Efforts and troubles elsewhere

In adjacent Zhejiang Province, rainfall exceeded 50 millimetres on 6.8 percent of the province's land on Friday night. The highest reading was 110 millimetres in Cangnan county bordering Fujian.

An expressway from Wenzhou of Zhejiang to Fujian was closed for 12 kilometers, while another from Hangzhou to Anhui Province was cut by landslides.

Power supply to 80 villages was also cut.

Nearly 500,000 residents and tourists in danger areas had been evacuated by 9 p.m. and the province has called nearly 30,000 ships back to harbor.

More than 50,000 soldiers were prepared for emergencies in Zhejiang, said the local government.

Shanghai was put on high alert and the World Expo venue is being protected around the clock.

More than 80 foreign ships were delayed or had their voyages cancelled.

"We are unlikely to resume if the typhoon moves northwestwards," said the captain of a Japanese cargo ship, which was scheduled to sail for Japan Saturday at noon.

In addition, more than 140 flights in Shanghai had been delayed by about 10 PM.

Anhui issued its first typhoon warning this year, and advised residents to stay indoors.

East China's Shandong province has also warned local governments to take measures beforehand to reduce losses from extreme weather.

Morakot, which means "emerald" in Thai, is the eighth storm to hit China this year. It landed in Hualien of Taiwan at 11:45 PM on Friday, and left at least six people dead or missing. A further 12 were injured. Morakot also overturned cars and cut power supplies.

Wave alert level raised

On Saturday afternoon, the National Marine Environmental Forecasting Center upgraded its alert level for both stormy tide and sea wave from "orange" to "red", the highest level.

The center said as a result of Typhoon Morakot, the stormy tide along the coast of Zhejiang Province and northern part of Fujian Province would be 0.5 meters to 1.8 meters high until Sunday afternoon.

The sea in southern part of the East China Sea and Taiwan Strait will be very rough, with monster waves as high as eight meters, the center warned.

Other coastal areas from Shanghai to Guangdong Province will all experience abnormally high waves, from 2.5 meters to six meters high, it said.

China adopts a four-grade warning system for stormy tide, tsunami, sea ice and sea wave, which uses four colors (red, orange, yellow and blue) to indicate different levels of emergency.