Thousands flee Vietnam floods after typhoon hits
Thousands of people have been evacuated from low-lying areas in the Vietnamese capital, Hanoi, as the Red River surges to its highest level in two decades, flooding the streets.
By Wednesday, flood waters from the swollen river reached a metre high in parts of the city, forcing some residents to navigate their neighbourhoods by boat.
Power has been cut to some districts because of safety concerns, while 10 of Hanoi’s 30 administrative districts are on “flood alert”, state media reported.
Vietnam is suffering the aftermath of Typhoon Yagi, which battered the north, killing at least 179 people. Floods and landslides across northern Vietnam have been the main causes of death, the government said.
This is the worst flood I have seen,” Hanoi resident Tran Le Quyen told Reuters news agency. “It was dry yesterday morning. Now the entire street is flooded. We couldn’t sleep last night.”
Yagi, which was initially categorised as a super typhoon – the equivalent of a category 5 hurricane – but later downgraded to a tropical depression, has continued to wreak havoc in Vietnam since making landfall on Saturday.
It has been described as Asia’s most powerful typhoon this year.
“My home is now part of the river,” Nguyen Van Hung, who lives in a neighbourhood on the banks of the Red River, told Reuters
