© HKO/AFPTwo dozen missing in Taiwan as typhoon nears China
Typhoon Megi unleashed torrential rains over Taiwan leaving two dozen people missing and hundreds more trapped by landslides Friday, as it bore down on cities along China's southeast coastline.
Megi, the strongest storm to hit the northwest Pacific in two decades, has already killed at least 36 people in the Philippines and was expected to make landfall late Friday or early Saturday in Fujian province in southeast China.
Authorities have evacuated more than 150,000 people from low-lying areas of the province, while 10,000 others have been moved to safer ground in Guangdong. Thousands of fishing boats have been ordered not to put to sea.
"Megi could bring the largest concentration of rainfall this year and will have a serious impact on the province's coast," Fujian's civil affairs department said in a statement.
Projections by the Hong Kong Observatory showed the typhoon was likely hit near the southern Chinese cities of Xiamen and Shantou -- between them home to more than seven million people.