Everyboy inside. Super typhoon – super exceptional – Saola threatens to make landfall “in coastal areas stretching from Huilai to Hong Kong” on Friday afternoon or Friday night into Saturday, Chinese media said. As residents of the Chinese megacities of Hong Kong and Shenzhen barricade themselves in preparation for the arrival of the typhoon, a red alert has been issued in mainland China as the tropical cyclone approaches, accompanied by some of the strongest winds the region has experienced.
Guangdong Province, near Hong Kong, has declared a Level I wind emergency, the maximum level. China’s Ministry of Transport has deployed 16 rescue ships and nine standby rescue helicopters to areas likely to be hit by the storm, the Xinhua News Agency reported.
Shenzhen, in the south of the country, a city of 17.7 million inhabitants, has decided “the closure of offices, shops and markets from 4 p.m. and the suspension of public transport from 7 p.m. “, according to a press release from the Emergency Management Service, which warned that the typhoon “is expected to cause a severe storm in the city.”
Stay at home
“Apart from emergency response personnel and livelihoods protection personnel, people are advised not to go outside,” the service added, adding that “the city will open all shelters for the public. can take refuge.
Neighboring Hong Kong closed the Stock Exchange and its schools on Friday and canceled inbound and outbound flights. At around 2:40 a.m. this morning, the financial center issued a T8 level alert on a scale that counts 10, and the Exchange announced that “morning trading sessions for all markets will be canceled”.
“There could be severe flooding”
Saola was 180 km east-southeast of Hong Kong at around 11 a.m. local time, the city’s weather observatory said. The super typhoon could bypass the territory less than 100 kilometers to the south, and cause a storm surge around Victoria Harbour, according to the observatory.
“There could be severe flooding,” he added, adding that eastern coastal areas could see water levels similar to those caused by Typhoon Mangkhut in 2018. More than 300 people were injured in Hong Kong. The super typhoon will be accompanied by “heavy showers and strong winds”, the observatory added, adding that the weather would “deteriorate rapidly” throughout the day.