Post floods, China issues yellow alert for high temperatures

 Post devastating floods hit China, Beijing issued yellow alert to its citizens to brace up for high temperatures in the country.

China's national observatory on Saturday renewed a yellow alert for high temperatures, as heatwaves hit vast regions of the country, reported Xinhua.

During daylight hours on Saturday, parts of Inner Mongolia, Shaanxi, Shanxi, Hebei, Beijing, Tianjin, Shandong, Henan, Anhui, Jiangsu, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangxi, Sichuan, Chongqing, Guangdong, Fujian and Xinjiang are expected to reach temperatures of 35 to 36 degrees Celsius, the National Meteorological Center said.

Temperatures in some of these regions will reach over 40 degrees Celsius, the center said.

The center advised avoiding outdoor activities during high-temperature periods in the afternoon and suggested that workers exposed to high temperatures take necessary protective measures, reported Xinhua.

China has a four-tier, color-coded weather warning system, with red representing the most severe warning, followed by orange, yellow and blue.

Earlier, close to 5 lakh people in East China's Jiangxi were affected by rain. Jiangxi witnessed heavy rain and floods in 55 counties from Saturday to 3:00 pm Monday. The heavy rain that lashed in Jiangxi has damaged 43,300 hectares of crops.

China upgraded its flood control emergency response to level II amid heavy rains.

A total of 548,000 people were affected due to the heavy rain in China's Jiangxi province last Tuesday, according to the provincial flood control headquarters.

Although it stopped raining on Wednesday, local meteorological department had predicted further rainstorms in the province this week.

Direct economic losses from the floods touched 470 million yuan (about 70.4 million US dollars), according to East China's Jiangxi Province, reported Xinhua.

The heavy rain brought the first floods this year in Changjiang River and Xiuhe River in the province, according to the provincial hydrological monitoring center.

According to local authorities, the torrential rains and rain-induced floods since May 28 have wreaked havoc in 80 counties of the province.