Chinese authorities evacuated thousands of residents from areas around Beijing at risk of flooding and landslides this week, as the remnants of Typhoon Dolphin dumped torrential rain across northern and central China.
The Beijing Meteorological Service warned on Tuesday that most of the capital would see cumulative rainfall exceeding 150mm over 24 hours, with some outlying districts forecast to top 200mm, according to Reuters. That single-day total would represent more than a third of Beijing's average annual rainfall of roughly 528mm, underlining how concentrated the downpour was expected to be.
A storm that travelled thousands of kilometres inland
Dolphin made landfall on China's eastern coast on 9 August as the most powerful tropical cyclone to strike the country this year, according to Reuters reporting carried by NBC News and other outlets. It had already swept through Japan's Okinawa prefecture, injuring six people and cutting power to more than 50,000 buildings, before triggering mass evacuations in Shanghai and the surrounding Yangtze River delta.
Reuters reported that more than 900,000 residents were relocated in the city of Wenzhou alone, with nearly 100,000 evacuated in Shanghai and another 99,000 in neighbouring Fujian province, according to state media cited by Al Jazeera. More than 1,500 emergency shelters were opened in Wenzhou to house displaced residents.
Even after weakening to a tropical depression, the storm's remnants pushed moisture nearly 1,000km north to Beijing while also drenching the central province of Hubei. Reuters, reporting from Xiangyang, described flooded streets, closed tourist sites and halted construction projects in Hubei, where the National Meteorological Centre issued an orange alert, the second-highest warning level, for up to 250mm of rain in 24 hours.
“"This area always gets flooded when it rains. If it continues like this, the waters could reach my home," one Beijing resident told Reuters.”
Beijing on alert after past disasters
Images shared on Chinese social media showed buses and cars partially submerged in Beijing's Shunyi district, northeast of the city's main financial hub, Reuters reported. Four districts on the capital's outskirts activated level-one emergency flood responses, the highest tier, as authorities pre-emptively moved residents out of low-lying and hillside communities.
The scramble to evacuate reflects lessons drawn from 2023, when the remnants of Typhoon Doksuri triggered the deadliest flooding to hit the Beijing region in decades. Days of unusually heavy rain that summer flooded houses and roads, killing at least 20 people and leaving 27 missing, according to state media reports carried by the Associated Press. The Beijing Meteorological Bureau at the time recorded the heaviest rainfall since records began in the Qing dynasty in 1883.
For international readers, the scale of this week's warnings is striking by European standards: a European capital receiving a third of its annual rainfall in a single day would be almost unheard of. Beijing's exposure stems partly from its location on the North China Plain, where summer monsoon moisture, sometimes amplified by the remnants of Pacific typhoons, can collide with cooler air to produce short, intense downpours rather than the steadier rainfall patterns typical of much of northern Europe.
Chinese authorities have increasingly framed such extreme rainfall events as part of a broader pattern of more volatile summer weather, prompting greater investment in early evacuation and flood-control infrastructure in and around the capital. As of Tuesday, forecasters said the heaviest rain was expected to continue through Thursday before easing.
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