Xi calls for all-out efforts in flood relief

The National Meteorological Center issued on Sunday a yellow alert, the second-lowest in the country's four-tier color-coded weather warning system, for rainstorms for the 24 hours starting from 2 pm on Sunday.

During that time, some areas in nine provincial regions, mostly located in southern parts of the country, will be engulfed by torrential rains. Among them, central and southern parts of Jiangsu province and northern parts of Shanghai will be the worst hit and receive precipitation of 10 to 20 centimeters, according to the center.

The center also issued a blue alert, the lowest in the warning system, for severe convective weather, which is characterized by strong winds, hail, thunderstorms and brief but heavy rainfall, for the same period. The greatest hourly precipitation in the affected areas will generally be between 3 and 5 centimeters but may exceed 7 centimeters in the most extreme circumstances, it said.

Some areas in Hubei, Anhui, Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces will be hit by thunderstorms and gales, it added.

Continuous rainfall has wreaked havoc in many regions across the country, especially southern parts of the country.

According to the Ministry of Emergency Management, 13.74 million people in 26 provincial regions had suffered from floods caused by continuous downpours and over 744,000 people had been evacuated as of Friday.

The direct economic losses from the floods have reached 27.8 billion yuan ($3.93 billion), it added.