Beijing gears up to tackle rain challenge

The Beijing Meteorological Bureau issued an orange alert for rainfall on Wednesday morning, prompting the city government to encourage flexible work arrangements at companies and institutions and ensure relevant departments made necessary preparations to prevent flooding.

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

While many commuters were caught in the rain on their way home from work in the evening, most were well prepared due to several rounds of alerts sent to their phones since morning.

"I stepped out of the subway station and saw it was raining heavily. There were sandbags outside and some emergency response vehicles were also stationed on the road," said Lin Lei, 22, a resident of Dongcheng district.

Zhang Linna, chief forecaster at the Beijing Meteorological Bureau, said the heavy rainfall was expected to last nearly 30 hours, from around 5 pm on Wednesday to past 8 pm on Thursday.

It was expected that most parts of Beijing would see heavy rainfall of more than 70 millimeters in an hour, from 7 pm to 8 pm on Wednesday, the bureau's website said.

According to the forecast, the northern mountainous areas and the eastern parts of the capital were expected to receive over 100 mm of rainfall in six hours. Parts of Miyun, Huairou, Pinggu and Shunyi districts are likely to receive over 150 mm of rainfall in 24 hours. Mountainous areas may face secondary disasters such as mudslides, the bureau warned.

Authorities also issued a yellow warning for mountain flood disasters, saying there is a high possibility of such incidents in Huairou, Miyun, Pinggu, Fangshan, Changping, Mentougou and Yanqing districts until 8 pm on Thursday.

Precautionary measures were taken across Beijing soon after the alerts were issued.

A total of 161 scenic spots, including Tanzhe Temple and Miaofeng Mountain, and more than 3,800 homestays were temporarily closed. People were advised to stay away from mountains and outdoor activities involving mountains and water.

As of 7 pm on Wednesday, about 20,000 people had been evacuated to safer places.

Water plants and pumping stations in the city mobilized 2,887 flood prevention workers, with 252 emergency teams put on standby.

The Beijing subway system stepped up deployment of emergency responders, while sandbags and water barriers were placed in key locations. Train services on the S2, Huairou-Miyun and Tongzhou-Miyun lines were suspended till further notice.

Authorities at Beijing Capital International Airport and Beijing Daxing International Airport started preparing for possible flight diversions at 4 pm. Capital airport had 1,263 scheduled flights on Wednesday, carrying a total of 194,300 passengers. By 4 pm, 716 of these flights had taken off or landed safely.

On Wednesday afternoon, the city's sports authority urged related bureaus and federations to halt large-scale sporting events, outdoor activities and training sessions.

Meanwhile, the State Flood Control and Drought Relief Headquarters activated a Level IV emergency response in Beijing and Hebei province. It is China's lowest level of emergency response for flooding in a four-tier system.

Li Boyu contributed to this story.

dujuan@chinadaily.com.cn