Floodwaters surging through Himalayan foothills in western China have swept away bridges, houses and hillsides, leaving at least 25 people dead and dozens missing.
Flooding in Sichuan was the worst for 50 years in some areas of the province, with more than 100,000 people forced to evacuate their homes.
Nationwide at least 44 people have died, around 66 are missing and at least 1.6 million have been otherwise affected since Sunday, according to figures from the civil affairs ministry and the official Xinhua news agency.
Thousands of homes have been destroyed or damaged and transportation has been brought to a virtual standstill in hard-hit areas.
Many of the casualties in Sichuan were from a massive landslide at a resort outside the city of Dujiangyan. A hillside collapsed on to clusters of holiday cottages where Dujiangyan residents go to escape summer heat, a survivor told Xinhua.
"The noise was like thunder and went on for two or three minutes. My first thought was that I too would be buried," Gao Quanshi, 47, was quoted as saying. Phone lines were cut, so villagers had to trek to nearby government offices to call for help, he added.
Images from the scene showed a valley filled with mud and rocks with only the tops of trees visible. Drenched rescuers wearing helmets and life jackets worked mostly with hand tools to prevent harming any survivors still trapped beneath.
A total of 352 tourists had been rescued from the area as of Wednesday night, Xinhua said.
Mudslides and flooding are common in China's mountainous areas, killing hundreds of people each year, but in some areas the current floods are the worst in half a century. Reports said the 94cms (37 inches) of rainfall that fell on Dujiangyan over 40 hours beginning on Monday was the most since records began in 1954.
The flooding caused the collapse of a bridge in a neighbouring county, sending six vehicles into the raging waters. Twelve people are missing.
The region lies in the foothills of the Tibetan plateau, where mountains rise sharply from the densely populated Sichuan basin.
The Guardian
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