BEIJING (Reuters) – Super Typhoon Yagi, Asia’s most powerful storm this year, churned towards the northern coast of Vietnam on Saturday after tearing through China’s southern island province of Hainan with lightning, rain and violent winds.
Yagi made landfall in Hainan on Friday, packing maximum sustained winds of 234 kph (145 mph) near its centre, downing trees and flooding roads. Power supply to more than 800,000 homes was cut.
No injuries or deaths have been reported, but the island province of more than 10 million people remained paralysed on Saturday, with all public transportation links still broken.
Yagi formed over the sea to the east of the Philippine archipelago on Sept. 1. On gaining strength, it became a tropical storm and swept across Luzon, the most populous island in the Philippines, killing at least 16 people and injuring 13.
The storm grew dramatically stronger late in the week, becoming the world’s most powerful tropical cyclone in 2024 after the Category 5 Atlantic hurricane Beryl, and the most severe in the Pacific basin this year.
As of 0100 GMT on Saturday, Yagi was spinning towards northern Vietnam over the Gulf of Tonkin.
Maximum wind speeds had eased slightly to the levels of a Category 3 typhoon from Category 4, coming in at 187 kph (116 mph), according to Chinese meteorological authorities.
(Reporting by Ryan Woo in Beijing; Editing by William Mallard)
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