China's vice premier urges intensified efforts for flood control

A senior Chinese official has called for intensified efforts to prevent flood and mitigate loss from possible flood disasters, while warning about possible basin-wide floods this year.

Vice Premier Wang Yang made the remarks during an inspection tour in central China's Anhui Province on Saturday.

Affected by super El Nino, China would face very complicated weather conditions and there is a relatively high possibility of basin-wide floods occurring this year in the country, said Wang.

He called upon local authorities and related departments to take precautions, intensify efforts in weather forecasting and monitoring, and formulate emergency programs.

The vice premier also stressed the importance of avoiding mass casualties and ensuring water supply safety.

Earlier on Sunday, at least a dozen people went missing and 400,000 people were evacuated from their homes, after a heavy downpour in Huanggang City, central China's Hubei Province.

A maximum of 251 millimeters of rain has hit the city from Saturday afternoon. Floods have collapsed houses, bridges, dikes and roads, and inundated farmland.

China's meteorological authority on Sunday evening renewed a yellow alert for rainstorm across parts of central China from Sunday evening to Monday evening.

Heavy rainstorm will hit the provinces of Guizhou, Hubei, Hunan, Henan, and Anhui in the coming day, with precipitation reaching 180 millimeters in some areas, the National Meteorological Center (NMC) said.

China has a four-tier color-coded system for severe weather, with red being the most serious, followed by orange, yellow and blue. Endi