Super Typhoon Yagi heads for southern China, shutting schools and cancelling flights

Powerful gales and heavy rain from Super Typhoon Yagi drenched southern China on Friday, with schools shut for a second day and flights cancelled as one of the strongest storms to hit Asia this year headed for landfall along Hainan’s tropical coast.

Packing maximum sustained winds of 245 km per hour (152 mph) near its eye, Yagi registers as the world’s second-most powerful tropical cyclone in 2024 so far, after the Category 5 Atlantic hurricane Beryl.

More than doubling in strength since devastating the northern Philippines earlier this week, Yagi is expected to make landfall along China’s coast from Wenchang on the island of Hainan, to Leizhou, in Guangdong province from Friday afternoon.

It is then predicted to hit Vietnam and Laos.

Vietnam’s Civil Aviation Authority said four airports in the north, including Hanoi’s Noi Bai International, would be closed on Saturday due to the storm.

Winds and rain were accompanied by powerful thunder and lightening across the region overnight and on Friday morning.

“I’m worried about this typhoon. It could destroy months of hard work,” said Qizhao, a banana farmer at the village of Gaozhou in Guangdong, adding that villagers were reinforcing their trees with poles to protect them from the wind.

Transport links across southern China were mostly shuttered on Friday with many flights cancelled in Hainan, Guangdong, Hong Kong and Macau. The world’s longest sea crossing, the main bridge linking Hong Kong with Macau and Zhuhai in Guangdong, was also closed. (Reuters)

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