57 die in tropical storm

The death toll from Tropical Storm Prapiroon jumped to 57, with 16 more people missing, after the storm knocked down houses and set off landslides and flash floods in China, news reports said today.

Hardest hit was Guangdong province, where 38 people have been killed since Prapiroon roared ashore on Thursday. In neighbouring Guangxi region to the west, 19 people were killed, including six migrant farm workers whose shelter was swept away by a flash flood in the city of Laibin, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Elsewhere, people were buried by landslides, struck by lightning and crushed by collapsed walls. One woman died after being hit by a billboard knocked down by high winds.

In Guangdong, a 25-year-old policeman assisting with rescue work was killed when a mudslide buried him in the city of Sihui, the Guangzhou Daily newspaper said.

The deaths came despite a massive evacuation ahead of the storm that moved more than 660,000 people out of threatened areas. It said 46,000 houses were destroyed and damage was estimated at 2.4 billion yuan (£157 million).

Prapiroon killed six people earlier as it passed across the Philippines. One person in Hong Kong was injured on Wednesday when high winds toppled empty cargo containers at a shipping terminal.

The typhoon season started early in China this year, where storms have already killed more than 1,460 people, mainly in the densely populated southeast.

Prapiroon, named after the Thai rain god, is the region’s eighth major storm of the season.

Typhoon Kaemi killed at least 35 people in China last week and left dozens missing in flooding and landslides.