Northern Vietnam was reeling Thursday from the aftermath of Typhoon Damrey which triggered landslides and flooding that left more than 100 people dead throughout East Asia.
Most of Vietnam’s 57 dead were in the mountainous province of Yen Bai where the typhoon caused flash floods, and a major rescue operation was under way.
“We have recovered the bodies of 25 victims,” said provincial flood control official Nguyen Dinh Vo in Yen Bai City, northwest of Hanoi. Many bodies were still inaccessible, he said, adding that in all 51 people had died in the province.
At least six other deaths have been recorded in northern provinces from the typhoon which struck Vietnam Tuesday before blowing itself out over Laos and Thailand on Wednesday.
The death toll on the southern Chinese island province of Hainan rose to 25 from 16 Thursday, the official Xinhua news agency said, quoting officials who put the economic losses suffered in China alone at 1.5 billion US dollars.
The typhoon, packing winds of 200 kilometres (125 miles) per hour, left at least 105 people dead during its week-long sweep through East Asia — 57 in Vietnam, 25 in China, 16 in the Philippines, and seven in Thailand.
In addition, a suspected cholera outbreak in the typhoon-hit eastern Philippines had killed nine people with nearly 200 hospitalised, a military official in Legaspi city said.
Vietnamese officials said the violent storm destroyed more than 10,000 houses and smashed through 54 kilometres of dykes. Some 200 schools and 45 medical clinics also suffered damage.
In one district in Yen Bai province alone, at least 44 people were reported dead.
Scenes of utter devastation were in evidence at Cat Thinh commune, in Van Chan district, 50 kilometres from Yen Bai, with some 28 houses mostly of Meo and Dao ethnic minority people having been swept away.
Infrastructure including power and communications was disrupted, with roads washed away and the whole commune covered in muddy sludge.
Trees were uprooted and landslides occurred in several places.
Cat Thinh commune official Tran Van Phung said: “The flash flood came so quickly at night that people were totally unprepared. The only thing they could do was to run away. Some of them were swept away in their sleep.”
A military commander said the army had geared up to provide relief.
“We are concentrating forces on helping people with clothes, food and medicine,” said Lieutenant General Ma Thanh Toan. “The army has set up a mobile medical team to help injured people.”
The typhoon, which Vietnamese officials described as the most powerful in a decade, also knocked out electricity and communications in several other provinces, and flooded more than 60,000 hectares (about 150,000 acres) of crops.
“The coastal regions had prepared well for the typhoon and had managed to limit the number of victims, but the northwestern mountainous provinces were caught out as the flooding happened too rapidly and they lacked weather information,” said Nguyen Lan Chau of Vietnam’s national meteorology centre.
Some 300,000 people had been evacuated from the coast of northern Vietnam as Typhoon Damrey approached.
Thailand’s interior ministry said Thursday the typhoon left at least seven people dead and four others missing in the north of the country, where it also left bridges and roads impassable.
Asia is prone to tropical storms and typhoons, two of which caused widespread destruction in China and killed scores of people earlier this month.
