Weather tracker: Typhoon Saudel triggers mass evacuations in southeastern China

Typhoon Saudel brought days of torrential rain to southeastern China last week, forcing mass evacuations and leaving flooding, landslips and infrastructure damage across several provinces.

Putian, in Fujian province, recorded 416.5 millimetres of rain in a 24-hour period between Thursday and Friday. Villages around the city reported more than 500 millimetres during the same period.

Authorities in Fujian estimated that almost 600,000 people had been evacuated from high-risk, flood-prone areas. In Jiangxi, a further 128,000 people across 53 counties were affected, with emergency evacuations involving 9,000 people.

The rainfall also caused flash floods in low-lying parts of Wenzhou, in Zhejiang province. More than 2,500 teachers and students became trapped in a school compound on Wednesday. At least 1,260 people reportedly had to be re...