On the banks of the Yongding River west of Beijing yesterday, Chen Xiaoyuan stared at the remains of a bridge that once led to his village.
Cleanup has begun after the region’s worst rainfall in years battered northern China, killing at least 20 people, destroying infrastructure and deluging swathes of Beijing and its surrounding areas. In the village of Chenjiazhuang west of Beijing, the deluge ripped up trees and sent debris crashing into a bridge Monday, causing it to collapse, Chen said.
“Everyone in our village used to use this bridge each day,” Chen, 50, said.
“I’ve never seen anything like this here, even in 2012,” he said, referencing heavy rains over 10 years ago that left 79 people dead.
His home still lacks electricity and water.
But Chen was lucky that his house was situated at a high enough level to not be affected directly by the surging floods.
Others weren’t so fortunate: Chen said one of his former classmates was missing and that he was feared to have been swept away by the torrent.
Further upstream, the hard-hit village of Shuiyuzui was struggling with the aftermath of the historic rains, which tore down a perimeter wall, sending waters flooding into residential buildings.