WUHAN, Aug 23 (NNN-XINHUA) – Yangtze River’s fifth flood of this year, smoothly passed the Three Gorges Dam, after pushing the reservoir’s water level to a record high.
The water level at the Three Gorges reservoir started to recede after reaching 167.65 metres at 8.00 a.m. yesterday, the highest since the reservoir was built in 2003.
The reservoir saw an inflow of 75,000 cubic metres per second, at the peak of the flood and a maximum outflow at 49,400 cubic metres per second, with some of the floodwater contained in the reservoir.
The Yangtze River, China’s longest, on Aug 17, recorded the fifth flood of the year in its upper reaches, after a spell of heavy rainfall, three days after the fourth flood was recorded on Aug 14.
The fifth flood of the Yangtze, along with a flood of the Jialing River, resulted in severe flooding of Chongqing in southwest China. This made the city activate a top-level response to the floods, the highest rung in the country’s four-tier emergency response system.
The floods caused an emergency evacuation of 251,000 people and inundated 23,700 shops, but did not lead to deaths, according to the municipality’s emergency management bureau.– NNN-XINHUA
