Andhra Pradesh is facing the threat of a cyclonic storm while heavy rains in the coastal region have claimed 20 lives and damaged crops in over 100,000 hectares, officials said Tuesday.
Nearly 400,000 people were affected, dozens of villages and residential areas in several towns remained inundated as rains under the influence of a trough of low pressure over Bay of Bengal and vigorous northeast monsoon caused havoc in north and south coastal districts.
Over 26,000 people were evacuated from low-lying areas in four districts while the authorities alerted the armed forces for possible deployment. At least 20 people were killed in rain-related incidents in the last three days, according to the disaster management department.
Storms
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Last month's floods killed more than 130 people in Vietnam.
Last month's floods killed more than 130 people in Vietnam.
The National Steering Committee on Flood and Storm Control reported a downpour of 165 to 545 millimeters of rain over the last three days in the worst-hit region, DPA reported.
Flood waters have destroyed nearly 600 houses in central and southern parts of the country. More than 5,000 hectares of rice paddies have gone underwater.
More rain has been forecast for the coming days.
This is the latest in a series of deadly storms hitting Vietnam this autumn. Last month's floods killed 134 and left six missing in Vietnam.
Figures show that annual heavy rains and floods have killed an average of 750 people in the pacific nation for each of the past 10 years.
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The National Weather Service said the storm had caused the second-largest October tornado outbreak on record.
Injuries from the storm have been reported in states across the US.
Conditions in many states returned to normal on Thursday as the storm made its way north-east toward Ontario.
But windy weather is still being felt in some regions in the Midwest, the Great Lakes and the Ohio Valley.
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A woman walks by damaged power lines and infrastructure after the storm hit St. James parish, Barbados, on Saturday.
A woman walks by damaged power lines and infrastructure after the storm hit St. James parish, Barbados, on Saturday.
The Category 2 storm was packing winds of 155 km/h when it made landfall. It tore the roofs from homes and knocked out electricity all over the island. But as the storm moved northwest over the Caribbean early Sunday, the winds were clocked at 150 km/h.
St. Lucia, Barbados and Martinique were tallying the damage done by Tomas earlier Saturday. Torrential rain made a number of roads impassible in Barbados and high winds destroyed roofs in several communities.
Authorities in St. Vincent said they had unconfirmed reports that three people died during the storm, including two men who might have been blown off a roof.
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A Thai boy sits inside his home surrounded by floodwaters near the Chao Phraya River, in Bangkok on Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2010.
A Thai boy sits inside his home surrounded by floodwaters near the Chao Phraya River, in Bangkok on Wednesday, Oct. 27, 2010.
The flooding has affected more than 3 million people in 36 of Thailand's 76 provinces, government medical and disaster agencies said. The floods have eased in a third of those provinces.
More than 4 million sandbags were used to erect walls this week in Bangkok along stretches of the Chao Phraya River, which has swelled with runoffs from upper provinces that officials feared could inundate the capital.
So far, flooding in Bangkok has been minimal but riverside residents were warned to be on alert through Friday, after which current high-tide levels were expected to subside.
Storm spawns twisters, downs power lines and leaves considerable damage in its wake
A powerful, 2,200-mile-wide wind storm plowed across the middle of the country Tuesday, spawning tornadoes and brutal wind gusts stretching from the front range of the Rocky Mountains to the eastern Great Lakes.
"It's a huge storm, and it's dominating the wind pattern and the weather over a big chunk of North America," said WGN-TV meteorologist Tom Skilling in Chicago. "And we're not done with this storm yet. The wind is going to blow for another couple days."
Wind gusts Tuesday were in excess of 60 miles per hour in parts of the Midwest, and several tornadoes were reported in Illinois and Wisconsin.
A powerful, 2,200-mile-wide wind storm plowed across the middle of the country Tuesday, spawning tornadoes and brutal wind gusts stretching from the front range of the Rocky Mountains to the eastern Great Lakes.
"It's a huge storm, and it's dominating the wind pattern and the weather over a big chunk of North America," said WGN-TV meteorologist Tom Skilling in Chicago. "And we're not done with this storm yet. The wind is going to blow for another couple days."
Wind gusts Tuesday were in excess of 60 miles per hour in parts of the Midwest, and several tornadoes were reported in Illinois and Wisconsin.
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Two Red Cross workers walk away from a barn that was lifted off its foundation by a tornado Oct. 26, 2010, in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin
Two Red Cross workers walk away from a barn that was lifted off its foundation by a tornado Oct. 26, 2010, in Mount Pleasant, Wisconsin
Forecasters told residents of the state of Illinois to expect the most powerful storm to hit the region in over 70 years.
Tornado warnings were issued across the US from the state of Arkansas to Illinois's metropolitan hub of Chicago.
The storm delayed flights at the city's O'Hare International Airport.
Severe thunderstorm warnings have been announced across the Midwestern US, as the storm continues to charge through the country - moving from North and South Dakota to the eastern Great Lakes, on the border with Canada.
The storm is carrying with it pressure levels similar to a category three hurricane, meteorologist Amy Seeley said.
Last winter the UK and much of Northern Europe were hit by severe snow and ice
It will come as no surprise then that the wintry conditions made last night the coldest in October for 17 years in some regions.
Temperatures in West Freugh in south-west Scotland dipped to a bone-rattling -5.2C, falling below the previous record of -5.1C which was endured in October 1993.
But it was even colder in Sennybridge, south Wales, where the mercury dropped to -6.4C, beating the -6.2C record set 13 years ago in 1997.
Met Office spokesman Charlie Powell said: 'Last night was the coldest in Sennybridge for 17 years and was very cold everywhere.
'It was well below freezing across the bulk of the UK.'
The outlook for this week is marginally better, with temperatures picking up slightly, although it will remain cold.
Tonight will remain dry with clear skies for most places, although it will be breezy along the North Sea coast with a chance of the odd shower.
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Emergency rescue team members extract a body from the flood debris caused by passing Typhoon Megi at a temple in Ilan county, north eastern Taiwan on Friday.
Emergency rescue team members extract a body from the flood debris caused by passing Typhoon Megi at a temple in Ilan county, north eastern Taiwan on Friday.
Six other people were missing and a number of vehicles were trapped on a highway as Typhoon Megi swept toward southern China, where landfall is expected late Friday or Saturday.
The storm earlier killed 26 people and damaged homes and crops in the Philippines.
Megi dumped a record 45 inches of rain in Taiwan's Ilan county over 48 hours. It had winds of 90 mph and was about 275 miles southeast of Hong Kong on Friday evening local time, the Hong Kong Observatory said.
The seven people who died were at the White Cloud Temple in Suao city along the eastern coast when it was engulfed by the mudslide, Taiwanese cable TV stations reported.
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Two dozen missing in Taiwan as typhoon nears China
Two dozen missing in Taiwan as typhoon nears China
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.
