(Corrects first bullet level to say kills 21, not 18, in Vietnam, and adjustments headline)
By Francesco Guarascio and Minh Nguyen
HANOI/HAIPHONG (Reuters) -Storm Yagi, Asia’s strongest storm this yr, was downgraded to a tropical melancholy on Sunday, after wreaking havoc in northern Vietnam, the place it broken factories and infrastructure in export-oriented industrial hubs.
Vietnam’s meteorological company issued the downgrade on Sunday however cautioned concerning the ongoing danger of flooding and landslides because the storm, the strongest to hit the nation in a long time, moved westwards.
On Saturday, Yagi disrupted energy provides and telecommunications in Vietnam’s capital, Hanoi, inflicting in depth flooding, felling 1000’s of timber and damaging houses.
The hurricane and subsequent landslides and floods killed 21 individuals in Vietnam and injured 229, based on preliminary estimates from the federal government, after claiming the lives of 4 individuals on the southern Chinese language island of Hainan and 20 within the Philippines, the primary nation it hit per week in the past.
In Haiphong, a Vietnamese coastal metropolis of two million which hosts factories of a number of multinationals, industrial parks remained closed on Sunday, staff and managers instructed Reuters.
One was flooded, and staff mentioned that they had been despatched dwelling after they tried to go to work unaware of the circumstances at their crops as a result of telecommunications networks had not been restored.
“The harm for the factories is de facto vital. Some have misplaced roofs or complete entrance facades,” mentioned Bruno Jaspaert, head of DEEP C industrial zones, which host crops from over 150 traders in Haiphong and the neighbouring province of Quang Ninh.
He mentioned no less than 80% of the factories had been broken however the industrial parks had not been flooded.
“It’d take a month if issues go effectively earlier than I absolutely recuperate from this harm,” mentioned Do Van Truong, a 45-year-old store proprietor in Haiphong, noting the ceiling of his seafood store had collapsed whereas energy and water provides had not but been restored.
A number of highways within the north of the nation had been flooded or significantly disrupted, state media reported, publishing footage and photographs of landslides.
RISK OF FLASH FLOODS
After it made landfall in Vietnam on Saturday afternoon, Yagi triggered waves as excessive as 4 metres (13 ft) in coastal provinces, resulting in prolonged energy and telecommunication outages which have difficult harm evaluation, the federal government mentioned.
The meteorological company warned of continued “danger of flash floods” in riverside areas, together with in Hanoi.
As winds subsided, authorities in Hanoi rushed to scrub up streets from toppled timber scattered throughout the town centre and different neighbourhoods.
“The storm has devastated the town. Bushes fell down on prime of individuals’s homes, vehicles and other people on the road,” mentioned 57-year-old Hanoi resident Hoang Ngoc Nhien.
Hanoi’s Noi Bai worldwide airport, the busiest in northern Vietnam, reopened on Sunday after closing on Saturday morning.
