Hanoi residents battle waist-deep floods as Typhoon Yagi toll exceeds 150

Residents of Hanoi waded through waist-deep water Wednesday as river levels hit a 20-year high and the toll from the strongest typhoon in decades passed 150, with neighbouring nations also enduring deadly flooding and landslides.

Typhoon Yagi hit Vietnam at the weekend bringing winds in excess of 149 kilometres (92 miles) per hour and a deluge of rain that has also brought destructive floods to northern areas of Laos, Thailand and Myanmar.

The Red River in Hanoi reached its highest level in 20 years on Wednesday, forcing residents to trudge through waist-deep brown water as they retrieved possessions from flooded homes.

Others fashioned makeshift boats from whatever materials they could find.

“This was the worst flooding I have witnessed,” said Nguyen Tran Van, 41, who has lived near the Red River in the Vietnamese capital for 15 years.

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“I didn’t think the water would rise as quick as it did. I moved because if the water had risen just a bit higher, it would have been very difficult for us to leave,” Van told AFP.

A landslide smashed into the remote mountain village of Lang Nu in Lao Cai province, levelling it to a flat expanse of mud and rocks, strewn with debris and laced by streams.

State media said at least 30 people had been killed in the village, with another 65 still missing.

Villagers laid dead bodies on the ground, some in makeshift coffins, some wrapped in cloth, while police with picks and shovels dug through the dirt in search of more victims.

Vietnamese state media said the toll from Yagi — the strongest storm to hit northern Vietnam in 30 years — had risen to 155 across the country, with 141 missing.

ALSO READ: Vietnam counts 59 dead as Typhoon Yagi devastates north

It was not clear whether that total includes victims of Tuesday’s landslide, where access remained difficult and internet was cut off, reports said.

Typhoon Yagi brings worst floods since 2008

Mai Van Khiem, head of the national weather bureau, told state media that the water level in the Red River in Hanoi was at its highest since 2004.

Forecasters said the waters in Hanoi have peaked now and river level will go down overnight, but Khiem warned of serious widespread flooding in the provinces surrounding the capital in the days to come.

Police, soldiers and volunteers helped hundreds of residents along the banks of the swollen river in Hanoi to evacuate their homes in the early hours as the water level rose rapidly.

A police official in Hanoi, refusing to be named, said officers were going on foot or by boat to check every house along the river.

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“All residents must leave,” he said. “We are bringing them to public buildings turned into temporary shelters or they can stay with relatives. There has been so much rain and the water is rising quickly.”

On Tuesday images showed people stranded on rooftops and victims posted desperate pleas for help on social media, while 59,000 people were forced to evacuate their homes in Yen Bai province.

Region-wide impact

In neighbouring Laos, authorities evacuated 300 people from 17 villages in northern Luang Namtha province, deputy district chief Sivilai Pankaew told AFP.

The UN’s World Food Programme said it was “very concerned” for the safety of communities in northern Laos, while national radio reported extensive damage to houses, roads, markets, schools and farmland.

State media said at least one person has been killed and images showed rescuers working in murky brown flood waters.

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Thai authorities said four people were killed in the kingdom’s northern provinces of Chiang Mai and Chiang Rai and the army has been deployed to help around 9,000 flood-hit families.

In Myanmar, days of rain around the sprawling, low-rise capital of Naypyidaw has sent river levels to danger levels, the junta said in a statement, without giving any details on casualties or damage.

Lay Shwe Zin Oo from the the ministry of social welfare told AFP that casualties were expected, but search teams were still gathering information.

Flooding in Tatkone near the capital “is really bad,” with some people reportedly carried away by floodwaters, Kyaw Thu Ya, a rescue worker told AFP.

Posts on social media showed people clinging to trees as the waters ran below by them.

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Southeast Asia experiences annual monsoon rains, but human-made climate change is causing more intense weather patterns that can make destructive floods more likely.

Typhoons in the region are forming closer to the coast, intensifying more rapidly, and staying over land longer due to climate change, according to a study published in July.

© Agence France-Presse