Officials in China's Hubei province destroyed some secondary dikes along the Yangtze River yesterday in an attempt to avert killer floods threatening seven million people in the provincial capital, Wuhan.
Dikes were blown up in Jianli county, 150 km upstream from Wuhan, after about 50,000 residents were evacuated. Despite the efforts, the Yangtze's turbulent brown waters continued to climb higher, maintaining the threat of floods hanging over Wuhan, a major industrial centre. A local official said that a fresh flood crest had developed on China's longest river, the fourth in flooding that has claimed at least 2,000 lives this summer. The flood peak passed Jiayu, 50 km upriver from Wuhan, and site of a dike rupture on August 1st in which state media said 19 soldiers were washed away, but flood defences had remained intact.
Officials hoped the blasting at Jianli would divert 800 million cubic metres of water and lower the swollen Yangtze River by 1025 cm above Wuhan, sparing the city.
The floods have affected some 240 million people, a fifth of the country's population and roughly equal to that of the United States.
Economic damage was estimated at $4.8 billion weeks ago, the last time the government released figures.
An official from Jiayu county, one of the hardest hit in the last week, said disease was a growing concern. "The basic health situation is not good because the water and the environment are very polluted," he said. "Minor illnesses are common, but no cases of serious diseases have been reported."
Upriver at Gong'an county, officials suspended plans to blow up a dike to divert floods in central Hubei province after water levels retreated slightly, officials said.
More than two million people were battling to reinforce dikes along the Yangtze and Dongting Lake. Witnesses said the Prime Minister, Mr Zhu Rongji, was touring dikes near Jiujiang in downstream Jiangxi province yesterday. Efforts to block a 60-metre breach in a key dike in Jiujiang city were being hampered by a lack of experience and equipment.
Flood fighters had sunk eight barges and dumped truckloads of rocks, rice and soybeans into the breach, slowing down the water flow by as much as one third. But the operation could take another 24 hours, the expert said, raising doubts that the breach would be mended before the flood crest hit Jiujiang, where thousands of residents had been evacuated or ordered to move to higher floors.
About 13.8 million people have fled the summer floods to safer areas, according to the official estimates.