Typhoon Ampil Weakens After Making Landfall In East China
Typhoon Ampil has weakened after it made landfall in east China’s coastal region, the country’s national observatory said on Sunday.
Ampil, this year’s 10th typhoon, made landfall in Shanghai at noon (Fiji time 4pm) on Sunday, packing winds of up to 28 metres per second, the National Meteorological Centre (NMC) said in a statement. At 5 pm (Fiji time 9pm), the eye of
Amphil was in Rudong County, Jiangsu Province. The tropical storm is now moving northwestward at a speed of 5-7m per second, and will reach east China’s Shandong Province around Monday noon, triggering a blue alert at 6pm on Sunday.
China has a four-tier color-coded weather warning system, with red representing the most severe weather, followed by orange, yellow, and blue.
Over 387,000 people in Shanghai, Zhejiang and Jiangsu were evacuated, and 41,400 ships returned to the ports before the typhoon hit Shanghai, the State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters said.
The headquarters launched an emergency response to the typhoon and flooding on Friday and sent 15 working groups to assist local authorities. Ampil made landfall on the island of Chongming in Shanghai at 12:30pm (4.30pm) on Sunday, the municipal meteorological observatory said. The island, 45 km east of downtown Shanghai, is at the mouth of the Yangtze River. The Shanghai municipal flood control headquarters said it had relocated a total of 190,000 people from coastal areas by early Sunday morning.
As of 8pm (Fiji time 12am Monday) flights at Shanghai’s Pudong and Hongqiao airports were resuming gradually after more than 350 flights were cancelled due to bad weather. Most of the high-speed train services in Shanghai were also suspended on Sunday. Xinhua