Widespread flooding and landslides triggered by Typhoon Yagi have caused at least 59 deaths in Vietnam and disrupted businesses and factories in the export-focused northern industrial hubs, according to state media.
Nine people died during the typhoon, which made landfall in Vietnam on Saturday before weakening to a depression, and 50 others were killed during the consequent floods by Monday.
The storm, which was Asia’s most powerful and the world’s second-most powerful tropical cyclone this year, earlier killed dozens in southern China and the Philippines and caused extensive damage to infrastructure and land.
On Monday, several rivers in northern Vietnam rose to dangerously high levels as heavy rain pounded areas along the national border with China.
People carry belongings through floodwaters after hundreds of homes were submerged in Lang Son province. (AP: Nguyen Anh Tuan)
A landslide swept a passenger bus carrying 20 people into a flooded stream in the mountainous Cao Bang province on Monday morning, with rescuers unable to reach the site due to blocked roads.
In Phu Tho province, rescue operations were continuing after a steel bridge over the engorged Red River collapsed. Reports said 12 vehicles fell into the river and three people were pulled out of the water, while more than a dozen were missing.
Pham Truong Son, 50, told VNExpress he was driving on the bridge on his motorcycle when he heard a loud noise, before quickly plunging.
“I felt like I was drowned to the bottom of the river,” he told the newspaper, adding that he managed to swim and hold on to a drifting banana tree to stay afloat before he was rescued.
A bridge collapsed in Vietnam’s Phu Tho province on Monday, submerging cars, trucks and motorbikes. (AP: Bui Van Lanh)
Reports from the Lao Dong newspaper said dozens of businesses in Haiphong province were unable to resume production because factories were heavily damaged, many with their roofs blown apart and suffering water seepage.
Some companies said it would take at least a month for them to resume operations.
Authorities are still assessing the damage to industrial units but initial estimates show nearly 100 enterprises have been damaged by the typhoon, resulting in losses amounting to millions of dollars, according to the newspaper.
The two provinces are industrial hubs, housing many factories that export goods, including EV maker VinFast and Apple suppliers Pegatrong and USI.
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh visited Haiphong on Sunday and approved a multi-million-dollar funding package to help the port city recover.
Climate change increasing intensity
Typhoon Yagi was the strongest typhoon to hit Vietnam in decades when it made landfall on Saturday with winds of up to 149kph.
It weakened to a tropical depression on Sunday. However, the country’s meteorological agency has warned continuing downpours could still cause floods and landslides.
In Vietnam’s capital, Hanoi, skies were overcast on Monday as workers cleared uprooted trees, fallen billboards and toppled electricity poles. Heavy rain continued in north-west Vietnam.
Flooding triggered by Typhoon Yagi submerged houses in Lang Son province on Monday. (AP: Nguyen Anh Tuan)
Initially, at least 3 million people were left without electricity in Quang Ninh and Haiphong provinces. It is unclear how much power has been restored.
Yagi also damaged agricultural land, nearly 116,192 hectares where rice is mostly grown.
Before hitting Vietnam, the typhoon caused at least 20 deaths in the Philippines last week and four deaths in China’s Hainan island, where authorities said infrastructure losses amounted to $US102 million ($151 million).
Yagi made a second landfall in Guangdong, a mainland province neighboring Hainan, on Friday night.
Storms like Typhoon Yagi are “getting stronger due to climate change, primarily because warmer ocean waters provide more energy to fuel the storms, leading to increased wind speeds and heavier rainfall”, said Benjamin Horton, director of the Earth Observatory of Singapore.
AP
