Chenxi County of Central China's Hunan Province witnessed one of its worst floods in a hundred years when the crest of the Ruanjiang, the third largest branch of the Yangtze River, entered the county in the early morning of Wednesday, said sources with the local government.

Boasting a peak of 125.89 meters, 5.89 meters higher than the warning line, and traveling at 25,500 cubic meters per second, the floods arrived at the county at 2:00 a.m. and left 445,000 local people badly affected, including 135,000 people made homeless, over 80 injured and two missing. The direct loss is 425 million yuan (51.2 million US dollars).

An emergency plan for flood prevention has been started as the whole county was mobilized to combat the floods under the direction of the county heads.

So far, all 135,000 trapped people and property worth 85 million yuan (10.2 million US dollars) have been transferred to safer areas.

According to the local government, 200,000 yuan (24,096 US dollars) of flood prevention funds, some 250 rescue vehicles and 35 rescue ships, 10,000 public servants and more than 200,000 local residents were mobilized to combat the flooding.

Source: Xinhua