Amidst preparation to battle typhoon Dolphin, China’s Shanghai has resorted to mass flight cancellation. Two airports in Shanghai, Hongqiao and Pudong, have cancelled around 60% of its Sunday’s scheduled flights. Nearly, more than 1,300 flights from China have been scrapped.
As a Precautionary measure, roughly 30,000 people across surrounding regions, including about 390,000 in Taizhou, Zhejiang, and over 30,000 from high-risk areas in Shanghai have been relocated.
National forecasters expect 200 to 400 millimeters of rainfall over the coming days as the storm hit Zhejiang and northern Fujian late Sunday, prompting severe landslide warning and a suspension of all water-based activities, including ferries and cruises. Before its landfall in China, authorities have moved offshore workers to safeties, ordered vessels back to port and increased checks at reservoirs, mountain streams, landslide-prone areas, construction sites and tourist locations.
Dolphin’s maximum sustained winds are estimated at 162 kilometers per hour as of Sunday morning, after its outer bands already brought heavy rain to northern Taiwan, including Taipei, on Saturday. Typhoon Dolphin is set to make landfall on China’s east coast Sunday evening bringing torrential rain and powerful winds.The typhoon has already swept through Japan’s southern Okinawa prefecture, including, injuring six people and cutting power to more than 50,000 buildings.Dolphin is expected to be the most powerful typhoon to make landfall in China so far this year.
According to National Meteorological Center, the typhoon is equal to a Category 2 storm on the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale, a storm capable of producing extensive damage to homes, trees and infrastructure.