.
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The city's transportation network has come to a screeching halt as the metro system was closed on Tuesday after roads and tunnels were flooded.
FT reports twenty-five people are dead, and seven are missing in Zhengzhou. Twelve were killed and five injured in subway tunnels when floodwaters trapped commuters.
We noted Tuesday night, yet, another dam, this time in Zhengzhou, collapsed, the third in 48 hours, after rising water levels spilled over the dam's crest and weakened the structure, resulting in a structural failure.
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The dam is the third to fail in recent days: over the weekend, two dams in Hulun Buir City in North China's Inner Mongolia collapsed due to severe rain.
Meanwhile, dozens of reservoirs and dams have hit emergency high water levels prompting authorities to evacuate more than 100,000 people. There's still an additional risk of other dams collapsing.
Reuters notes the rainstorms are the worst in 1,000 years. More than 6,000 military and fire service personnel are involved in rescue operations.
Here's more video of the devastation across Zhengzhou.
Zhengzhou is flood-prone as it sits in a low-lying area though the local government has beefed up surrounding infrastructure to ensure torrential rains don't result in flood-outs - that appears to have failed.
Millions of people have been upended in the city as floodwaters result in closed transportation networks, delayed flights, damage to critical infrastructure and commercial and residential structures.
I am trying to figure out what the Civilian Climate Corps are going to do. Are they going to watch people’s houses and monitor their utility use? Are they going to look at people’s odometers and see how much they drive? Are they going to make sure every citizen is using their recycling bins properly?
At what point do we the people shrug, and stop allowing these things to be created?
